Four Ways to Know You've Found the Right Influencers

Reaching influencers online is not enough. You must reach the right influencers.

One byproduct of the social media and blogging revolution is that there are more influencers. Less than 20 years ago, you could reach out to editors of traditional media and a handful of online blogs and connect with everyone who mattered for the marketing plan of your business.

Today, however, the number of influencers has expanded and not all are equally valuable. You must select influencers wisely, and feed them just what they want.

Here are four ways to make sure you find success with your influencers outreach.

1. Look for the right communities

Just because an influencer has a large following, that doesn’t mean the audience is engaged and will take action on your product or message if it gets mentioned.

Look for influencers who have rallied a strong community where followers are engaged and interacting with the influencer. Things to look for include comments, retweets and shares, replies, and what is being said in response to the influencer’s thoughts.

2. Look for relevance

The influencer might have a large following that’s engaged, but will this audience care about your marketing message?

Good influencer communities are already talking about the topic you’re pitching, which is a fair indication that you’ve found a relevant influencer.

3. Look for those who further your campaign goals

Even if you have found the right influencers, they may be useless for your specific calls to action. It is important that you consider if the influencer and his or her community of followers will deliver the desired results for your marketing campaign.

List out your key performance indicators and check this list against the possible utility of your influencer. For instance, your KPI list might include backlinks, sales conversions, new email subscribers, social media shares and overall web site traffic.

4. Look for those with proven success

If you’ve worked with an influencer before and the results have been good, this is proven utility. Obviously, this influencer should be near the top of your list as opposed to those who are untested.

In the absence of a past relationship with the influencer, look at other businesses that the influencer has mentioned and try to see how that has benefited those businesses. Not all mentions are created equal, so be discerning and particularly aware of the metrics when trying a new influencer for the first time. Past success is a good indication of future results.

If you keep these four keys in mind, you’re much more likely to win at the ever-evolving influencer game. Don’t let your marketing campaigns run on auto-pilot. Make sure you have influencers that maximize your campaign.