When running your business online, working with opinion leaders is a crucial part of your success. Due to the popularity and significance of social media platforms, the people that have created a following for themselves can also play a significant role in marketing your brand.
Social media influencers can help you reach your target audience and promote your products and services a lot more easily. To utilize such influencers correctly, there are a few things you need to take into consideration. Here are some tips to help you work with opinion leaders easily and effectively.
What exactly are opinion leaders?
In order to get a better understanding of how to work with these people effectively, it is important to know who opinion leaders actually are. Opinion leaders are people who are considered influential in their group, community or society. They have established a position for themselves which allows them to act as a means of passing on information and opinions to the people that follow them.
These people are supposed to be informed about the latest trends in their niches. They have to be able to reproduce this information to their audience in order to inform them about new technologies, offer them deals on innovative products and services and help them come in contact with new pieces of information which would have otherwise been missed by the general population.
1. Find opinion leaders in your niche
The very first thing you need to take into consideration when working with opinion leaders is to make sure they are working in the same niche as you. There are many reasons why this should be a priority but probably the most important one is because they will help you come in contact with your target audience.
Another reason why this is important is that if they are familiar with your company, they will be much more likely to accurately understand and explain the information you provide. The easier it is for them to inform their audience about your company’s online activities and presence, the more likeable your company will be.
Opinion leaders in your niche will be able to easily affect the opinions of their followers who trust the information presented to them. Therefore, working with influencers in your niche will allow you to attract more people truly interested in trying what your brand has to offer.
2. Decide between an old-timer and a newcomer
Most people might think that working with someone who is new to the field is not a wise decision. When it comes to working with opinion leaders, most companies prefer to connect with influencers who have managed to establish a certain position for themselves online.
While this can help you access a pre-existing audience, you need to keep in mind that newcomers often have a lot of innovative ideas which can help you elevate your social media marketing campaigns and allow you to start thinking outside the box.
There might be some risks in working with a new opinion leader, but you can always work with more than one influencer and thus benefit from both an experienced and an upcoming influencer.
3. Trust their opinion on marketing matters
When it comes to promoting anything online, opinion leaders have a way of knowing how to create content which their audience will enjoy. The reason behind this is because they know their audience better and they have the means to improve and enhance any marketing campaign with their audience knowledge.
Trusting their opinion on the marketing matters that involve them will help you come up with, and implement, new ideas which will bring a fresh perspective to the way you approach your marketing tactics as well as your customers.
Because of the fact that these people have views on various topics which carry weight and significance in your community, they know how to approach your desired audience in a way that will make you look more professional. This will all contribute to a higher quality marketing campaign.
4. Connect with their online audience
Something you should probably keep in mind is to try and find ways to approach an influencer’s online audience by yourself. There are a few different techniques you can use in order to make this happen.
A clever way to approach this is by replying to audience comments left on the posts the influencer has created in collaboration with your brand. Through your replies, you have a chance to answer questions that might arise, hand out information about your brand and products and welcome people interested in getting to know more about your company.
On the other hand, your replies can be something as simple as an emoji of your choice. You can also follow some people who you have interacted with or give a small shout-out to new followers or customers through the “Story” feature of your social media pages.
In any case, interacting with the followers of the opinion leaders you work with can give you easier access to your target audience and allow you to present your company as more approachable and friendly.
5. Work together on hosting giveaways
If you’re looking to follow a trend, which will definitely make collaboration with an opinion leader more successful, then giveaways might just be the answer.
This method of social media marketing has a lot to offer for all parties and can allow your company to get more exposure and new customers very quickly.
Giveaways can be setup as follows: a brand and an influencer pair up in order to promote the brand’s products and the influencer creates a social media post in order to present his/her audience with this new product.
Giveaways are very successful with online audiences because it is normal for people to want a chance at winning something free of charge. Moreover, opinion leaders tend to have a great influence on the people that follow them. By choosing to promote something on their social media pages, they know that those that care about their opinion will want to give it a try too.
6. Allow them to share their own opinions
Last but not least, you need to remember that above all else, influencers are valued by their communities because of the weight of their opinions on anything they review. This is something you can use to your advantage in a variety of ways.
Positive comments on your products and services coming from the influencers you work with will help your brand gain more online visibility and potential customers. As long as influencer comments are accurate and not misleading, you can bring people your way who will truly want to give your products a try.
In order to achieve this though, you will need to listen to what the influencer has to say. Chances are they are much more experienced in marketing and will be able to give you advice which will elevate your marketing campaign and make your strategies more successful.
Listen closely to their ideas even if initially it doesn’t seem like those ideas could work for you. As long as they are able to show you how they envision it, you should put your trust in the influence they have on the people that follow them.
Make your collaboration with an opinion leader work to your advantage
Opinion leaders, and especially social media influencers, can have a great impact on the success of a brand they collaborate with. Their opinion matters to the people who follow them and the more influential they are, the more people will trust their suggestions and reviews.
Therefore, it is important for you to always work with people who will know exactly what they need to say in order to promote your brand correctly. The tips mentioned in the article will help you get a better understanding of how you can make this collaboration much more fruitful and fun for both parties.
