what is the future of influencer marketing?

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What Is

The Future of Influencer Marketing?

OPENfor.business

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Let’s start with a question…

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Do you trust marketers?

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Of course you don’t.

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Neither does anyone else.

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Even marketers don’t trust other marketers!

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That’s too bad for brands, isn’t it?

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Brands know that trust sells – especially in B2B, where the stakes of a single sale could be in the tens of

millions of dollars. Or more.

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If we don’t trust marketers, who do we trust?

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When it comes to our B2B buying decisions,

we have always trusted…

1. Industry journalists

2. Industry analysts

3. Our Peers

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Historically, these have been the people we trust to help us make key buying decisions.

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And more generally, they help us know what’s next so we can bring disruption to the market rather than be

disrupted.

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These groups are still important.

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But through social, we look to a fourth group people to help us with our B2B buying decisions.

1. Journalists

2. Analysts

3. Peers

4. Influencers

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Who are these new B2B influencers? C-level executives

Speakers and consultants Authors and bloggers

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Tens of thousands, sometimes hundreds of thousands, of people follow some of these B2B influencers.

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Their audience is heavy with decision-makers: exactly who B2B brands most want to attract.

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Influencers have strong personal brands,

based on proven expertise and trust.

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Trust.

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Trust.

That’s what makes influencers influential.

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Trust.

The very thing marketers lack most.

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That’s why, globally, 84% of brands report they will leverage influencer marketing in 2016.

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84% of brands.

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84% of brands.

Globally.

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84% of brands.

Globally.

This year.

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B2B brands have a tough time making influencer marketing work, though.

As many as half say they’re dissatisfied with their results to date.

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B2B brands have trouble with

1. Identification: discovering which influencers are most relevant – most influential – to the brand’s

potential clients.

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B2B brands have trouble with

1. Identification

2. Recruiting: attracting the highest-impact influencers. Brands often have to settle for third-

tier “influencers” instead.

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B2B brands have trouble with

1. Identificaiton

2. Recruiting

3. Performance: activating their influencers to perform on their behalf.

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B2B brands have trouble with

1. Identification

2. Recruiting

3. Performance

4. Retention: keeping influencers in their programs.

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What’s a B2B brand to do?

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Right now, that answer is all over the board.

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Today, influencer marketing is the Wild West. No rules, plenty of chaos.

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In today’s Wild West of influence, brands suffer from poor results.

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Brand managers have to invent their programs from scratch, or hope the consultants or agencies they hire

give them good advice.

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Some of that advice is good. But a lot of it is terrible, even damaging, because it’s based on the B2C model

of influence.

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B2C isn’t B2B.

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B2C isn’t B2B.

Sneakers and shampoo don’t have much in common with

Big Data or enterprise consulting services.

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Meanwhile, on the other side of this equation…

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In this Wild West landscape, influencers suffer by having to fend for themselves.

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Even within the same brand’s influencer program, the influencers involved are managed differently, utilized

differently, and compensated differently.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for brands.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for brands.

It’s what causes brands the troubles of identification, recruitment, performance, and retention.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for brands.

Worse, it can give a brand a bad reputation with influencers, who see the brand as unprofessional,

arrogant, or even as taking advantage.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for brands.

The last thing a brand needs is for influencers to tell other influencers or their clients to avoid that brand.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

Negotiating a relationship with a brand can feel very one-sided. That’s unnecessarily stressful.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

The doubt influencers feel about the deal they strike with a brand versus what their peers have negotiated

can cause resentment toward the brand.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

This resentment can poison the well. It’s the #2 cause of the low performance and high turnover in influencer

programs.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

But the number 1 cause of this poor performance and high turnover?

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

But the number 1 cause of this poor performance and high turnover?

Opportunity costs.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

Influencers only have so much time and attention to give. They have to devote their time in ways that help

their careers or businesses.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

Influencers only have so much time and attention to give. They have to devote their time in ways that help

their careers or businesses.

This isn’t selfish. It’s just necessary if these professionals are to remain in business.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

The most influential influencers – those most coveted by brands – can’t afford to work with brands they see

as unprofessional, arrogant, or taking advantage.

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The chaos of the Wild West is bad for influencers, too.

The most influential influencers – those most coveted by brands – can’t afford to work with brands they see

as unprofessional, arrogant, or taking advantage.

So they don’t. And brands suffer.

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All of this chaos, this inefficient Wild West that is influencer marketing in early 2016, has created a tremendous

opportunity for the company that figures it out.

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What if there were one company, a market network like Uber or AngelList, where top-tier influencers were organized to work with their most admired brands as

a ready-made team?

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All a brand would need to do is log in to engage.

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What if this market network, this Uber for brands + influencers, had tamed the Wild West already?

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What if this network had an integration partnership with the most advanced social-analytics technology

available?

Identification would no longer be a problem.

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What if this network included the world’s most admired influencer marketing consultants, available to help brands

build the most effective influencer program possible?

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What if this network had rigorously studied the market to standardize performance expectations and rates of

compensation?

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What if this network used bleeding-edge performance analytics so brands and influencers could see exactly

how effective each influencer was?

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What if this network used bleeding-edge performance analytics so brands and influencers could see exactly

how effective each influencer was?

The guesswork would be removed entirely.

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Best of all, what if this network were enabled with SaaS (cloud-based Software as a Service), allowing brands and influencers to conduct all their business

via mobile or desktop at their convenience?

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Now, what if most of this already existed, available for select brands to leverage right now, today?

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It is.

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It is.

(You probably saw that coming).

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The Extraordinary Influencer Network at OPENfor.business brings together

50 top-tier B2B influencers A following of over 5 million

Suggested performance expectations and rates of compensation

Integration with the most advanced analytics tool on the market today for identification

Individual influencer performance tracking

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50 top-tier B2B influencers.

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50 top-tier B2B influencers.

A following of over 5 million.

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50 top-tier B2B influencers.

A following of over 5 million.

What brand could say no to that kind of reach?

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We are already in business, in planning with our first clients from a hand-picked selection of most-admired brands.

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We are already in business, in planning with our first clients from a hand-picked selection of most-admired brands.

But that’s just the beginning.

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We are already in business, in planning with our first clients from a hand-picked selection of most-admired brands.

We are also seeking funding to build our mobile SaaS platform.

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

Immediately.

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

Immediately.

These influencers on our waitlist are waiting… patiently…

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

Immediately.

These influencers on our waitlist are waiting… patiently…

(well, kind of patiently).

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

That will be an audience of over 20 million.

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

That will be an audience of over 20 million.

Heavy with B2B decision makers. Buyers. Prospective customers.

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With our mobile SaaS platform in place, we’ll be able to scale up to 250 top-tier B2B influencers.

That will be an audience of over 20 million.

What brand could say no to that kind of reach?

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Growth from 250 B2B influencers to thousands – in other words, scale – will evolve through market segmentation:

• Enterprise IT (mobility, BigData, ERP)• Fintech and banking

• HR and human capital management• Healthcare and pharma

• Consulting services…You get the picture

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From there, the sky’s the limit.

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Meet a few of our top-tier influencers.

or

Contact us to learn more for your B2B brand.

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