In a context where consumers are constantly exposed to promotional messages, brands need to redouble their creativity to engage their audience and stand out from competitors. Influencer marketing offers many ways of doing this.
To the question what is influencer marketing? The first answer is that this strategy is unavoidable. According to a recent study, the global influence market is worth more than 16 billion dollars. Working with content creators is an essential way of humanising your brand, creating an authentic connection with your audience and reaching a wider public.
However, this strategy also presents challenges. Influencer marketing is evolving to meet consumers’ expectations of proximity and interaction. Also, it needs to equip itself with more tools to better measure the performance of campaigns and personalise them.
Gamification, the integration of playful elements into influencer marketing, is an excellent way of meeting these challenges. This article looks at the advantages of this strategy and the various interactive tools available to boost its performance.
What is influencer marketing?
Influencer marketing is a strategy in which brands collaborate with content creators, mainly on social networks. Influencers are personalities who have managed to build up an online audience. Generally by specialising in a particular content niche and creating links with their followers.
This closeness to their audience and ability to create native content on social networks are two levers for companies. By co-creating campaigns with influencers, brands can reach a wider audience that is interested in their products or services. Content creators also act as ambassadors, embodying the brand, giving it an image that is authentic and closer to its audience.
An integral part of influencer marketing strategy is to identify content creators whose interests, tone and values are close to those of the company (as in a co-branding strategy). In this way, companies can ensure to reach the right audience, maintaining consistency in their communications and highlighting their value proposition.
The benefits of influencer marketing for brands
Influencer marketing can be a powerful marketing tool for brands, whatever their reputation, sector of activity or objectives. According to a recent report on the subject, almost half of consumers (49%) make a purchase at least once a month after being exposed to influencer publications. And almost all shoppers (86%) make a purchase following recommendations from a content creator at least once a year.
The reasons for influencer marketing include :
Increase brand awareness
Working with influencers enables companies to reach a highly qualified audience. By sharing campaigns about a brand, content creators help to raise awareness of the brand among new people or improve its image. This is how Léna Situations has modernised the image of the Jennyfer brand.
Target the audience for your marketing campaigns more effectively
Influencer marketing helps brands to target their audience. The key is to work with a creator whose community matches the characteristics of the company’s target audience. So it’s an excellent way of ensuring that your message reaches the right people and is delivered in a way that resonates with them (making the campaign more impactful).
Achieve higher conversion rates
Social proof is a powerful conversion factor. Consumers are more likely to buy a product if it has been recommended to them by someone they trust. What’s more, influencers have mastered the codes of content creation on social networks. As a result, their publications are better integrated into users’ news feeds, making them more likely to capture attention and generate conversions.
Create a more authentic and trusting relationship with your audience
Influencers also enable brands to humanise their communications and create an authentic connection with consumers. They will create credible content that will enable their followers to understand their brand. Identify the strengths of a product or service and the different ways in which it can be used. Their shared experience, which is less formatted and spontaneous, is also likely to generate trust (conversion and loyalty) than a traditional promotional campaign.
How to gamify influencer marketing campaigns
Influencer marketing is a strategy for reaching and converting your target audience. But it has also become an ultra-competitive advertising arena in which brands must redouble their efforts to convince designers to collaborate with them and capture the attention of their subscribers.
Gamification in marketing is a lever that can be used to boost the performance of a campaign in many ways. This technique can be used to motivate influencers and promote their content. Companies can gamify their influencer (or ambassador) program in the same way as a loyalty program. Designers who generate sales can accumulate points, reach new levels and benefit from specific advantages (goodies, higher commission on each sale, access to the brand’s backstage areas).
Above all, gamification makes it easier to capture the audience’s attention and stimulate engagement. By creating playful campaigns, in the form of creative contest or marketing games. Companies and influencers can encourage users to interact with them and boost the virality of their content.
The playable mechanics of gamification are also a way of increasing subscriber interaction with the campaign. There fore, it is e lever to collect more zero-party data to better understand the needs and expectations of its audience. Based on this, the company can then create even more personalised, and therefore much more engaging campaigns!
Conclusion
Gamification is an excellent way of creating even more effective influencer marketing campaigns. To engage the creators you work with and their audience, don’t hesitate to integrate interactive mechanisms into your content. Discover our catalog of marketing games and boost your influencer strategy!
