Are you looking to increase your brand awareness? Great, because influencer marketing is one of the best ways to do it. In this blog post, we will reveal how to reach a new target audience with a digital behaviour, increase brand love and create more positive feelings towards your brand.
How to increase brand awareness with influencer marketing
When the marketing objective is to increase brand awareness, people tend to think it’s primarily about quantity instead of quality. To be seen frequently in their advertisements – it must be the most effective way to make people remember your brand, right? Well, not always. In order to make an impression on the receiver, relevance is key – and the relevancy is one of the biggest benefits with influencer marketing. A recommendation from an influencer is often equivalent to a personal recommendation from a friend, because followers value their opinions likewise. Your brand will be placed in a credible context (that is, if you work with the right influencer) and the marketing will be a natural element in the audience’s daily media consumption – instead of an intrusive interruption. Therefore, relevance is one of the most important reasons why influencer marketing is an effective marketing tool to increase brand awareness.
How do influencers increase brand awareness?
In today’s noisy media landscape, it’s more difficult than ever for brands to stand out in the crowd and make an impact. To build a strong brand, you need to be there for your target audience over the long term – just like a friendship, you can’t just pop up in their lives every now and then and believe that’s enough for them to have you top of mind. Instead, you need to have continuous presence, add value and be relevant depending on what their needs and wants are.
Does it sound complicated? Well, building a strong relationship to your audience, and eventually increase brand awareness, is not a walk in the park. But luckily, there are some smart ways to do it – for example by collaborating with influencers that already have a relationship to your audience.
Most influencers have spent many years on building a strong bond to their followers. By working with these influencers, you have the opportunity to tap into this relationship and put your message in their hands. When they talk about your company or your products, your message can get across in much stronger way compared to if you as a brand would say these things. For example, our recent research shows that 49% of consumers think an influencer recommendation is more trustworthy than a brand recommendation. The trust and the relationship are already there – all you need to do is to use this in a good way.
And remember – increasing brand awareness through influencer marketing is not done overnight. You need to work with the channel over the long term to make sure it’s credible and trustworthy – factors that are key to succeed.
Below are two more reasons why influencer marketing is a great way to increase brand awareness, when it comes to reaching new audiences and building brand love.
Instant reach of new target audiences
‘If your brand is already established on the market, you have probably worked with traditional media channels before, and doubtless invested some money into it. The biggest difference (and benefit) with influencer marketing, compared to TV or other traditional media channels, is that you will be able to be present in the audience daily life on their terms. What characterises today’s consumers is primarily their behaviour – they find recipes on Instagram and blogs instead of in cookbooks, they watch YouTube videos to compare vacuum cleaners and they read destination reviews on blogs rather than in a traditional travel magazine. To reach this modern and digital target audience with traditional media is difficult – but through influencer marketing, you will have the chance to increase brand awareness among new target audiences; especially among people that spend much time online.
Long-term brand awareness creates brand love
By collaborating with influencers over a long period of time, you have great opportunities to increase the positivity of your brand. Brand awareness can occur from several different perspectives. There are many big and well-known companies where the common perception of their brand is neutral or negative. Collaborating long-term with an influencer could lead to a more positive brand perception – because the audience relates to the influencer and trust their recommendations. In the long term, this can contribute to an increased so-called ‘brand love’. For the same reasons, the followers will likely tell their friends and family about the brand they were inspired by on social media, especially if you have a strong brand community in place. This engagement and the positive brand awareness can then spread organically and create buzz marketing (i.e. word-of-mouth of today’s digital generations).
Another important outcome is that customers generated via influencer marketing often have higher CLV (Customer Lifetime Value) than those generated via traditional media. It’s likely to be based on the fact that the customers, from the start, feel greater love and pride towards the brand.
Beyond increasing brand awareness, you have great opportunities to increases sales and establish your brand in new markets when working with influencer marketing. If you want to know more, contact our influencer agency experts or download our guide below to learn more about how to measure your success!
