Key trends seen in influencer marketing in 2022

If you’re looking to expand your influencer marketing tactics in 2022, here are some of the trends we've noticed with potential for growth:

1. Short Video Formats Are Here for The Long Run

The upsurge in using TikTok brought the evolution of short-form video content on other platforms like Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts. Short-form videos have the highest ROI of any social media strategy, and 30% of social media marketers plan to invest more than any other trend. Many influencers are also comfortable working with this format; therefore, collaborating with them to promote a product will likely help brand recognition and engagement. With many platforms now capable of sharing short-form videos, cross-posting across all platforms also help with content generation for audiences on those platforms.

2. Authenticity Wins

People want to see more genuineness, vulnerability, and relatability. The days of perfectly curated and aesthetic grids are behind us, with more audiences now preferring more relatable content than aesthetic. Therefore, finding the right influencer to collaborate with is essential so that they will be able to connect with your audience. Before deciding on who to work with, go through their existing content and see what their reputation is like so that it doesn’t conflict with your brand’s values. Ensure the influencer would like and believe in your brand and can make the audience believe in your brand too. Instead of looking for perfection, look for influencers who foster a more authentic relationship with their audience.

3. Go Small, Not Big

It’s important to keep in mind that higher followers don’t guarantee high engagements. Therefore, the better approach would be to get involved with nano (less than 1,000 followers) or micro (between 1,000 and 100,000 followers) influencers. In fact, studies have shown that nano and micro-influencers have the highest ROI of all the influencer tiers. Small-scale influencers have better engagement with their audience and allow you to target more niche audiences. Collaborating with a micro-influencer that has good ties to the community your brand belongs to will help drive brand loyalty and customer retention. An added benefit to working with nano or micro-influencers would be that they are likely to be more affordable than a mega influencer. With their affordability, you could perhaps go for multiple influencers than just one, which would also help reach out to a larger audience as well.

4. Going Live!

One of the more popular affordances social media grants us nowadays is the ability to have live streams that allow influencers to interact with their audience in real-time. Live streams are good opportunities for an influencer’s audience to discover your brand, whether by casual placements or by reviews, demonstrations or interviews conducted by the influencer. This also gives the audience to interact with the influencer and ask questions they might have about the brand, thereby creating higher engagement and better brand awareness.

5. Make the Most Of UGC

According to Forbes, more than 86% of brands use user-generated content (UGC) as a part of their marketing strategy. With the number of channels and platforms increasing it has become more challenging to create genuine content for each of them, UGC has become a more affordable way to generate more content. It is also a way for brands to tap into channels where they don’t have much of a footing. Studies have shown that 90% of consumers read reviews or testimonials before buying or using a service. UGC provides creative ways to generate content that consumers might trust better, for example, sharing pictures or feedback through custom hashtags created by a brand. This also encourages customers to engage on a more emotional level with the brand and create more credibility for your brand.

Now knowing why working with influencers is a route you might want to take with your social media strategy and marketing your business, how do you choose the influencer(s) that would best fit your business and its brand?

• Look at their audience. Do they have an audience that is relevant to your brand? Consider other demographics too, such as location and age of the audience.

• Engagement rates. Does the audience engage well with the influencer and their content? Find the engagement rates depending on the number of likes, comments, and followers the influencer has, as well as the average engagement rates per 10 posts.

• Make an audit of the influencer's past content and see whether it can work for your brand and the ways in which they can create content that aligns with your brand.
• Build a good relationship with the influencer, this also helps ensure that the content created would be more authentic.

• Reliability. Make sure the influencer you are considering is reliable in terms of their turnaround in producing the content agreed upon. If they are slow in responding to you, it might affect the overall project and getting work done within set time frames.

• Quality content. Remember that your brand is trying to maintain a certain reputation therefore it requires a level of quality in all the things it is associated with, including the content influencers would release as part of a collaboration. At the end of the day, the influencers will be representing your brand.

• Would they fit in your budget? You are likely to have a social media budget for the year, so will the influencer be affordable? Will they be paid monetarily or non-monetarily? Non-monetary would mean that the influencer would be given free products, services or experiences in exchange for content rather than being paid.