Is Influencer Marketing Right for your Brand?

Should I engage with influencers?

It can seem like a no-brainer, they have a ready-made, loyal and engaged audience who have trust in them. But between budget concerns and reputation management, is it right for your brand? Ultimately only you can decide, but here are a few things to consider:

Make it authentic

The first thing we’d say is it has to feel authentic. The reason an influencer’s audience is engaged is because their values and needs align with the person they’re following. So, when the influencer advertises something that feels off-brand, people cotton on quickly. This can ultimately negatively affect your brand. 

Think about reputation

When you partner with someone – be that an influencer or another brand, you should think about the associated risk. You’re tying your brand reputation to the person you partner with. So, although none of us have a crystal ball, it’s smart to choose someone who isn’t posting anything too controversial.

Look at competitors

Before you commit to working with an influencer, look into who else they’re partnering with and whether this will help or hinder your brand. You want people to think of you when they see the influencer. And you also ideally want a partnership that locks out other brands from using the same influencer.

Long term partnerships or one-offs?

In many ways, influencers are like any other media channel. You’re paying for access to their audiences. If that’s all you’re interested in, long term partnerships don’t often make sense. This is because you’re gambling that the influencer can navigate social algorithm changes and will maintain, and ideally grow, their audience. All without posting anything controversial and risking reputational damage to your brand. It’s hard enough for brand teams to do this within their own social channels.

When long term partnerships make sense it’s typically because the influencer is prominent enough to be used as a fluent device or distinctive asset, just like any other celebrity. You want to make people think of you whenever they see the influencer, like our client Abbott Lyon with Stacey Solomon. 

It’s also a good idea to test an influencer before committing to anything long term and see if your and their audience are receptive to the partnership. Of course, this relies on your ability to prove that the partnership was effective, which isn’t always easy – another reason why long term contracts aren’t all that common. 

I think there will continue to be a demand for influencers, especially for brands, and think long term partnerships are a preferred route as the partnership feels more authentic.

Helen Jeremiah – Former CMO at Boots

As brands lean further into the influencer space, this will naturally come with increased concern around brand reputation – i.e. the reputation of your brand will be associated with the actions of the influencers.

“So, whilst the start-ups will certainly leverage influencers increasingly to be exposed to target audiences quickly, they will subsequently risk more, however the more established brands will tread very carefully in an increasingly crowded influencer market.”

Andy Weir, Chief Client Officer – Ride Shotgun

When long term partnerships make sense it’s typically because the influencer is prominent enough to be used as a fluent device or distinctive asset, just like any other celebrity. You want to make people think of you whenever they see the influencer (and think things about you), like our friends at Abbott Lyon, with Stacey Solomon. You probably want a long term partnership to lock out other brands from using the same influencer.

Stephen Kenwright, Director of Strategy & Digital Marketing – Ride Shotgun

What percentage of my budget should I allocate?

Influencer partnerships aren’t going anywhere. There will continue to be a demand for influencers, especially for brands. So, sometimes it’s hard to negotiate how much budget you can allocate if you want to partner with someone specific. 

A general benchmark, according to our Ride Shotgun digital team, is 5 – 15% of overall marketing budget, 10 – 25% of digital budget.

This does of course vary depending on factors like: your industry, audience size, business size and overall campaign aims. For example, if you work in the health and beauty industry you’ll see a much higher percentage spend as influencer marketing is very effective in this sector.

It’s worth noting that, according to Marketing Week, 70% of UK marketers have said they plan on expanding their use of influencers in 2024/25. So, using budget strategically and effectively going forward will help to cut through the noise and keep costs down. Influencer marketing is also much more effective in brand awareness sales compared to direct sales so this should be considered.