When Wander Beauty wanted to generate consistent and organic social media conversations around new shades of its Dualist Concealer and Double Date Lip and Cheek product lines, the company turned to Tribe Dynamics, a CreatoIQ Company, to leverage its comprehensive influencer marketing analytics platform to cut through the overwhelming din of social media noise.
And instead of chasing likes and sorting through posts, Wander Beauty was able to use Tribe Dynamics’ platform to monitor posting activity and identify and re-engage lost fans via its dashboard — in real time. The results were astonishing. During the campaign, content focused on these product lines generated 3.5 million impressions and 760 fan posts. And the two product lines ranked among Wander Beauty’s top five best-selling products during just the first month of the campaign.
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Here, Conor Begley, Co-founder of Tribe Dynamics and CSO at CreatorIQ, whose client list includes MILK Makeup, Gucci, Gymshark, LVMH, H&M, Rare Beauty, Disney, and Unilever, among others, explains how the company’s platform differentiates itself in the market. Begley then takes a deep dive into the challenges and opportunities facing brand marketers today as well as key trends in influencer marketing that companies need to know to succeed.
Fairchild Studio: How does Tribe Dynamics differentiate itself from other firms? What is the value proposition for brands that team up with Tribe Dynamics and CreatorIQ?
Conor Begley: Tribe Dynamics is the industry-leading influencer marketing software for content capture, analysis of creator communities, benchmarking brand performance historically and versus competitors, and qualitative insights into these and other areas.
CreatorIQ complements these strengths by bringing the best all-in-one software solution for brands looking to accomplish nearly any influencer marketing task, from recruitment and onboarding to campaign measurement to creator payment and whitelisting to streamlining influencer data to internal systems via a unified API. Our customers will be able to draw upon the strengths of both brands, enjoying the benefits of the world’s most comprehensive, best-reviewed influencer marketing software platform.
Fairchild Studio: From a marketing perspective, what are some of the challenges and opportunities facing brands today?
C.B.: When we surveyed nearly 150 brands for our 2021 Trends Report in September of last year, brands overwhelmingly highlighted two objectives: finding new, impactful brand advocates; and retaining the creators in their communities. However, neither task proved easy, with many respondents also identifying creator discovery and retention as challenges for their teams.
For many brands, surfacing new content creators is not a straightforward process, while other brands struggled to inspire consistent activity from their fans.
Fairchild Studio: What are the most notable trends in influencer marketing and how do you see the space shifting?
C.B.: We foresee influencer marketing occupying an increasingly important role in brands’ overall marketing strategies, so one trend within the space is the continuing rise of influencer marketing itself. In addition to that, as more and more brands find their voice on TikTok, the platform will play an integral role in brands’ influencer marketing programs.
Quality products and clear values will spell success for brands, as will granting creators compensation and creative control over their collaborations. Finally, we think that there will be a continued shift toward wellness and fitness, with those brands poised for sustained growth in social coverage throughout 2022.
Fairchild Studio: What should brands consider when developing an influencer marketing strategy?
C.B.: There are several steps and general principles that brands should keep in mind while building a winning influencer marketing program. One key aspect to consider is that as consumers are becoming increasingly discerning in evaluating a creator’s authenticity, there is nothing more powerful than a creator who genuinely loves and organically promotes your products. That’s why organic affinity for a brand is a prerequisite even for sponsored partnerships.
As with everything, it’s especially true with influencer marketing strategies that you get what you give: brands that have invested in building deep, long-term relationships with their creator fans are the ones that will continue to succeed.
Fairchild Studio: How do you build an “influencer community” and why is it essential? What are some of the best practices?
C.B.: As mentioned above, in today’s marketing space, dedicated creator communities are key to success for brands in almost any vertical. A creator usually has an engaged following on social media, and their followers look to them for honest information and relatable inspiration to help guide them as consumers. The close relationship between a creator and their followers means that a passionate endorsement from a creator has the power to drive an immense volume of ready-to-buy consumers to your brand.
As for best practices, it’s important to prioritize outreach to creators who are already posting about your brand, as this cohort is more likely to continue posting about you, and drive ROI down the line. Once you’ve found those faithful brand fans, customize your outreach and keep track of the details: what products are their favorite, what their personal style looks like, what kind of content they create. Keep these advocates engaged with thoughtful gestures and opportunities for content creation. Regardless of scale, relationship-building efforts should be intentional, consistent, and personalized.
Fairchild Studio: How do you measure the success of an influencer marketing campaign? What are some of the ROIs?
C.B.: There are several metrics that brands can use to gauge the impact of their campaigns. Metrics to determine the health of individual influencer relationships — all of which are included in Tribe Dynamics’ brand dashboard — include Posting Activity, Engagement Rate, Fit, and Earned Media Value (EMV). Then, for measuring the welfare of their overall creator populations, brands can look to Community Size, Retention, Post Count, Posting Frequency, Potency, and other community-oriented metrics.
To ensure that your brand is striving towards holistic and sustainable growth, it’s important to use a range of complementary metrics, and to contextualize growths and declines in specific metrics by surveying the full range of data about your brand.