Clarifying internal ownership of influencer marketing, setting goals with influencers and getting comfortable with less control are key ways to drive material ROI through more authentic storytelling

TapInfluence, the only influencer marketing SaaS platform uniquely combined with a high-performing marketplace and a services offering, and Altimeter, a Prophet company, today released The Influencer Marketing Manifesto, an in-depth study of both marketers and influencers that uncovers how each party views social capital, the why, where and how of investments in influencer marketing, and what changes must take place to continue the category's rapid growth. Resoundingly marketers feel influencer marketing is important as it creates more authentic brand storytelling. Additionally, the channel offers advanced targeting to consumers, greater ROI compared to other marketing channels, is a meaningful alternative to traditional ads and plugs brands into their digital communities, especially amongst millennials and centennials.

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The Separation of Influence: A View of Influence from Influencers and Influence Marketers (Graphic: Business Wire)

"Influencer marketing is promising in its ability to drive community engagement and peer-to-peer action," said Brian Solis, principal analyst at Altimeter. "As marketers experiment with digital influence, naturally there will be many mistakes made and lessons learned. We all have something to learn. And, we can do that by understanding the world of influencer engagement through the perspective of influencers themselves. We set out to do just that in this study and the results are compelling and revealing."

Challenges to Expanded Investment

Altimeter's research reveals that influencer marketing is on the cusp of becoming one of the largest investment categories for today's marketers, but that, in order to expand investment, corporations and brands need to better understand their own internal structures to support these efforts, listen to the influencers themselves and access metrics on campaign ROI:

"Influencer marketing is evolving fast, making it an even greater challenge for brands and agencies to effectively capitalize upon. The legacy form of this market, which was the exclusive domain of celebrities, is dead; from its foundational 'ashes' has risen the most powerful marketing channel of the 21st century that is delivering on the promises long-made by social platforms and content marketing," said Promise Phelon, CEO, TapInfluence. "With Altimeter we're hoping to accelerate the maturation process of this field, encouraging marketers to get to know influencer needs better and define strategies that will lead to long term relationships and material ROI."

Valuing Real Value

The largest misunderstanding taking place in influencer marketing today isn't between brands and influencers, but internally at brands and their agencies. The concept of "throwing too much money" at influencers did not prove to be the case in Altimeter's study as it surveyed marketers actively treating influencer marketing as an integrated strategy. Brands buying celebrity endorsements or expecting work in kind aren't investing in well-thought-out programs targeting the audiences that matter: they're not actually doing influencer marketing. Yet despite this industry-wide education hurdle, budgets are still understandably a top concern for marketers; Altimeter asked many questions related to influencer payments and expectations:

Agreeing to What Success Looks Like

Marketers studied were clear on what kind of influencers were most successful – a popular person with a significant and desirable audience and those that are subject matter experts regardless of follower count. Yet despite this, the prioritization of social channels by marketers over owned sites (blogs) further complicated the issues around success metrics tied to influencer marketing:

Influencers evaluate success based on traffic as they don't get the same transparency as brands do on other metrics that matter. But the ROI of influencer marketing can be vastly improved by first defining the "R" (return) as related to cause and effect against a current measured state.

According to influencer marketers, it's important to consider how well your brand, market, or product will resonate with a given influencer's audience. Marketers reported that they were more successful when working with influencers who are prolific on a variety of channels, as opposed to those who limit themselves to predominantly one platform or medium.

Letting Go of Control to Win

Altimeter's research looked into the motivations and needs of influencers and how those are understood, interpreted and respected by brands. While making money was the number one driver of influencers getting into the business, and payments were an obvious area where influencers felt brands could improve, other motivations and misalignments proved most fascinating:

Influencers are powerful because of their authenticity, and, as aforementioned, brands put "more authentic storytelling for our brand" as the top reason why they believe influencer marketing is important. Clearly, controlling the message is counterproductive to the ultimate business goal and influencers are frustrated.

Download a free copy of The Influencer Marketing Manifesto here.

Methodology

This study was commissioned by TapInfluence to understand the current state of influencer marketing. Research was conducted by Altimeter using an anonymous online questionnaire between February 26, 2016 and April 29, 2016. In total, 1,753 influencers and 102 marketers responded.

About TapInfluence

TapInfluence's complete SaaS platform, coupled with an engaged influencer marketplace and strategic services, is the leading solution facilitating real conversations between consumers and brands. The company enables Fortune 1000 brands to tap into the power of digital influencers and their authentic, trusted voices. With its influencer marketing automation platform, TapInfluence customers increase market share and amplify revenue growth through scalable reach and optimized engagement to achieve unprecedented ROI. In a recent independent study, TapInfluence proved that influencer marketing drives 11x the return on investment annually versus any other form of digital media.

TapInfluence's Fortune 1000 customers include Kraft, Horizon Organic, Silk, and P&G, as well as top agencies such as Golin, RhythmOne and AMP. TapInfluence is privately held, with headquarters in Boulder, Colo. and Mountain View, Calif. The company is backed by leading venture capital firms Noro-Moseley Partners, Grotech Ventures, Access Venture Partners and Knollwood Investment Advisory. For more information, visit www.tapinfluence.com.

About Altimeter

Altimeter, a Prophet company, is a research and strategy consulting firm that helps companies understand and act on disruption. In July 2015, Prophet acquired Altimeter Group, to bring together forward-thinking digital research and consultancy under one umbrella to help clients unlock digital transformations. Altimeter was founded in 2008 by best-selling author Charlene Li, focusing research in digital transformation, social business and governance, customer experience, big data, and the Internet of Things. Altimeter is based in San Francisco, CA. For more information visit http://www.altimetergroup.com.

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TapInfluence Kate Gundry, 617-797-5174 tapinfluence@pluckpr.com