In today’s market 63% of marketers are working with at least 10 influencers on their campaigns. It is interesting to understand the sudden rise in the influencer marketing. The reason behind this growth is that the influencers are trusted peers for your target audience. Where advertisements seem like bragging about yourself, influencer marketing is like connecting to your target audience through someone whom they trust and consider to be a peer. The influencers with their knowledge authenticity and opinions can convert your target customers into loyal ones. 

However, finding the right influencers is not that easy and it requires a lot of research and hard work.

Know your target audience

The audience is the main part of the influencer marketing strategy that you have in mind. This is also the mistake that most brands make while looking for influencers. It is necessary to ensure that your target customers are the ones who are following your influencer. This is the reason that you need to know your target audience and then choose the influencer who has a large number of your target audience following them. 

Let us take the example of a beauty blogger. If you are in the beauty industry then you need to understand that not every beauty blogger is the same. Some of them target youngsters while others may target middle aged women. You need to make sure that your target audience and the influencer’s audience are the same. If you choose the right influencer then your products or services will reach the target audience who are likely to opt for your products or services. Your goal should be to find the influencer who creates the content and presents it to target audience. This way your products will be exposed to people who are actually interested in them.

Evaluating your influencer

If you want to find an influencer for your business then the first thing to do is to evaluate them. This is necessary otherwise you may end up with the wrong influencer or even a fake one. Let us look at some parameters which you should check when looking for influencers for your brand.

• Reach of the influencer – the reach simply means the number of followers that an influencer has on the social media or their blogs. It I necessary to ascertain that the influencer you are choosing have a good following on the social media platform where you wish to run your campaign. This is one of the most important things to check when you want to find influencers for your brand.
• Engagement – the engagement rate of the influencer is even more important than the reach. This is because it indicates how many followers are actually interested in the content that they are sharing on the social media platform or blog. This is the measure of the influencer’s ability to influence the purchase of the target customer. It is usually seen on Instagram that the influencers who have a following of 1k to 5k followers have a better range of engagement than the influencers with larger following. 

• Authenticity – for the followers to trust and follow the influencer, the recommendation of the influencer should sound authentic. Their posts should not look like they are talking about the product or service only because they are paid to do it. It should seem as if the influencers actually believe in what he or she is posting.
• Personality – you should look for influencers whose personality and style are in alignment with your brand values and messaging. This kind of resonance will ensure that the content is appealing and relevant to the target audience.
• Niche – it is necessary to look for influencers whose niche is aligned with your products, business or industry. For instance if you are manufacturing tech gadgets then the influencers should also be from the technology niche. Relevance is the main factor when it concerns your influencer campaign and it will decide how successful it is. 

Where you can find right influencers

Influencer marketing was earlier restricted to celebrities, but now it is not the case. Brands nowadays prefer influencers who have a small but engaged following. In fact micro influencers are more adept at buying conversations than the average consumer every week.

Let us look at some places where you can find and identify influencers:

• Social media – the easiest method of finding influencers is to look for those who may already be talking about you. They may be mentioning you in their blog posts or social media posts and you should look for these influencers for your brand. Nowadays social media monitoring tools are easily available and they can help you find influencers who are talking about your industry. For instance, someone could have posted about accessories for yoga, and if you deal in something similar then you should engage with them.
• Using hashtags – hashtags are meant to make content searchable on social media platforms. Hence you should look for hashtags that are relevant to your brand. When using hashtags you may come across some influencers who are talking about your industry. If you like their content then check them out for your brand. Check if they have decent number of followers and also their engagement rate. This will give you an idea if the influencer is worth engaging with your campaign.
• Google alerts – this is another influencer search tool that proves as the best way of finding influencers for your business. You should set alerts for keywords that are relevant to your product or service. This will help you to find relevant brand advocates. 

There are many other platforms like blogger outreach platforms, influencer marketing platforms etc. where you can find influencers who will help in growing your business. Always remember that when choosing an influencer you are choosing your brand ambassador and this is why making the right choice is necessary. Make sure that you evaluate and judge the potential of the influencer, because if you don’t then it may send out a wrong message regarding your brand. Choosing an influencer properly is very important not just to make sure that the money and resources that you spend on them are spent wisely, but also to make sure that the right message is received by your target audience.