You may know the importance of partnering with an influencer to make your Instagram marketing effort a success but you may not know how exactly you can find the right influencer for your specific type of business and according to your budget.
Finding the right type of influencers for your business marketing campaign can really be a big challenge if you do not know how to go about it. To start with, you should have clearly defined goals for your business and your Instagram marketing.
For example:
- If you want to have a lot of engagement then it is better to partner with a micro-influencer that has a smaller fan following but higher engagement rate.
- If you want to enhance your brand awareness then it will make more sense to choose an influencer based on different metrics such as traffic and reach.
However, it is not as easy as it seems just by looking at these two factors. There are several others that you should also take into consideration as well.
The engagement rates
It is better to start by checking the Instagram engagement rates of the influencers to choose one for your business.
If it is high it means that:
- The influencer has a large number of followers
- The followers are also paying attention to the influencer and
- They are taking action according to the comment of the influencer.
It is for this reason that most of the businesses, as well as social media agencies, use engagement rate as a useful parameter to evaluate which is the ideal influencer for their business.
If you want to do so then make sure that you choose an influencer having at least 2 to 3% of engagement rate on each post. However, an engagement rate of 4 to 6% is excellent and if posts have an engagement rate in the tens and twenties, consider those to be “viral.”
Quality of followers
The quality of followers rather than the number of them matters most when it comes to Instagram marketing, as suggested by the experts. Look up at a few high-quality Instagram influencer marketing at sites like https://blastup.com/ or another for ready reference.
It is essential that the type and quality of the followers of the influencers are in accordance with your product or service. This will ensure that:
- Increase brand awareness and
- Show your product or service in a much more creative way.
It goes without saying that the quality of the followers will play a significant role in aligning your business needs with the influencers who will attract the desired audience towards your account.
Number of followers
Once you are sure that you have an influencer who has the right type of followers for your business, focus on the number of followers now. At this point, it is very crucial to remember that the number of followers of an influencer is not all that important given the fact that the Instagram algorithm impacts the engagement rate of larger accounts.
It is inversely proportional, according to Instagram algorithm meaning:
- Engagement rate decreases as the number of followers increase and
- It increases when the number of followers is low.
This means that the influencers often having fewer followers, called the micro-influencers, have higher engagement rates on their posts.
No matter whichever influencer you choose, with a large or a small fan following, just make sure that they have direct interaction with the followers as well as are an appropriate fit for your business.
The budget
hiring an influencer for your Instagram business will involve a lot of money and therefore you should certainly consider the budget requirements of that.
- Know about how much they charge for each post which will vary according to the type of influencer you choose to partner with, a micro-influencer or an Instagram influencer.
- You may find out whether you can use an influencer who is happy to have a product for free, however, that will again depend on the type of product you deal with.
Make sure that you balance the cost of the product with the flat rate, though it is reported that more than 77% of businesses follow the ‘free gift’ approach. However, this may not be the case always. Some influencers may only work for flat rates while others may charge you on the basis of the number of sales made or leads created for the business.
Getting more followers
Now that you are over and done with your selection of influencers, you should shift your focus on the ways in which you can gain more Instagram followers and increase your organic reach on Instagram, in addition to that of the influencer.
Yes, it is hard, thanks to the Instagram algorithm but it is not impossible right away. It involves a few things.
- First of all, you will need to design high-quality content so that it resonates well you’re your target audience
- You will also need to optimize that content so that you can reach out to a larger audience and finally
- You will need to optimize your Instagram profile bio so that it encourages the new visitors to click on the “Follow” button.
In addition to that, you should also spend some time researching the right type of hashtags to use for your business. This will grow your reach as well as attract more customers and get more engagement. Remember, the commonly used hashtags may not work for your specific business. Look for hashtags that have a more engaging community behind it or any niche and industry-specific rather than going for the popular ones.
Lastly, if you have a business account on Instagram, you can also check the performance of the hashtags and how many views are coming from it by using the Instagram Insights. If you find that this number is pretty low then you should switch on to some different tags and see whether or not it increases. Therefore, rely on Instagram analytics more.
