Influencer marketing has evolved. No longer are we in the days of the wild west with brands searching endlessly on social media for influencers who have some relevance and may like to work with them.
We now have advanced influencer search tools, marketplaces, established creative processes and even dedicated influencer managers. Influencer marketing is well established and certainly here to stay.
In this article, we are going to explore 5 of the biggest benefits of influencer having management - both for brands and influencers.
Better Transparency
Influencer marketing has, in the past, been arguably the least transparent marketing tool.
Typically, when working with content creators such as copywriters and photographers or when buying media such as social media or search ads, brands get a clear idea of what they are paying, what they are getting and when it would be delivered.
In contrast, during the early days of influencer marketing pricing varied widely with influencers and brands struggling to grasp the true value that influencers brought to the table. Brands would also often struggle to pin influencers down in terms of deadlines and disputes over what was agreed would often arise.
The introduction of influencer managers has put an end to this issue. Managers are able to work with influencers to help them understand their value and are experts in communicating that value to potential brands. They can also help influencers manage their collaborations and set realistic timeframe expectations that all parties can agree to.
Due to their exposure to the wider influencer marketing space, influencer managers can be realistic about costs, ensuring that everyone gets a fair deal.
Simple Communication
As a brand, it can be tricky to communicate directly with influencers. Their inboxes can often be filled with brands keen to work with them and as they spend the majority of their time creating awesome content, they can have little time to reply.
When working directly with influencers you can spend weeks, even months trying to communicate only to learn that a collaboration won’t work. This is incredibly frustrating and time-consuming.
Influencer managers are experts in communication and can deal with a considerable number of enquiries without the influencers input. They will typically be able to share key information with potential brands such as rates, availability and preferred ways of working.
For influencers, this means that brands are well informed and vetted before being introduced for a potential collaboration. For brands, this means they can make decisions on influencer viability much faster than if dealing directly with the influencer.
Higher Levels of Professionalism
From influencers bad-mouthing the brands that are paying them to brands demanding unreasonable levels of service, anyone who has worked in influencer marketing for a while will have heard countless horror stories of influencers and brands acting badly.
As influencer marketing has become more established and widely understood, we do hear these stories less and less. This is largely due to the widespread adoption of influencer managers.
Influencer managers act as a professional ‘middle person’ who can keep things professional. This is beneficial for both influencers and brands. For example, an influencer manager can help by:
Maintaining consistent, clear communication between both parties
Working with brands to help them understand how an influencer can meet their needs
Helping brands create comprehensive briefs
Helping influencers understand brand briefs
Managing time scales
Clearly communicating expectations
Professionally managing disputes and issues
Better Creative Insight
Although reach and trust are key factors in its success, creativity is at the heart of influencer marketing. When brands work with influencers it is important for them to allow enough flexibility so that the influencer can be fully creative when creating content. If this isn’t achieved the content can often be stale and unnatural in nature.
An influencer manager will be able to offer brands valuable insight into how best to work with an influencer in order to get the best results. They will also have extensive experience of seeing other brands working with their influencers so can provide advice on what has and hasn’t worked well in the past.
Legal & Financial Considerations
Legal, regulatory and financial considerations are not the most interesting part of influencer marketing. That is why it can be highly beneficial to influencers and brands to deal with specialist influencer management.
The list of requirements set out by advertising regulators such as the ASA is growing every year. Transparency is becoming an increasingly scrutinised aspect of influencer marketing, with many authorities now requiring clear marking of paid adverts and gifted products or services.
Along with advertising regulations, there are a whole host of legal and financial obligations associated with being an influencer or working with them. These range from ensuring all money earned is reported for tax purposes to ensuring that no laws are broken during collaborations.
Many influencer managers have experience in dealing with the legal and financial side of influencer marketing and can do this on behalf of the influencer and the brand. This frees up brand time to work on wider marketing campaigns and allows influencers to focus on what they do best - creating high-impact content.
Matchmaking
When we think about influencer managers we often just think about a ‘middle person’ who helps ease the communication and interaction between a brand and a specific influencer. It is easy to overlook the fact that most influencer managers work with several influencers and what benefits this brings to the table.
For brands, when working with an influencer manager they can ask for tailored recommendations for influencers to work with. This can often lead to the brand finding well-matched influencers who they previously hadn’t considered.
For influencers, influencer managers can introduce them to relevant brands as well as help them network with other influencers for collaborations and future opportunities.
Influencer Management: Why Use Them?
In this article, we have outlined 5 great reasons why influencers should work with a professional manager. Whether saving time and stress with legal and financial requirements or providing a seamless line of communication, fundamentally all of this boil down to one thing - the fact that influencer managers make influencer and brand marketers lives significantly easier.
Written by Owain of Make It Mana