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To run compelling influencer campaigns, you must be familiar with the industry terms. But in this fast-paced social media world, it is tough for marketers to juggle work and learn new influencer marketing terms simultaneously.
So, we have rounded up an influencer marketing glossary with simple definitions to help you easily understand the industry definitions and stay up to date.
Let's check it out!
Affiliate links are unique links to landing pages provided to the affiliate partners. The links are used to keep track of the affiliate's performance and the conversions driven by them. When a customer clicks on a link and comes to the website, the affiliate partner is paid for that click, enabling affiliate tracking for marketers.
Affiliate marketing is a strategy where companies pay a commission for the traffic, leads, or clicks generated by the affiliate partners. When a visitor lands on your website through the affiliate link, it is attributed to the affiliate partner.
Audience insights are detailed data points that give you a clear picture of who your target customers are, what are their interests, behaviors, engagements, unique traits, demographics, and more.
Brand advocates can be existing customers, brand ambassadors, or more who spread awareness about your product through word of mouth. They give positive reviews and talk about your product or service with their family, friends, colleagues, etc., encouraging them to purchase from your brand. Businesses can collaborate with these advocates to acquire new customers.
Brand affinity is the emotional connection established between a company and its consumers. It can be defined as the consumer's perspective (positive or negative) regarding your brand and the values both of them share.
Brand ambassadors are individuals hired by companies to endorse their products or services in return for compensation. The ambassadors are brand fans who love the products or services and know everything about the brand. They help build brand awareness and acquire new customers through word-of-mouth publicity.
Celebrity endorsement is the product or service review given by a celebrity like a sports player, actor, or someone with a large following. Celebrity's fame and engagement help brands reach new audiences and spread mass brand awareness.
Click-through rate, or CTR, is a metric that measures the amount of clicks a post has received in comparison to the number of views. So, for example, if 100 people saw your content, and 15 people clicked on it, your CTR will be: clicks/views = CTR, which is 15/100 = 15%
In the creator economy, creators earn money by promoting products to consumers directly. They create content to engage with their audience and grow followers, which helps brands to target their audience.
Content approval means getting your content approved by someone based on previously approved guidelines. In influencer marketing, brands often approve the creator's content before it goes live on social media and websites.
Customer centricity means the customer is the center point of all your influencer campaign decisions, including strategies, content, posts, etc.
A data-driven approach is where the decisions depend on data analysis and insights. In influencer marketing, data-driven campaigns are run based on insights like engagement rate, audiences, followers, demographics, brand affinity, and more.
Deliverables are the content pieces that the influencer is expected to create, as confirmed when signing the contract. For example, 10 IG stories, 20 images, and five videos can be deliverables for one campaign.
Disclosure is defined as the action of telling someone something or making them aware of critical information they should know. Disclosure in influencer marketing means letting consumers know that the influencer content is paid for or sponsored by brands. Disclosure has become popular in the influencer marketing industry as more and more guidelines are coming into effect to save consumers from misleading content.
A distribution channel is a medium through which the content or information flows. It can be social media, emails, blogs, websites, landing pages, and more.
Engagement rates are the metrics that show how much your audience is involved with your or the influencer's content, which means how many people like, comment, or share the content on social media. The engagement rate of influencers helps determine their convincing power and how much the audience likes their content.
Estimated media value quantifies the influencer's efforts. It is a measurable quantity of the amount the brand will receive from the reach generated by the influencer's social media content. For example, if the influencer generated 100 impressions, calculated at $10 per impression, the brand would earn $1000.
A guest post is an article or blog post written by writers outside your company. Brands often invite professional writers or bloggers to write website content to gain backlinks, reach new audiences, improve rankings, provide information to consumers, and more.
Impressions are the number of times your customers have viewed your article, ad, or social media post.
Influencer activation is a marketing strategy where brands look for influencers to get their products endorsed on social media channels or blogs.
An influencer campaign is the course of action in which brands find creators, manage content, and analyze performance. A campaign includes everything from the start (building strategy, hiring creators) to the end (performance measurement, ROI calculation).
Influencer discovery means finding creators with the experience and expertise to convey your brand message to the target audience. Brands can use influencers to reach potential customers and build trust for their products.
Influencer endorsement is when a creator promotes your product or brand to their followers. It is a form of advertising where the influencers create specific branded content to promote the brand. The content can include product reviews, unboxing videos, or more.
An influencer marketing agency is a business that handles influencer marketing campaigns on your behalf. Agencies have close connections with talented creators, which they leverage to partner your brand with authentic influencers. They plan everything from strategizing to managing relationships and analyzing behavior.
Influencer fraud is when creators lie about their authenticity and connect with brands to work on campaigns. Some influencers in the industry buy followers, likes, comments, shares, clicks, etc., to seem authentic on social media. Such creators risk damaging your brand's reputation and generating no engagement. Statistics say that 55% of influencers are engaged in fraud.
Influencer marketing platforms are software-based services that help brands and agencies find new influencers, manage campaigns and conversations, and measure their effectiveness. The platforms allow you to do all the work in one place and help you streamline end-to-end campaigns with automated technology.
Influencer outreach means reaching out to influencers, leaders, and creators, with a pitch to convince them to promote your brand. It involves sending emails, direct messaging, talking to their agents, and more.
An influencer rate card shows the pricing of the services that creators offer for brand promotions, including the type of content, number of posts, or more. The rate card can include cost per follower, cost per post, services packages, or more.
Product seeding is the process of gifting free products to influencers for endorsement. The influencers who agree to your proposal to work on the campaign can choose to promote your brand using free products.
Influencer relationship management builds positive relations with your creators to drive authenticity in your social media content. IRM tools provide all the necessary functions required to connect and get to know your creators.
Key opinion leaders are influential thought leaders with a loyal following due to their expertise in a particular field. KOLs can be doctors, lawyers, nutritionists, trainers, or more who share their knowledge with the audiences.
Key performance indicators are performance metrics that help measure the success of a campaign, business, or activity. For example, in the case of influencers, indicators can include engagement rate, reach, audiences, experience, and more.
A pitch is either a proposal you send to influencers conveying why they should work with you or it is an influencer proposing their services to you on why they should work on your campaign. Either way, a pitch should be crafted carefully, highlighting reasons why you want to partner, what you can offer, what they will get in return, what the work is, etc.
Referral traffic is the number of visitors your website gets without being searched on Google. These visitors hear about your business from someone else, like ambassadors, influencers, customers, and affiliates, and reach your page through a direct link instead of searching for you on Google.
ROI is the profit you earn on an investment that is calculated by dividing the profit by the cost of the investment.
Sentiment analysis is the process of evaluating what your customers think about your brand. To know your audience's sentiments, you can review their comments and see what they say about you.
Viral marketing is an organic marketing strategy that involves the mass-spreading of a brand's message, usually within a short period. In the social media world, your products and services have the chance of catching people's eye and becoming a sensation if marketed the right way.
Word of mouth is a marketing strategy that brands use to reach new customers with the help of feedback or positive opinion about their product. When customers like a brand, they tell their peers and family about it, hence, creating word of mouth. Influencer marketing is a scalable version of word of mouth where influencers share content about your product with a large number of followers who trust their word.
Social listening is when you choose a topic and analyze related conversations, and brand mentions on social media to get an idea of how you can improve your content.
Virtual influencers are artificial social media creators with human-like personalities who share content on social platforms, including brand promotions, product reviews, and more. Some popular virtual influencers are Knox Frost, Guggimon, Lil Miquela, and Shudu.
UGC or user-generated content is the posts, images, videos, reviews, etc., posted by your existing customers. The customers who have already purchased from you act as excellent sources of social proof for your new potential customers. UGC can include a review, a rating, a social media post about your product, a customer experience story, etc.
The target audience is the market segment or the people to whom you want to sell your product or services. They are the potential customers you need to market your brand to drive purchases. For example, the target audience for a baby care brand is parents.
Now that you're familiar with the influencer marketing glossary terms, you're all set to get started with creator marketing!
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