How to Get More Social Media Followers
Without even having a TikTok account, F'real Foods, a milkshake brand became viral on social media. Now, the company has close to 799.5K followers on TikTok and 50k on Instagram.
How did it become popular? In 2020, customers and micro-influencers began sharing the shopping experience at the store just for fun. TikTokers recorded themselves making shakes and it mobilized more than 120 million free impressions under the hashtag #freal and #frealmilkshake.
What if your startup could get in front of 120 million online users? Would it be effective to drive your sales up?
In this guide, we’ll explore how your startup can take advantage of influencer marketing on social media.
You’ll learn the difference between TikTok and Instagram for influencer marketing, which one is best for your startup, and how to leverage each platform for your influencer marketing campaigns
top social media influencer
Are you a Company?
Looking For a Influencers Marketing for Promoting your Social Media? That’s what we do here at Crowdcreate. We’ve rated the #1 Top Influencer/PR Marketing Agency and have helped with some of the most successful companies in the world. Book a call with our team to learn more.
Why use Social Media Influencer Marketing?
The transition to online sales and social commerce is more evident than ever. The engagement rates over any paid media are higher on platforms like Instagram or TikTok compared to the traditional channels that we used a decade ago.
Many startups still create social media profiles to put their brand out there, but they don’t tell their customer’s a story and they don’t create community. Despite the evident importance that social media offers, many businesses debate over prioritizing influencer marketing as part of their growth strategy.
The benefits?
Influencer marketing on social media can build awareness around your brand and your value proposition. influencers can be considered like a court, people come to find and eat at the end. The influencer audience comes to get inspiration, recommendations, or curiosity. Influencers open doors to make sales.
Influencer marketing on TikTok or Instagram can direct you to your niche. You might open your biz in a court, but what if your target customers don’t hang around there? When you partner with the right influencers you can speak directly to your customers, they have similar needs, expectations, or preferences.
Instagram Influencer Marketing Paid Post Examples
TikTok Influencer Marketing Paid Post Examples
influencer marketing instagram
Whether you are a startup or a yoga clothing brand your business can take advantage of influencers’ niches. Read more about influencer marketing categories that may be relevant to your niche.
Does your startup want to create a connection with your target customer? Social media influencers can humanize and give a voice to your story because direct promotions don’t work as well anymore for companies. Food startups must develop a story that customers identify with, and influencers can be a reflection on such.
A brand could say they are the number one or the expert in whatever industry, but building that authority within the market takes time. Influencers can be considered subject experts even if it’s a lifestyle. By partnering with an influencer, your brand can institute credibility rapidly among your customers.
The ideal influencer is your brand’s fan and marketing partner. They can brainstorm with you on how to exceed customer expectations. Influencers spend significant time on social media, and they might understand the marketplace more than you do. They can give you ideas on what to improve.
Are Social Media Influencers effective?
Despite all the mentioned benefits, you might still wonder if influencer marketing truly converts into more sales. Well, if you have clear goals for your influencer marketing campaign, create strategic content, and partner with the right influencer, you can get the results.
How to Track Social Media Influencers KPI
Take the case of the peanut butter brand, Nerdy Nuts. The startup founder discovered a content creator on TikTok who made a no-bake peanut butter pie. The entrepreneur sends her a product to try on her next video and it reached 100k views.
@aligracemorsell Nerdy nuts is LIFE! Check them out with my code “Ali10” #FavoriteRecipe #fyp #foryoupage #fyp #diy #letscook #food #chef #browines #sweet #summer ♬ original sound - Ali Grace Morsell
The results?
Nerdy Nuts went from around $10,000 in sales in July to more than $500,000 in sales by August. The company sold out, they had to shut down the website and they had to re-create their sales model by launching new batches every Sunday until they sold out.
Again, influencers’ effectiveness will depend on making the right partnership. However, you can expect a better ROI from social media influencer marketing compared to other channels. On average, a study revealed that businesses can earn $5.78 for every dollar spent on influencer marketing.
Check how Crowdcreate has helped other startups reach their marketing goals with influencer marketing and how they can support your startup too.
Promoting your Food Brand
TikTok and Instagram for Hiring Influencers?
Influencer marketing rose on Instagram; however, digital users and their engagement rates are migrating to the TikTok Platform. To get even, Instagram is now revamping its interface and algorithm to reap the benefits that short videos offer on the TikTok app.
With the two channels competing, you may be wondering if TikTok or Instagram Reels are better. As each platform evolves, you will need to assess where your target audience engages after all. Here are some of the key highlights that each of the platforms offers for your next influencer marketing campaign.
Research shows that Instagram continues to lead the interaction rate compared to other social media platforms. People understand that Instagram is a media channel for businesses and many use it to inform themselves about future purchases.
influencer marketing examples
Featuring Products
Studies show that 65% of the top-performing Instagram posts feature products. On the other hand, 45% of businesses reveal that they are now using TikTok as a channel.
TikTok is growing and the other platforms are following
Although Instagram has been the go-to channel for influencer marketing, more brands are entering the TikTok scene as they see the opportunity to go viral with their content and gain more awareness for their brand. Users can digest information from videos like the ones on YouTube, but interact like Instagram.
Know your funnel
TikTok is great for top of funnel brand awareness, but terrible for sending people to your website. You have a bigger chance of going viral on TikTok than on Instagram. Instagram is great for medium funnel and a place for your followers to continue getting your content and interact with your brand. From Instagram, you can direct them to your website.
TikTok is more organic
From a business standpoint, Instagram increases the possibility of customer engagement with your business profile and external websites. However, TikTok’s strength lies in how the platform presents sales content more organically, as content is not over-edited or scripted, or at least that’s how it should appear like.
Short Form Video Wins Most of the Time
Initially, TikTok only allowed 15-second videos, but as content creators fell short of delivering all the message, the app has optimized its model, and now allows videos of up to 10 minutes. So, instead of users having to migrate to YouTube to watch a review and click the link below, now they can stay in the app.
Instagram has been the number one social media platform for influencer marketing so far. The app is catching up to features that have made TikTok popular. Although it is unpredictable for now to define where the audience will stay, you should create strategic content to leverage and adapt to both platforms.
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How to do Influencer Marketing on Instagram?
Starting an influencer marketing campaign may seem complicated. Structuring your plan and the end results you expect from the campaign can help you define the best steps, to begin with. Before looking for influencers you must define your goals and objectives, as the first step.
influencer marketing strategy
Your marketing objectives will aim to influence and affect the behaviors of the consumer. Some of the objectives your startup can have at the moment may be to create awareness around the brand, create a favorable attitude, educate about your value proposition and business mission, and lastly make a call to action.
With a clear objective, you can define your marketing strategy, the key performance indicators for you to track its success, and your budget. To clarify your strategy you can look at what competing or even other brands to connect with the audience, how can you innovate and how can you improve your brand’s social content.
How to reach out to TikTok and Instagram influencers?
When to partner with macro-influencers
The next step is influencer outreach. If your startup is looking for rapid brand awareness, most likely you will need macro-influencers. You can contact them directly or through their agents. However, some may have partnership limitations, conflict of schedule, or you may find there’s no real brand alignment.
How to find influencer’s contact information
Typically, you can find influencer email information usually on their Instagram page. If you find them on TikTok, go to their TikTok page and click their Instagram link to go to their Instagram page with their contact.
Where to reach out to influencers
Reach out to influencers via email and not in their direct messages. If you direct message them, you can disappear amidst the flood of direct messages from their fans and other brands. If they are not following you, you’re message will end up in the Message Requests section.
Cold Emailing Influencers
Find a post that stands out to you. In the subject line, you can use “Huge Fan” or a title for their post. In the body, your goal is to grab their attention, pitch them quickly, and have a clear call to action.
Influencer Marketing Agencies and Marketplaces
To facilitate the process you can use marketing agencies or influencer marketplaces to discover the best partner for your brand. When looking for an agency for influencer outreach make sure they understand your target audience, the key metrics you aim to achieve and your campaign’s time frame.
If you find the right agency, the influencer outreach process can become easy. Learn how your business can take advantage of Crowdcreate’s influencer database and connect with influencers to take your company to the next level.
Partnering with Influencers
When partnering with influencers for Instagram you can opt for different types of media for your marketing campaign. These can include posts with product placement, multiple images in a carousel post, stories, and reels.
Leverage User Generated Content
Ask your influencer if you can repost on your social media and other marketing channels. You can use their post in your paid digital ads.
How to do Influencer Marketing on TikTok?
Define your strategy
Similar to launching a campaign on Instagram, you must define objectives, content strategy, key performance indicators, and your budget. Because TikTok metrics vary from Instagram, influencer discovery and outreach are also different. Followers are important, but also a consistent engagement rate.
Consistency is key
Many users find success with one video and go viral but may not know how to maintain their audience engaged. Typically influencers would have a consistent average of views per video and they can also be influencers on more than one platform.
Not all engagement is equal
Besides the views, you can also decipher the engagement quality from the likes and comments the video generates. Because likes and comments are less frequent on TikTok compared to Instagram, a video that has significant community interaction is a good sign of the influencer’s quality.
Reach out to Influencers on TikTok
Do your research
TikTok’s influencer outreach process is similar to Instagram. However, because some users may have overnight success on the app, you should make in-depth research on their performance metrics to make sure your campaign goals can be achieved. Boost your startup presence on TikTok and access our network here.
Influencers Elevate Paid Ads on TikTok
As a business, you can use multiple paid strategies on TikTok. First, if you have the budget, a brand takeover allows you to put your business on the first page as soon as your targeted users open the app. Another option is in-feed native videos that auto-plays within a user’s “For You” feed like any other video, or paid ads with customized discount codes for the influencers.
@natashapehrson #ad 🔗 TASHA for $5 off! #magicspoonpartner #weightlossjouney #weightlossdiary #healthykidsnacks #healthykidsfood #whatieatforweightloss ♬ original sound - Natasha Pehrson
Create Hashtag Challenges with Influencers
Lastly, you can ask influencers to promote a hashtag challenge. In this way, more user-generated content is created and you build a community around your product. This might make more time and effort, and it also has the potential to make your brand challenge go viral.
Whether you are on TikTok or Instagram reels, using popular hashtags, sounds, and effects can expand your content’s reach. Overall creating strategic hooks to begin your videos, entertaining, and delivering an easy message can optimize your influencer marketing campaign.
Looking For a Influencers Marketing for Promoting your Social Media?
That’s what we do here at Crowdcreate. We’ve rated the #1 Top Influencer/PR Marketing Agency and have helped with some of the most successful companies in the world.
influencer marketing strategy
Hire an Influencer Marketing Agency for TikTok and Instagram
Using social media influencers can bring many benefits to your startup marketing strategy. You can connect to a wider market, reach your target audience, create a community within your niche, build trust and get insights into the marketplace to help your company’s growth.
Both TikTok and Instagram are effective platforms to promote your influencer marketing campaign. Finding the platform and the right influencer will depend on your target audience and your campaign’s goals. To maximize your influencer marketing ROI you want to develop a strategic marketing plan and optimize your outreach process.
Influencer agencies like CrowdCreate can offer solutions to facilitate your research and began your influencer outreach now. Crowdcreate is a top rated digital marketing agency & advisory. We’ve worked with some of the largest companies and fastest growing startups around the world connect with investors, build hype with influencers & pr, increase sales, acquire users, and grow their online community.
