Today we'll talk about one of the most confusing areas of influencer marketing, namely influencer sizes or tiers. There are quite a few of them already and not only it pays to remember who is who, but it literally pays to learn how properly use the right ones for different marketing strategies, products, and campaigns.
Influencer marketing as an industry is getting more mature and as a result, an average business owner would struggle to remember all those terms and magic words. Well, not that she would know much about the influencer marketing itself, but that's another story.
Today we'll talk about one of the most confusing areas of influencer marketing, namely influencer sizes or tiers. There are quite a few of them already and not only it pays to remember who is who, but it literally pays to learn how properly use the right ones for different marketing strategies, products, and campaigns.
In general terms, influencers are famous and not so famous social media users, who have managed to build a sizable following of other social media users. You follow me, right?
Every post on Instagram, Twitter, or other social media platforms can be seen by a certain number of users and competes for their eyeballs with millions of others every second. If you want to make sure your posts are seen by a lot of people, you should have those people following your Instagram or Twitter account.
If somebody like me will post my cute selfie on Instagram, barely anybody will notice, apart from a dozen people who know me anyway. But if a member of a Kardashian family will do the same, it will be noticed by millions and millions of people. And then if she takes that selfie holding some kind of branded product, that would be huge for a brand, a product and her as well, because the brand will pay her tens or hundreds of thousands of dollars to do that. For just a single selfie.
That what's called influencer marketing and Kardashian sisters are mega-influencers. Of course, not every brand has a big enough marketing budget or even a good fit to work with one of them, and that's where our terminology is starting to play out.
Like the above mentioned Kardashian family, mega-influencers are generally enjoying the celebrity status for some other reason that their Instagram account. Those are famous Holywood actors, TV personalities, musicians, or top-models, who have tens and sometimes hundreds of millions of followers on Instagram and other social media platforms.
It is very expensive to hire some of these mega-stars even for single product placement, but it can make a million-dollar brand overnight. This is what Oprah used to do on her TV show, but now a few dozen Instagram mega-influencers can do the same.
A level down from the social media mega-stars are ordinary influencers, who command between 100,000 and a few million followers combined across Instagram, Twitter, Snapchat, and other platforms.
The total numbers of Influencers are hard to tell, but it's generally assumed there're tens of thousands of them. In this group, you can find fashion models, musicians, and actors, but also some pretty ordinary people who have to build their huge following through their talent and hard work.
Influencers travel the world and document their every move with bright professionally made photos and videos. They have their production crew of photographers, make-up artists, and other supporting staff who make sure the quality of content is top-notch.
The costs of working with them are generally much lower than with mega-influencers, but the same goes for the results. They can help your brand even with a single Instagram post, but unlikely to make it an overnight success.
Another step lower is so-called micro-influencers, who usually have between 10,000 and 50,000 followers across their social media accounts. But micro-influencers are still professionals who make their living from sponsorships and advertising. They maybe don't have a production crew, but they try hard to project the image of wealth and success.
They travel the world too, at least taking pictures in, if not using private jets, super-cars, and 5-star hotels. In fact success, wealth, and a fit body is some of the main themes of the content photos and videos they produce.
Commercially, micro-influencers are less well off than "real" big influencers, with the rats in hundreds of dollars or even a free product or service. But their power is the ability to relate to the products they promote much more closely than the bigger influencers.
Micro-influencers also much more often talk to their followers, answer the questions about the product they promote, and generally easier to reach and to be considered as a 'one of us'. In this way, micro-influencers can be a great asset for a mid-market brand which not only wants to get more exposure on Instagram but also to sell their products and get more long-term customers.
Nano-influencers are barely influencers at all. They are more like ordinary people, who have under 10,000 followers on social media and usually much less than that. They are not professional influencers by any measure. But many influencer marketing professionals consider nano-influencers the most powerful kind.
Why is that? Ther are a few major factors which make nano-influencers so important tool for any modern marketer.