Working With Influencers to Drive Retail Sales - Episode 255

INTERVIEW WITH PAULA ERSLY

DESCRIPTION

In today’s podcast, Kiri is once again joined by Paula Ersly, Head of Social Strategy at Acadia. They cover influencer marketing, how to work with influencers, and some of the best tips and tricks for working with influencers.

Make sure you tune in to find out more!

Paula Ersly has been working in social media strategy for over seven years, with a focus on organic channel management and creative execution that drives engagement. She has worked across a variety of industries, from travel to sexual wellness. She’s based out of Asheville, North Carolina.

“Any influencer worth their salt is a bit of a curationist.”
— Paula Ersly

KEY TAKEAWAYS

  • Paula Ersly returns to the podcast and talks with Kiri about a related topic to the previous episode with Paula and that’s working with influencers. If you’re going to set up a TikTok strategy, you don’t have to make your own content, there are so many influencers who can create the content for you.

  • One of the subjects of this episode is ‘What are the reasons why retail brands would want to work with an influencer?’. Paula shares 3 main key reasons why:

    1. WORD OF MOUTH: influencers can lend your brand authenticity, especially in long-term partnerships 

    2. Ability to find NEW AUDIENCES on the platforms where it matters.

      1. TikTok, Instagram, Twitch, Amazon

    3. Add NEW CONTENT to the rotation. Influencer content can be recycled into organic posts, paid ads, website testimonials

    Another question they discuss is what are the bad reasons to work with an influencer? 

    1. To provide “legitimacy” to an unproven product – essentially, to swindle. (The NFT and bitcoin markets are full of this right now.)

    2. Solely to grow your owned followers

    3. Because “everyone else is doing it”

    Kiri and Paula discuss the top 3 tips and best practices for working with influencers. 

    They talk about some common mistakes which can be made when working with influencers. 

    1. Getting hung up just on audience reach, ignoring engagement, authenticity, and re-usability of content 

    2. Not aligning influencers with your brand values + tone

    3. Ignoring influencers’ past partnerships or posts

    Another topic that was discussed in this episode is how Acadia helps brands to initiate and scale work with influencers. 

    1. We work with you to identify your goals, key demographics, and how influencers can fit into the picture

    2. We source influencer recommendations using software that helps us take a deeper look at their audience insights, content performance, etc.

    3. Vet them, handle all contracts/communication

MENTIONED IN THIS EPISODE

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