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Guide on Different Types of Influencers and How They Can Help Your Business

Do you want to attract a lot of attention for your business online? If so, using influencer marketing is one of the best ways to do it.

Guide on Different Types of Influencers and How They Can Help Your Business

Influencer marketing involves calling on a so-called influencer to put up a social media post that is approved by your brand. This social media post is almost guaranteed to get plenty of eyes on it, which should, in turn, help your company’s bottom line.

Before you can put influencer marketing to the test, though, you’re going to need to learn about the different types of influencers that are out there. It’ll prevent you from bringing the wrong influencer on board to lend a hand with your company’s marketing efforts.

Today, we’re going to touch on some of the various types of influencers that are available to you and break down how working with them could benefit your business. It’ll help you decide whether or not influencer marketing is going to be the right option for you.

Here is everything you need to know about the six main types of influencers.

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Mega Influencer

If you want to make sure that millions of people see the branded social media post that you have an influencer put up, then you’re going to want to work exclusively with a mega influencer. A mega influencer is someone like Kylie Jenner, who has well over 100 million followers on Instagram.

You aren’t going to have any issues getting people interested in your business when you hire a mega influencer to help you out. They’re going to provide you with a global reach that your company might not be able to get access to otherwise.

There is just one problem with bringing a mega influencer into the mix to post something for your company on social media: It’s going to cost you a pretty penny! You’re not going to get someone like Kylie Jenner to cosign your company for less than $1 million per post in most cases.

Mega influencers are, therefore, the most effective types of influencers. But they’re also going to be way too expensive for most companies to work with. You’re not going to want to reach out to them for help unless you’re running a company that is bringing in the big bucks every single year.

Macro Influencer

If you know that your company can’t afford to hire someone like Kylie Jenner to give you an assist on sponsored Instagram posts, you’re going to want to set your sights elsewhere. You’ll be happy to know that a macro influencer might be every bit as effective for you in certain instances.

Unlike mega influencers, macro-influencers don’t have tens or sometimes even hundreds of millions of social media followers. More often than not, they have somewhere between 100,000 and 1 million followers total.

But oftentimes, those followers are rabid fans of macro-influencers since macro influencers tend to have a very strong online presence that was developed on the internet over time. We’re talking about people like:

  • Popular podcasters
  • Influential bloggers
  • Social media darlings

When you have a macro influencer put up a post for your company, you’re not necessarily going to get the global reach that you might crave. But what you are going to get is access to a hardcore fanbase that is more likely to check out what your brand is all about thanks to the cosign that a macro influencer gave it.

You will, of course, want to be sure that your company’s products and/or services are going to resonate with a macro influencer’s audience. But as long as they do, you shouldn’t have any problems benefitting from working with a macro influencer in a big way.

Micro-Influencer

Although working with a macro influencer isn’t going to be anywhere near as expensive as working with a mega influencer, it’s still going to cost you more than you might feel comfortable spending. If you can’t quite afford the services of a mega or macro influencer, the next best thing is going to be a micro-influencer.

A micro-influencer is going to be someone who has between 1,000 and 100,000 followers in most instances. They’ll have enough followers to make a splash on behalf of your company but not enough followers to charge you astronomical prices for doing it.

If you suspect that working with a micro-influencer might be the right move for you to make, it’s going to be absolutely essential that you choose the correct one. You want to be sure that each and every follower that a micro-influencer has is going to be likely to look further into your brand once they hear about it.

Advocate

In a perfect world, you don’t want to be running around paying one influencer after another to big up your brand online. You want those who have some influence on the internet to naturally flock to your business and promote it without you having to ask them to do it for money.

These people are going to serve as advocates for your company. Brand advocates are those who take it upon themselves to alert others as to what your brand has going on at any given moment. A lot of larger non-profits are able to benefit from having advocates build up awareness for their brands.

Working with advocates is going to help you spread the word about your business more organically than it would spread otherwise. You won’t have to worry about breaking the bank to do it.

But you are going to have to work pretty hard to find potential advocates and to lobby them to help you. You’ll have to spend your fair share of time trying to connect with those who you think might be up for advocating for your business.

Referrer

Every single time that your company makes a sale, you’re going to have the opportunity to add referrers to your stable of influencers. Referrers are—as their name would suggest—people who use a product or service from your company, love it, and tell others about it.

There is a good chance that you’re already using referrers day in and day out without even realizing it. There are likely some people out there who are helping to let others know about your business without you having to do a thing.

It’s important for you to realize the power of referrers and to aim to get more people to work as referrers on behalf of your business. The more people there are referring your brand to others, the better off your business is going to be in the long run.

And the only way for you to continue to add to your growing list of referrers is by ensuring that people are always 100% satisfied with your products and/or services. If people aren’t happy with them, it’s going to make it awfully tough for you to convince them to refer your products and/or services to other people.

Loyalist

Many of the people who use your company’s products and/or services are only going to use them once or twice. Or if they use them more than that, they’re only going to utilize one or two of your products and/or services on a regular basis.

This won’t be the case with loyalists! Brand loyalists are essentially going to be your company’s biggest cheerleaders. They’re going to love all of your products and/or services, and they’re not going to be shy about letting other people know all about it.

To be clear, it’s not going to be easy—at all—to turn people into loyalists for your brand. Even if there are lots of people who like your products and/or services, they’re not all going to be as head over heels in love with them as you would like them to be.

It’s why you should cherish any person who willingly decides that they’re going to be a loyalist for your company. You should shower them with freebies at every turn and show them just how much you appreciate their support.

If your loyalists ever turn their back on you, it isn’t going to bode well for your business. They might not always have millions of social media followers. But their opinion on your company is going to matter a whole lot since they will have been with you from the beginning to some degree.

Which of These Types of Influencers Would You Like to Work With?

As you can see, there are quite a few different types of influencers that you can use to promote your business on social media. They each bring something a little different to the table.

Ideally, you’re going to want to work with all six types of influencers at some point in time. It’s going to be the most effective way to get the word out about your business.

But at the start, you should think long and hard about which types of influencers will suit your company best. It’ll help you connect with influencers who will work wonders for your brand.

Get more great marketing ideas by browsing through some of the other informative articles posted on our blog.

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