An influencer is an exceptional social media personality with a huge fan following on several social media platforms. Influencers are a new rage and compete highly with other celebrities of the traditional media.
One thing that separated these from movie celebrities is their sheer dedication to keeping their lives open. While other celebrities try their hardest to keep their lives wrapped under the blankets, social media influencers give their fans access to their lives.
Giving unedited access is one of the most critical job roles of being an influencer. They let their followers experience all the things from their personal life and thus gain trust, which helps them leverage that trust to do sponsored deals and posts.
Most of the followers that follow these influencers are consumed with their way of living and consider them the most critical and knowledgeable people in their respected niches.
Clinging on to influencers has made it extremely easy for everyday people to access the market accordingly. In the earlier days, it was a task to find a brand that sells sustainable products.
But today, if you follow an influencer who specializes in sustainability, you will get all the latest updates about new sustainable brands in a few scrolls.
The unique and creative channel of social media lets them be as creative as possible, making many positive changes in people’s consumption patterns.
There is a very unhealthy stigma attached to the word influencer, revolting that influencing isn’t a real job, or they are mostly superficial.
We deny this statement; we highly agree that their work doesn’t fit the traditional culture, but they try hard 24×7 to sell everyone a dream of a particular lifestyle.
They are working as much as ordinary people but in a fun and fulfilling way. As social media platforms are getting more creative, they have given rise to many niche-specific influencers who educate with new things every day.
Pros And Cons Of Influencer Life
Like every job globally, being an influencer also comes with its fair share of pros and cons.
Pros
- The flexibility of working hours has to be the most significant pros of being an influencer. You do not need to worry about caving in and following a strict schedule of specific timing. They also get the flexibility to travel wherever they want to go and can work from their home with digital devices and a stable Internet connection.
- Influencers get to make many friends in the field who share similar interests. They also get a huge fan following who always thinks of them as their community leader.
- Influencers usually get a lot of freebies as part of the company’s PR marketing. You will see many big and small brands sending them parcels to review or post about. For example, Daniel Wellington did a colossal campaign where they gifted all the significant influencers their new watches. This influencer marketing created hype, and people bought the product, which in turn benefitted the company.
- They are their boss and do not have to work under anyone. If they feel a deal isn’t working, they can quickly stop working and find a new brand to work and collaborate with.
Cons
- It can be a daunting task for micro and macro-influencers to find steady, consistent work. They might have months where no brand wants to collaborate with them. If you aren’t comfortable with uncertainty, this cannot be a viable career path for you.
- They are the first people to get criticized and blamed when a blunder happens. They also have to be very careful as people these days call out and cancel anyone within seconds; this can pose a severe threat to their career.
- They have little to no privacy. Since influencers are always in the media’s eyes, it becomes their duty to share every big little thing with the public.
- They have to constantly work and cannot enjoy social media just for fun. While people working from 9 to 5 can relax and enjoy social media, influencers do not have the liberty to do so.
Building Personal Brand
Now that you have decided on becoming a social media influencer and wish to hop on the bandwagon, you need to create a unique personal brand that speaks to the audience.
We highly recommend doing the following things to get the ball rolling.
Selecting a Niche
Selecting a niche is an essential step that will decide the course of your influencer journey. Of course, you have the general niches of fashion, tech, lifestyle, gaming, healthy, beauty, travel, parenting, etc.
Still, if you want to get popularity, you need to get as specific as you can. For example, if you are gravitating towards travel, we want you to niche it even more. A minimalist traveler or a vegan traveler would serve you well.
On the other hand, if you like architecture, nature, and love bending the societal rules, you can become a tiny house influencer or better known as off-grid living influencers.
Please take time to find the right niche because since you have to create content in that field, you need to have an interest while creating that content.
Apart from that, you cannot change your niche that quickly since most of your followers follow you for that topic; changing a niche means starting from zero.
Establishing Your Unique Brand Voice
Your brand voice should always correlate with your niche and your personality. Keeping a consistent brand voice is also that much important.
You need to study the type of people you wish to attract and make sure the entire brand voice fits. For example, you cannot be a vegan influencer and take random foodservice deals selling meat.
Your brand voice should follow through the whole post and page of any social media platform. For example, this teacher influencer uses her platform to educate parents and provide excellent educational resources for kids while keeping everything light and easy to grasp.
Establishing Your Platform Aesthetic
Establishing an aesthetic is very important when your primary platform for influencing is Instagram. You need to attach your audience by keeping a consistent theme, layout, colors, filters, font throughout your page.
This visual element adds a layer of cohesiveness and makes it very easy to incorporate that connection under your brand’s roof. For example, this account has kept an aesthetic of dark Gothic.
Each post has the same filter and has a consistent theme of colors and fonts.
Search Engine Optimization (SEO)
Influencers have to be extra careful and always use SEO to have their social media platforms on the first page of google. They need to post on their channels constantly; if they are blogging, they should always do guest blogging to increase in-links.
If they are specifically on Youtube, they should try to cross-pollinate and collaborate with other influencers to expand their reach and boost their SEO.
It can be hard to maintain a steady SEO considering the number of newcomers raiding the platform; thus, they need to be constantly on their toes to have all-around SEO-friendly accounts.
Best Platforms For Influencers
There are tons of different platforms that an influencer can use and start their journey.
The most common and highly used apps include Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, and TikTok. You need to have good credibility on at least three platforms for the overall growth of your brand.
The most important has to be Instagram as it is very visual, and you will not require a lot to start. For example, if you are very much into thrifting, you can create a YouTube channel dedicating to the knowledge of thrifting and such.
But you might have to invest a little for your setup. If that is not feasible currently,
Instagram has an IGTV and various video features that you can use to gain followers. Once you find a desirable number of followers, it is always good to shift to YouTube to start earning from there.
The platforms’ importance keeps changing from niche to niche. For example, if you wish to join the gaming niche, Instagram would not be the best platform; you might focus on Twitch or Youtube.
Similarly, if you are very interested in cooking, you should focus on Pinterest as you succeed on that platform rather than on Twitter or Instagram. If you wish to be a comedy influencer, TikTok has to be your best bet.
This way, keep the central platform ready and spend the first six months polishing that one platform, slowly moving to another channel, and adding more credibility to your brand.
Importance Of Quality Content
Churning out quality content is something every influencer has to pay heed to. People have lots of options, ways, and platforms to consume media, so if you want to catch their attention, you need to carry the heavy task of creating quality content.
If people see repeated, same old run-of-the-mill content, they would surely avoid following you. So whatever you post, make sure it has some value, and you aren’t feeding them husk.
The most straightforward way to do this is by creating:
- Very creative and unique content
- Utilizing your platform to start a meaningful conversation about important topics
- Keeping your A-game while studying your competitors
- Capitalizing on new and ongoing trends
- Creating a community that respects your opinion as a creator and influencer
Conclusion
Now that you have read all the critical parts of being an influencer. The decision lies in your hands on how you create a space for yourself in the digital world.
Staying true to your fellow followers will indeed help you become the most influential influencer.
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