Recently I did an Instagram cleanse. I pulled up who I was following on Instagram and asked myself three questions:
1. Do I know this person/organization?
2. Do they make me laugh?
3. Do I learn things from them/do they inspire me?
If I couldn’t say yes to one of these three questions, I hit the unfollow button. As an avid user of IG for almost 10 years, it was cathartic to say goodbye to people I’d followed throughout most of my 20s. There were moments of hesitation as I scrolled through my list, but I stuck to my plan and reminded myself: I am tired of being sold to.
Instagram (and all social media) has evolved significantly since we were all putting the ‘Earlybird’ filter on photos of our homemade dinner in 2012. Now, in addition to being a content powerhouse, Instagram is an established e-commerce platform. In the early 2010s, social media content creators began partnering with companies to promote and sell products, and with the introduction of in-app checkout in 2019, opening Instagram feels very similar to visiting your favourite clothing store.
It’s no secret that influencer marketing is on the rise. In fact, the industry is expected to grow by over $4 billion this year, to a whopping $13.8 billion, and is only predicted to increase year over year. As someone who works in social media every day, I can tell you that influencer marketing works. But I am not totally convinced it’s here to stay—at least in its current form.
I am not the only one cleansing my Instagram follower list. The demand for relevance and authenticity in social media is increasing rapidly, especially with the popularity and pace of the new social media darling, Tik Tok. The reason influencer marketing grew to be so effective may be the same reason it starts to decline: trust and authenticity.
Trust in influencers is declining due to inauthentic, repetitive and cliché content. For social media influencer marketing to continue grow and benefit both brands and influencers, organizations and content creators alike need to be strategic in their partnerships. It’s no longer about finding the biggest and brightest stars for your influencer campaign, but about finding partners who believe in your brand and product and giving them the freedom and flexibility to speak about your brand in their own voice. The ideal influencer partner is someone who likely would have become a customer anyway. Why pay someone to conduct a once-and-done promotion of your brand or product if they don’t actually believe in it?
Take a look at beauty brand and digital marketing pros, Glossier. The company’s founder Emily Weiss took a different approach to influencer marketing. “At Glossier, something we’ve always stayed very true to, since pre-launch, day one, is that every single person is an influencer.” Weiss famously said during a live interview with Kara Swisher for her Recode Decode podcast. Rather than partner influencers with millions of followers, Glossier identified 500 superfans who could be brand ambassadors. Although these superfans (or micro influencers) don’t have the same reach as large influencers, they had trust and more importantly authenticity. The superfan strategy worked—with 70% of Glossier’s online sales and traffic coming from peer-to-peer referrals.
Going small and letting go of creative control may sound risky, but in an environment where authenticity is the greatest online currency, it’s vital. When looking for potential influencers, look beyond their following and into their content—does it make you laugh, or do you learn something? Consider their engagement—are people commenting on their posts, and is the influencer responding? And most importantly, view your influencer as a content creator partner, instead of a vendor—the value of an influencer is in their unique voice, not their follower count.
Calissa is a Communications Specialist and our master of all things social. When she’s not deep in content creation, you’ll find her deep in the mountains hiking.
