They are more complicated than other marketing strategies because they require human interaction. Marketers feel uncertain about how to evaluate the success of an influencer marketing program relative to their business goals.
Let’s get to it. What can we do to know if our job is doing a good one?
We have more data than ever before to assess the effectiveness of our marketing strategies in today’s age of MarTech tools that are widely available and booming. However, all the data you have won’t be able to help you if it doesn’t matter what you are measuring and why. Influencer marketing is no exception.
Let’s look at five key performance indicators (KPIs), which will help you understand and measure the effectiveness of your influencer marketing program in the context of your overall marketing goals.
1. Brand Awareness
- How it’s Measured: Potential Reach based on the influencer’s audience size and paid impressions.
- Why it Matters: Customers can’t trust you if they don’t know who you are. It is crucial to establish and increase brand awareness in order to achieve other goals, such as conversion and engagement.
- When it’s misleading: Awareness can only be a powerful KPI if your content is reaching the correct people. It is important to measure not just volume growth but also the relevance of those being reached.
2. Audience Growth
- How it’s Measured: You will need to add new social followers on one or more channels and/or sign-ups for email.
- Why it Matters: When someone is ready to buy, the more they see your brand’s message, then you will be top of mind.
- When it’s misleading: A rise in followers doesn’t necessarily mean that your campaign is a success. You should not only aim to attract the right people but also post regularly to keep them interested and add value to their feeds.
Also read: How SMBs Can Utilize Video Marketing to Increase Their Revenue
3. Engagement with Content
- How it’s measured: Influencer social posts engagements, podcast listens, and email and content clicks. Website bounce rates and viewing times may also be included.
- Why it Matters: Engaging with branded content by an influencer helps to show that your brand and content are relevant to the audience.
- When it’s misleading: Some people become so used to liking social media posts that they scroll through their feeds. It is important to think about a variety of engagement types. Clicking through to your site is one example of a significant engagement. However, liking the post of an influencer can be more meaningful than clicking through. A higher view time may also be important than a click.
4. Conversions
- How it’s Measured: UTM codes, website tracking pixels, and referral code redemptions can be used to track direct sales and lead captures.
- Why it Matters: The conversions have a direct effect on your bottom line.
- When it’s misleading: Social media does not always clearly show direct attributions, as opposed to other digital outlets. Multi-point attribution models can help you get a better picture of the campaign’s or an influencer’s success.
5. Brand Advocacy
- How it’s measured: Number of positive brand mentions (percentage of your brand’s online interactions compared to others based on social listening) through active channels and campaign hashtag use, landing page share, and/or digital share of the voice.
- Why it Matters: While brand-shared content may seem more authentic, the authenticity of organic conversation is unsurpassed by content from contracted influencers.
- When it’s misleading: Sometimes it can be difficult to distinguish between conversation inspired by influencers and general conversation. It can be easier to pinpoint the source of your findings by using campaign-specific hashtags or setting attribution periods.
Marketing is quantifiable. What’s measured gets improved and celebrated as a key tool for reaching your business goals.
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