Influencer Marketing for Small Business: Grow Your Audience

Expand Your Reach & Build Trust With Your Target Audience

The average person spends about 2 ½ hours per day on social media. With all the time we log on platforms like YouTube, TikTok, and Instagram, you might wonder how your small business can get noticed there. Even if your brand’s social media accounts are active and effective, it’s easy to get lost in the noise. That’s why more brands are turning to influencer marketing — a powerful way to expand your reach and build more trust with your target audience.

What Is Influencer Marketing?

The term “influencer marketing” might bring pictures of big stars repping huge brands with deep pockets. But don’t let that make you think it’s out of reach for small businesses.

Influencer Marketing is a partnership between a brand and one or more popular social media content creators (or “influencers”). The influencer promotes the brand’s products or services in exchange for some form of compensation. This can be a set fee, a portion of the sales they generate, or free products.

This type of marketing allows businesses to tap into the established trust that influencers share with their audiences. It can help brands in many ways, including:

Generating high-quality content for their own marketing channels
Building brand awareness
Increasing sales by expanding their audience
Informing audiences of new promotions or sales

Influencer Marketing Isn’t One-Size-Fits-All

Small businesses are tapping into influencer marketing’s power more than ever, and it’s something that’s very achievable. That’s because effective influencer marketing doesn’t just mean getting the biggest celebrities. There are several levels of influencer, ranging from smaller local personalities to large ones with nationwide — or worldwide — reach.

For small businesses, the ability to partner with smaller influencers allows you to drill down into your specific geographic area or topical niche. Here’s a look at some of the different levels of influencer, and approximate costs associated with working with each:

Nano-Influencers

Followers: 1,000 to 10,000
Best for: Businesses with a specific, niche audience. Nano-influencers usually have a close-knit community they’ve built with personable content.
Approximate cost: $10 to $100 per post

Micro-Influencers

Followers: 10,000 to 100,000
Best for: Brands seeking a balance of reach and engagement. Micro-influencers usually have a strong presence on one specific platform.
Approximate cost: $100 to $500 per post

Macro-Influencers

Followers: 100,000 to 1 million
Best for: Brands looking for a broader audience and increased visibility. Macro-influencers are established personalities who are seen as thought leaders in their niche.
Approximate cost: $500 to $5,000 per post

Mega-Influencers

Followers: 1 million or more
Best for: Major brand awareness campaigns. Mega-influencers usually hold celebrity status and can captivate a diverse audience.
Approximate cost: $5,000 to $10,000 per post

Is Influencer Marketing Right for My Small Business?

The answer is maybe. Influencer marketing could be right for you if:

You have e-commerce or direct-to-consumer sales.
Your target audience is active on social media.
You need to build trust or awareness quickly.
You have a clear, shareable brand identity.
You’re running a promotion, event, or launch.

What Are the Types of Influencer Marketing Campaigns?

If you said yes to one or more of those options, you might be wondering what an influencer marketing campaign could look like. They can take many different forms, depending on a business’s goal and budget.

Here are some of the most common:

Event Coverage

Event Coverage is a type of marketing campaign where a brand invites an influencer to attend an event like a product launch or grand opening and post about it. This helps to build buzz and provide event visibility through the influencer’s audience.

Gifting

Gifting is when a brand sends a product or provides a service to an influencer for free, in exchange for the influencer posting about it. This can be a lower cost way to get coverage than paying the influencer directly.

Video Collaboration

A video collaboration is when a brand partners with an influencer to create a video together that shows the brand’s product or service in action. This gives brands an engaging way to explain products in a real-world context.

Giveaway

A giveaway is when a brand partners with an influencer to give away a product or service to one or more of the influencer’s followers. This drives engagement (likes, shares, follows, etc.) back to the product or service and can grow your social media audience.

Takeovers

An account takeover is when an influencer posts on a brand’s social media platform from their perspective throughout the course of a day or during a special event. This brings a new energy to your brand’s social media feed and helps expose your brand to the influencer’s followers.

Affiliate Programs

Affiliate programs are partnerships where influencers earn a commission each time someone makes a purchase from a brand using a unique link or promotional code. This is a performance-based way to partner with an influencer, motivating influencers to post more because they benefit directly from converting customers.

Does Influencer Marketing Really Pay Off?

The short answer is yes. According to one report, businesses report earning approximately $5.78 for each dollar spent on influencers. That will, of course, depend on your business, your niche, and how effectively you plan your campaign. And success is never a guarantee.

How would you measure success? This will depend on your goals. Some of the common ways to determine your return on investment (ROI) include:

Increases in sales and conversions
Impressions, reach, and mentions on your social media accounts
Website traffic

That’s where it’s important to work with a marketing expert to ensure you’re targeting the right social media channels, choosing the right influencer, and using the right type of marketing campaign.

At Webspec, we’ve seen the success that a well-researched influencer marketing campaign can have. For example, we helped one of our clients, the Des Moines Italian restaurant Barrata’s, partner with a food influencer to create a food review video and post about their menu. This initial partnership led to another collaboration, a Baratta’s food giveaway that the influencer will promote to drive more traffic to Baratta’s. They also partnered with the local website Des Moines Girl to feature their restaurant in an article, which resulted in thousands of clicks and impressions across Facebook and Instagram.

Wondering if Influencer Marketing Is Right for You? Talk With Our Experts.

If you’re interested in learning more about influencer marketing, you might be wondering how to get started. The best way is to work with a trusted digital marketing company like Webspec.

Our team helps with:

Overseeing strategy: Our team ensures you’re choosing the right platforms and personalities to drive ROI for your brand.
Sourcing influencers: We handle the outreach on your chosen platform.
Managing influencer relationships: We streamline communication between your business and the influencer(s) you are working with.
Tracking performance: We bring the tools and expertise you need to show the results of your campaign.

Want to see how influencer marketing could help your brand? Contact us today.

Influencer Marketing for Small Businesses