It might seem buzzy, but influencer marketing is much more than that. In 2017, it’s proving to be stronger than ever, thanks to changes in the number of people online and changes in their online habits.
If you’re not convinced that influencer marketing is here to stay, the figures and data behind it can convince you otherwise. There are plenty of reasons why your brand should try influencer marketing. The fact that it’s effective is just one of them.
1) People Are More Connected On Social Media
To say the use of social media has skyrocketed over the past 11 years might be a bit of an understatement. Back in 2005, when the Pew Research Center first began tracking who was on social media, just 10 percent of online adults were on at least one social networking site.
Flash forward to 2016, and that number of online adults who use social media (namely Facebook) had climbed to 79 percent. And Facebook isn’t the only game in town. Around one third of internet users are on Instagram and just under one quarter of internet users are on Twitter.
2) People Use Social Media More These Days
People aren’t only likely to have a social media account nowadays. They are also likely to use it frequently. Pew’s study found that more than three quarters of Facebook’s users visit the site daily. The number of daily site users increased from 70 percent in 2015.
The 2017 State of the Creator Economy Study (SOCE) made a similar finding. The mean number of monthly visits made to Facebook by study participants was 101. In second place, Instagram had a mean of 64 monthly visits and YouTube, in third place, had an average of 61 monthly visits.
3) People Trust Referrals
It wouldn’t matter how often people use social media or how many people are on social media if it weren’t for one thing: people really trust referrals and word-of-mouth recommendations. A 2015 study from Nielsen found that word-of-mouth advertising, or recommendations from family and friends, was the most trustworthy form of advertising.
Around 83 percent of study respondents stated that they trusted recommendations the most. Of those respondents, 66 percent stated that they also trusted consumer opinions and reviews they read online. The message is clear: people trust the opinions of their peers.
4) People Like Influencers
Influencer marketing wouldn’t work if people weren’t fond of influencers. And people really love influencers.
A survey from Variety found that teens in the US actually liked influencers on YouTube more than they liked traditional music and TV celebrities. YouTubers such as PewDiePie, Smosh, and the Fine Bros. were more popular with teens than celebs such as Katy Perry and Jennifer Lawrence.
5) People Trust Influencers
Having people like influencers will only do so much for a brand. The good news is that people also tend to trust influencers and are likely to make purchases based off of a recommendation they get from an influencer.
A study from Twitter and Annalect examined the role influencers play in influencing purchasing decisions. The study found that 49 percent of Twitter users rely in the recommendations made by influencers on the site. In contrast, 56 percent of Twitter users trust recommendations from family and friends.
Additionally, seeing a tweet from an influencer and from a brand made a Twitter user 5.2 times more likely to purchase an item.
6) People Are Blocking More Traditional Forms of Advertising
The rise in influencer marketing doesn’t just correspond to a rise in social media use. It also parallels a rise in the use of ad blocking software.
Banner ads allow sites like Facebook and Google to earn revenue. But, as the New York Times revealed, around 11 percent of global internet users have some type of ad blocking software installed.
Although sites are doing what they can to fight back against ad blocking software, it’s up to marketers and brands to find a new, more effective way to reach consumers. Influencer marketing is proving to be that more effective way.
7) Marketers Are Putting Their Faith (and Money) in Influencer Marketing
On a scale of one to 10, influencer and content marketers rated influencer marketing at 7.56 and 7.54, respectively, according to the SOCE.
Going along with that increase in effectiveness ranking, marketers are boosting their influencer marketing budget. More than two thirds of marketers now have a separate budget for influencer marketing, according to the SOCE. One third of those marketers have budgets totalling more than $500,000.
Will 2017 be the year your brand gives influencer marketing a try?
