The professionalization of content creators is now at the heart of the social network economy. Nowadays, influencer is a real profession that can bring in a lot of money… if you do it right! So we’ll tell you how to make money as an influencer in 7 small steps.
An influencer is a person who, through his level of popularity on social networks, is able to influence the consumption habits of his followers. Therefore, companies can partner with her in their marketing campaigns.
Note that an influencer does not need to be on the same scale as a celebrity. Micro-influencers”, representing influencers with less than 50,000 followers, for example, can generate huge gains with the right strategy.
With that in mind, here are 7 strategies to take your influencer career to the next level:
1 – Choose your specialty
Before you start, you must first choose your preferred field. What are you most passionate about? What are your interests? As an influencer, you will need to research and publish content around your chosen field. It is therefore important to choose a subject that you are passionate about and that you will enjoy spending your time on. You can of course combine 2 or 3 interests, as long as they are more or less related: sports and nutrition, fashion and makeup for example. The more targeted your content is, the easier it will be to develop a close-knit community that will trust you. It’s better to be an expert on a few things than to be a jack-of-all-trades.
Here are some examples of areas that might interest you:
- Fashion
- The lifestyle
- The sport
- The tech
- The food
- The skincare
- Video games
- The series
- The news
- Entrepreneurship
Once you have chosen your specialty, it will be much easier to create content for your social networks.
2 – Determine your target audience
To become an influencer, you will need to target people who are likely to be interested in your content. This is called audience targeting. This will help you to choose the content you will publish, as well as your preferred platform. For example, younger people are most active on platforms like Tiktok, Snapchat, YouTube and Instagram, while those over 30 are generally found on Facebook. Note that most successful influencers stick to one or two social networks at a time, 3 at most. It’s up to you to choose who your content will be aimed at!
3 – Publish content
After choosing your preferred social network, the objective will be to produce regular quality content. This is the most important condition to become an influencer and succeed in becoming known in the field. A few years ago, it was possible to publish sporadically and grow steadily. But in 2022, it’s a different story. Indeed, most social network algorithms give preference to accounts that post regularly.
On Instagram, YouTube, and Tiktok, you may be content to post once or twice a week (although that’s the minimum!). However, be careful to select the days and times you publish. A study by Sprout Social actually found that for most platforms, the highest engagement rates on posts can be seen in the late morning and mid-week afternoon, with Wednesday being the best day to post.
To become an influencer, you’ll need to find content that interests your community based on your area of focus. If you are a fashion influencer, you can share your daily outfits, good shopping addresses, tips for better dressing…. Just make sure you vary the content you offer, while staying within a well-defined sector of activity. Also, don’t be afraid to diversify the types of media you’ll be posting. For example, if you’re on Instagram, don’t just post photos; post reels and stories too. Looking to produce captivating videos for various social networks? The Flexclip video editor is a great tool for achieving this, and it doesn’t require any prior experience.
4 – Make partnerships
The best way to make money on social networks is through partnerships. Don’t let your subscriber base pull you back! Some brands accept collaborations from 1000 followers on Instagram. Do not hesitate to contact them yourself to propose collaboration. You have nothing to lose.
Here are some tips on how to pitch yourself to brands and land your next collaboration:
Take care of your profile
One of the most common complaints from new influencers is that brands don’t come to them. Most of the time, it is because their page is not properly optimized. Indeed, it is very important to pay attention to your profile. It will show brands who you are, who your community is, and what kind of content you like to create. You must therefore take care of your biography. A solid bio explains who you are, what you do and who you create your content for in a few short sentences or bullet points. Your biography should also provide all relevant information about you, such as your full name, location, contact information and areas of expertise.
You should also add a profile picture, which will be an important part of your brand identity. People often recognize a social network profile by its profile picture, so you’ll need to carefully select yours. Also make sure that your face is clearly visible and that the image quality is good.
Create a network
If you want to start getting brand collaborations, you need to put yourself out there. As you establish yourself as an influencer, building relationships with other influencers in your industry can help you increase your opportunities. To connect with other influencers, you can interact with their content through regular comments and shares. Eventually, they will be able to share your content, thus encouraging their audience and potential customers to follow you.
There are several influencer platforms where brands and influencers can meet. You can also use them to find brands in your niche that are looking for collaborations.
Contact the brands
Creating regular content and building a community on social networks without trying to get the attention of brands is like winking at a guy in total darkness… they won’t notice!
A more direct way is to advertise yourself to brands, and send them a polite message explaining what you have to offer: a bonus in their sales, more visibility, a better image…. depending on your own strengths.
These are some of the most direct ways to seek brand collaborations. Another way to get their attention is to tag brands and mention them when you show their products in your posts.
However, keep in mind that your sponsored posts should be able to integrate naturally with the rest of the content you publish.
5 – Build loyalty in your community
If you want to stay in the influencer market as long as possible, it’s important to build a quality community. Indeed, on social networks, brands do not look at the number of followers, but rather at the engagement on your publications. Having a million followers on Instagram is worthless if you only accumulate 1000 likes per post!
Here are two tips for creating a community:
Interact with your audience
When you have an audience, it is important that you interact directly with them. She will feel more valued, and therefore more likely to continue supporting you. You can do this by replying or reacting to their comments, responding to direct messages, and taking the time to highlight content created by your community.
Stay up to date on trends
As an influencer, your audience expects you to provide them with the latest news, trends and other important information related to your field. You can do this by following industry news sources, thought leaders and other experts and sharing them with your community, not to mention sharing your perspective.
It is also important to be aware of any changes to your preferred social networks, such as new features, so that you can adapt your content as needed.
6 – Monetize your content
Once you’ve built a strong community, you can take the next step and start monetizing the content you produce, or at least some of it. To do this, you have several choices. Already, you can go straight to paid subscriptions…which your community will not appreciate, no matter how loyal they are. A less radical solution would be to open an account on a third-party platform, such as Patreon, OnlyFans, or MYM. On these platforms, increasingly popular since the pandemic, you can offer your audience exclusive content in exchange for money. Your community shouldn’t mind, as long as you don’t give up on the idea of producing free content on your other platforms.
7 – Create your brand
The final step in your epic journey as a content creator would be to create a brand of products that you can sell to your community. But be careful to choose the right products! Make sure you sell products that are aligned with your image but also with the needs of your community. If you are a tech-oriented YouTuber, you have no interest in creating your own skincare brand for example.
But before you launch your brand, it is very important to test the waters. We don’t count the number of brands created by influencers that have flopped for one reason or another. Is your community ready to buy your products? You can ask her directly, through a post or a survey.
Remember that being a successful influencer is a process that takes time and a lot of effort to achieve satisfactory results.
