INFLUENCER MARKETING IN 2022
Whilst using spend on social media and influencer marketing campaigns is at an all-time high, pandemic recovery has still proved to be the thorn in everyone’s side throughout 2021 and looks set to continue into the new year. Furthermore, as part of a wider shift in the social media landscape, many creators and brands have reached somewhat of a roadblock in terms of what content can do to impact a brand’s goals.
The major shift we’re expecting to see in 2022 is the evolution of the relationships between brands and their partners and how they function commercially. Covid-19 put a pin in any offline or experiential marketing activity, and in many cases this spend was moved to influencer or social media driven work. However, there is a false expectation that influencer marketing can be made to perform and translate in the same way as other paid digital marketing channels. This hope was even further embedded into brand strategy when the pixel updates were introduced, and brands were looking to retrieve their clear attribution models using social media.
As a result, influencers are now taking a more strategic position within wider marketing plans as advisors to the brands they work with, and therefore the measure of success has become about much more than just promoting products that drives a commercial return. That said, most brands don’t have the time or patience for any content that doesn’t have an immediate impact or clear ROAS (return on advertising spend).
Image Credit: @melissaswardrobe
From the creator’s standpoint, things are arguably better. There is no doubt whether or not influencer marketing is a worthwhile exercise. But at the same time there needs to be an understanding of reasonable rates, collaborative decisions over content and an agreed plan around how partnerships will be measured. Creators need to have a hook, a point of difference in the market and something brands can easily digest and understand the benefit of – over the 73,000 others in the UK market.
So, there are some positives but it’s not all rosy for influencer marketing. This week, we’re sharing a review of 2021, and our predictions for 2022.
1. Mutual Understanding
2021 was a difficult one for influencer marketing, which may surprise some people as the general message to market has been that the power of the social media star is stronger than ever. The reality is that whilst yes, brands have finally cottoned on that influencers can help their businesses, the expectation is that it can happen instantly and without any work on their side – and most importantly – for a fee that works for them, usually benchmarked against spend in other departments.
What we’re finding is that both sides are pretty fed up; brands are tired of influencer activity “not performing” (more on that below) and influencers and their managers are pretty exhausted with the endless list of expectations they’re expected to meet, most likely for less money than they feel they’re worth.
So, who’s right to feel annoyed? In our view, neither and both. Our response to either of those grumbles is, what are you basing those numbers on? To brands; why or how did you think an influencer would deliver/convert that amount? To talent; what are you tangibly able to provide to give brands an understanding of your pricing structure ahead of partnerships?
2. Covid Planning
We’ve got to stop waiting for a time when Covid-19 doesn’t exist. The reality is that until the majority of the global population is vaccinated, the virus will continue to throw curve balls. Influencer and social media activity should always be actioned with a caveat that the messaging or objectives may change subject to restrictions (or simply down to moral relevance or tone). It is already clear that Omicron looks set to be a problem for the first quarter of the year, and its more than likely that this will seep into how audiences prioritise their spending.
Furthermore, marketing strategies need to be a great deal more agile than they used to be pre-Covid. YOY (year-on-year) figures are not helpful – we simply do not have a time period against which the pandemic, technology and audience mood are comparable. In our view, we should be ripping up the idea of the traditional calendar and look to working in a more reactive manner.
3. Inclusivity in All Areas
To many this sounds obvious, but you’d be surprised how often when discussing improvement on a brand’s current use of a diverse range influencers we are met with comments like “but our models have always been diverse” or “but we reached out to X recently”. Frankly if every pillar of your business doesn’t echo your stance on inclusivity you should expect to be called out, and to be making active improvements. Customers should never have to work to find your stance. Understandably, any audience you haven’t historically paid attention to will take time to trust you really intend to serve them – so this focus should be front and centre to every marketing action you make across the year and beyond.
4. Fair Measurement of Influencer Activity
Achieving parity for influencers and the brands they work with is essential for a healthy social media marketing landscape. This means fair payment, frank conversations when commencing relationships, and executing campaigns with reasonable expectations – on both sides.
Ensuring (and driving) success is beneficial to both the brand and the influencer when running a campaign. Without considered measures to benchmark positive results, you can’t quantifiably see what (and who) worked for you and what didn’t. We are massive advocates for looking at the hard data when selecting influencers to approach – effective content is a must, but so is only comparing relevant posts when auditing their feeds. So don’t compare their best performing personal announcement (or a chatty, funny post) when you are preparing for a paid beauty campaign that necessitates a lot of detail and education, with not much space for personal nuance. This means there is little space for misunderstandings of what a solid performance looks like.
It goes for influencers as well; campaigns are demonstrably more successful when talent have primed their audiences by speaking about a brand in advance of any paid posts. But a crucial lesson is that this type of content is still subject to the ASA’s guidelines, and so brands cannot have approval of ‘organic’ content that presents itself as outside of a campaign.
Solid preparation for a brand also means nominating a clear goal, and orientating all aspects of the campaign around that. All elements, including the chosen platform, content vertical, content style, influencer audience and CTA should all be working together to ensure that the messaging is communicated in the most effective way to reach this goal. It’s about setting personal preferences aside and looking at the hard facts. This level of attention to detail is the bare minimum we would ever recommend to do justice to the budget dedicated to the project, and the influencers putting in the work on a brand’s behalf.
5. Incorporating TikTok
If you’re still sceptical about TikTok then you aren’t alone, and there are good reasons not to jump in with a full suite of resources. The magic of TikTok is real, but only if it aligns with your capacity to engage with users there and create content that suits the particular algorithm.
When approaching TikTok, first ask what you want to achieve? If the reply is direct traffic to your website and attributable conversion, it may not be the right platform for you: the algorithm uses every tool it has to encourage users to continue consuming content rather than navigate away, and currently you cannot link from individual posts, meaning that the call-to-action an influencer presents cannot be a link click.
However, we aren’t the naysayers when it comes to TikTok – in fact, it’s going to continue to be the platform that brands, influencers and users can’t help but talk about in 2022 as it continues to birth trends, shift expectations of what content creators can achieve, and help shape the evolving influencer marketing landscape. There are still really accessible ways for brands to gain traction on TikTok by carving out their own channels and working with influencers. If you want to find out more about integrating TikTok into your 2022 strategy, check out our online January Masterclass here.
6. The Possibilities of Affiliate Marketing
Amusingly, 2020 onwards has been when a lot of brands caught on to affiliates. The reality is it’s an incredibly old marketing method. Prior to organisations like rewardStyle (now LTK) and APPRL springing up it was often discounted as a grim, tasteless way of generating revenue and left to the eCommerce teams to run without considering its overlap into general audience acquisition (which ultimately affects all departments).
There are some common mistakes made by those new to affiliates. Please don’t be mistaken in thinking that affiliate marketing can replace the need to spend on influencer partnerships. Please also don’t think it’s purely down to the influencer to make a large enough amount of sales through affiliates to warrant consideration for paid work. Lastly, please don’t think that affiliate marketing is a neat way around the ASA guidelines to avoid ad disclosure (the official line is that any use of affiliate marketing links should be marked as advertising).
That said, affiliates are a brilliant way for influencers to generate revenue in return for the content they generate themselves (without guidance from a brand). Consequently, it is also a useful way for brands to understand exactly who moves the dial for them commercially (assuming you use a program that allows you this visibility). It should not be used in a manner where a brand expects or needs an influencer to produce clicks – the brands who rely on those kinds of incentives or simply offer discount codes to audiences will struggle in 2022.
So, that’s some food for thought going into the new year. We have big plans ahead, but if you’re looking for more ideas to inspire and shape your strategy right now, check out our publications, The Foundations of Influencer Marketing and The Influencer Pricing Chart for Instagram, or get secure your place at our TikTok Online January Masterclass, which has limited tickets still available.