It’s important to develop a plan, determine industry influencers and identify your company’s target buyers… persona development is key
Brands shouldn’t focus on the biggest, most well-known names within their industry since everyone will be trying to connect with them. Instead, keep an eye out for the up-and-comers and new thought leaders; focus on building relationships with them as they’ll be happy to be noticed and will appreciate the support.
Stay active on social media channels; it might seem time-consuming but it’s worth the commitment
It’s important to be out there everyday engaging; engaging in a Twitter chat, sharing content, responding to a LinkedIn discussion. If a brand develops an influencer strategy tied to goals and invests the time and energy to follow through, it’ll have success increasing its visibility and message reach, and will build a trustworthy and well-respected customer base.
It’s impossible to be on every social media platform and keep it well-oiled without a plan, a team in place and persistence
If your marketing team is small you’re going to have to stay on top of your social media strategy by prioritising your quarterly, monthly, weekly and daily objectives and goals. You need to prioritise and keep track of what’s important by taking time to identify those tasks that are critical to your success, and make them a priority.
In a dream world it’s nice to have a budget for influencers, but it’s relatively easy to find good people who can do it for free
Depending on the reach of your social channels/platforms the relationship can often go both ways and be quite beneficial for both brand and influencer.
"Keep an eye out for the up-and-comers and the new thought leaders - they’ll be happy to be noticed and will appreciate the support"
Social-media wise, I’m a big fan of Buffer; not only do they have a killer blog
But they’ve got my favourite social media tool to develop visual images: Pablo by Buffer. They’ve transformed social media image development, sharing, and scheduling and always have fantastic social media engagement and content.
I’m also enjoying Influenster, which is a community for social media folks to share news, products and reviews
I’ve signed up as an influencer and receive various products in exchange for providing feedback and a review. I love to see the campaign hashtags, enjoy new products and follow the social media discussion to see how other users are interacting. I’m also part of the Simply Measured Influencer Wave Program. They’ve done a nice job of identifying a good mix of influencers within the industry from different backgrounds, and leverage us well.
I love following Michael Brenner
He used to work at NewsCred and is now the CEO of Marketing Insider Group. I’m a big fan of the thought leadership he develops and shares, and I love the email updates and the ability to quickly share them with my social media channels.
I’m a huge believer in LinkedIn, and think with the recent acquisition by Microsoft we’re going to see a lot of changes
Big data is the key to marketing, and with LinkedIn mapping out custom email audiences as an advertising option, despite the higher cost, marketers are going to be able to reach their target audience using the most professional social media network out there.
