Let’s Look into the Top Influencer Marketing Platforms
The right social media platforms for influencer marketing spell the difference between success and fiasco. Marketers plan their campaigns for the greatest probability of success. Of course, you’re that marketer, and you want to know where to put your efforts on to make sure your campaigns succeed.
The choice of influencer marketing platform may depend on a few factors. One of the most important factors is the type of your target audience. For instance, if you have largely a young target audience, Instagram is the ideal platform for you. Also, it’s worth taking a look at the pros and cons of each type of network.
At Expaus, we help clients understand the differences among social media sites from a standpoint of influencer marketing viability.
There is no contest about what site is mostly used by consumers. It’s the older social networking site, which has been around for more than a decade and has seen changes over the years. Facebook enjoys the most users and it continues to be the most important social media site. Young and old people alike use Facebook. It’s easy. Its strength is the various ways communication and interaction can happen over it. You’re not limited to text. You’re not limited to photos. You’re not limited to 140 characters. Facebook is for people of all walks of life, for tech and non-tech savvies.
Various influencer marketing surveys have ranked Facebook as a top-performing influencer marketing platform among social media sites. For instance, a survey conducted by Tomoson in 2015 on 125 marketers puts Facebook above all social media sites. The only platform more effective than Facebook is blogs. More marketers would vote for Facebook than Instagram and Twitter combined.
Moreover, it makes sense to know where the influencers are. While they are on various social media sites. A huge bulk of them are on Facebook. Instagram comes next. Twitter and Pinterest remain significant for specific purposes. That means your influencers are most likely on Facebook.
A more comprehensive study by Mavrck hails Facebook as the best platform among different social media sites in terms of user base, time users spend on the site, and referral traffic. People in general spend nearly 21 hours on Facebook every month, and this results in nearly 24% of web referral traffic.
One of the major downsides of Instagram in terms of marketing is it doesn’t allow you to put links to your posts. Nevertheless, it’s one of the best influencer marketing platforms. Japan has a little over 10.39 million Instagram users. United Kingdom has 14.13 million users. Canada has 10.92 million. United States has more people on the photo sharing site than any other country does (88.48 million).
Overall, Instagram has about half a billion of active users. That essentially means it’s a great tool for promoting your brand. One of the reasons why Instagram is popular is its simplicity. It gives you an upfront means of promoting your brand.
Influencer marketing on Instagram can be done in a few ways. The easiest is asking or letting your influencer post an image of your product or asking them to take a photo of themselves using or wearing your brand. Companies have done this tactic for quite some time, and it has resulted in tremendous returns.
Marketers believe that Instagram is an ideal platform for creating brand awareness. You’re able to use up to 30 hashtags on Instagram, which make it possible to increase your followers quickly. That’s why it’s an influencer hub.
Instagram adds 100 million more users each month. It’s growing faster than Facebook and enjoys the highest engagement among all social networks.
YouTube
One billion users mean an opportunity to get to more people. YouTube remains a relevant site because it offers different media. You would rather post high definition videos on YouTube, which is solely a video sharing site, than post them on other social media sites, like Facebook or Twitter. Vloggers who become popular in their niches may be considered influencers, and they may monetize their videos. However, influencers who partner with brands do include links to their sponsors or partners.
Brands overall get 0.06% web referral traffic from YouTube. That sounds tiny, but it’s more than a decent figure that puts the platform fourth among social media sites in terms of referral traffic.
Influencers upload several types of videos to entice and engage audiences. The most popular videos are fun and useful videos. If you can make people smile and laugh with your baby and puppy videos, they’ll subscribe to your channel. If you can teach them how to choose the right footwear or eyeglasses, they’ll subscribe. If you keep posting tasty dessert recipes, they’ll tune in. If you can’t do these things, then work with someone who can, and that’s what influencer marketing is about.
Brands have been working with popular vloggers on YouTube. The most popular categories on the site are entertainment and how-to and style niches. Brands may seek to educate audiences through their influencers.
Pinterest is one of the least talked about social media marketing platforms among beginners. But digital marketing specialists have long recognized the sheer value of this seemingly silent site. A Mavrck study shows that people spend more than 600 minutes every month on Pinterest. But the vital figure is the web referral traffic generated by the site: 5.72%. The figure is much lower than that of but is second to Facebook. Twitter, on the other hand, generates 1.03 web referral traffic. Other social sites generate much lower inbound traffic. The figures explain why Pinterest is one of the top influencer marketing platforms.
One good thing about Pinterest is it shows you what you want, as opposed to just showing you anything people in your network are sharing even though it’s irrelevant to you. If you’re an influencer you can stimulate the same desire for brands and content in your niche. If you’re a business owner, you can use that tiny but crucial detail as a leverage.
What about other platforms?
Twitter comes to mind. We consider it an excellent platform for specific purposes. Twitter is most useful for live updates. Snapchat shares the same advantage.
As a final word, you’ll still have to monitor your influencer marketing campaigns. Watch where your numbers are soaring and where they are dwindling. Watch which influencers bring in traffic and drive sales.
