Influencer Marketing: Case Studies and Strategies

To gain traction in a rapidly evolving digital world, brands need to stay on track with what is popular and trending. As social media expands, more companies are hurrying to invest in these interactive platforms to bolster their names. 

Your company will only grow when it has the attention of a wider audience. One of the best ways to achieve this is by using influencer marketing to promote your product or brand. In this article, we take a deep dive into what influencer marketing is, the strategies used, and the case studies of its success. 

What Is Influencer Marketing?

Social media is based on the popularity of specific accounts made by certain people. These people have a high number of followers who subscribe to their accounts. Influencer marketing tries to take advantage of this collection of followers by collaborating with these popular individuals to expand their brand’s reach.

The popular accounts – or influencers – will then promote whichever product or service your company pays them for. From Instagram and TikTok to YouTube, influencer marketing can be seen across almost every platform. In 2023, the influencer marketing industry is said to be valued at US$ 21.1 billion.

Influencer marketing mostly takes advantage of the way people frequently use social media and often base purchases on what brands they see being widely used. Using targeted advertising tactics, influencers will try to cater to the needs of specific audiences. For example, a makeup artist would be more likely to promote cosmetic brands while a game developer would promote computer brands. 

A consumer survey showed that 31% of social media users prefer to discover new products on social media through an influencer they follow over any other social format or channel. While companies have and still do rely on celebrity endorsements for products, the influencer market has gained more traction due to how much more relatable influencers can be to a wider audience.

How to Use Influencer Marketing 

While influencer marketing can be a great way to boost your brand, it needs to be carried out smartly. Many brand deals with influencers tend to damage companies when enacted poorly. These are some influencer marketing strategies you can follow to ensure your influencer marketing strategy goes well:

1. Know Your Audience: While this might seem like a fundamental step for any company, a lot of branding opportunities can be missed by companies misjudging their audience. When it comes to influencer marketing, you need to do thorough research into the type of content your target audience consumes. This will tell you the type of influencer you might want to collaborate with to drive engagement.   

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2. Using Incentives: Most influencers persuade consumers by offering unique discounts and incentives when using promo codes containing their names. This can also act as an incentive for the influencers themselves as more codes used with their name could result in a higher commission from the company. 

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3. Focus on Interaction: Many brand campaigns rely too much on simple advertising without giving consumers something to do. Try to work on promotional campaigns, raffles, and competitions with influencers that encourage consumers to name things they like about your product while following your company’s page and sharing your company’s profile to enter. This starts a conversation and generates traffic on your social media which will boost your brand across algorithms.

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4. Choose the Right Influencers: Naturally, your company will have to be sure about the people you collaborate with as they will be seen as an extension of your brand in the public eye. Try to choose professional and reliable influencers who can boost engagement without damaging your brand image.

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5. Budget Accordingly: Influencer marketing can be a very lucrative industry for many people. This is why your brand needs to understand the budget you have to work with. Some influencers have higher prices than others depending on the social media platform and the number of posts you require. Try to get an understanding of the going rates before investing in an influencer collaboration.

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6. Track and Evaluate Performances: Most social media platforms these days have analytics tools for business accounts that allow you to view the engagement, likes, and reposts. This can help you track how successful your influencer collaboration is and which areas need improvement. 

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For most brands, influencer marketing can be as simple as sending out PR packages and asking for a review. However, it takes a lot more to create engaging content that cements your brand as a leading name. Let’s look at some of the influencer marketing success stories we know of today. 

Influencer Marketing Case Studies 

Social media is crammed full of popular and trending accounts that have risen to fame in some way or the other. Most influencer accounts were approached by brands after establishing themselves in specific online communities. These are a few of the influencer marketing collaborations that have proven successful in the past:

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Subaru: Meet An Owner Campaign

In 2017, Subaru collaborated with up to 20 influencers in its “Meet an Owner” campaign centered around the launch of its 2017 Impreza car. Each influencer created posts about their experience with the car. Zach King was one of the popular social media stars to participate in the campaign as well.

Sourced from Zach King

Subaru also created a Meet An Owner landing page where the influencers and other Subaru car owners could share their thoughts and stories with the car. The campaign was wildly successful and generated nearly 2 million likes through 58 sponsored Instagram posts and 2.5 million views on YouTube. 

Gymshark 

This popular fitness and apparel brand leveraged influencer marketing to become a US$ 500 million business. Founded in 2012, the UK e-commerce company took to using influencer marketing to create buzz around the brand. Starting on YouTube, Gymshark collaborated with fitness influencers,  Nikki Blackketter and Lex Griffin.

Sourced from Nikki Blackketter

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These key influencer collaborations pushed many other influencers to invest in the start-up apparel brand and generated engagement for the brand.

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H&M: Fall Studio Collection

In 2017, popular retail clothing store H&M took to using influencer marketing to promote their fall studio collection. Fashion blogger Julie Sariñana and model Ela Velden participated in the promotional campaign – each posting themselves in the signature looks from the store.

Sourced from Sincerely Jules

This campaign helped to establish the brand as accessible yet still worn by the popular and famous in the fashion industry.

Samsung Note 7 Launch

In 2016, Samsung released its Note 7 smartphone and partnered up with CyreneQ, a professional Snapchat artist and designer with a huge subscriber base. She then documented her journey to the launch event and gave her audience a sneak peek of the new device. Using both Snapchat and YouTube, she posted reviews and showed her followers some of the device's new features.

Sourced from CyreneQ

Choosing influencer marketing to boost your brand is a great way for a company to reach a wider audience and accelerate growth. However, your brand will only go as far as the content you choose to promote. This is why TMG Global is here to provide comprehensive, insightful, and SEO-optimized content that amplifies your brand’s voice in the best way possible. Contact TMG Global today for a free content audit or to learn more about how we can help your business reach new heights.