Social Media 'Influencers'

[LittleDreamer1]

AIBU to think that if you have 2000 followers you are not an influencer?

I run a small online shop selling toddler bits on Instagram and Facebook and get contacted by people with 2000-8000 followers asking for freebies to promote? My shop has nearly 6000 followers on it's own not sure why I'd want someone with 2000 followers to promote it?

Don't get me wrong I think 'influencers' are great for marketing but they need to have a really strong following for it to be worthwhile, and most of the bigger ones have little interest in my shop! Lol.

AIBU when I totally ignore these messages?

I wouldn't ignore them, it's rude and bad business. I would cut an paste a reply saying essentially no

Don’t ignore! Send a polite and kind reply and if you are willing offer them a discount or cost price. You might get some sales out of it.

Did you see what the White Moose Cafe did when asked for a freeby from an influencer? As much as I felt he took things too far I agreed with him in a way. Influencers are bought. Even if your product is shit they'll tell everyone it's great so they keep getting more and you risk a public shaming if you stop giving it to them. I don't really agree with it tbh.

It depends who their followers are and if they have a niche. I'd probably ask for more Info and offer a discount.

You shouldn't ignore them just because you don't think they will be of benefit to you.

And actually, some accounts might have lower numbers than you, but might have a better reach in general because of hashtags etc. I sometimes follow hashtags rather than specific accounts on my Instagram. Also there are accounts with smallish follower count, but their followers have larger followings and repost often, I know that's what happens a lot with the accounts I follow.

It depends how their followers are made up. 2000 genuine, interested followers who interact are more valuable as an audience than 6000 more transient followers.

I would never ignore though, prepare a simple “no thank you message” if you don’t see the worth.

Not sure why folks would bother to reply..? Just ignore them. I don't reply to junk mail in my hotmail account so 🤷‍♀️

I’d ignore them. Unless they have 2000 followers and a huge engagement rate of something hugely rare like 50%+ then with you already having a higher follower it makes no sense for you to enter any kind of agreement.

Micro influencers are a great way to reach people but you need to be highly selective and pick someone who has been around for a while, with a good engagement (the 50% above is no where near normal but that’s the only way a 2000 follower level influencer will work for you) and someone who understands disclosure and any laws surrounding things like no follow links, affiliates, competitions etc. or it can lead to issues for you.

Not sure why folks would bother to reply..?

Because you catch more flies with honey

I’ve got a client out of turning them down (politely!) for something else.

Completely reasonable. The freebie they are after is unlikely to translate into many sales.

I am running a new campaign at the moment. We have made a good start and we are still learning about how to translate raising awareness into votes, which is much the same as you reaching a potential buyer and that translating into a purchase. For example, we have found that a youtube video that receives 100,000 views probably gained us 100 UK votes for our UK-based campaign (and voting is free - it just requires someone to give a minute of their time).

Good luck with your business. I am sure you have a better idea of your market are and how to pitch to them than the instagram influencer after a freebie.

Just sounds like spam to be honest with you. What happens if these so called influencers don't like your products and write negatively?

I have 4,000 followers on Twitter and I'm a nobody. If somebody has only 2,000 followers they aren't really trying !

Wouldn't it make sense to just offer a discount code to their followers? Surely that's targeted advertising to followers who otherwise wouldn't have heard of you.

Might be worth looking at affiliate marketing with them too. No need to be rude to them - you can help each other.

@Biancadelriosback what did White Moose Cafe do? never heard of it tbh... do you have a link?

I have 10k on one of mines, niche account and definitely don’t think of myself as an influencer! Although have been offered tons on it. Usually from shops with far less followers than me that I’m not really interested in. I’ve “promoted” quite a lot of stuff but I’ve never lied about a product.

I have a few over 17k for my online shop account, and have sent free gifts for promotion to a few different sized accounts (not very regularly in the grand scheme of things, but enough to have worked out what works best for my business). I actually find that accounts with a smaller number of followers, who are very engaged, and who fit with the theme of my products, work better than huge 'influencer' type accounts. An engaged and fitting audience is far superior to a large one who are just there to look at selfies etc. I do get emails from people quite regularly asking to 'collaborate', and generally send them a nice thank you but no thank you. You never know if they may work really hard on raising their game and be someone that you'd love to work with in the future. Plus it's always good to have a reputation as a nice person.

“Influencing” = 21st Century word for “Blackmailing to get free shit”

I think it totally depends on the individual account. I work a lot with Instagram and like PPs have said, some smaller accounts have much higher quality, more targeted followers. I also keep a list of beautiful & interesting accounts which although small now, are doing everything right to become big.

That said, I get plenty of the generic 'give me free stuff for exposure' messages and loads of them are complete BS with fake followers and lazy in their approach. Sometimes I ask more questions to see if they actually have anything to offer, but most of the time I just say thank you for the message but it's not something I'm interested in right now.

Johnson & Johnson and Mark Warner seem to think it's worth working with small accounts. I know of accounts with less than 5k followers who are doing sponsored posts with each of them.

In some respects wouldn't a 'instamum' with 1000 other 'mum' followers be a better prospect for advertising your items and achieving extra sales than an instamum with 20k followers which are mostly made up of bot accounts and other rival/inconsequential brands?