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Generative AI is everywhere now. You see it in content, campaigns, customer experiences, and even internal workflows. It promises speed, scale, and efficiency, but there’s a harder question sitting underneath all that progress; Do your audiences actually trust it?

Trust in the Age of AI: What Consumers Really Think About AI Generated Content

Today, PR teams aren’t just tracking media coverage and share of voice. They’re also measuring how their brand shows up in AI-generated answers, search summaries, and large language models (LLMs). This new LLM visibility layer is quickly becoming a critical part of PR performance.

15 Must-Have PR KPIs and How to Track Them

See how one platform can power every decision across PR, communications, and marketing.

The Meltwater Blog

Blog Topics: Generative Engine Optimization, Media Intelligence, Media Relations, Social Listening, Consumer Intelligence, Influencer Marketing

Find out how you can leverage Facebook to boost your brand's online presence and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

Facebook Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage Instagram to boost your brand's visual appeal and gain a competitive edge. Explore our category page today!

Instagram Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage LinkedIN to grow your professional network and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

LinkedIn Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage TikTok to elevate your brand with creative content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

TikTok Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage X / Twitter to engage your audience effectively and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

X / Twitter Blog | Meltwater

Find out how you can leverage YouTube to create engaging video content and gain a competitive edge. Explore the Meltwater category page today!

YouTube Blog | Meltwater

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) is transforming how brands show up in AI-powered search. Explore insights, strategies, and best practices to help your content rank and resonate across conversational engines like ChatGPT, Gemini, and Copilot.

Explore insights and strategies for Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) to help your brand stay visible and discoverable in AI-powered search.

Generative Engine Optimization (GEO) Blog Collection | Meltwater

Every day billions of conversations take place on social media: tweets, posts, comments, blogs, reviews, podcasts, and much more.
Learn how to use social listening to make sense of all of that data.

On our social listening category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around social listening and social media monitoring. Read more.

Social Listening Blogs | Category

Business Reputation Management: What does it take to add reputation management to your marketing strategy? More importantly, how do you keep your reputation sparkly and shiny? Here’s your all-access guide to online reputation management for the long term.

On our reputation management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around business reputation management. Read more.

Reputation Management Blogs | Category

From your brand's logo to your website, your social media presence to your customer support—these elements combined are what constitutes a brand in the minds of customers. But, there are thousands of other businesses that have a logo, website, social media presence, and website. So, how can you position your business on the market and make it stand out from the competition?
The key to success is branding & brand management!

On our brand management category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around brand management. Build your strategy and reach your goals!

Brand Management Blogs | Category

Competitive intelligence and the act of collecting competitive data can be seen as growth drivers for a company. Our guide will help you understand the concept of competitive intelligence (CI) by answering questions such as: What is the definition of competitive intelligence? How is competitive intelligence useful to organizations? What is the goal of competitive intelligence? And more.

On our competitive intelligence category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around competitive intelligence. Learn how to stay ahead.

Competitive Intelligence Blogs | Category

Let’s dive into the customer journey framework and how to optimize the process by creating a customer journey map and using metrics that matter when analyzing the customer journey.

On our customer journey category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Customer Journey Blogs | Category

What Is Data Analytics? [Beginner’s Guide 2023]
How can I grow my business? 
How do customers interact with my newly launched product?
How do I increase the productivity of my employees?
How do I know if my marketing efforts are working?
We have just two words for you...Data analytics!

On our data analytics category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around AI and data analytics. Technical and still easy to understand.

AI & Data Analytics Blogs | Category

Public relations and media relations can add impact to any marketing strategy. It’s an opportunity for brands to grow their reach beyond traditional sales messages. PR helps to shape the image you want people to have of your brand.
So, what is PR and how do you use it? This guide shows you everything you need to know to build a strong public relations foundation.

On our public relations (PR) category page, you find all our blogs covering public relations and communications topics. Step up your PR game.

Public Relations (PR) Blogs | Category

We all know exactly what the roles of sales or accounting are in a company, right? We might even have a slight idea of what the IT guys are doing.
But there is another business discipline, that plays a crucial role in organizations, even more so during the pandemic – internal communications!
But what exactly do we mean by that, what purpose does it serve and what steps can you take to ensure you and your employees will communicate effectively?

On our internal communications category page, you find all our blogs about internal comms topics. Learn about the intranet, internal newsletters, and more.

Internal Communications Blogs | Category

As the internet has taken root in more areas of our lives — everything from entertainment to shopping to paying bills and more — traditional marketing is becoming less impactful. As any marketer knows, you need to focus on where your audience is if you want to reach them. Since the average person spends about seven hours a day online, it’s no surprise that content has maintained its hold on marketers.

Here's a closer look at what content marketing is and why it matters more than ever in our digital-first economy.

On our content marketing category page, you find blogs about content marketing topics. Learn about strategies, KPIs, tips, and more. Make your content king!

Content Marketing Blogs | Category

The rise of the influencer marketing space – today a $10 billion industry, growing 50% per year – is one of the clearest examples of how social media is transforming traditional marketing. These days having a business website, presence on social, PR coverage, and your own content isn’t enough to compete.
We'll dive into the intricacies of influencer marketing to help ensure that you're equipped with the insights needed to be successful in this space.

On our influencer marketing category page, you find blogs about influencer marketing topics. Build your strategy, find influencers, and measure results.

Influencer Marketing Blogs | Category

Have you just launched a new product or service that you want to get the word out about? Maybe you want to share with consumers why it is awesome and how it is so much better than the one your competitors offer.

Well, then, there is one thing you can't do without...Marketing!

On our marketing category page, you find blogs about marketing topics. Learn about all the different angles and types of marketing and improve your results.

Marketing Blogs | Category

In this guide, we want to give you a peek into the definition of social media management, the daily schedule of a social media manager, social media platforms to promote your business, and the do’s & don’ts of social media management.
Are you ready to begin the journey of becoming a social media superstar?

On our social media management category page, you find blogs about social media management topics. Build and manage your online community.

Social Media Management Blogs | Category

Building a following and using social media platforms to reach a wider audience requires a well-planned social media marketing strategy. In this guide, we’ll be looking at why social media marketing is so essential and how you can make it work for your business.

On our social media marketing category page, you find blogs about social media marketing topics. Learn how to get the highest paid social ROI!

Social Media Marketing Blogs | Category

In the fast-evolving realm of digital marketing and public relations, utilizing the right tools is crucial for success. Our interdisciplinary category showcases all the pertinent tools for digital marketing & PR. These tools help in enhancing your online presence and effectively reaching target groups, whether through reputation management, influencer marketing, or social media management.

On our digital marketing and PR tools category page, you find all our blogs covering topics around mapping and understanding the customer journey.

Digital Marketing & PR Tools Blogs | Category

Creating and maintaining your social media presence as a business, without a clear plan or budget, could result in a social media fail. Whether major or minor, a snafu on social can be catastrophic for brands if not dealt with properly, so knowing how to avoid them is key to a thriving social media strategy. This post outlines common social media mistakes to look out for, that can stymy your brand. Once you're ready to build a robust social program, download our ebook, Driving Growth With Social.

Social media is a big opportunity for most organizations, whether they are B2B or B2C, or whether they operate online or from a physical location. And while the theory of social media is simple (i.e. if I write great content, people will want to engage with it), the execution is not quite as straightforward. 

Here are some common mistakes that are made on social media that you should do your best to avoid:

1. Thinking All Social Media Platforms Are the Same

2. Not Having a Plan, or a Company-wide Social Media Policy

3. Always Selling, Ignoring Messages or Complaints

4. Not Taking Advantage of Social Media Marketing Tools

5. Focusing on the Quantity of Likes and Follows, Rather Than the Quality

To the novice social media marketer, most social media platforms may look and feel the same. Users have profiles and post status updates, videos, thoughts, complaints, photos of their food, and links to their favorite sites. 

But it would be unwise to treat all social media platforms the same, because they aren’t. Each channel targets different demographics and some of them also function very differently. For example, YouTube is for posting videos while Instagram is the most visual-forward platform overall, ideal for photos and short-form videos. Twitter remains the king of micro-blogging and LinkedIn is the place for business thought-leadership and professional community building. 

With this in mind, you don’t want to spread yourself too thin by being present on all social media platforms. Rather than creating accounts on Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube, you should focus your efforts on one or two network to start with – the one where you are most likely to engage your audience (and they with you). Is your audience really interested in your content across all the social networks? Are you sure? All of them?!

If you don’t know what you want to achieve with social media, how can you possibly hope to achieve it? Do you want your account to drive traffic, entertain, be a customer service channel, be a PR platform, or something else?

Also, there’s a pretty solid chance that nearly every one of your employees is on some type of social media platform. Whether they’re posting on Facebook or blogging, they’re talking, and they might be talking about your company.

Nothing is ever truly private on the Internet, even on a private social media account. Some things that your employees post or share may end up coming back to bite you, especially if they’re talking about product or service plans. If your employees are bad-mouthing your company, it's not a good look. 

Establish a company social media policy and ensure that everyone reads through it and signs it. Outline what is appropriate to post and what is not appropriate, and when you’re discussing a new product or service launch, make sure your employees know that discussing it on social media will be considered a breach of contract. Use our handy template for drafting employee social media guidelines to get started.

Social media is all about engaging the end user — and nothing disengages people more than feeling like they're simply part of a transaction. That’s not to say that you can never sell on social, you just need to earn the right by posting other non-sales content. And make sure you pick your moment carefully, unlike these guys.

Almost all social media sites have a way to send and receive personal or direct messages, and they allow other users and brands to tag one another. Users can also write public messages on your business page’s Facebook page or Tweet at you on Twitter. While the majority of your feedback will probably be positive or neutral, you may face some problems with complaints from users who are upset with your company.

The worst thing you can do is ignore these posts. It comes off as cowardly to your followers and it makes you look guilty by default.

For every complaint you receive, you have the opportunity to turn the complaint into a positive experience and show your customers that you do care. Address the problem directly and make it clear that you are sorry and want to rectify the situation. Never engage in an argument or try to win it. If a customer gets out of hand and begins using rude or defamatory language, you can attempt to move the conversation to a private exchange rather than continue the discussion in the comments section. This shows you are actively attempting to resolve the issue. 

Most of the big social media platforms have their own marketing tools that businesses can use to reach out to new prospects and retarget lost visitors. To some marketers though, ignorance is bliss, and they’d rather not mess with social media advertising and concentrate on Google Adwords. 

Analytics packages for the 3 ‘old’ social networks: Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn are pretty good to help you learn more about your presence on each platform. You should invest time looking at analytics to see where you could improve your social media offerings. And if your social media accounts drive traffic to your website, then it makes sense to continue posting. Checking your web analytics will also give you insight into which social channel converts to page views.

With Facebook advertising, for example, you can post advertisement banners along the sides of the newsfeed and promote your website, an offer or even an upcoming webinar or trade show. You can search for users with Facebook Audience by their geographical location, age, gender or even hobby, which will allow you to put your hand directly into the hands of those who need them the most.

But to really peek under the hood, and strategize based on what the metrics are telling you — across all the platforms you use, a more comprehensive analytics solution is necessary.

Social shares and followers are important, but are your followers actually clicking through to the content you’re sharing? How deeply engaged are they with your content? There are a million reasons why a person might like your page, but just because they liked your page doesn’t mean they want to buy from you. 

Marketing Land reports that while “social media enthusiasts” account for 85% of a brand’s social media interaction, they make up only 29% of a brand’s audience. Furthermore, many are designated as “dabblers” and “lurkers” rather than buyers. Digging into your metrics will help you better understand whether your brand is only connecting superficially with these dabblers and lurkers, or truly translating into deeper relationships and ultimately more sales.

At the end of the day, social media is about building customer relationships so that they will want to buy from you, but if your message is going out to people who never wanted to be your customer in the first place, then you’re wasting your time and efforts.

Remember, a “like” doesn’t equal a sale. Focus on building brand loyalty and awareness with the real customers who are connecting with you on social media, and you’ll be more likely to convert followers into buyers. 

Also, don’t buy followers. It never works. Ever. And it completely defeats the whole point of social media. You should be focused on your reach rather than your audience size. Just because they are following you, doesn’t mean they are listening. And if you buy followers, they are not listening and most likely, not real people.

With all the cool things you can do on social media, there are those who get just a little too wrapped up in it. If you’re guilty of a few of these overdoing-it crimes, check yourself before you wreck yourself. 

You should consider your audience when you are posting. Would they be interested in what you are saying? If you are using one platform to talk about your products, your sports team, your family, and your politics, you are doing it wrong. You should approach posting as your business through a more strategic and focused lens if you want to achieve success on social.

The number of times that you post per day should differ by social network
The lifespan of a Tweet is far smaller than the lifespan of a Facebook post, for example. So, spend some time working out what frequency you can commit to and dig into your analytics to find out when your audience is most likely to be online – this will maximize your reach.

Posting too frequently
There is definitely some merit to the saying, “too much of a good thing.” Even if your followers like your posts and engage with them, posting too frequently may result in unfollows and a decrease in engagement. Post no more than two or three times a day, if necessary, and try to space out your posts. Check out our guide to the best times to post on social for some helpful tips.

Liking too frequently
As a business, you shouldn’t really be liking your followers Tweets or posts unless they specifically mention you or your product or service

Posting too much through automation
Automation tools are great scheduling in advance and having a steady stream of content prepared. They're also very helpful for reaching audiences that are in different time zones. But it's a good idea to sprinkle in real-time posts with your automated posts to assure your readers that you’re authentic and a real person is behind your social media strategy. Responding to trending news is and memes is a great way to incorporate real-time posting. 

7. Ignoring Evergreen Content & Third Party Sharing

In order to build a steady audience, you need consistent posts to drive interaction and interest. What matters most is both the quality and consistency of the posts. Short on content? It's a common problem, and many companies make the mistake of thinking they only need push new articles out on social; when in fact you have a huge library of evergreen content to pick from. Repurpose or update an older post to re-share on social. The benefit here is you can compare how it performs against the previous time it was shared. Experiment with switching up the post copy or image used to see what your audience responds to. 

Another option for content to fill your calendar with is sharing third-party articles and thought-leadership pieces from your industry. This helps break up your profile and illustrates to your followers that you're actively involved in learning and appreciating everything going on in your sector.  

If the main purpose of your social media posts is to increase brand awareness and drive traffic to your website, it’s important to consider what customers see first when they visit your profile.

Make sure your profile picture / logo is accurate and up to date, and that your header image does the best job of helping explain who you are, welcoming people to your social profile.

“Social media marketing provides a tremendous opportunity to drive traffic to your B2B website. You can optimize your profiles with a detailed description of your company and a link that directs back to your site,” advises Emily Ahlbum of online marketing company Emagine.com. “It’s also important to know that social media content is now indexed by search engines. So be sure to consider each Tweet or status update as a piece of content that can be optimized for search engines.”

Depending on your industry or the services you offer, your audiences’ demographics may vary vastly. Tech start-ups tend to comprise of a younger audience, while established local business owners may skew a little older. For example, the 25-34 age group is the largest age group on social media, but not by much.

“Facebook, Google+, Twitter, Instagram, and Pinterest fall into this category. Millennials age 18-24 consist of the most users on SnapChat, and Tumblr. LinkedIn is the odd-one-out, with 35-44-year-olds leading the way,” explains Tyler Becker on Social Media Week.

Knowing who your audience is and where they are can save you time and money. Use a social listening tool to uncover where people are already talking about you on social media, and in what context!

In this day and age of social media marketing, many times you never get to see your client face-to-face. Your calling card is your social media shares, and your storefront is your website landing page. With this in mind, consider working with a social media marketer to get the cleanest campaign with the best results. Sloppy posts, not scheduling posts in advance, or inconsistent messaging invalidates the integrity of your company and decreases viewer click-through rates.

Ready to plan a social media program that avoids these common social media mistakes? Fill out the form to demo some social media tools that will help ensure your social strategy soars. 

10 Common Social Media Mistakes

What’s your go-to container for your favorite beverage? Mug, bottle, insulated tumbler with a straw? Whatever it is, grab some water and settle in — today, we are taking a closer look at the phenomenon of the viral Stanley tumbler. 

Marketers have a lot to learn from the success of this once-overlooked drink vessel. We used the Meltwater Media Intelligence Suite to get the numbers on the cup everyone is talking about.

Not to be confused with the hockey championship trophy of the same name, Stanley cups are stainless steel tumblers sold by the Stanley drinkware company. Formally known as the Quenchers, they first went on the market in 2016 but didn’t become big sellers until 2020, when they became a hit on social media. Two years later, they saw a 275% year-over-year increase in sales. Today, Stanley tumblers may very well be the most popular cup in the world — at least when it comes to online conversation. 

Sales of reusable bottles have been on the rise for years, giving birth to other retail hits like the Nalgene bottle, the Hydro Flask, and the S’well bottle. 

The Stanley Quencher stands apart for being huge (it comes in 14-, 20-, 30-, 40-, and 64-ounce versions), highly insulated, extremely durable, having a handle and straw, and coming in a wide range of standard and limited-edition colorways. Together, those qualities make the cup an accessory to keep at hand all day.

The Stanley Quencher first became a trendy bestseller in 2022. That year, The Wall Street Journal, which deemed it “the new office status symbol,” reported that the company’s waitlist for the bottle was 150,000 customers long. 

That success came after Stanely radically changed its marketing strategy. After seeing one shopping blog’s success in selling the cup to its female audience, the company pivoted from marketing the cup primarily to outdoors enthusiasts and workmen to targeting millennial and Gen-Z women. From there, sales took off, and the cup became part status symbol, part collector’s item. 

Stanley then introduced a revamped version of the cup, the Quencher H2.0, in late 2022, paving the way for new levels of virality in 2023.

What does the Stanley cup online conversation look like?

We used our social listening and analytics solution to analyze the Stanley tumbler conversation from January 15, 2023, through January 15, 2024. Over those 12 months, mentions of the cup were almost 900% higher than those in the previous period.

As our analysis shows, online conversations about the cup spiked on November 17, 2023, at more than 20,600 mentions. This was largely thanks to an internet user who posted a video of her Stanley Quencher that survived a car fire. In the video, she revealed that the cup still had ice in it, a testament to its superior insulation.

Stanley responded in what was perhaps the best retail PR move of 2023 — offering to buy the woman a new car. The story spread across social media and was picked up by traditional media outlets in the United States and abroad. 

As a result, “fire” became one of the top keywords in the overall conversation.

Mentions of the cup spiked again on December 28, 2023; that day, the top keyword in the Stanley conversation was “Crocs”.

This was due to a viral tweet that highlighted that the current Stanley CEO, who took the tumbler from the verge of discontinuation to retail success, previously worked at the footwear company.

Most recently, the conversation spiked on January 5, 2024, when Forbes, The Washington Post, and The New York Times all published articles about the Stanley phenomenon on the heels of the company’s viral collaboration with Starbucks. 

The special-edition “Galentine’s Collection” of tumblers launched in Target stores on January 4, prompting fans to camp outside of the retail locations — and even tussle with each other — for a chance to buy the $49.95 cups. As a result, mentions of Starbucks in the Stanley tumblers conversation increased by more than 800% compared to the previous two weeks. 

Stanley cups have a large and enthusiastic following, but our analysis shows that the sentiment of the overall conversation is mixed.

One of the most engaged positive mentions came from this viral Reddit post showing a girl crying and hugging her father after receiving one of the tumblers as a gift.

Meanwhile, one of the most-engaged negative mentions also came from Reddit via a post from someone who doesn’t understand what the hype is all about.

As our AI-powered content clusters tool identified, Stanley cup-related incidents of school bullying, as well as injuries related to the Target launch, have also contributed to negative sentiment about the product and the craze surrounding it. 

What can marketers learn from the Stanley cup craze?

First and foremost, the rise of the Stanley cup shows that brands see success when they follow the lead of their audiences. Had the company continued to pursue the outdoors segment instead of millennial and Gen-Z women, we wouldn’t be talking about it today.

Next, the success of Stanley cups shows just how crucial social media is to attracting attention and building an aesthetic around a product. Partnering with influencers and celebrities who highlighted the cup as a lifestyle product rather than a strictly utilitarian one was key to its success. For example, our analysis shows that mentions of #ad in the Stanley cups conversation from January 15, 2023, through January 15, 2024, were 4,480% higher than those during the previous 12 months. (That random car fire helped, too!)

The brand’s partnership with country star Lainey Wilson has proved particularly successful, with a recent collaborative Instagram post racking up more than 131,000 likes.

If you’re looking for a Stanley cup-like boost to your bottom line, start by using social and media intelligence to see where your audiences are and how they are connecting with your brand. See how the Meltwater Suite can take the guesswork out of your marketing by scheduling a demo today.

The Stanley Cup Craze — a Social Listening Analysis

In 2024, the influencer marketing industry is estimated to be worth an impressive $22.3B. There’s no doubt about influencer marketing’s role in today’s digital marketing ecosystem. To grab a slice of this market, brands need to think and act strategically. That’s where our free influencer strategy template can come in handy.

Understanding the intricacies of what makes influencer marketing work will become more important as the market grows. To do this, it’s helpful to examine all of the moving parts of influencer marketing and how they connect to each other to form a complete strategy. 

If you’re thinking of getting in on this unique and powerful marketing channel, you’re not alone. But before you can begin you need a strong influencer marketing strategy. 

While the notoriety of internet personalities is appealing, you can’t simply chase after campaign success by partnering with someone who happens to have a large audience.  Understand how to find the right influencers to partner with and stay aligned on your business goals with a comprehensive influencer strategy.

Are you ready for a deep, deep dive into influencer marketing strategy? We recommend making yourself a cup of coffee, because there's a lot to take on-board here: 

Answer Big Questions Early in the Process

Why You Need an Influencer Marketing Strategy

How to Create an Influencer Marketing Strategy

Examples of Successful Influencer Campaigns

Influencer marketing should be an important component of your marketing strategy. It involves partnering with individuals who have a strong following on social media and arranging promotions of your products from their platform. These promotions can come in a wide variety of styles - they may be sponsored posts, paid promotions, or other types of arrangements. Influencers cover a wide range of topics and can be found on a number of social networks, from YouTube to TikTok to Instagram. Successful influencer marketing relies on the influencer’s voice and their relationship with their audience. 

Tip: Don’t make the mistake of thinking an influencer marketing strategy isn’t for you if you’re not in one of the sexier spaces that are rampant on Instagram like fashion and food! Influencers run the gamut from health care to astronomy.

Maintaining their authenticity and trust from followers is going to strengthen how your brand is perceived, so as tempting as it might be, marketers need to resist micro-managing the style and delivery of an influencer's message. You can and should have control over the talking points of course, and make sure a final approval process is in place. 

You can better target your efforts once you answer bigger questions, such as budgets and goals. 

For example, your goals will determine the following:

The types of influencers you will work with

Budget is also a big part of an influencer strategy. It could be the difference between choosing an influencer with 10K followers (nano-influencer or micro-influencer) or 100K followers (macro-influencer). Or it could mean the difference between working with 10 influencers or just one. 

Deciding on budget early in the process will help to guide these and other key decisions.

A well-thought-out influencer strategy will help keep all your internal stakeholders aligned, as well as keep the partnerships running smoothly. The stronger your strategy, the stronger your relationship will be with the influencers and may lead to multiple collaborations.

56% of brands use the same influencers across different campaigns, For more stats, check out our blog on influencer marketing statistics.

Influencers help brands gain exposure to audiences they may not have otherwise. In return, brands pay influencers or compensate them with free products and perks. However, brands have to make sure to find influencers who have the best fit for their campaign or strategy.

But what makes audiences connect with these influencers in the first place?

What really sets social influencers apart from other types of endorsers, like celebrities, is their relatability. Despite their impressive followings, influencers still seem like ordinary people who their followers can easily relate to. 

They post about everyday life, are easy to get a hold of — some reply to every single comment and direct message they receive — and often share the same interests and demographics as their followers.

It’s human nature to be swayed by our close friends and family. That's part of why consumers are 92% more likely to trust their peers over traditional advertising when it comes to purchasing decisions. 

Influencers offer a more human kind of recommendation. Their follower count, likes, comments, and shares add social proof to the equation.

If you like working with an influencer and their numbers are strong, it is highly advisable to work with them more than once. This way their followers learn to trust what’s being advertised, so while they may not have converted to a customer the first time, seeing your brand name associated with an influencer several times will keep you top of mind. 

Their followers will also be able to acknowledge that you are helping keep the influencers lights on - allowing them to continue creating the content they love. 

We've laid out all the important facets your influencer strategy needs to include to be successful.

TIP: Map out your influencer marketing strategy as far in advance as possible in order to build relationships with potential partners. 

You can get more specific closer to the actual campaign date but have a rough outline based on product releases and marketing initiatives that you have planned for the year.

This gives you time to develop a natural rapport with potential influencers in your space by liking their posts and leaving comments. For example, if you know you’re releasing a new lipstick line in the spring, you can start interacting with fashion and makeup influencers in January.

Then when it’s time for the “ask” they’ll already know who you are, and know that you’ve enjoyed their content. This process also gives you time to keep tabs on their style, flag any inconsistencies, as well as get a sense of how engaged their followers are.

Building a Successful Influencer Marketing Strategy

When crafting your influencer marketing strategy, first and foremost you need to understand what you’re trying to achieve. Many companies use influencers for brand awareness, growing their subscriber base, or if it’s a product-specific campaign, your goals will probably be tied to the number of purchases.

Strategizing and careful planning is one of the most important stages of a campaign. It is when you determine the Why and What of your campaign. Why are you running a campaign, and what do you hope to accomplish? The first step of this is to identify your campaign goal(s). A campaign can have a single goal, or it can have multiple goals. Here are common outcomes brands hope to achieve when running an influencer marketing campaign:

Brand Awareness - a campaign with a brand awareness goal is aimed at familiarizing potential customers with your product. It will help you establish your brand as a clear player in your industry, and put you on the radar of an extended network. While there are no clear KPIs for quantifying brand awareness, making your brand synonymous with your industry is a true indicator of brand success.

Have you ever heard someone say, “Wow, I could use a Coke?” But, they don’t necessarily mean a Coca Cola, they just want a soda. This is because Coca Cola has such strong brand awareness that for many people it represents all soda.

Site Traffic - many influencer campaigns are targeted to bring more website traffic. This is a very realistic goal, as influencer audiences are highly engaged. Generating traffic from this network is relatively easy. But, it is important to determine how traffic will be measured. For example, this would require having a bitly link that all influencers will use, that can be easily tracked.

Conversions - if you’re running an eCommerce campaign and you would like to boost sales through your influencers, then your goals should be conversions. Many influencer campaigns are used to generate sales and customers. Similar to a campaign targeting Site Traffic, it is important to have a method for tracking influencer conversions as well as incentivizing sales. One great way to boost sales and track conversions is through Coupon Codes.

Think about how you will measure the success of those goals. You need solid KPIs clearly laid out for both you and the influencer partner so that everyone is on the same page when it comes to how the success of the partnership will be measured. This is important not only for the internal reporting of the brand but will also give you a clear indication of whether or not you should work with the influencer again in the future.

Engagement - a lot of influencer marketing campaign reporting relies on qualitative results. Even though an engagement doesn’t necessarily correlate to a website visit, a new email subscriber, or a purchase, it is an important measure of brand awareness. These KPIs will include things such as post likes, impressions, shares, comments, and brand mentions.

Web traffic - if your campaign agreement with the influencer includes link sharing, you’ll definitely want to track traffic to your website through those link(s). Once the campaign goes live and you see a bump in traffic, you could surmise that the influencer helped create the spike, but it’s impossible to know for sure. Some good ways to increase the accuracy for this KPI include asking visitors how they heard about you, but the best way is with a UTM code. This helps you not only see the volume of traffic from the influencer's link but can also show you more information about their user journey.   

Purchases - promo codes are a nice perk for buyers headed to your site to make a purchase. But they serve another purpose as well. They make it easy to attribute a purchase to a particular influencer and campaign.

As with most marketing campaigns, you’ll need to decide who you’re talking to with your influencer marketing. Influencers tend to have very niche audiences; that’s part of what makes them so effective in marketing. They’re speaking to a large group of people who share a particular interest. The influencer is seen as someone who is credible and authoritative on that topic.

One of the key benefits of influencer marketing is the ability to target niche audiences. When planning your influencer marketing campaign it is important to understand who you would like to connect with. Here are some questions to ask that can help you determine your audience:

Another critical element of identifying your influencer audience is the location. It is important to understand that the location of an influencer does not necessarily indicate the location of an influencer’s audience. If you’re aiming to target users in a specific region, check an influencer’s demographics to ensure they align with your goals.

Once you have determined the audience you would like to target, these parameters can be used to identify influencers with a matching audience.

Your job is to figure out what type of audience you want to speak to in your campaign. Once you know your audience, you can start searching for influencers whose audience aligns with your needs.

Another big decision, budgeting will help to set the tone for the rest of your influencer marketing campaign. Budget will determine who you partner with, how many influencers you use in a campaign, and how you compensate your influencers (e.g., cash payment, commissions, free product).

Keep in mind that all influencers are different, which means influencer pricing will vary. There is no one-size-fits-all when it comes to payment. Some are perfectly fine receiving free products and services in exchange for a piece of content. Others work strictly on a cash payment basis. 

You may want to add some flexibility in your budget in case you find an influencer you’d love to work with who won’t accept a trade for services.

Identify the types of influencers most relevant to the campaign

Once you’ve nailed down the campaign parameters like the target audience and messaging, create a map of the influencer landscape most likely to deliver on your KPIs. Frame a big question around the written asset or product like “who influences the target audience of this campaign?” Use these to determine your outreach approach, and if you’re also planning to incorporate inbound marketing as well, this can help direct your landing page copy. 

Part of successful influencer marketing is being able to qualify influencers before working with them. You’ll want to choose partners who align with your brand values and voice. You want your influencers to appear credible so they can help you reach your goals.

Brands should be sure to look at not just numbers when selecting an influencer. There are other factors that also determine the right influencer for your brand. 

Brand values are the beliefs your company stands for. They could be beliefs that are incorporated into your product. For example, TOMS shoes donate a pair of shoes to a child in need with every purchase. Or, they are social values that are reflective of your community. Customers have become more aware and sensitive to brand ethics, having strong brand values helps drive decision making and compassion from potential customers.

An influencer is also a brand. As such they too have values that identify them amongst their competitors. Influencers are often explicit with their values, so reviewing past content is a great way to get to know them better. Or, perhaps review past collaborations to ensure that an influencer has not collaborated with a brand that contradicts your brand values.

There are also methods to check an influencer’s values using AI. Meltwater Influencer Marketing lets you set safety keywords to ensure your influencer has not used explicit language that would contradict your values.

Identifying influencer values is extremely important. First, it is a testament to the importance of your brand values. And, it avoids any online controversies that can result in a lack of faith from your audience.

We are currently in the age of Conscious consumerism. A conscious consumer is someone whose buying practices and decision making is driven by environmental, economic, and social impact.

Here are some values consumers tend to look for when making a purchase:

Fair Trade: Brand that supports a fair-trade cycle over profit

Give-Backs: Brands that donate to a charity or a marginalized group with every purchase

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