HOW DO YOU SEE THE SOCIAL MEDIA INFLUENCER LANDSCAPE EVOLVING IN THE SHORT-TERM?
The landscape of influencer marketing in the region is ever changing. Some of the things we will see come into play in the short term are a higher focus on long-term partnerships as brands look to build more advocacy with influencers; stricter regulation on specific categories promoting through influencers, in addition to influencer licensing laws impacting how brands can activate influencers. There will be a focus on a more multi-platform approach, ensuring audiences are targeted through different channels and through content formats that resonate best with them.
THE BUZZ WORD IS AUTHENTICITY. HOW DO YOU MAKE SURE THIS HAPPENS?
We always work with influencers on an organic co-creation approach, where we provide content guidance on ideation in line with our client’s objectives and the campaign messaging and allow them to come up with their own content flow that translates this concept in a way that will resonate with their followers. To be authentic, it’s crucial to ensure influencers have creative freedom and are genuine in their communication.
HOW ARE CLIENTS’ DEMANDS CHANGING?
Clients are no longer fixated on the following of an influencer but rather the quality of the content they will bring to the campaign, meaning there’s a higher focus on skilled content creators. They are also constantly looking to understand the effectiveness of the campaign in terms of results to ensure ROI, with a much greater focus on engagement metrics including shares and saves vs just reach.
CAN YOU EXPLAIN THE PROCESS OF HOW THE CONTENT IS CREATED AND CONTROLLED?
We and our clients typically run the whole content management process through our proprietary platform, AnyTag, and depending on the campaign requirements, content can either be created by the influencers themselves (organic content) or by the brand (branded content). The majority of influencer marketing campaigns involve organic content to ensure it is authentic and aligns with the influencer’s own content style and tone of voice. A branded content approach is occasionally used when production is required to create brand-owned assets. When it comes to control over the social media posts, we always recommend this to be left solely to the influencers’ discretion while actively monitoring the posts on our end, to ensure it is garnering the right level of engagement and there is no negative sentiment towards the influencer or the brand from the audience.
