In our line of work, we are lucky to work with PR and marketing professionals who are on the cutting edge of new techniques and strategies within the communications industry. With this in mind, we decided to ask Traackr users and non-Traackr users who are active in influence communications to share their unique perspective on the discipline of influencer discovery, engagement and measurement. The response was great, with more than 100 executive-level professionals sharing their insights and experiences.
The following ten influencer commandments were put together by Pierre-Loic Assayag, CEO of Traackr, in response to the insights gathered from those on the front-line of online influence.
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1. Spend Time to Find the Right Influencers
”3% of people online make 90% of the impact”
The top three goals for influencer discovery among our survey respondents were promoting a product, building relationships and research. Among the non-Traackr user respondents, the number one goal was research, while a significant amount of Traackr users found promoting their product to be the key goal in influencer discovery. Some may argue that building relationships generally leads to product promotion. Either way, it is apparent that influencer outreach is best utilized with relationship building rather than transactional conversations such as mass e-mailing free product give-a-ways.
2. Relevance Over Popularity
“Choose relevance over popularity. The most popular influencers on social media are often the least helpful in a social media campaign.”
Among Traackr users and non-Traackr users, the answer was unanimous – relevance drives influence. It’s what we’ve believed from the beginning, and it’s what leaders in the industry believe as well. Influence must be contextual in order to create value.
3. Use the Right Tools For the Job
“We use Google to find the most relevant keywords, Traackr to gain insights and Klout to validate Twitter.”
It’s no secret that there are a ton of platforms available to assist in influencer discovery. The challenge is figuring out what makes the most sense for your needs. In this survey, more than 10 different platforms were ranked as very important for finding influencers, with Google at #1. This comes as little surprise to us since Google is the most well-known and utilized search engine on the web. Despite its breadth of coverage, Google is probably not the most efficient tool for any type of influencer identification though. Looking for the right people for your campaign on Google could be compared to finding a needle in a haystack.
The Most Important Platforms to Find Influencers:
1. Google
2. Traackr
3. Twitter
4. Blogs
5. Klout
Challenges of Influencer Discovery
According to our findings, the main challenge of influencer discovery is the lack of time and resources. Finding the right tools for your business and figuring out how to best utilize them will require initial investment, but can help to greatly minimize this challenge in the long-term.
We also found that for non-Traackr users, selling benefits of influencer campaigns was equally as challenging as finding resources, whereas very few Traackr users found this to be an issue at all. It seems that by using a tool you can trust and know how to utilize, you are able to much more easily identify the value of influencer campaigns and have more success selling it.
4. Welcome Surprises
“Don’t discount the ‘little’ guy. Some of their one-to-one interactions are stronger than those of broadcasters. It only takes a pebble to start an avalanche.”
We couldn’t have said it better ourselves. Not only should you not discount the little guys for the power they have now, but for the power the could potentially have in the future. There was a great post written about this by Christopher Penn. We’ve also written about Robert Llewellyn, an influencer that surfaced on Honda UK’s A-list with very high relevance, but low reach, who went on to become one of the largest hybrid car voices in the UK. You can read more about Robert here and the Honda campaign here.
5. Be strategic
“Tools and technology are a good place to start, but we always need the human element.”
When you’re planning your influencer campaign, it’s important to have a clear goal in mind. The discovery aspect is only step one. After this, you have to figure out how to engage in a meaningful way and measure your efforts. You need to do all of this in the context of what your goals are and you should plan to keep re-iterating those goals because you probably aren’t going to get it right the first time around.
6. Be Timely and Aware
WhoRetweetedMe.com
Need we say more?
In a world where everything moves at lightning speed and everyone is constantly looking to create the next best thing, slip-ups are bound to happen. It’s important to stay timely and relevant to the influencers you are reaching out to, as well as making sure what you’re doing supports your campaign efforts.
Oh, and in case you’re wondering, Hubspot, the company that released whoretweetedme.com, did end up changing it to WhoTweetedMe.com. 
7. Build a Relationship
“It’s a marriage, not a date”
Engagement Success Criteria
Traackr Users Non-Traackr Users
1. Provide value 1. Be relevant
2. Be relevant 2. Have a compelling story
3. Be genuine 3. Craft good content
Once again, relevance – whether it is for finding the right influencers, or for engaging with them – is among the most important criteria for communications pros.
Another worthwhile note here is that Traackr users have found that providing direct value to influencers is the most important part of building relationships. Many of our clients have successfully engaged with people they wouldn’t have thought of engaging with before either because they didn’t know about their relevance in the industry, or just didn’t think they’d be able to connect. However, with so much information at your fingertips, you simply need to find what value you can provide to them while never forgetting to stay transparent. If you believe sending out press releases and doing follow-up calls with 100 journalists will provide anywhere near the same value as building solid relationships with just a few people, you’re sorely mistaking.
8. Be Creative, Experiment
“Use subject matter experts, not marketers, to engage. No marketing-speak: be authentic.”
You’re going to fumble along the way and that’s ok. It’s still important to continue to experiment.
In past years, the practice of sharing client news via press release and websites was common. Nowadays it’s about the experience you present to an influencer, not the news you have to share with them. Influencers generally have a community they foster through their blogs, vlogs, micro-blogs, etc. and anything you can offer to them that will benefit and interest their community is something they will appreciate and be much more likely to use. Think about creative ways to turn the news you have into something valuable and exciting for the influencers you are reaching out to.
9. No Silver Bullet, No Black Magic
“Success is for those who show up” ~Woody Allen
There’s rarely a silver bullet to any problem in business, so why would influencer communications be any different? With the web, things are, at times, very confusing and complex. Unfortunately the possibility of a silver bullet is highly unlikely because of this. There’s nothing secret about this though – it’s hard work on everyone’s side.
Anyone that tells you you’re going to do a great campaign with minimal effort is lying. Business doesn’t work this way – hype does.
10. Measure What Matters
“Define and communicate your goals and make sure your measurement aligns with your business objective.”
With clear and defined goals, you can accurately measure the success of your campaign.
Most Important Measurement Metrics:
1. Engagement metrics
2. Website Traffic
3. Brand Mentions
4. Sale
5. Sentiment
For any given campaign, you don’t need to track all five of these things, just track the most important.
This is completely objective, though, and the measurement for your campaign may include none of these. For instance, Shonali Burke’s #bluekey campaign counted tweets with the hashtag, site traffic and blue key purchases as their measures of success. These metrics made sense for this campaign, but make sure you figure out what makes sense for yours.
0. Drive with a Business Goal, Not Hype
Ok, we cheated a little. There is an eleventh commandment, and it’s perhaps the most important one.
The drive behind your business and actions shouldn’t be for hype. It should be for the right reasons. When you start thinking about influence engagement, ask yourself two questions:
1. “Why am I doing this?”
2. “How will I measure success?”
Once you’ve figured these things out, you’re well on your way to a successful campaign.
Do you agree with these? Is there a 12th commandment you’d add to this? Let us know!
