It can be a tricky proposition to get people to buy from your e-commerce business, especially if you are just starting up. Most people like to do business with established brands and companies they trust.

So, how do you get your e-commerce business off the ground or grow your business from the few clientele you have?

The answer is influencer marketing.

In recent years, the global influencer marketing industry has grown significantly, and because of its effectiveness (when done right), brands are investing more and more in it. It is projected to be worth $15 billion by 2022 – up from $8 billion in 2019.

Using an influencer/popular personality/thought leader to promote or endorse your e-commerce business can enable you to get your message across and get better returns on your ad spends. In fact, studies show 80% of marketers found influencer marketing effective, and 89% say influencer marketing ROI is better than other marketing.

It can also provide an opportunity for long-term business collaboration between your brand and the influencer, leading to interesting new ideas for products and services.

Influencer Marketing in 2021 – The Whys & Hows

Technology is evolving rapidly, enabling brands and businesses to connect to their audience like never before.

By pairing influencer marketing with these technological innovations, you can develop a bunch of new ways to promote and market your product. For example, podcasts are turning out to be an excellent platform for e-commerce brands to engage with new audiences and can boost leads and sales by offering a range of discounts, and giveaways through influencers, brands.

Unboxing videos are also good examples and seem to have particular appeal for niche users as they can get a feel for a product before investing in it.

Other ways in which influencer marketing can help:

1. By being a differentiator and helping you stay ahead of the competition
2. By assisting you in reaching specific interest groups that are a better fit for your products than the general population.
3. By driving customer engagement and giving your customers solutions to a pain point before discovering it themselves.

5 Inspiring Benefits of Influencer Marketing

1. It drives brand awareness

There are many ways to grow your brand awareness through digital marketing, but none compare to influencer marketing. This is probably the reason why 65% of marketers measure the brand awareness created by an influencer marketing campaign to gauge its success.

By giving you access to their bands of followers, influencers naturally spread your brand’s reach and create more awareness for it.

And since influencers can use a range of social media platforms to share information about your e-commerce brand with their audiences, this increases your brand’s social media presence and awareness.

But that is not all! Influencer marketing has also been proven to drive referrals and repeat sales.

2. It creates trust in the brand

Influencers allow their followers to be privy to their daily lives (or what appears to be their everyday life). And the more they post online, the more their followers trust them, relate to them, and feel like they are friends.

This is important because recommendations from friends and family hold value. So, when consumers are looking for authentic, trustworthy reviews when considering a purchase- the influencer has their trust. Studies show that 49% of consumers are known to make purchase decisions on product recommendations from influencers.

Therefore, when an influencer endorses your e-commerce business, you benefit by gaining credibility for your brand and the consumer’s trust.

3. It creates social proof

Psychology plays a crucial role in purchase behavior.

Consumers want to emulate the people they idolize and buy products endorsed by them.

But more importantly, when consumers are uncertain about what brands they should purchase, they assume that the people around them (celebrities, friends, etc.) probably have more knowledge and experience about the best brands and how to use them.

Demonstrating a product (which influencers often do) plays into this psychology. Product demonstrations reinforce that they use this particular product and are experts when it comes to it. This will almost always work to sell your product.

And the good part is that this does not just improve the probability that a lead will convert but also stay with a brand longer than other marketing forms.

By throwing in the right strategies and excellent content, influencers can positively affect consumer buying decisions for your e-commerce brand.

4. It reaches your target audience

Working with the correct influencers is key to the success of your e-commerce brand and marketing campaign. 71% of marketers say the quality of customers and traffic from influencer marketing is better than other sources.

However, picking the right influencers is much more than just finding people who have a lot of social media followers. The influencers that you choose for your marketing campaign should have credibility within their communities and not endorse any and every product just for money. Since these influencers are the face of your brand a good reputation is critical. Therefore, influencers who will contribute greatly to your marketing are the ones that are authentic, engaging, and share the same values as your brand. 48% of marketers using influencers believe that the audience relationship is the most valuable factor when choosing to collaborate with an influencer.

Thus, if you have carefully picked influencers that are relevant to your brand, your brand will automatically be exposed to social users that are already interested in your product or specialization.

You will not need to expend more time and resources to find your audience – the influencer already has the target audience you are looking for. This helps e-commerce brands close sales faster and reduce the overall cost of customer acquisition.

5. It has built-in reporting and analytics

The good part about using influencer marketing to promote your e-commerce brand is that you can track online sales made through your influencer’s social channels/platforms and blog posts.

For example, one simple and effective way to track your ROI is by combining your influencer marketing campaign with affiliate links. The links provide data about the number of website visits, sales, and the average order value. If your influencers are bloggers, you can use pixel tracking to measure how many readers visited in a 30-day period.

Influencer marketing is a powerful tool, but if you cannot track your ROI, it’s difficult to know what is effective for your brand. By setting goals, you can define what you want to accomplish and how you want to go about measuring it. And by tracking influencer marketing metrics, your brand can strategize how to leverage your influencers optimally. Tracking conversions and revenues generated through engagement will help you get the most out of your campaign.

Thus, influencer marketing is a form of social media marketing that uses product endorsements and mentions by influencers to promote products/ brands/ services. It is becoming increasingly important and necessary for marketers, especially those focusing on visibility.

Collaborating with influencers can help you create excitement about your e-commerce brand. But more importantly, it can help you to strengthen your brand’s reputation, increase audience engagement, conversions and scale your e-commerce business.

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