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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

Influencer marketing has grown rapidly over the past decade, and marketers are leveraging influencers to increase brand awareness more so than ever. But while big-name influencers like Kim Kardashian were once the only sought-after option, we now live in an age where micro influencers reign supreme. 

Marketers now know that when it comes to influencers, the number of followers isn’t the only, or even the best, metric to use for determining "influence." People relate to people, and for audiences today, authenticity, trust, and connection is what they value from brands — and this is something that micro influencers already offer. 

Today's influencers are in many ways an extension of the kind of word-of-mouth marketing businesses covet: recommendations from friends, family, and now someone on the internet who just happens to have an audience devoted to their content, style, and interests. 

Micro influencers by definition have fewer followers. However, these niche audiences are loyal and highly engaged. 

There’s a difference between a celebrity and an influencer, and there’s also a big difference between a macro influencer and a micro influencer. Today there are 4 broad buckets of influencers: Nano, Micro, Macro, and Mega. In this blog, we’ll be looking at what a micro influencer is, how to find them, the benefits of working with micro influencers, and tips for building a fruitful relationship.

How are Micro-Influencers Different From Macro-Influencers?

Why Do Micro-Influencers Get Better Results?

How Can Brands Benefit From Micro-Influencers?

Micro-Influencer Marketing Success Story: Zara, South Africa

Conclusion: Why Work with Micro-Influencers?

They don’t get stopped on the streets for autographs. 

They’re simply content creators who have lots of people watching them and can therefore help brands promote their products in front of new audiences.

There is a common misconception about influencers: The more followers they have, the more influence they have.

Influencers with a large audience have followers of every age, demographic, and interest. So, while a high number of users may see your content, they are not always relevant. 

A micro-influencer audience usually tends to fall under a single umbrella. Even though their content reaches fewer people, it is reaching the people who matter. Essentially, micro-influencers are the very definition of quality over quantity.

A micro-influencer is a content creator who has a "smaller" platform on social media — the general consensus is that micro-influencers have between 10,000 and 100,000 followers. They’re often experts on a specific topic, industry, or skill, and have a highly engaged online community. Sometimes nano-influencers (1000 to 10,000 followers) are roped into the Micro category, and for the purposes of this blog we'll be considering them fairly similar. 

Macro influencers have larger followings (typically between 100,000 and 1 million) and could be considered more of your standard "public figure" than a micro-influencer. In many cases being an influencer is their full-time job, thus they are more expensive to work with. While micro-influencers do support themselves with brand partnerships, it's likely they also have a 9-5 or other means of income as well. 

While micro-influencers have a smaller follower base, this allows them to get to know their audience on a more personal level. As a rule, the more valuable micro-influencers to work with tend to be more connected to their own followers.

Micro-influencers have also been found to have a higher engagement with their followers and a greater influence on them. They tend to be more niche compared to larger-influencer followings, meaning their audience is likely to be relevant to your brand and interested in what the influencer talks about.

Micro-influencers are the most common type of influencer on Instagram. They’re also growing on other platforms too, like TikTok, YouTube, and even LinkedIn. 

Beyond follower count, there are different types of micro-influencer campaigns that will help you to narrow your focus. 

Thought leader and subject matter experts

Influencers with their own blogs have more than one way to connect with their audience. They often share content on the blog and in their social media content. Blogger influence campaigns are helpful for building brand awareness and driving one-off sales.  

The same holds true for vloggers — they offer more than one way to share content with their target audience, and they offer video content rather than text-based content.

Activists help to build awareness around an issue or cause. They excel at creating emotional responses, fostering engagement, making an impact, and nurturing honest, authentic connections with their audience. Higher engagement rates come easier when people care about a cause or issue.

Thought leaders and subject matter experts

Influencers on a particular topic tend to have loyal followings. They might be doctors, lawyers, consultants, spiritual leaders, scientists, or anyone who has hands-on experience not available to the average consumer.

Instagram and TikTok influencer niches, such as gamers, beauty and fashion mavens, and outdoor enthusiasts provide a great place to start your micro-influencer marketing. Micro-influencer engagement rates tend to be high because they’re focused on niche influencer marketing campaigns rather than mass appeal.

Accidental influencers whose content has somehow gone viral can be great resources to promote your brand or product. They might not be experts, but they’re recognized and beloved by their audience.

Celebrity influencers reach more people, while less well-known, micro-influencers reach more people on a personal level. It’s this level of personalization that makes micro-influencers so valuable in influencer marketing.

Micro-influencers encourage more people to join their conversations and be proactive with the content — to like it, share it, and discuss it.

This finding is even more significant with sponsored posts: Macro-influencers reach eyeballs, but micro-influencers prompt actions. 

Using an influencer management platform like Meltwater Influencer Marketing, you can gain insight into an influencer’s audience and engagement rates prior to partnering with them. It can bring clarity to the following:

In the early stages of an influencer’s career, you will often see posts where no comment is left unanswered. You'll find tight-knit communities among micro content creators. They're a go-to source for information, which usually results in high engagement rates.

The influencer feels more obliged to communicate with their audience. As they gain more power and followers, it’s hard, if not impossible, to keep up with everybody, but early on it’s a must.

Think about an influencer with millions of followers. Her audience is wide and her followers’ interests are varied. 

Meanwhile, a fitness influencer with 50,000 followers will be followed by people who are mainly interested in her fitness updates. The latter has a niche, while the celebrity influencer appeals to a wide audience with little to no common ground.

Influencers with larger followings tend to be in greater demand, making it harder to access them. Because so many brands want to work with them, you might find that bigger influencers can’t give you enough of their time to drive meaningful engagement or create impactful content for your brand. 

Micro-influencers, on the other hand, tend to have greater availability. Partnerships are usually less complicated, lead times are shorter, and the influencer may be able to dedicate more time to your campaign.

Authenticity is often called into question when using influencers. Naturally, influencers are getting paid to promote a product, which can create a sense of inauthenticity from the beginning. But micro-influencers have to take their images seriously, and so they carefully choose their brand partnerships.

Recommending a product or company they don’t believe in or one that doesn’t fit their values puts their image — and their following — at risk. What’s more, demand for influencers with a smaller target audience is also small, meaning there are fewer opportunities for them to gain partnerships.

They genuinely care about their audience’s interests and are more likely to work only with brands they really love. This penchant for their brand partners translates to their content, which helps you look good by association.

Micro-influencers still have among their fans a good portion of friends, family and people who know them from the offline world. When their fan base expands, it’s inevitable to see that the personal relationship rate drops.

There are many advantages for brands working with micro-influencers. It can be more cost-effective for one thing, and if you find someone you really like working with, you can grow with them as their audience grows, putting you in front of larger audiences from an already established place of brand credibility.

It's also a great way to grow brand awareness and your social followings since you're getting in front of audiences who already like to engage on their social channels. 

Key benefits of working with micro-influencers

https://meltwater-experience.pages.dev/meltwater-blog-micro-content/horizontal-tab-module/

While we'd all love a celebrity endorsement for our business, for most of us it just isn’t feasible. Now, smaller brands on smaller budgets can partner with less famous people who still have a widespread influence. The ‘micro-influencer’ is inexpensive (in relative terms), effective, and just what your brand needs if you’re not in a position to hire Mr. Clooney or Ms. Aniston. 

As a benchmark figure, micro-influencers can charge as little as $100 (nano-influencers will charge less — between $2-$10 in some cases) for a post depending on their follower count. By saving on costs you can work with several micro-influencers at once and benefit from multiple engaged communities.

According to Influencer Marketing Hub, here are some rough ranges for how much nano or micro-influencers charge:

Instagram: Anywhere from $10 a post to $500 a post

YouTube: Between $20 and $1,000 per video

TikTok: You could pay as low as $5 for a TikTok micro-influencer post, or as high as $125

Facebook: Nano or micro-influencers on Facebook could charge between $25 and $1,250

Reading Tip: Learn more about micro-influencer pricing, costs, and rates.

Your brand’s visibility increases when using micro-influencers. These content creators are likely active on the most popular platforms, building audiences on TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram.  

20K - 100K followers have 1.22% engagement

5K - 20K followers have 2.7% engagement 

20K - 100K followers have 3.5% engagement

Why Micro Influencers Should Be Part of Your Marketing Mix

Computer programming pioneer Grace Hopper once said: 

One accurate measurement is worth a thousand expert opinions.

Who wouldn't want a thousand expert opinions? With so much energy going into the smooth running of your daily operation, thoughtful and accurate insight and reflection often feel like a nice-to-have rather than a pressing need. 

But, if you can't measure your media coverage performance how can you grow or repair any holes in your strategy?

Analysing Media Coverage: We’ve Come A Long Way

What Should be Included in Your Media Coverage Report?

Just as an accurate measurement helps you to grow and progress, the industry is constantly working to grow the selection and efficiency of the measurements of media coverage available to you.

Traditionally, Advertising Value Equivalency (AVE) was used to measure the amount of space a piece of content occupied, compared with the cost of an equivalent paid advertisement which was a common way to analyse media coverage.

While this may have been the best way to demonstrate value in the past, it doesn't have the same efficacy today. This is partly due to the differences between PR and advertising today, as Claire O'Sullivan, Director of Client Services at Metrica, points out: "Advertising agencies do not report their success or failure in terms of PR equivalence".

AVE also fails to account for the tone of media coverage, who has seen the coverage, or the digital impact of that coverage in the world of social media. Traditional advertising is also no longer the focus for many brands, who instead focus on influencer marketing, paid social advertising, or web-based pay-per-click style ads.

Despite this, a UK study showed that 35% of agencies still use it. For many, AVE is useful as the only form of measurement that attributes a monetary value for content. However, due to the restrictions mentioned above, this must be used in conjunction with newer, more digital-focused methods of measurement to give a fuller picture.

Meltwater has got you covered. The age of digital media has brought with it advanced media monitoring tools to help bridge the gap and more effectively measure and analyse your media coverage, campaign successes, gaps, and ROI.

Learn more about media monitoring in our extensive social listening guide.

Need to create a media monitoring analysis report? This guide will support you.

Your job is to put together a media coverage report? Then you should cover the following topics:

Media Coverage Item #1: Monitoring Website Traffic

As the saying goes, “Simplicity is the ultimate sophistication.” This holds true when deciding to measure the amount of traffic you generate for your site, especially in the context of your media coverage.

The Meltwater platform uses a Google Analytics plugin to give you more detailed information on your users and their behaviour. Find which news articles converted to the most traffic, or which social post resulted in more visits, demonstrating your ROI and contribution to getting your brand out there. Interested in getting a free tour of our platform? Simply fill out the form at the bottom of this blog and we will be in touch.

Reach looks at an article’s (or any other type of content) potential viewership by looking at monthly unique visitors to the publisher. Publishers of physical content, such as monthly magazines, know exactly how large their audience reach is, based on subscription information.

Some online media has subscription content behind a paywall, and the reach can be analysed in a similar way to print. However, the majority of published articles or press releases are usually free. By tracking the reach of your content, you get to know the various traffic sources of each campaign.

You can also determine the referral sites, that is, how your audience ended up on your website. Additionally, mobile use is increasing, making it more important than ever to analyse which devices users are accessing content from, in order to tailor your campaign and strategy.

Tip: Take a look at the most popular US magazines, the largest US newspapers, and the state of print media in South Africa.

Measuring your share of voice helps you to understand how much of the conversation around a certain topic your brand commands. You can also calculate the value of your audience’s brand perception and see where you stand against your competitors.

These conversations can be tracked in real-time using media monitoring tools, as well as using our retrospective data. By comparing your metrics over time, you can determine which areas need more attention. Another plus? This data gives you a competitive edge over industry rivals.

Media Coverage Item #4: Tracking Brand and Industry Mentions

Monitoring your brand’s mentions is an integral part of your organisation’s social listening strategy. Users are constantly conversing on the subjects of your brand, competitors, and topics related to your industry.

Monitoring is necessary because one small tweet can make or break your reputation. You can keep up to date with the conversation and follow key stakeholders, product names, and industry news.

Tip: Learn more about brand reputation measurement.

Media Coverage Item #5: Sentiment Analysis

Sentiment analysis or opinion mining helps to discover the sentiment of social media posts and editorial news media, that is, whether the commentary is positive, negative, or neutral. Tracking this information helps inform you of the tone of the article or post, with regards to the brand or topic under analysis.

Get to understand your industry through tracking the media coverage of your brand. Once you have this information you can do something about it before it becomes a potential crisis. Ultimately, you can use it to redesign your business strategy by playing to your strengths and addressing your weaknesses in the eyes of consumers.

Media Coverage Item #6: Audience Insights

Engagement is a necessary metric to track because it helps to analyse how your audience relates to your content and how much of their attention you've managed to capture. Understand if your audience stays engaged or, even better, responds to what you’ve put out there.

Social media platforms each have their own metrics, including likes, views, and votes. Start by figuring out what insights you want to discover about your audience and have a goal in mind before considering different types of impressions.

Tip: Read about 'The Importance of Social Media Metrics - Definitions and Calculations'

Media coverage is one of your greatest weapons in terms of winning the credibility battle and gaining additional reach for your wins. But it also opens your brand to potential negative coverage. Media monitoring allows you to be on the pulse. 

Pitching the right content to the right publications is also integral for a successful media strategy. By targeting the most relevant journalists, you can pitch ideas that are creative, insightful, or thought-provoking and reap the rewards of a targeted approach (rather than throwing spaghetti at the wall and hoping some of it sticks).

In order to identify wins and spot bad press, you'll need a media monitoring tool that picks up on where you're mentioned. 

One Meltwater customer story of maximised media coverage involves HASSELL, an international design leader. Before approaching Meltwater, they needed to track and collect media coverage as they struggled to effectively monitor media metrics and were strategising in the dark.

They managed to streamline workflows and measure the impact of PR activity in their organisation. They gained insights that could be easily shared with stakeholders, while saving valuable time.

If you would also like to maximise your media coverage or find effective ways of measuring it, then contact Meltwater to access our arsenal of media monitoring tools by filling out the form below. You can also view our free, on-demand webinar on maximising media coverage for a more in-depth analysis of how to go about it. 

How To Measure & Analyse Media Coverage

Influencer gifts offer a way to sweeten the collaboration with your influencer partners. (Who doesn’t love a free gift?) The influencer gifting process gets your product into the hands of content creators as quickly as possible, ensuring they have ample time to test, use, and enjoy it before sharing it with their audience.

That said, brands should put some thought into how they go about choosing and sending influencer gifts. Chances are your influencers are working with other brands and receiving gifts from them as well. How you send gifts gives you an opportunity to stand out and solidify not only your partnership, but also your brand image.

What’s more, adding a personalized influencer gift note makes the gifting package — and the collaboration itself — feel more personalized and valuable. It’s fine details like these that shouldn’t be overlooked.

Let’s explore how you can elevate the influencer gifting process plus take advantage of our free influencer gifting note template.

Why Do Brands Need to Know About Influencer Gifting?

Don’t Forget to Include an Influencer Gifting Note

Tips for Writing an Influencer Gifting Note

Improving Influencer Gifting With the Right Technology

Influencer gifting is the process of getting your products into the hands of influencers so they can share them with their audiences.

The idea is for influencers to have an authentic experience with your products so they can create high-value content on your behalf. It’s also a show of goodwill and appreciation for your collaboration.

You might also hear influencer gifting referred to as product seeding or product gifting. Whatever you call it, an influencer gifting campaign is a common practice in influencer marketing.

Tip: Learn how to use Instagram collab posts to increase your reach.

It’s not uncommon for brands to woo celebrities and mega-influencers with free products. However, brand ambassadors, macro-influencers, micro-influencers, and nano-influencers appreciate and benefit from gifts, too. They can use those gifts to create better content for your brand.

It’s hard to create a product demo video for TikTok if they don’t have the product to showcase. Having to purchase the product themselves may add friction to your influencer campaigns and make the partnership feel less valuable to the content creator.

Just as there’s an art to choosing the right influencers to work with, there’s also an art to the gifting process.

The key takeaway brands need to understand is how the gift supports a strong campaign. Start with the end in mind and work backward to make your influencer gifting strategy work for you.

As with any influencer marketing campaign, your first priority is to choose a select group of influencers to receive your gift. Your influencer partners should be able to showcase your product in a way that’s authentic to their brand and yours. It should look like real life, not a forced promotion.

You also want to take stock of the social media channels they use to reach their followers (Instagram, TikTok, Snapchat, LinkedIn, etc.). Consider whether your target audience uses those same channels and whether your influencer will be able to reach them.

From there, you can send free products to your influencers to use. Many influencer marketing managers send free gifts as part of a paid promotion. Others may send influencers a gift without a formal partnership in hopes of earning some free media attention.

Ideally, your influencers will use those products themselves and share them in social media images or videos. But keep in mind that influencer gifts are exactly that — gifts. Gifts come with no strings attached, so there may be times when your gifting campaign doesn’t generate an influencer marketing ROI.

It’s best practice to engage influencers prior to sending out free gifts. In your influencer outreach, you can send an influencer outreach email to confirm their shipping address, build familiarity with your brand, and start building the relationship.

To maximize your chances of gaining positive influencer marketing ROI, it’s best to engage with influencers before sending gifts. Using Meltwater Influencer Marketing, marketers can connect with potential partners and verify their contact details (including shipping addresses) before sending out free products. This is a great way to build familiarity before the gift and start nurturing the relationship from day one.

Once you have an influencer agreement in place, send the influencer the product(s) you want them to promote. If you have multiple products in your lineup, see which ones your influencer is most interested in. This allows them to create authentic content that won’t look like a forced promotion.

In some cases, free products are part of a guaranteed paid promotion. But it can also pay off to send free gifts to potential partners without a pro forma partnership. The influencer may feel flattered by your generosity and promote you on their channels as a courtesy.

Keep tabs on your influencer partners’ social media content to see how they’re sharing their gift with others. Pay attention to the types of content they’re creating (e.g., unboxing videos, demonstrations) and how many times they’re promoting your gift.

Ideally, your influencer partners will keep and use the gifts for themselves and share them with their followers. But keep in mind that gifts should come with no strings attached. Whether you’re entering a paid promotion or hoping to earn some free media attention, keep in mind there may be times when your gifting campaign doesn’t result in an ROI.

Influencer gifting has worked well for many of the world’s leading brands, helping them to create profitable collabs in a cost-effective manner. Let’s look at some real-life influencer gifting examples.

Activewear brand Gymshark grew its brand awareness through partnerships with brand ambassadors. They have a huge community of loyal followers on Instagram along with a unique style of photography for their posts.

As a small business with no capital, the brand needed a way to promote its products to relevant audiences. The company sent fitness influencers free apparel as part of its grassroots movement, which the influencers started wearing in their videos. The user-generated content sparked massive interest in the brand, helping the company to grow organically.

Beauty brand Glossier proves that anyone can be an influencer, regardless of nano, micro, or mega status. Since its launch, Glossier’s philosophy has been to treat every customer like an influencer. They’ve built a brand ambassador army of more than 500 individuals.

These small-scale influencers are part of an invisible marketing strategy, a nod to the barely-there products Glossier is known for. The ambassadors post content for Glossier, which can also end up on the brand’s own social media pages. Customers can also purchase products directly through the ambassadors, helping them to earn gifted credits on future products. It’s a win-win for everyone.

Sometimes, a “free” marketing campaign is the best idea for brand awareness. As a small business owner, Sarah Shaw didn’t have much to spend on a celebrity marketing campaign. But the fashion brand did have plenty of products, so it gifted products to big-name celebrities like Oprah and Jennifer Anniston.

Combined with the free press it earned from being seen in the hands of famous people, the company quickly grew to an eight-figure business.

As you’re planning your marketing checklist, make sure that a personalized hand-written note is part of the process. Adding an influencer gifting note is so much more than a formality. It also:

The Meltwater Blog

Why Micro Influencers Should Be Part of Your Marketing Mix

How To Measure & Analyse Media Coverage

How to do Influencer Gifting [+ Influencer Gifting Note Template]

Influencer Pods: Secret Communities For Becoming A Fake Influencer

Best Hashtags for #Followers

How To Create Media Monitoring Analysis Reports

FTC Regulations and Influencer Marketing

Ultimate Guide to Facebook Image Sizes in 2025

The Ultimate Instagram Analytics & Insights Guide

40 Top Global Fashion Influencers to Inspire You

Media Requests: When to Say Yes and When to Say No

Influencer Marketing Measurement: KPIs, Metrics, ROI