5 Reasons Why Influencers Are Turning Down Your Campaign Offers
You are in the midst of planning an upcoming influencer campaign. You have developed creative briefs for the campaign. You have compiled a list of influencers you hope to work with and have sent initial offers out to said influencers, only for them to reject your offer.
Why do influencers turn down campaign opportunities? There are a number of factors that go into deciding if a campaign will work out, from budget to scheduling.
Here are the 5 top reasons why we see influencers turn down offers and how to receive as few campaign rejections as possible moving forward:
1. The Rate Is Too Low
One of the most common reasons why an influencer rejects a campaign offer is budget. Influencers are running businesses, and they need to make money for their work. If the rate is too low, the project is not worth it.
To ensure the budgets you present are aligned with what influencers are charging, familiarize yourself with industry standards.
If the budget you present is close to the going rate for a particular influencer, keep things open for negotiation. If an influencer comes back saying that an offer is far below their typical rate, reconsider how you are allocating your influencer marketing budget and what influencers you are targeting. Not every campaign will be able to afford a celebrity influencer, so think critically about your campaign objectives to select the right influencers that also fit within your budget.
2. The Usage And Exclusivities Are Extensive—And Not Properly Compensated For
Related to rate, influencers will charge more for extensive content usage. Reposting an influencer campaign photo on your brand’s Instagram feed is one thing; using influencer content to create a major television ad spot is quite another. The more usage rights you request, the more expensive the influencer’s fee will become.
Your agreement with the influencer should list out specific usage rights, including both where you intend to use the content and for how long. Usage “in perpetuity” will be more expensive than one year of usage rights, so the more specific you can be about usage, the better.
Similarly, wide-reaching campaign exclusivities (meaning, restricting the contracted influencer from posting about brand competitors) will also drive up rates. Say you represent a candy brand: requesting exclusivity for a year in the “food” category will cost exponentially more than requesting a week-long exclusivity period strictly in the smaller “candy” category. Additionally, asking an influencer to stay out of a broad category for a long time will also give them pause.
Define the exclusivity of your campaign to be specific enough that direct competitors are not talked about in close proximity to your campaign—you can even list out specific brand competitors—to avoid increased influencer rates or rejections on campaign offers.
3. The Creative Brief Does Not Align With The Influencer’s Content
We have run across all types of creative briefs here at Lytehouse, from the extremely vague and open-ended to the deeply specific. The best creative briefs usually meet in the middle: specific enough that the influencer knows what your brand is looking for out of the content they deliver, but not so narrow that it removes all possibility for an influencer to create content that he or she feels is authentic. After all, you are hiring a content creator, so there should be a little flexibility within the creative brief to allow for original spins on the campaign.
Need more tips on developing a strong campaign creative brief? Check out our guide here.
4. The Turnaround Is Too Quick
It can be something as practical as scheduling; influencers are busy, and oftentimes a last minute campaign just will not fit into their schedule. When things come up last minute, it can be hard to avoid scrambling for influencers, so avoid this predicament by planning out your influencer campaigns well in advance and starting negotiations early.
5. The Brand Is Not A Fit
At the end of the day, sometimes a brand is just not a fit for an influencer. For example, a budget fashion influencer may turn down an offer from a luxury brand because she knows her audience won’t respond to the campaign.
Influencers want the campaigns they participate in to succeed just as much as brands do, so if an influencer cites “brand alignment” as a reason for rejecting a campaign, it is because they do not see their audience resonating with the brand.
As experts of influencer relations, Lytehouse can help you through every step of the influencer campaign process. Partner with an agency like Lytehouse to help negotiate and secure influencers for your next influencer campaign.