Weekly Shorts: 7 steps for marketers to get influencer mapping right

Given the current scenario of efficient use of marketing budgets and making every penny count, influencer mapping is crucial for an effective marketing strategy.

The proliferation of platforms and formats like short-videos have changed the influencer marketing game for marketers, brands and creators. In this fast-evolving space, keep up with the big trends and hot topics that matter in Storyboard18’s Weekly Shorts in collaboration with affable.ai, an end-to-end AI-powered influencer marketing platform. Track how creators, communities and brands are engaging with users and disrupting marketing to get a sharp and fast insight into present and future trends.

Influencer mapping is the process of identifying and analyzing individuals or groups who have a significant influence on a particular target audience. These influencers can be bloggers, social media personalities, experts, celebrities, or other individuals who have a loyal following and can impact the opinions and behaviors of their followers.

Given the current scenario of efficient use of marketing budgets and making every penny count, influencer mapping is crucial for an effective marketing strategy.

The process considers the audience size and ranking of the influencers and makes a head-to-head comparison of these influencers.

The benefits of influencer mapping include:

Identify key influencers: Your influencer marketing campaigns can only be successful if they are targeted to the right audience. Influencer mapping identifies the key influencers for a brand based on their network. It helps you decide which influencers you should approach for collaboration to reach the right target audience for a brand.

Put the influence to test: It allows you to compare the influence of all the key influencers by putting it to the test. Creating different influencer marketing campaigns with different influencers and then A/B testing can help you compare which campaign had a better impact on your audience. This data can help you decide which influencers are the best for a business.

Find hidden audiences: Influencer mapping also allows you to identify who exactly is the audience that an influencer can influence. By knowing the influencers' audiences, you may encounter hidden audiences you've not targeted before. This opens up new opportunities for you to expand reach, generate new leads or conversions and drive more revenue.

Execute cost-effective marketing: Influencer marketing can be a cost-effective marketing strategy when done correctly. By mapping out the right influencers, brands can leverage their existing audience and avoid the costs associated with building a new audience.

Also read: Weekly Shorts: How YouTube and its influencers stay relevant and at the top of their game

Increase reach: Influencers can help increase the reach of the brand's message and products. They have a dedicated following, and their audience is likely to engage with the content they share, increasing the likelihood of the brand's message reaching a wider audience.

Build trust and credibility: Influencers have built trust and credibility with their followers, which makes them an effective way to promote a brand's products or services. Influencers' endorsement of a product can carry significant weight with their audience, as their followers trust their recommendations and opinions.

Improve engagement: Influencers can help improve engagement with the brand's target audience. By partnering with the right influencers, brands can create content that resonates with the target audience and encourages engagement, leading to increased brand awareness and sales.

From defining to measuring: 7 steps to get your influencer mapping started

Define - Whether generating more leads or sales, achieving higher engagement, or expanding your reach - whatever goal a brand wants to accomplish through an influencer marketing campaign, it should be the center of your influencer map. If you don't have a goal, you'll be clueless about which direction you should take your campaign ahead.

Identify - Now that you know what a brand wants to achieve from the campaign, the next step is to identify the industry's most influential and prolific influencers. You can also do this with accuracy and scale using influencer marketing platforms.

Shortlist - Once you have a list of all the key influencers, shortlist and then rank them based on the business objectives.

Analyze - Look at the kind of content the shortlisted influencers publish and find out their areas of interest. Deeply analyze their social media networks, common characteristics of their followers, and audience segmentation to understand who can be an excellent fit for the brand's campaigns.

Also read: Weekly Shorts: How brands are using hybrid models for influencer collaboration

Profile - Once you are done with the analysis, start building their detailed profiles, including engagement behavior, market, and background. For example, what kind of content do they prefer to share to engage with their followers and so on.

Map - Net, group the influencers based on certain characteristics, such as their authority, influence level, focus areas and overall social presence and footprint. This will create a map.

Measure - Once you decide on the influencers and a campaign begins, you must measure the results. By measuring the engagement level and participation effectiveness, you can determine the potential business impact of engaging them in marketing campaigns.

Influencer mapping helps build an efficient influencer strategy as it helps identify the right influencers, ensures cost-effective marketing, increases reach, establishes trust and credibility, and improves engagement with the target audience.

This week’s Weekly Shorts is written by the editorial team of affable.ai