Everything You Need To Know About Using Influencers To Create Content For Your Brand

In this day and age, brand-crafted content can only carry you so far? People crave truth and authenticity as much as brands crave awareness and sales, so some traditional approaches to marketing have had to change. How, then, do you create stories that resonate and satisfy everyone? 

Enter the age of influencer-generated content. It’s a tactic that provides a route to realness for everyone, meaning richer relationships and better content experiences all round.

What Is Influencer-Generated Content?

Influencer-generated content (IGC) is authentic, targeted and engaging content created by influencers for brands that want to reach new customers.

When brands connect with influencers who have active and engaged social followings, they expect honest (and hopefully positive) reviews in return for gifts. It can be a cost-effective way to attract potential customers, but it can go embarrassingly wrong if it’s poorly executed…

Brands need to be wary of picking the right people to carry their stories, so there’s a bit of an art to getting gifting right if you want to create content that, well, influences.

Don’t worry, though—we’ve got you. This guide will take you through everything you need to know to start nurturing those influencer relationships and, with a little help from GIFTA, turning out world-beating content on the regular.

What Are The Benefits Of Using Influencers To Create Content?

Anyone who’s had their eyes open for the past few years will know how good a lot of influencer content can look. It’s fair to say those guys are pretty good at their craft.

Influencer-led content has more than aesthetics going for it, though. It can be a superb way of diversifying your content output as a brand. This is especially true if you’re willing to make yourself a little vulnerable, too.

Inviting an army of storytellers to post about you of their own free will might strike fear into your protective brand guardian’s heart, but, trust us, these authentic results can be next-level if you pick the right creators.

Think about it: hundreds of posts by gifted storytellers with their own brands to protect, too, easily outweigh a handful of heavily branded posts by your own internal team—even if you’ve got a Hemingway on your hands.

With the overuse of internal resources in mind, a solid IGC strategy can be your path to high-quality content without the high-end price tag. The cost savings you can make internally and the far superior number of prospective customers you can reach may lead to ROI from influencer marketing quicker than the ink can dry on our personalised packaging.

To make it a worthwhile and rewarding pursuit, here’s what you need to bear in mind:

What To Consider When Using Influencer-Generated Content

A strategy that works won’t happen overnight—influencer marketing is about building relationships that last, which we think you’ll agree sits under the ‘long game’ bracket.

If you want to make it work, keep this list handy: 

Authenticity

The first thing you’ll want to be sure of is how authentic the relationship is going to be. When choosing your influencer partners, look at engagement levels, tone of voice, follower count (bigger isn’t always better…). Are they going to be genuinely interested in your product or are there too many other products to compete with on their grid? Will they write authentic content that brings your brand to life?

Clarity

When you’re starting the relationship, it’s important to be as clear as possible from the outset. Nobody is a fan of unexpected and unrealistic demands, so writing a clear brief and setting expectations early will be the key to gaining their trust. 

Longevity

Be clear about your long-term plans as well—is there potential to establish a partnership and craft a narrative together? Can multiple products be used at different times of the year? There’s potential in influencers that naturally align with your brand’s story, especially if there’s mutual benefit in growing your respective audiences, so think about tomorrow when you’re planning for today.

Quality (and Quantity)

It almost goes without saying that the quality of the content influencers put out is a deal-breaker. Remember you’re looking for the strength of the message as well as the standout-ability of the photos and videos, so be sure to check through a fair few posts to make sure they’re a good fit.

With GIFTA, you can reap the rewards of vast quantities of standout content as well. We try to make influencer marketing more affordable by connecting you to a greater number of storytellers with smaller, more engaged audiences. So, rather than throwing all your budget at one macro-influencer who’ll create a couple of posts, you can reach 100 micro-influencers with the same spend and multiply your content output. This also allows smaller creators the chance to be discovered and build relationships with some of their favourite brands.

Personalisation

Effective gifting needs a personal touch, too. Influencers want to feel like you’ve picked them for a reason and the right ones will only want to work with you if they feel a connection with your brand. That’s why we personalise every box we send, with products chosen specifically for each Influencer, bespoke marketing material and a handwritten note to make the unboxing experience authentic and building human connections from the start.

Partnerships

That personal touch can shine through even more if you match your gifts with complementary products from other brands. If you make vegan BBQ products, for instance, there might be sauces and vegan cheeses you can team up with for a campaign. Taking the time to think about the full experience for the influencer can really show you care about what they get from your relationship, so exploring multi-brand boxes can put you on to a winner.

Logistics

Yep, the boring stuff needs looking after, too. Where are your products stored and how will you get them to influencers quickly and efficiently? What will the packaging look like? If this sort of thing fills you with dread, fear not because we can run the entire show for you. From picking and packing in the warehouse to delivery to the doorsteps of your influencers, we manage the supply chain so you don’t have to.

Trust

Every aspect of your relationship with influencers needs to be built on this. They want to trust the quality of your products, while you want to trust the integrity of their posts. What’s more is that end-users want to trust that the partnership is indeed genuine. That’s why we never build our campaigns based on mandatory reviews from influencers. If they love your products, they’ll create real stories about them and spread the word naturally. If they don’t, they’re not forced to post and their followers aren’t subjected to disingenuous content. Trust, trust and more trust.

The Legal Bits

Once your organic social campaign is all done and dusted with your chosen influencers, you’ll want to think about usage rights for the top-performing content. Purchasing them allows you to extend your campaign and enrich your other marketing channels with high-quality IGC, from email and paid social to offline and print. 

Value

Of course, you’ll want to get maximum ROI from your campaigns, so tracking and reporting of influencer-generated content are essential, too. With an understanding of how much value you’ll get from each photo, story, video and reel, including numbers of impressions and engagements, you’ll know which influencers and kinds of content worked best for you.

With the right partnerships from the start, you can enjoy real value from an influencer-led approach to your marketing. It could be the difference between content that resonates and content that relegates you into insignificance. To find out more about GIFTA’s approach to influencer-generated content campaigns, get in touch via hello@gifta.co.uk today. 

Influencer-Generated Content FAQs