How Influencers Help Your Adventure Brand
As social media became an integral part of consumers’ worlds, so did influencers. In every corner of the internet, creators have grown followings who listen and trust their recommendations. The outdoor adventure niche is no exception! Prominent public-facing individuals, like influencers, can be an extremely effective way to market your adventure brand. Partnerships with influencers give your brand exposure and credibility with their loyal followers. The 2022 Influencer Marketing Benchmark report makes it clear – 90% of survey respondents believe influencer marketing to be an effective form of marketing and 49% of buyers rely on influencers for purchase decisions. But there are countless options – how do you know who to collaborate with? The following is our hit list of what to keep in mind when launching influencer marketing campaigns. For a deep dive, check out our the influencer toolkit!
How To Begin Your Influencer Marketing Campaign
As with any campaign, it is essential to create tangible, measurable goals before making any decisions. The things to keep in mind are:
- Who is your adventure prospect? (You may have several customer types- which one(s) do you want to target in your influencer campaign?
- What point of the customer experience journey is your audience in?
- What level of the sales funnel are you trying to reach – brand awareness, lead generation, or direct sales?
- What is your overall campaign budget?
Having these parameters set beforehand will narrow down your options between nano (under 1000 followers), micro (from 1,000-100,000 followers), or macro-influencers (100,000+ followers) and help ensure you spend your marketing dollars efficiently.
What Kind of Influencer Campaign Should You Run?
One of the most exciting aspects of influencer marketing is that the sky is the limit when it comes to creative ways to reach audiences! Your influencer will know how to reach their following best, so collaborate to find the best and most engaging way to deliver your message. Ideas include:
- Social Media Mentions
- Giveaways or Contests
- Offering Discounts & Specials
- Honest Reviews
- Co-Created Content
- Sponsored Content
- Social Media Takeovers
How to Find and Decide Which Influencer to Work With
So, you’ve decided on your goals and parameters for your campaign. How do you go about actually finding someone who fits them? Although a one-time deal can be a straightforward way to boost your brand, we recommend building relationships with your influencer. This adds authenticity to the content and actually can increase ROI as you’ll spend less time researching, vetting, and establishing the partnership expectations and contractual terms. Prioritize brand fit over follower count – do your audiences intersect? Do their values complement yours? Have they worked with adventure brands before, and if so, were they successful? Also, assess how the individual engages with their followers with the content they create.
Tip: Try tools like Phlanx to determine the engagement levels of different influencers’ social media platforms.
There are a few ways you can search for the right fit. Follow hashtags that are relevant to your industry or set up Google alerts for keywords and topics. Explore resources like your industry’s magazines and podcasts. Often there are even databases of influencers easily found with just a quick search (for example, Starnage has a list of the top 1000 ski influencers in the US). Or, let a marketing agency like Liquid Spark take care of the legwork for you!
How to Work Effectively with Influencers
REI partners with Influencer Jacey West to promote membership
Once you’ve found the individual you’d like to collaborate with, it’s time to prepare your pitch. As with any professional agreement, it is best to have clearly defined terms in order to avoid misunderstandings down the road, which could hurt both your relationship with the influencer and subsequently with their following.
Be prepared with a campaign brief for your pitch – keep it short, with detailed goals and KPIs. Provide brand and content guidelines that help creators make relevant, impactful work. Then, in a full contractual agreement, list expected deliverables, timeline, and your payment arrangement. Don’t forget your required media release agreement (this legally allows you to use the individual’s content for your own brand). And, in many cases, including a non-disclosure agreement ensures your intellectual property and trade secrets are protected.
Tracking Your Influencer Campaign Success
You’ve done the work to set up a campaign with a great influencer that aligns with your values and brand – now it’s time to assess how successful it was. Analyzing your results will differ depending on your goal. For example, it will be pretty straightforward to see entries for a
contest or giveaway, sales generated, or visits and/or leads from a tracking URL. In other cases, you can check things like engagement, reach, audience building, clicks, or conversions.
Get Your Influencer Marketing Toolkit for Adventure Brands
Still unsure on how to move forward with selecting the best influencer for your adventure brand? You’re in luck – we’ve created a comprehensive, free Influencer Marketing Toolkit that walks you through the steps of planning your campaign, vetting your influencers, tracking your results, and more.
Don’t have the time or in-house resources to pull off creating your own Influencer marketing campaign? Liquid Spark can help – contact us and get started today.
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