It could be your next-door neighbour, or a former colleague, or a friend’s friend who is now sought after by brands. This individual might not exactly be a social media celebrity, but engages closely with his or her circle, influencing their buying decisions; and thus becoming a new-age commercially viable option for brands to invest in for better traction. Brands now actively seek out and engage with ‘’micro-influencers’’, people who create their podcasts, attend events and promote brands on social media, write books, give mini-talks, etc.
With 281.3 million urban online users in India and 270 million social media users, influencing is becoming an important tool for digital marketing, says Sophia Sinha, senior marketing manager, Moet Hennessy India.
“Micro-influencing is essentially precision targeting. The idea is to tap the focused audience who align well with the brand’s offerings and ethos. Micro-influencers are subject matter experts with excellent engagement with their followers on social media,’’ says Sinha.
Experts say micro-influencers especially do justice to millennial brands in categories like food, beverages, travel, fashion, beauty, wellness and lifestyle.
“Micro-influencers reflect recognition by brands that they need more quality content shared by credible sources and not shallow interactions,” says Rashi Mittal Nair, co-founder &CEO of WOOP, a platform for brands to build consumer advocates.
According to Srinivasa Rao, Sr.Vice President, Marketing, Lifestyle International, the brand works with established and upcoming influencers, primarily to deconstruct trends in fashion and beauty, to debunk myths and propagate positivity. “Micro-influencers have a loyal, engaged and a responsive following. This makes them more relevant, which is a big advantage for brands seeking to disseminate specific information to a targeted set of audience.”
Today, brands are increasingly conscious of promoting their products/offerings to the right set of audience and not really to the mass market as such, says Sinha. “Micro-influencer marketing enables brands to reach out to a hyper targeted community..’’ Hennessy employs the micro-influencer strategy across specific activations, says Sinha, explaining that for “Hennessy Very Special, we target influential millennials across lifestyle, pop culture and beverage, as this is the DNA of the brand and its target consumer, who is digitally connected.’’
Likewise, hair and skincare brand Kaya collaborates with micro-influencers on a regional level to reach out to a wider audience. “Collaborating with mom groups who are micro-influencers in their own right, has helped Kaya approach our segment and target group differently. These women are homemakers with young kids and feel the need to reach out to their kind, forge connections in new digital villages, talking about a range of topics. The mom group covered product recommendations, helped enable experientials for our target group, organised events that led to interactions with a much wider base in the form of trials and giveaways,” says Arvind RP, vice president & head - marketing, IT and analytics, Kaya Limited, India. Arvind adds that by partnering with regional micro-influencers, Kaya got a pulse on what beauty, lifestyle and grooming means to women across regions. “Tying up with Mrs.Karnataka 2017 for example, resulted in 40%+ engagement, especially on Instagram as compared to category A bloggers.”
Research shows Instagram and Facebook rank high as tools for micro-influencers to engage with their network and promote brands. Twitter is an emerging resource, as nearly 40% of Twitter users globally claim to make a purchase post an influencer’s tweet.
But, real micro-influencers go beyond those with massive following on social platforms, say experts. Brands like pharmaceutical company Cipla use everyday influencers (consumers of the product) to advocate the brands. Nair says Cipla’s immunity booster for kids, ActiveKids Immunobooster, used the WOOP platform to identify their consumer advocates, engage deeper and leverage them to generate brand advocacy.
Going ahead, while micro-influencers will help to reduce brand dependence on celebs, they will not exactly replace celebs as ambassadors, says Pranay Swarup, co-founder &CEO, Chtrbox, an influencer marketing agency and tech platform.
“Micro-influencers convey authenticity and repeatability that celebs cannot. With celebs endorsing multiple brands, credibility is sometimes weak,’’ says Arvind.
PLAYING RIGHT TUNE
- Micro-influencers especially do justice to millennial brands in categories such as F&B travel, fashion, beauty, wellness and lifestyle
- They convey authenticity and repeatability that celebs cannot. With celebs endorsing multiple brands, credibility is sometimes weak
- Instagram and Facebook rank high as tools for micro-influencers to engage with their network and promote brands
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