Influencer marketing campaigns earn an average of $5.78 for every $1 spent.
If you’re interested in that type of ROI (who wouldn’t be?), then you need to know how to nail the influencer outreach process, put together an outreach strategy, and use the right tools.
But there’s a catch…
Most influencer outreach is done incorrectly.
If you jump on this social media marketing bandwagon without a clear plan of attack, you’ll end up with a forgettable (and expensive) experience.
82% of people trust social media networks to guide their purchasing decisions. If you’re ready to grow your brand, drive sales, and generate revenue, we’ve gathered all the tips, tricks, and templates you need to be successful.
Read on to find out how to avoid the influencer outreach mistakes most brands make, identify the right influencers, and get the most out of your campaign.
What is influencer outreach?
Have you ever looked at an influencer’s content on social media and thought “Wow, partnering with that content creator would really elevate my brand and drive sales”?
Influencer outreach can make that happen.
Influencer outreach is how you connect with influencers, celebrities, key opinion leaders, and thought leaders to promote your brand. Whether reaching out to actors, models, or more traditional influencers, this powerful brand-building strategy goes beyond sending a DM or tweeting at your favourite influencers.
Great influencer outreach is about:
- Identifying the individuals who can deliver content to your target audience
- Building mutually beneficial relationships
- Promoting your brand to drive ROI
But we don’t just want to explain what outreach is. We want to take a practical approach and focus on what reaching out to the right social media influencers can do for your marketing strategy.
So here’s how you can start partnering with leaders in the social space and kick your marketing goals.
How to nail your next influencer outreach campaign
More than 60% of brands used influencer marketing in 2020 with the average earned media value (EMV) from influencer-generated campaigns between $12 and $18.
However, even though influencer marketing works, it can be a time-consuming process to find the right influencer. To help you avoid burnout and inconsistent results, here’s our step-by-step guide to successful influencer outreach.
Or, if you’d prefer to save time and skip the hassle of DM’s and individual outreach, scroll to the bottom to find out how theright.fit makes influencer outreach quick, easy, and successful.
Step #1 – Research your influencers
You wouldn’t set off on a road trip without your route mapped out. And you shouldn’t start contacting influencers without a strategy either. The first step – before you get in touch or send a message – is to figure out which influencers are relevant to your brand.
This starts by narrowing down your niche to find relevant influencers.
- Do you want to outreach to top models and actors?
- Are you looking for specialist Instagram influencers?
- Are you looking for mega influencers with 500,000 followers or micro influencers with 5,000 followers?
Influencers exist in practically every niche possible, from broad categories like travel, food, and fashion; down to ultra-segmented niches like domestic travel, vegan food, and kid’s fashion.
Finding an influencer in your field is crucial because their followers are more likely to be interested in your products and services. A popular influencer with 250,000 followers and booming engagement on each post is worthless to you if their audience doesn’t care about your industry.
Outside of the industry, you can also segment your influencers by:
- Activity level
- Reach
- Influencer engagement rate (IER)
- Experience
How to research influencers
If you’ve got time on your hands, there are plenty of ways you can search for influencers to contact. Here are a few classic strategies to find influencers:
✔ Using hashtags: Searching for hashtags on Instagram can help you filter industries and send DMs to potential influencers. Search for hashtags related to your industry or business then click through to view the content, and influencers, using those same hashtags.
✔ Scan competitor mentions and tags: Keep your friends close and your enemies closer. You can see if your competition is using influencers by checking out their Instagram profile and switching to the ‘tagged photos’ tab. Influencers are likely to be listed in these posts. And if an influencer is already working in your niche, they’re more likely to work with you too.
✔ Use influencer databases: Why work harder when you can work smarter? Influencer platforms like theright.fit bring together influencers of all sizes and in all niches. Instead of manually searching for the talent you can filter by category and access leading influencers at the click of a button.
Step #2 – Engage with influencers
It’s time to put the ‘social’ in social media.
Once you’ve identified your ideal influencers, you’ll want to get on their radar by engaging with their content and building relationships. Influencer outreach strategy isn’t a numbers game – it’s about relationship building.
Whether following their social profiles, commenting on their posts, or sharing their content, building a relationship can help make it easier to reach out to request a collaboration (scroll down for our FREE influencer outreach templates below), and improve your response rate.
Influencer outreach should include:
- Following their social accounts
- Checking out their content
- Understanding the way they communicate
- Recognising their work (like, comment, share)
It’s a mistake to fire off a generic email or DM to every influencer in your niche and expect to hear back. Influencers are people, not robots, and by taking the time to enter their orbit you’ll increase your chance of hearing back and progressing towards a working partnership.
Once you’ve gathered your list of influencers and built up the rapport, you’re ready to start reaching out.
Step #3 – Contact influencers
You’ve laid the groundwork, now it’s time to get in touch with a direct message.
As we mentioned, the worst mistake you can make during an influencer outreach strategy is to send a generic message to every influencer on your list. Although this may save time, it decreases your chances of getting a reply.
You’re trying to build a relationship, so take the time to send a personal message and make your influencers feel special. Don’t forget, you’re looking to create a mutually beneficial influencer campaign, so explain why you’re getting in touch and what’s in it for them.
To make the outreach process easy, we’ve included our FREE influencer outreach templates below, so scroll down to nail your message and increase your responses.
BONUS: Influencer outreach templates for Instagram and Facebook
If you’re using theright.fit to search for Australia’s leading influencers, you won’t need to use a template. Simply post a job, set your parameters so influencers know what niche you’re looking for, and you’ll have an inbox full of talent keen to partner with your brand.
But if you’re looking to slide into the DM of a thought leader on Instagram, Facebook, or Twitter, it’s important you get attention (for the right reasons).
You’ve got one shot at making a first impression, so the following influencer outreach templates can be used to pitch your brand and get an influencer partnership up and running.
theright.fit tip: DMs can be more casual than emails. If you’re getting in touch with an influencer via email, you can provide a more in-depth explanation of your brand and your plan. For direct messages, get right to the point.
DM Outreach Request [Template]
Hey <influencer name>
We loved your post about <describe post related to your product or industry>. At <your brand>, we <describe what you offer>. We’d love to send a sample your way so you can give it a try and share it with your audience.
Let me know if you’d be interested in working together.
Thanks for your time!
DM Outreach Request [Example]
BONUS: Influencer outreach template for email
If you have the correct contact information, outreach emails can go into more detail about why you’re getting in touch, what makes you think a partnership would be mutually beneficial, and why you think the influencer is a perfect fit.
Keep in mind, an email is more than a handful of words on the page. It’s someone’s valuable time. So avoid being super self-promotional and be clear on who you are, why you’re reaching out, and what the benefit is for the influencer. A clearly defined goal will improve your likelihood of success.
Use the email templates below to help inspire your outreach strategy.
Email Outreach Request [Template]
Hey <influencer name>
I’m <your name>, and I work for <your brand>.
I’m reaching out because I’ve been following your profile on <social media platform> and I love what you’re doing to support and grow the <industry or niche community>.
Since my team and I are just as passionate about <industry or niche community>, I wanted to reach out and see if you would be open to testing our <product> and collaborating together.
We think you really align with our brand and would love to provide you with <insert offer> to give value to your audience.
Let me know what you think of this idea and I can send more details.
Thanks and chat soon!
Email Outreach Request [Example]
3 Reasons your current influencer partnership isn’t working…
49% of customers depend on influencer recommendations. So there’s a good chance you’ve worked with a thought leader to grow your brand and drive sales. But while working with influencers is common, the following situations may be painfully familiar.
Here are 3 common reasons an influencer partnership falls flat.
Mistake #1 – You’re chasing vanity metrics
Stop us if this situation feels painfully familiar…
You’re running an influencer marketing campaign on Instagram or Facebook. Your chosen influencer has a seriously large following (awesome). And each post gets thousands of likes and more comments than you can count (double awesome). It is clear people are speaking about your brand and things are looking up. But there’s just one problem… your sales haven’t changed. Your influencer is getting a high level of engagement on social media. But you’re not seeing the results translate to your brand.
“What’s the problem?”
You’re working with the wrong influencer.
Popularity is great. But nothing beats finding an influencer in your niche with access to an audience who is interested in what you sell. Bigger isn’t always better, and part of learning to master influencer outreach is understanding what metrics are important.
It’s advisable to check an influencer’s audience insights and analytics to make sure their audience is aligned with your goals. You don’t want to book someone who’s built massive followings in India if you’re looking for sales in Australia.
Mistake #2 – You don’t have contracts in place
Professional influencers – regardless of their follower counts – understand that contracts are required to protect all parties involved. Like any partnership, a written contract or agreement means everyone knows what is expected of them, which helps reduce miscommunication.
For example, your influencer marketing agreement might outline that the influencer is to provide five Instagram posts and five IG Stories by a certain date. In exchange, you’ll provide compensation in the form of money or products by a set date.
You’ll help build a successful relationship that delivers value to you and your influencers when you clearly define all roles and expectations.
Mistake #3 – You’ve got a short-term mindset
Influencer marketing should be a partnership, not exist within a campaign mentality.
Creating brand awareness and driving sales is about momentum. And finding influencers to work with for the long term can help you maintain that momentum. Remember, an influencer offers authenticity in a time when consumers are moving away from branded messages.
If an influencer promotes your brand over time, it shows they genuinely love what you sell and what you stand for. This resonates with their followers who also come to see you as a brand worth trusting.
Think about this from a customer’s perspective. Are they more likely to check out a product if their favourite influencer recommends it once or multiple times over multiple months?
This ‘always on’ approach to an influencer marketing campaign can help you cut down on time since your influencers already know how to work with your brand. And boost ROI, as their followers become familiar with your brand over time.
ATTENTION BUSY BRANDS: The mistakes above are made more often than you think. You can steer clear of trouble by putting in the time and effort to vet influencers, deep-dive into analytics, draw up contracts, and manage long-term partnerships.
The only problem?
Manual outreach can be a serious drain on your time. Looking to save time and still enjoy a successful partnership with top influencers? Read on to find out how theright.fit makes the outreach process a simple ‘click, browse, and book’ process.
Looking for the fastest way to find the best influences?
With an influencer marketing strategy fast becoming essential in a brand’s marketing toolbox, there’s good news and bad news.
While influencer content outperforms branded content, the growth of this $13.8 billion industry means influencers are inundated with collaboration requests.
With more and more brands reaching out to influencers, finding influencers to work with is becoming harder. Given the value on offer, finding ways to browse influencers in your niche, vet candidates, and create contract agreements is crucial. And that’s exactly what theright.fit offers.
The leading marketplace to discover and book professional models, actors, and influencers, it’s FREE to post a job, receive applicants, chat to potential influencers, and book talent on time and on budget.
