Eighty-four percent of today’s consumers trust the recommendations they receive from their family and friends more than they trust any other form of advertising. Influencer marketing is essentially capitalizing on these trusted connections to promote your brand.
For example, let’s say you are a premier manufacturer of surfboards. What if all the top local surfers started bragging about your brand to all of their friends and fans? They have close relationships with each follower, they have a mass relevant social reach, and are trusted to give their authentic opinion on products. That is some powerful marketing! In today’s world, social media marketing, as well as experiential marketing, are the most influential tools when promoting your brand. Couple those tactics with national and local influencers and you can create an effective marketing campaign. However, the question remains, how exactly can you measure influencer marketing ROI and success when you have other marketing efforts at the same time? Here are three separate ways we have found.
Study Impressions and Engagements
Viewing the amount of social media impressions and amount of engagement on each post is a quick and easy way to determine if your influencer marketing strategy is a success. “Impressions” are how many total potential followers have viewed the posts, while “engagements” are how many shares, retweets, comments, favorites, and likes a post received. By viewing these figures, you will have a straightforward answer to whether or not your influencer marketing strategy is garnering the attention you desire. Before your campaign, however, be sure to create goals regarding the amount of likes, favorites, retweets, shares, and comments you want to achieve. Overall, this data is especially useful when you are working with multiple influencers, as it shows you in one glance who is promoting your brand in the best way to connect with their audience and yours.
Be Aware of Brand Mentions
If you are lucky enough (and strategic enough) to get a viral post, the amount of brand mentions you receive will dramatically increase—which equates to better brand awareness and more sales. If you strategically choose the influencers, there is a high probability that one of their posts will go viral. Keep an eye on your brand mentions so you have a clear grasp on how many people are talking about you.
Track Conversions
Finally, the black-and-white way to measure influencer marketing ROI: your conversions. While you can’t equate impressions to sales, there are several techniques you can use to ensure your conversions are counted:
- Trackable Links – You can easily generate trackable links through Google Analytics. Create custom ones for each influencer marketing campaign to see exactly where your increased sales are coming from.
- Promo Codes – Equip each of your influencers with their own promo code to include in their social media posts about your company. Not only do promo codes let you keep track of who is referring whom, they also provide an extra incentive for readers to take immediate action.
- Correlation – Give your influencers specific times to post, and then keep an eye on your sales. If they go up shortly after the influencer recommended your brand, there is a good chance these two events are related. But we will be honest, with larger purchases, the time frame between posts and purchase can vary drastically.
Using the techniques above can be black-and-white ways to track conversions, but are not always perfect for each campaign. Promo codes and links do take away from the organic nature of the messaging. XOMAD works with influencers to find the right balance of organic messaging and usage of promo codes and links, all while complying with FTC guidelines.
Ultimately, a strong influencer marketing ROI comes down to finding powerful influencers, with the right audience, who are effectively communicating your brand message. At XOMAD, we research the most effective social media communicators within each industry. Contact us today to learn how we can use influencer marketing to grow your brand.