With the rise of influencer marketing, companies have been successful in recruiting influencers to market their products to home-grown UK audiences and audiences overseas alike.
When investing in international marketing campaigns, managers need to know how effective the use of influencer marketing will be in the country that they are targeting. But it’s equally important (if not more so) to understand the reputation and impact of the words and the individuals themselves you’re using to build your brand overseas.
The team at Bubbles have a wealth of experience when it comes to professional language translation services and this includes working with companies to help them build a clear understanding of their social media marketing overseas.
Here are a few insights on influencer marketing if you’re approaching it from a global perspective.
What is influencer marketing all about?
With the advent of social media stars garnering huge followings, marketers have looked to tap into this popularity in order to reach greater audience numbers with their products and benefit from a positive association with certain influential individuals.
Influencer marketing is becoming a more powerful and mostly affordable tool compared to various traditional advertising methods when it comes to taking a new product to market. As consumers have become more distrustful of directed targeted advertisements, influencers have offered an alternative and possibly more personal approach to building connections with new brands and products.
What makes a good international influencer?
When you’re looking for a new influencer to market your brand – especially in an overseas market – don’t simply get caught up in their follower numbers.
Instead look at their ability to convince people to behave differently and the engagement on their posts. Whether they are speaking to a niche in terms of product range they promote, or whether they aim for a specific demographic or a wide and varied audience, the important thing is the strength of their connection with their followers – this is essentially what you’re buying.
For influencer marketing to be successful, whether at home or abroad, the influencer needs to have contextual credibility, reach and be able to influence people’s purchasing behaviour. The higher these three factors are, the better your chances will be of achieving success with an international influencer.
Contextual credibility
An influencer must have a high level of trust and authority, given to them by their audience. For example, a celebrated food blogger will need a high credibility when it comes to all things food or kitchen related.
Reach
This is purely about how many people that person can potentially connect with and … influence.
The good news is that influencers can have a multi-platform reach. This doesn’t just have to be an online, social media audience. Many influencers are also TV hosts or even writers, so your brand could also get publicity in other offline spaces if you play the game right.
Remember, there are also micro-influencers whom you may wish to consider reaching out to as part of organically growing your international marketing campaign. They will typically have a smaller reach, but will have high credibility with their audiences.
Salesmanship
A good influencer must demonstrate the ability to explain to their followers in a convincing way, the benefits of your product or brand with confidence. Sometimes this merely means the ability to model an item of clothing for their Instagram feeds, but it could also be their capacity to fully review and critique your product during a live video session.
Remember, in order to connect with their audience an influencer needs to speak that audience’s language! Look for French influencers for your French market and Chinese influencers for your Chinese market. It’s very rare that you will get a single influencer who will connect with a global market. The Kardashians might be just about the only exception here!
How to find an influencer abroad
The only way to find influencers – assuming that you don’t want to use an agency or special platform – is to build relationships with them yourself. Start out by targeting those who are currently posting or broadcasting about your industry that have relevancy to your business and international target market.
There are also free tools available to use, looking at social media, blogs and podcasts so take some time to look around the market.
One simple starting point is to reach out to those influencers who are already commenting on or using your products, or you can get creative by arranging to meet them at an international conference or event.
Should you use influencer marketing internationally?
The global market for Instagram influencer marketing is worth $1.6 billion (£1.25 billion) in 2018 alone and is projected to reach $2.8 billion in 2019. Influencer marketing is big business.
To be successful, you must first understand that each influencer also wants to be recognised. This is key to strengthening their brand as a popular figure or character in their industry. Their goal is often to gain more followers and enhance their credibility. So if you can find ways to support this you’ll get on well.
Influencers also like to be the first to break news in their field of expertise, so if you can offer this to them, then you’ll be able to develop a working relationship that is mutually beneficial to both of you.
But ‘relationship’ really is the key word here. Don’t pay for a couple of posts in an ad-hoc fashion.
You will need to invest time in building a genuine relationship with an influencer to get the best results. Make a plan to start well in advance of an international launch, and consider inviting them to your big events to gain that much-needed international exposure.
Wondering how to get the conversation started with an overseas influencer who doesn’t speak your language?
Bubbles offer professional language translation services tailored to your company’s requirements. We will make sure your business puts its best foot forward in all written communication. Contact us today to find out how we can help.
