What is Influencer Marketing - Why it is so Popular?

Using influential figures to promote a product or service is not new. Still, in recent years this practice has caught speed because of the evolution of the digital landscape and changing consumer behavior. People have easy access to information and endless choices, making it difficult for any brand to convince its audience through traditional advertising. Brands needed other ways to overcome these challenges, and the rise of influencer marketing and top influencer marketing agencies resulted from them doing just that.

Influencer marketing utilizes subject matter experts who have made a niche of their own through their skills, knowledge and expertise. People turn to influencers for advice, recommendations, and information before making vital decisions. This makes them strong word-of-mouth advocates to promote brands of all sizes. Influence marketing continues to grow in popularity for many reasons. The primary ones are continuous advancement in social media, increasing influencer diversity, and more niche consumer segments for brands to target. This article covers each cause in more detail. 

What is Influencer Marketing?

Influencer marketing is where brands capitalize on the trust and authenticity of vital subject matter experts to promote their products or services and raise visibility. The criteria for selecting subject matter experts vary depending on goals. Brands can work with social media influencers with a large following or opt for opinion leaders with niche and engaged communities. 

For influencer Marketing to work, you must partner with opinion leaders who align with your products, industry, and customers. For example, if you are a fashion brand, partnering with an influencer marketing company for fashion brands will be a wiser choice. These Influencers have an audience interested in nail polish - hence, they are in the best position to integrate your products into their work. 

Top Reasons for the Popularity of Influencer Marketing

Social media growth and Innovation

There are 4.89 billion social media users, according to Statista - almost 2 billion growth from 2018. The numbers are estimated to shoot up to 5.83 billion in 2027. And as the numbers grow, platforms are becoming more innovative in how users can connect, interact and share information with their peers. This has brought most of the brand's audience online and allowed them to sell more.

For Influencers, social media growth has also added more users to their following. Plus, the smart in-built analytics provide subject matter experts insights into their audience's likes/dislikes and activity rates. This has allowed them to curate content for users' interests and needs, resulting in more engagement and reach.

Lastly, social media sites are working on ways where brands and Influencers can attract, inform and convert customers directly without them exiting the platform.

Diversity in Influencers 

Influencers are distinctive by their total followers, engagement rate, topic expertise and reach. And they are usually categorized into celebrities, macro, mid-tier, micro and nano Influencers. This is also a significant reason brands of all sizes and budgets get maximum returns from influencer marketing. 

A business with a hefty marketing budget can approach celebrities and micro-Influencers for a partnership when they want to create maximum exposure for their brand. On the other hand, small businesses and new startups can opt for micro or Nano Influencers with highly engaged niche communities which can be convinced to purchase their product. With influencer marketing, any goal can be accomplished with the right opinion leaders.

Micro-targeting

Unbeknownst to many, influencers compete in the marketplace to grab most of the audience's attention. They do this by demonstrating their expertise, out-of-box thinking and creativity. There is an invisible race to create hyper-niche segments of people attracted to similar topics (and influencers). For example, a person interested in fitness may not follow a fitness influencer only for their workout tips. But there are other factors in motion. Influencers' tone of delivery, creativity in content, consistency in uploads, interaction rate etc., are some of them.

A fitness brand can save substantial resources and time by approaching the fitness influencer. This niche audience is interested in fitness, and the fitness Influencer can position the brand's product perfectly by utilizing the factors that attracted followers to them in the first place.

To Sum Up

Influencer marketing utilizes the authenticity of subject matter experts to bring your brand closer to your target audience. The strategy works for all goals, from brand awareness and social proof to leads, customer retention, and sales. 

The growing popularity of influencer marketing can be attributed to the rise of social media users and innovations, which have brought like-minded people together and created diversity in Influencers. This allowed brands to reach consumers more likely to convert to their goals.