Managing Long-Term Influencer Partnerships

Long-term partnerships between brands and influencers are the way to maximize the potential of influencer marketing.

As a brand, you’re able to establish a long-lasting relationship with both influencer partners and their audience. Now is the perfect moment to start securing influencers for brand ambassadors for 2022 programs, and we have a few tips for you so your upcoming influencer programs can break through.

Our tips for planning your upcoming influencer ambassador programs:

Select performance-based influencers: Long-term ambassadorships are an investment, and you’ll want to prioritize influencers who can deliver on the KPIs you are after.

Test creators with short-term partnerships first: Before you commit to working with influencers for a year, try working with them for a shorter period of time to test their content’s performance and ensure that their audience is aligned with your target audience. You can even use upcoming holiday programs as the trial run.

Look for organic brand supporters: Sponsored content fatigue is real. Audiences will be able to tell right away if a sponsored post is a poor fit for an influencer. Avoid this by partnering with influencers who are preexisting brand fans or whose content and style align with that of your brand.

Understand audience demographics: Not only will you want your influencer partner to align with your brand, but you’ll also want to check that their audience demographics make sense as well. When you hire influencers to promote your brand, you’re really looking to market to their following, so ask for their audience insights ahead of time so you know the content will be reaching your target audience.

Mix up posting types throughout the program: One way to keep a long-term campaign exciting is by switching up the post types throughout the program’s duration. Instagram Posts and Stories are always popular, but try out an IGTV video, blog post, live video, or another content type to see how various posts perform. We also encourage you to activate across different platforms such as TikTok, Clubhouse, or YouTube, as cross-platform campaign strategies extend the reach of the branded content to additional audiences.

Offer incentives to influencers to encourage above-and-beyond content: Ambassadorships are about relationship building, not just between your brand and the influencer’s audience, but between you and the influencer. Incentives like a commission system, gifting, and VIP experiences will strengthen your partnership and encourage the influencer to go above and beyond with their content creation. We recommend providing each influencer with a personalized discount code to provide with their audience, as it incentivizes the audience to purchase directly from the influencer’s content while at the same time providing your brand a way to track performance and sales conversion. 

Be okay with adjusting your strategy: Even the best-laid plans can go awry, which is why it’s important to know when to take a step back and recalibrate if a campaign isn’t performing as expected. Instead of continuing with content that doesn’t work, alter your strategy for the remainder of the program. Just know that such alterations may require contract edits and rate negotiations with the influencer