“Influencer Marketing” is a phrase that has gained momentum over the past few years. It seems that everywhere you turn, marketers are telling you that you need to incorporate influencers as part of your integrated digital marketing strategy. But the question is, does it really work?
Many companies may not have the staff or resources to run a full-fledged influencer marketing strategy, but that doesn’t mean you can’t begin dabbling in influencer marketing campaigns to help meet marketing and business objectives. A successful approach to influencer marketing provides value for both the company, and the influencers that participate.
One ripe opportunity for building awareness and integrating influencer marketing into your marketing mix is to use it as a means to help promote events.
Below are three stories of how TopRank Marketing helped three companies incorporate content and influencer marketing to create a winning combination for event promotion.
#1 – Collaborating with Influencers on a Blog Post to Increase Target Conversion Pageviews
A leading genealogy research company wanted to leverage their involvement in the annual RootsTech event that averages around 20,000 attendees. In order to take advantage of a clearly identified and qualified audience, this company worked with TopRank Marketing to develop a content and social amplification plan that included contributions from industry influencers.
Objective: Collaborate with influencers to drive traffic to a specific high priority page on the business website.
Campaign elements included:
- Content that included tips from influencers on how to best create a genealogy project
- Thought leader outreach for contribution
- Social message development to encourage amplification of the content
- Cross promotion of influencers within social messages to increase reach
Results: Visits to the landing page increased significantly and the social reach exceeded all predictions and expectations.
#2 – Using Influencers to Create Evergreen Content to Build Credibility
One of the largest healthcare technology companies in the United States participates in an annual event managed by Healthcare Information and Management Systems (HIMSS). Healthcare technology is an incredibly competitive field and marketing is heavily regulated. That means that companies in this industry have a unique opportunity to get creative with their approach.
Objective: Partner with influencers to create awareness at the event and develop evergreen content that is still promotable post-event.
Campaign elements included:
- eBook including contributions from top healthcare experts
- Gated landing page of the eBook on the company website
- Optimization of the content for search
- Paid and organic social amplification
- Banner advertisement on the company blog
- Supporting blog content
Results: This co-created campaign generated 22x the typical page views of previous landing pages and 3x as many downloads compared to other recent fulfillment pieces.
#3 – Increasing Event Awareness with Co-Creation
Content Marketing World is the largest content marketing event in the world. But, competition in the digital marketing industry is becoming increasingly fierce, which means they need to find a creative way to provide valuable content for marketers. Content Marketing World partnered with TopRank Online Marketing to create a series of four eBooks (and supporting content) to provide attendees and potential attendees with tips from some of today’s top content marketers.
Objective: Develop an opportunity for influential speakers to participate in content creation that would promote their presentations, the CMWorld conference and create a useful and infotaining resource for all marketers interested in content marketing.
Campaign elements included:
- 4 Alice in Wonderland themed eBooks co-created with conference speakers
- 4 infographics that included tips from the speakers
- Long form interviews to promote speaker sessions and expertise
- Tweetable quotes to encourage social sharing
- Paid and organic social amplification
Results: The campaign eBooks have garnered over 200,000 views on SlideShare and captured more than 1,000 leads.
Ready to Embark on Your Own Influencer Marketing Initiative?
These examples only provide a glimpse into the possibilities you can uncover with an influencer marketing program. Over the next few months, TopRank Marketing’s CEO Lee Odden will be speaking at some of the largest national and virtual conferences in the United States on the topic of influencer marketing and how to incorporate it into your digital marketing mix.
If you’re interested to learn more about the benefits of adding influencer marketing to your integrated digital marketing strategy, please visit our website and learn more about our influencer marketing programs.
Header image via Shutterstock.
