The 10 Commandments of Influencer Marketing

These ten commandments are a set of principles for your influencer marketing campaigns.

Social influencers, digital marketers, and brands all benefit by following them. Doing so will ensure your social influencer campaigns are established on a firm foundation.

Over the last several years, I have noticed increasing numbers of digital marketing consultants flocking to the influencer marketing space.  This is a good thing as there is a real need for qualified professionals.  However, not everyone shares the same ethical or moral code.

Unfortunate but true.

On the other side of the coin, influencers are popping up like mushrooms.

The gold rush mentality is in full swing and many are determined to capitalize on it while they can.  Unfortunately,  many are looking to become social influencers to get free stuff and make money by charging brands to post content.

We all want to make money, but making money dishonestly isn’t worth it.  Whether it’s promising inflated results or claiming your audience is bigger than it really is, fakery is everywhere.

Call it bad karma, bad luck or the hand of God, but if you engage in bad practices, bad things will come back to you.

Just don’t do it.

So, live by these principles and thrive:

1: You shall not confuse influencer marketing with influencer advertising.

Influencer marketing is a high-touch strategy that requires building relationships with social influencers.

As a marketer, the content they create is ideally leveraged in multiple ways and repurposed to inform, educate, and aid your target buyers throughout their “customer journey.”

Influencer advertising is paying influencers to post using content you provide them about your product in order to drive click-throughs and conversions.

It’s known by some as “smash and grab.”

This strategy is common on platforms like Instagram, Twitter, and YouTube. Be careful, there are many charlatans who make big claims.

Ask for references.

2: You shall not expect social influencers to create content in exchange for cheap products.

Don’t ask influencers to spend their time creating content in exchange for trinkets.

It’s disrespectful.

Most influencers have day jobs and are professionals. They work hard to create content and build their following.

They value their time. You should too.

3: Influencer marketing is not a cure-all for your business or marketing problems.

Influencer marketing is not a panacea for your business problems.

If your other marketing strategies aren’t working, don’t expect influencers to save your ass.

Fix your business and marketing problems before looking for influencers to help you.

4: You shall respect the influencer’s time and compensate them fairly for their creativity and content creation.

Content creation takes expertise and time.

Don’t expect influencers to create content for you without being compensated fairly, so don’t lowball them.

Compensation can take the form of gifting your product (it must be valuable) to them, paying them outright, or agreeing to some other exchange of value.

5: Social influencers shall conduct themselves in a professional, courteous manner in all dealings with brands and marketers.

If you are an influencer, don’t expect brands to cater to your every wish.

Also, just because you are an influencer doesn’t give you the right to attempt to extort money from a brand by overcharging what you’re worth.

Businesses are not bottomless wells of money and they don’t exist to serve you.

Remember, there are many fish in the ocean and brands can easily find other influencers to work with.

6: You shall not choose influencers based on audience size alone.

Choosing social influencers because they have large audiences is a rookie move and one of the primary causes of losing money.

Do your homework.  

If you choose an influencer because he has big audience numbers but he doesn’t produce the ROI you want, you have no one to blame but yourself.  

Instead, Look for those who are relevant to you and who have good engagement.

Your social influencer campaigns will produce much better ROI.

7: Influencers shall not falsify their social media metrics with fake followers, likes, views, comments, or subscribers.

Any influencer worth the name doesn’t pad their audience numbers to look bigger than they really are.  

Be honest. Brands are getting wise to fake followers, likes, comments, and the rest.

Better to be a micro-influencer with a hyper-loyal following than a large influencer with low engagement and fake followers.

The truth inevitably comes out.  

Don’t be on the wrong side of it.

8: Influencers shall not make false claims about their ability to generate conversions and sales for brands.

Closely related to commandment number seven.

Making false claims is not only dishonest but downright loathsome.

9: Brands shall not ask influencers to do anything unethical or that conflicts with FTC guidelines.

This is self-evident and requires no further explanation.

10: Influencers shall adhere to the FTC guidelines and encourage other influencers to do the same.

The more social influencers adhere to these guidelines, the fewer problems the industry will encounter going forward.

We will all retain the trust of consumers and therefore benefit.

Remember, without the trust of consumers, influencers have nothing.

Wrapping Up

Any social influencer campaign should be set up with a goal and a coherent strategy.

Otherwise, even if you are working with top social media influencers, your campaign can suffer and you’ll not get good ROI.

Unfortunately, there are many pitfalls to influencer marketing and the dirty little secret is that many lose money the first time they try it.

The good news is, this is totally avoidable.  If you have doubts, contact a consultant in marketing who can help you.

It can mean the difference between losing money and making it.