The Power and Shortcomings of Influencer Marketing at Scale

Consumers Trust Influencers

Did you know that 63% of consumers trust influencers about brands more than they trust brands about brands? This has got to be one of the most undeniable proof points for the viability of peer to peer influence. Yet, so many brands still shy away from influencer marketing. This week we talk to David Armano about why you need to rethink this mindset.
The truth is that consumers are more likely to believe what they hear about a brand via word of mouth than what the brand says about themselves. Consumers listen to influencers because they trust them, and they’re entertained by them in some way. However, it’s not all sunshine and rainbows in the influencer space.
As David Armano cautions, the influencer marketing space has a lot of rampant fraud. Yes, brands can leverage influencers to get in front of the right audiences. But, technologies also have the power to drive fake followers and engagement using bot farms, which can damage the authenticity of the results.

In This Episode:

• 06:08 – How Edelman structures their social digital team
• 08:34 – How social campaigns have evolved over the last decade
• 15:36 – How much testing and experimentation brands should do in social digital
• 20:17 – How Edelman’s Trust Barometer works
• 25:07 – The relationship between influencer marketing and word of mouth
• 29:28 – How to assess whether a spokesperson is suitable for a brand promotion
• 35:48 – How issues in crisis communication has changed in the era of social

Quotes From This Episode:

“The price of operating in the social space is that it’s very iterative. You try something and then you know what worked and what didn’t, and you try it again. That’s the nature of the social space.” – @armano
Most of the influencers that we work with are paid or compensated in some way…but it's also about matching up your influencers with the right brand. So that it's not just transactional, because that comes through in their authenticity Click To Tweet
“Managing crisis is in three phases. It’s the initial damage control, then it’s the response, and then you can begin to do things that are meant to build trust back.” – @armano
 

Resources:

• Get the new State of Marketing report for free from Salesforce
• Find out more about the community at SocialMedia.org with a special form for Social Pros listeners
• Find out more about how Airtable can help you organize your work and get your free guide on how to use your social media calendar better
• Learn more about Edelman and how they can help you earn trust through communications
• Download the results from the 2019 Edelman Trust Barometer