Our Influencer ContinuumTM begins with topic based influencers – those who cause others to take action. The methodology serves as a guide to help brands form deep connections and advocacy with these influencers. In this eBook, we’ll provide you with the steps and guidance to create influence marketing programs which will move your target influencers through our Influencer Continuum, or to any level of engagement you hope to create.

The Appinions Influencer Continuum™

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Click here to learn more about the Influencer Continuum

Appinions defines an influencer as a person, brand or company who expresses a contextually relevant opinion that is meaningful enough to elicit action from others. Social presence alone does not always indicate influence. Influencers may have a popular blog or strong social media presence, speak offline to press or to audiences, and/or have a strong network online or off. Most influencers are active in their topic of expertise over a period of time; we call those Earned influencers, and, in most cases, consider them the most credible and valuable. Other influencers may have short-term influence on a topic, or they may be up-and-coming in their space.

Who is an Influencer?

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Because influencers have the ability to drive action, converting influencers to advocates for your brand can be a powerful way to amplify awareness and support your brand initiatives. When an influencer becomes an advocate for your brand, we call them a Super Advocate™ – a fan of a brand who also has a platform to influence for the brand.

Why does this matter to you?

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Influence marketing programs are designed with the end goal in mind – to build loyalty among influencers and turn them into Super Advocates™. These programs may incorporate traditional, digital, and social media marketing tactics depending on where your influencers fall on the Continuum and how they like to interact with brands. Influence marketing programs are typically long-term engagements. Any one program can have multiple touchpoints and is often built over months, if not years.

What’s an influence marketing program?

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As outlined in the Influencer Continuum, there are four major steps to creating a successful influence marketing program:

Identify your Influencers

Map Influencers to Continuum Phases

Determine which Brand Assets you possess (or want to create)

Create your program

Steps to an influence marketing program

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You have two options when identifying your Influence Cluster: •  Consider influencers you’ve already

engaged with •  Find new influencers

Identify your Influencers

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Note: If your company or brand has already engaged with influencers, skip to Page 10. If you’d like to find new influencers, read on.  

How to Find New Influencers •  Identify the topics within which you’re looking to engage influencers.

–  These may be prominent themes that your brand focuses its reputation on, attributes or characteristics of your target audience, or industry topics related to your product or service.

•  Listen to what people are saying across the web and traditional media. –  There are countless monitoring tools that you can use to search

conversations, news articles, and blog posts across the web. Find the tool that’s right for you based on the volume of conversations, number of keywords, and budget.

–  Pay attention to sentiment around the topic – you will most likely want to engage with influencers who are positively disposed towards your topic, and not negative about your brand or product.

Identify your Influencers (cont’d)

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Identify Known Influencers to Engage •  Consider “known” influencers you or your teams (PR, marketing, corporate

communications) have already engaged. –  These influencers can be clustered and moved together to a new

Continuum phase. •  Consider influencers you may already be following. Here are a couple of

places you can find them: –  Blog authors from your RSS reader, if you think they’re smart on the

particular focus topic. –  People you’re following on Twitter, if they regularly engage on your

topic. –  Newsmakers in traditional media.

Identify your Influencers (cont’d)

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Analyze Your Influencer List Once you’ve compiled a list of potential influencers, evaluate each individual for credibility, engagement, and activity. •  Understand the point of view for each influencer you identify. For example,

if they are already a strong advocate for a competitor, they may be less likely to want to work with your brand.

•  Look to see if their blog posts or articles get comments, and whether they’re active in responding to those comments.

•  Do they have a social media presence and are they active? If so, which channels are they most active on and do they engage in conversations with their followers?

•  Is there an easy way for you to contact them?

Identify your Influencers (cont’d)

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Another Option for Influencer Identification If you’re not interested in spending the time and energy it takes to manually sift through content and monitor conversations, remember that the Appinions Influence Marketing Platform does it all for you. Let’s talk!

Identify your Influencers (cont’d)

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Before you begin your program, you need to determine where your targeted influencers are on the Continuum. For example, if influencers already know about your brand, product, or service, you have passed the awareness phase and should focus on the credibility phase. Further, if you have activated your influencers in the past and they’ve built that credibility, you may want to focus on the emotional connection and loyalty phases. 

Map Influencers to Continuum Phases

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Mapping Influencers Influencers who fall into each phase of the Continuum are likely to meet the following criteria. Note that some of your influencers may be pre-Awareness; your program goal may be to move them into Awareness.

Map Influencers to Continuum Phases (cont’d)

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Awareness •  Aware  of  your  brand,  product,  or  

service  •  Have  visited  your  website  •  Follow  one  or  more  of  your  social  media  

profiles  

Credibility •  Have  shared  your  content  on  their  

website,  social  media  channels,  or  in  a  conversa;on  

•  Have  interacted  with  your  brand  either  in  person  or  online  

Emotional Connection •  Have  formed  a  personal  rela;onship  

with  your  brand  through  physically  mee;ng  representa;ves  at  an  event    

•  Have  first  hand  experienced  of  your  product  or  service  

Loyalty •  Are  repeat  customers  •  Refer  you  to  their  network  regularly  •  Recognized  contributors  to  new  product  

ini;a;ves  

Map Influencers to Continuum Phases (cont’d)

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Developing Influence Clusters Influence Clusters are highly focused groups of topical influencers aligned to a particular niche, goal, or objective. These are especially valuable if you are focused on promoting several topics with different types of influencers because each group or cluster may require different levels of attention and different engagement tactics. When creating influence clusters, assign influencers in the same topical area, who are at the same phase of the Continuum, to the same cluster.

Invite to Speak at

Event

VIP Treatment

Meetup

Give Products

What is a Brand Asset? Brand assets are tools you can use to help engage with influencers.

Determine Your Brand Assets

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White Paper

Tradeshow

Primary Research

Online Event Demo Brand Party

Meet R&D Team

Content Contributor

Expert Voice

Identify existing Assets or create new ones Determine which assets you have available and set aside the ones you will need for this effort. If you don’t yet have any assets, come up with a strategy for creating the assets you need to move influencers into the Continuum phases you’d like to affect.

Determine Your Brand Assets (cont’d)

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Map Influence Clusters to Assets Once you have mapped influencers mapped to the correct phases of the Continuum, determine how you wish to engage them to move them through your influence marketing program. You will be using each asset you have identified to engage with an influencer, or cluster or influencers. Planning and tactics are extremely important here, as influencers should be approached and relationships fostered with care.

Create Your Program

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Program Template Use this template to create your influence marketing program. For examples of Influencer Continuum programs, also visit our website.

Create Your Program (cont’d)

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Program  Name   Give  this  program  a  name  to  dis;nguish  it  from  others  you  have  running  simultaneously  

Timeframe   Describe  the  ;meframe  in  which  this  program  will  run  (i.e.,  January-­‐February  2013)  

Con/nuum  Phase   Describe  which  phase  you’re  expec;ng  to  move  influencers  into  (i.e.,  Build  Awareness,  Awareness  to  Credibility)  

Objec/ve   Describe  your  objec;ve  in  crea;ng  this  program  (i.e.,  generate  coverage  for  product  launch,  establish  brand  as  thought  leader)  

Influence  Cluster   Describe  the  influence  cluster  you  are  targe;ng  with  this  program  (i.e.,  local  mom  bloggers,  B2B  tech  writers  in  the  storage  space)  

Brand  Assets   Describe  the  brand  assets  you  will  be  using  in  this  program  (i.e.,  product  giveaway,  tradeshow  invita;on,  wri;ng  opportunity)  

Program  Descrip/on   Describe  the  program  in  detail  

Notes   Keep  notes  about  the  program’s  progress;  make  note  of  successes  and  opportuni;es  along  the  way  

Congratulations! You’re on your way to creating influence marketing programs. Don’t forget, the power of influencers must be cultivated on an ongoing basis. Once your plan is in motion, keep up the momentum! Continue the conversation regardless of who your influencers are, whether or not your goals change, and despite any staff turnover. And remember: influencer engagement takes time. Don’t get discouraged if you’re unable to attract influencers right away. Putting the pieces of an influence marketing plan into place before you start the process can take a significant amount of time and energy, but the hard work is worth the payoff in this case. Finally, once you’ve converted an influencer to a Super AdvocateTM, keep them involved and active. It is at this point that these relationships are the most valuable to you and your brand.

Conclusion: Reap the Rewards of Influence Marketing

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For more information on creating Super AdvocatesTM, check out our Resources page on our website. For ongoing tips and tricks to influence marketing

success, subscribe to the Appinions Influence Marketing Blog.

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