How to use influencers in an advertising campaign?!

Influencers are the new benchmark of social proof. They are better received than celebrities, even though they also get paid for brand collaborations. Nevertheless, campaigns involving them are very popular and bring record profits for companies. From this article, you will learn how to use influencers in an advertising campaign to make it popular and increase your company’s revenue.

Who is an influencer?

An influencer is an internet creator who produces content on social media that aligns with their interests. This can be a niche (fashion, beauty, parenting, sports) or so-called lifestyle, which involves sharing one’s life and giving advice in various fields. Influencers with a niche are the most popular because it is easy to find content on topics of interest to us. Internet creators like to share their lives to show that something is always happening with them. Hence numerous stories from trips, every shopping outing, or even meetings with friends (or just from breakfast). When they collaborate with companies, they also like to share this because they are proud to be recognized for their “hobby”. Influencers can be divided into 3 categories:

• Nano-influencers – below 1000 followers;
• Micro-influencers – from 1000 followers;
• Macro-influencers – above 100,000 followers. The numerical division is fluid and changes every year, but contrary to appearances, the number of fans is not insignificant. The smaller the number of followers, the higher the ER (engagement rate), which is an indicator of engagement. It’s not just about how many followers an influencer has, but most importantly, whether their content is liked, shared, and especially commented on by social media users.

How to choose an influencer for an advertising campaign?

Collaborating with an influencer is a very good marketing move. Influencers operate in the world of social media, where breaking through with interesting content is difficult, especially with new advertising. The human eye has evolved to the point that it skips ads without thinking about it. However, a well-prepared campaign becomes viral and is willingly shared by users of the platform.

If you are planning an advertising campaign with an influencer, remember a few things:

• Choose an influencer who creates content closely related to your industry – a beauty influencer will speak better on cosmetics than, for example, a man running a lifestyle channel who gives cosmetics to his partner. The influencer will have more authority.
• Be cautious of billboard influencers. There is nothing wrong with advertising, so it’s not surprising that influencers want to earn and therefore participate in many campaigns. But if their content is constantly ads, such people lose authenticity and are considered billboard influencers. Internet users don’t like that.
• Choose the right SM platform. You have TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook to choose from. But not every target group uses all of them. Find out where your potential customers are and plan your activities there.
• Combine different forms of advertising. Focus not only on social media. Plan an OOH, DOOH, or TV campaign. SM users like such actions because they consider it a kind of recognition of their favorite influencer by big brands. This is what Bell, among others, did.

Bell x Red Lipstick Monster – OOH and Online Campaign

A good example of combining an influencer collaboration is the campaign of the cosmetic company Bell from July 2023. The cosmetics manufacturer invited for collaboration – well known to Generation Z and Millennials – Ewa Grzelakowska-Kostoglu, aka Red Lipstick Monster. She is one of the first Polish influencers, with numerous collaborations with cosmetic brands under her belt. Her YouTube channel has over 1.5 million viewers, which could classify her as a celebrity according to all rankings. However, Ewa remains primarily active in the online world, and people trust her a lot! The principle of social proof works great with her. And because Ewa is a ‘girl next door’, Bell decided that cosmetics signed with her nickname would be available only in … Biedronka. Additionally, the brand focused on an OOH campaign with a limited number of billboards in the city. Ewa herself was so excited about this fact that as soon as she shared where she found her first billboard, her Instagram followers started following her and taking pictures under it and posting them on social media. The result? A simple billboard (with colors referring to the cosmetics series) with minimal content made it to SM and started advertising itself.

The Bell brand campaign created in collaboration with Red Lipstick Monster proves that it is worth combining online campaigns with traditional OOH campaigns. At Be Media, we also encourage this. Especially since Ewa’s reaction to her banner was very natural and unforced, and authenticity is listed as a trend for 2024 in terms of collaboration with influencers. As an agency that creates OOH, DOOH, and City Transport campaigns, we are open to new ideas, and above all, we have many of our own. We are eager to create interesting campaigns that will involve internet creators. Want to surprise your customers? Get in touch with us.