What is An Influencer?

What is an influencer in today’s world? An influencer is someone who motivates thoughts, decisions, and behavior. Today, that usually refers to someone who does so through social media. Traditionally, it means through any form of media. In this article we’ll look at influencer marketing, how to identify legitimate influencers, and how you can get started as an influencer.

To better define what an influencer is, here’s a litmus test: When certain people tweet, and certain mega-events happen, you’ve got an influencer.

What is Influencer Marketing?

Aren’t you excited that there is a new method of marketing? Me neither! But influencer marketing is a thing. And it’s a big thing. You might call it, the next big thing in marketing.

The good news is that you don’t have to be a fortune 500 company with a bottomless money-well of advertising in order to take part.

Authenticity is the hot buzz word that’s all over marketing. In the past, maintaining a bottom line was all about consistency, and not so much about being a real person. That’s why you talk to automated female robots on the phone so much.

People still like people more than robots, and they trust people more than robots. Authenticity means your decisions and purchasing trends will be influenced by a popular person(that you adore) on social media.

Which also means that marketers are targeting influencers to help push products. Just ask Pewdiepie how much he gets paid for his self-proclaimed shameless product plugs.

How You Can Identify an Influencer

Strangers’ faces are everywhere nowadays. Usually, appearing to talk to you about how you can 10X yourself.

How do you know they’re actually an “influencer” though?

To cut through the noise, you can certain steps to see if you’ve got a certified influencer. You can do this before deciding whether you should listen, watch, click, or have anything to do with them.

Here’s a quick checklist to get a feel for if someone is a real influencer.

High number of followers
A part of legitimate relevant networks
Authority on something

For a more in-depth look, check out this video of influencers talking influencers (they sure love to talk about themselves).

Transcript: well how long what’s up what up what up on this episode hey guys we talked to here at Forbes this week on the business of influence we are going to talk about what it means and what it takes to be a social media what is a social-media influencer um oh come to me said someone who is doing a large amount of people and can brand themselves and then being able to they’re wearing that shirt I want to go find my shirt and I want to buy that shirt so in 2010 late 2000 at my first video I basically do stance and sketches and blogs such I do everything I guess I’m Ariane bar and also known as baby Arielle I’m 16 years old and I’m a social media influences I’m musically I have about 18 million followers on Twitter I’m almost at six hundred out on Instagram I have about 6 million on YouTube I have 3 million I started Jerry about 60 years ago on tumblr I noticed like I could obviously leverage large followings I started to pick out like base targeting we have like a pizza account kind of doing things crispy shirt so just creates its own network of accounts and now we have about 20 of them there are like 30 million unique followers well like I think what people think impulses are just going to be allowing people to have you know and million followers and I think the opportunity really is in the hundreds of thousands right now we define micro as really 5,000 to 100,000 followers that a hundred thousand to a million is a mid-level influencer and then a million and up would be a macro and I think there’s a perception that oh that’s easy like anybody to go and film a video and upload speeds and there’s a lot of artwork because for a lot of people illogical don’t understand that this is a very tough career a tough life social media is open to anyone so anybody who is driven and feels like this is their passion and isn’t what they want to do with the rest of their life of course they just come on and do it but it’s something that not everybody may eat assess black there’s a supply and demand issue it turns out that there’s a lot of attractive people it turns out that there’s a lot of fun people it turns out there’s a lot of smart people when you can choose from 700,000 fitness models to promote your you know muscle milk all of a sudden you’ve got to change the economics on next week’s episode there’s a few different ways to make money off of uses over 50% of the channels are generating over this decision the closest is it’s great all right guys thanks for tuning in and don’t forget to subscribe.

How You Can Become an Influencer

Not popular? New to all this? Don’t know where to start?

You’ve already got the most important trait. I know this because I can see you through your screen. Just kidding, kind of…

…It’s because you’re unique. Influencer marketing is all about discovering what sets you apart and leveraging that.

Starting early, meaning now, will definitely pay off in the long run.

Most people just post their knee-jerk reactions to life on social media, and that’s OK. Showing who you really are is important. However, being conscious of your audience, what they react to, and what they like hearing from you, is a firmer step in the right direction.

If you’re starting to think you were born to be an influencer, here’s The Ultimate Influencer Marketing Guide

…or you can start with learning about Personal Branding.

Trends in Influencer Marketing

What do trends in influencer marketing have to do with you, or anything?

As influencer marketing continues, you’re going to see the world start to form around them(as if life wasn’t scary enough). Simply put, knowing the present helps in planning for the future.

I’ll end here, and present to you a colorful picture of the future.