Mid-Level Archives

All the new Influencer Regulations in the EU
Influencer marketing in the European Union can be problematic: while having a unified market for goods and services the regulations and responsibilities around the promotion of such goods and services can vary drastically from country to country.
Three main actors are involved in shaping the regulations around influencers in the 27 countries of the Union: the European Commission and Parliament with their Directives (especially the Digital Service Act and the General Data Protection Regulation), the European Advertising Standard Alliance (EASA) which is a self-governing organization (SRO) that coordinates with national homologs SROs to create a common framework for advertising and local governments that can go above and beyond the European regulations.
This article is part of our series on influencer marketing regulations. You can find our other here:
Digital Service Act (DSA) & influencers
Entered into force on the 16 of November 2022, the Digital Service Act (DSA) has the goal to contain the spread of harmful content and create an environment that is faster to react to illegal content. In doing so, the DSA incidentally tackle influencers and their content.
By connecting the definition of “illegal content” with the national law of member states (“any information or activity, including the sale of products or provision of services which is not in compliance with Union law or the law of a Member State, irrespective of the precise subject matter or nature of that law”), the DSA expands already existing regulations applicable to advertising to influencer marketing.
Based on this interpretation of the DSA that most countries without a regulation that specifically targets influencers connect them to other forms of marketing and include them in their existing regulations.
GDPR compliance in influencer marketing
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the main legal framework that rules the collection and use of data of EU citizens. Implemented in 2018 it aims to protect personal data and guarantee the right to be forgotten to any individual that had previously provided its personal data. Anyone that intends to engage in influencer marketing within the EU should make themselves very familiar with the provisions included in the GDPR since fines to breach it can reach 20 million euros or 4% of a company’s international turnover.
Luckily for you, if you are engaging in influencer marketing is quite easy to comply with GDPR’s requirements since differently than with other ways of marketing you are not collecting influencers’ or customers’ personal data.
If you plan to collect influencers’ or (potential) customers’ data you need to explicitly inform the interested parties of it. Furthermore, you need to be able to scrap records about any individual at that individual’s will. Any use of data collected this way should be done only after anonymization if not otherwise directly agreed with the involved subjects.
What are EASA’s best practices on influencer marketing?
EASA is a self-governing agency that connects all the national advertising agencies active in the EU and tries to coordinate them in adopting similar regulations to create a homogeneous environment when it comes to advertising. EASA does not have legislative powers and neither the national agencies do but they often impose fines and punishments for regulations transgressions.
In May 2022 EASA published a new iteration of its best practices for influencer marketing, in this version the agency calls for the obligation to disclose commercial partnerships and enhanced collaboration for brands in order to forge a more ethical ecosystem where customers are safe and protected.
EASA’s best practices on influencer marketing are the bedrock foundation for doing influencer marketing in the EU. While some countries may have more stringent or more lax regulations, adhering to EASA’s will make you compliant in most cases.
While not constituting law, EASA’s best practices aim to be the stepping stone to spark national self-regulatory organizations (SROs) into adopting a cohesive and coherent regulatory framework.
To help creators and marketers EASA prepared an online tool called DiscloseMe, thanks to this tool is possible to look know the regulations of every country in the European Union.
National regulations
Austria
In Austria, the Media Act, and the Code of Ethics created by the Austrian Advertising Council establish that is required to disclose clearly when content is an advertisement.
Belgium
In Belgium, influencers are considered on the same level as media service providers, and like them, they need to make commercial communications recognizable. Concurrently who is paying the influencer need to make sure that there is a clear disclosure.
Bulgaria
The Bulgarian National Council for Self-Regulation recommends for any sponsorship be disclosed through the use of dedicated hashtags and in a clear and immediate way.
Croatia
Croatia does not have specific regulations for influencers but their activities fall under the category of promotional activities. Like other promotional activities sponsored posts need to be clearly identified as such, with the possibility of fines for both influencers and brands violating the Media Act.
Cyprus
Considering the small population of the country influencer regulation is not at the forefront of the topics debated.
Czechia
Czechia had to deal with many influencers promoting tobacco and alcohol products and without any dedicated legislation the pushback has been light and ineffective. The Platform of Professional Communication, a self-regulatory body that covers influencers, agencies, and brands has created a Code of Conduct with best practices. The Code invites the influences to mark the sponsored posts as such, not lie or conceal information about their experience with products and services and respect the laws around regulated products like alcohol, tobacco, and gambling which should not be advertised by anyone with an audience composed for more than 25% by underage people.
Denmark
Hidden advertisement is illegal in Denmark and this translates to influencers’ promotions as well as de-facto making it mandatory for influencers to disclose their partnership and be upfront with their connection to the brands. Recently the Danish Veterinary and Food Administration passed new rules especially aimed at tackling the promotion of foods, prohibiting exaggerated claims and anecdotal evidence for health benefits that could mislead customers.
Estonia
The Consumer Protection and Technical Regulatory Authority of Estonia established that influencers’ promotions on social media need to be clearly marked as such. Concurrently alcohol and tobacco promotions are not allowed on the personal account of an influencer.
Finland
The Finnish Competition and Consumer Authority composed guidelines for influencer marketing on social media in 2019. The guidelines promote the disclosure of advertisement content and paint both the influencer and the sponsor as responsible for the respect of the rules.
France
In March 2023 France passed new regulations for influencer marketing. Under this framework, influencers can incur in high fines (up to €300,000) and even jail time if fail to properly disclose sponsored content. Striving to also address the harmful impact that edited photos have on people’s self-esteem and mental health the bill includes an obligation of disclosure also for those instances.
Germany
The case of influencer promotion in Germany has been at the center of a few court decisions that created and shaped how influencers should behave. While was rapidly clear that any paid promotion, not immediately recognizable as such, should be labeled with proper hashtags in order to inform the potential customers of the sponsored nature of the deal, German courts had variable takes in regard to unpaid promotions. If the influencer buys the product themselves or receives it for free should they still disclose it as a partnership? Ultimately the court decided that the only way to not have to disclose is if is proven that the brand mentioned in the post had no influence in the judgment expressed. Since is easier said than done, the safest approach is to disclose it as sponsorship even when there is no monetary transaction between the influencer and the brand.
Greece
Greek influencers don’t need to comply with any specific law but they are bound to the Hellenic Advertising Communications Code that imposes the disclosure of promotional material making the marking of sponsored content as such mandatory.
Hungary
Hungary’s Competition Authority requires influencers to disclose their sponsorships and keeps both the influencer and the brand liable in case of violations.
Ireland
Ireland influencers are self-regulated under the Advertising Standard Authority for Ireland (ASAI) which requires commercial content to be tagged as such. In the past, the ASAI publicly shamed those influencers who didn’t comply with the practice.
Italy
The Istituto di Autodisciplina Publicitaria (IAP) is the self-regulating organ responsible for regulating marketing in Italy. In 2019 they included the “Digital Chart”, a collection of best practices before only recommended, in their regulations making it mandatory for influencers to disclose sponsored content through proper use of hashtags.
Latvia
Latvian authorities require sponsorships to be disclosed via text or orally.
Lithuania
Influencer practices aren’t the most pressing issue faced by Lithuania, considering that the country in 2020 only had 300 people that would have qualified for the title. But nonetheless, the self-regulating marketing organization created guidelines that encourage influencers to label their sponsored posts with the hashtags #ad or #reklama.
Luxembourg
Luxembourg has not instituted any special rule for influencers, but any influencer inside the little principate needs to follow the guidelines of the Autorité Luxembourgeoise Indépendante de l’Audiovisuel (ALIA)
Malta
No specific regulation has been established around influencers in Malta.
Netherlands
Dutch regulators established that is mandatory for any content creator with over 500,000 subscribers to register with the Media Authority, join the Dutch Advertising Code Authority, and clearly state when content is sponsored by the use of dedicated hashtags. In case of non-compliance Dutch authorities could impose fines of up to €225,000.
Poland
The Office of Polish Competition and Consumer Protection instituted a series of guidelines after a concerning investigation into social media advertising. Currently, content should be tagged and clearly understandable to be sponsored content. Violation can incur in fines of up to 10% of the influencer or brand turnover.
Portugal
No specific regulations have been introduced by Portuguese authorities regarding influencer marketing. Sponsored content falls under the category of commercial communication and requires to be disclosed as such. Therefore the use of hashtags to indicate a partnership is necessary when operating in Portugal.
Romania
Romania does not have special regulations for influencers when it comes to sponsorships.
Slovakia
The Slovakian self-regulating agency issued a Code of influencer marketing requiring that sponsorships are fully disclosed and forbidding the use of fake reviews.
Slovenia
Influencers in Slovenia are not considered media and because of this technicality, they are unaffected by the Mass Media Act and any existing advertisement regulation.
Spain
The Asociación para la Autorregulación de la Comunicación Comercial (Autocontrol) establishes what constitutes a commercial post and how it needs to be labeled in Spain. Whenever a post is aimed at promoting products or services, is the result of financial remuneration, or is subject to validation before publication it falls under the Code of Conducts regulation. Autocontrol establishes that posts need to be marked as commercial by explicitly stating it and when possible by also using the features built into the social networks to highlight such cases.
Sweden
Swedish regulators, and courts, have established that any kind of sponsored content needs to be marked as such, clearly indicating if the influencer received compensation for the post.
Davide
September 19, 2023
Guides
Mid-Level, Regulatory Compliance
New 8-steps Guide to Influencer Marketing in the EU
Influencer marketing is a powerful strategy for brands to connect with their target audiences and amplify their message. By partnering with influential individuals on social media platforms, brands can leverage the trust and reach these influencers have built to promote their products or services. However, when it comes to conducting influencer marketing campaigns in the European Union (EU), it’s crucial for brands to understand and comply with the specific regulations governing this practice.
On May 22, 2023, the European Advertising Standard Alliance (EASA) has updated its best practices regarding influencers and how they need to disclose collaborations and partnerships.
But what this means for everyday marketers that want to carry out an influencer marketing campaign in the EU? In this article, we are going to discover how to craft a perfectly EU-regulation-compliant influencer marketing campaign.
What are EASA’s best practices on influencer marketing?
EASA’s best practices on influencer marketing are the bedrock foundation for doing influencer marketing in the EU. While some countries may have more stringent or more lax regulations, adhering to EASA’s will make you compliant in most cases.
EASA is a self-governing agency that collects all the national advertising agencies active in the EU and tries to coordinate them in adopting similar regulations to create a homogeneous environment when it comes to advertising. The EU has established a single market where goods and services can easily pass across borders, but it is not the same story for advertising: each country has its regulations that establish how promotions of products can be carried out.
While not constituting law, EASA’s best practices aim to be the stepping stone to spark national self-regulatory organizations (SROs) into adopting a cohesive and coherent regulatory framework.
How to do influencer marketing following EASA’s best practices:
The founding pillars of EASA’s Best Practices are responsibility, recognizability, and disclosure.
Influencers and Brands are concurrently responsible for making sure to abide by disclosure regulations and acting following local laws. The sponsored content needs to be instantly recognizable as such and overtly disclose its sponsored nature. Each local SRO usually provides a list of hashtags and terms that can be used to easily disclose a post born from a brand influencer partnership.
To simplify creators’ and marketers’ lives EASA also created DiscloseMe, a simple online tool to help influencers and marketers to know the regulations for each European country.
Digital Service Act & influencers
Entered into force on the 16 of November 2022, the Digital Service Act (DSA) has the goal to contain the spread of harmful content and create an environment that is faster to react to illegal content. In doing so, the DSA tackled influencers and their content. By connecting the definition of “illegal content” with the national law of member states (“any information or activity, including the sale of products or provision of services which is not in compliance with Union law or the law of a Member State, irrespective of the precise subject matter or nature of that law”), the DSA expands already existing regulations applicable to advertising to influencer marketing.
GDPR compliance in influencer marketing
General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) is the main legal framework that rules the collection and use of data of EU citizens. Implemented in 2018 it aims to protect personal data and guarantee the right to be forgotten to any individual that had previously provided its personal data. Anyone who intends to engage in influencer marketing within the EU should make themselves very familiar with the provisions included in the GDPR since fines for breaching it can reach 20 million euros or 4% of a company’s international turnover.
Luckily for you, if you are engaging in influencer marketing is quite easy to comply with GDPR’s requirements since differently than with other ways of marketing you are not collecting influencers’ or customers’ personal data.
If you plan to collect influencers’ or (potential) customers’ data you need to explicitly say so. Furthermore, you need to be able to scrap records about any individual at that individual’s will. Any use of data collected this way should be done only after anonymization if not otherwise directly agreed with the involved subjects.
The 8-steps Influencer Marketing Campaign in the EU
Define the campaign objective
Is important to have clear in mind what is the final objective (or objectives) of your campaign. Once the ultimate goal is defined you can start evaluating which are the appropriate steps to take in order to achieve it, on which platforms you should engage your audience, and with which types of content.
Having identified the campaign objective and the path to achieve it it will be easy to spot which metrics would allow you to understand if the campaign is going in the right direction while it is running, these are going to be your KPIs.
Identify target audience
Consider psycho-demographic factors that are shared by your current customers and use that information to highlight interests, buying behaviors, and content categories. Through this process, or creating consumer personas, you will get closer to understanding what moves your customers and how you can approach new potential customers through content and influencers.
Research and select influencers
The right influencer would not only be able to help you achieve your final goal and approach your target audience but will also align with your company values and vision. The extra step of finding influencers that match your company deeply will be a major help in establishing trust in their audience and creating a stronger bond with your brand. While is always recommended to prefer content creators with a highly engaged audience you may also want to focus on other metrics that may better reflect your campaign objectives. To simplify your life influencer marketing platforms, like CreatorDB, provide advanced search tools to easily identify creators on the base of many different markers.
Start up the partnerships
Once you identified the influencers you want to work with you can start connecting with them. This is as simple as sending out emails that describe the details and establishing a communication line with the interested creators. Is it at this time that you will have to negotiate the terms of collaboration, such as compensation, content requirements, posting schedules, and disclosure guidelines. It’s important to ensure transparency and align expectations with the influencers.
Create compelling content
Work in concert with the influencers to craft content that is both compelling to their audience and aligns with your brand values and goals. To streamline this process you can prepare guidelines and creative directions that will allow the creators to understand how they can keep their style and voice while fitting your brand image and values.
Ensure legal compliance
Before anything goes live make sure that all creators are aware of their country’s local regulations in matters of influencer marketing. As a general rule sponsored content of any kind needs to be disclosed as such and tagged with hashtags that identify it as an advertisement. Under the upcoming implementation of the DSA influencer’s content will get closer to other forms of content in the regulatory framework.
Monitor performances and optimize
When a campaign is running is important to have under control the various metrics that were identified as KPIs. Concurrently you should measure the different influencer’s performances. Collecting real-time data on each of the pieces of content you sponsored is going to allow you to understand if your planned steps are functioning in the way you intended. By keeping the pulse of the situation in check you will have the chance to tweak your campaign if things are moving in an unexpected direction.
Foster long-term relationships
To leverage the influencers effectively maintain open communication, provide timely feedback, and consider evolving the initial collaboration into something else if the experience with the influencer was positive and productive. Long-term collaborations are conducive to trust and loyalty building toward the brand.
Conclusion
While there are not yet European-level regulations for influencers set in stone a series of tendencies are emerging: is to be expected that more responsibilities will fall onto creators and possibly, on the French example, brands for disclosure. Concurrently EASA is calling for the local SROs to introduce a more inclusive approach when it comes to influencers instituting certifications and compliance courses.
If you are running influencer marketing campaigns in Europe or you plan to do it in the future this is a moment of changes, influencers are gaining traction at times positive and at times negative this is bringing the eye of the regulators on the field and will possibly translate in various European countries introducing more specific regulations on the base of the EASA guidelines or the example of other nations.
Davide
September 19, 2023
Guides
Mid-Level, Regulatory Compliance
Make the best of Engagement Rates in Influencer Marketing
Engagement rates are essential in influencer marketing because they measure the level of interaction between influencers and their followers. A high engagement rate indicates that an influencer’s audience is interested in their content, which points to an audience that trusts and connects with the influencer.
When applied to influencer marketing campaigns, highly engaged content increases brand awareness, sales, and brand loyalty.
What are engagement rates?
Engagement rates measure the level of interaction between an influencer and their followers. The engagement rate is calculated by dividing the number of interactions (likes, comments, shares, etc.) by the number of followers and multiplying by 100.
Engagement rates can be calculated per-post basis to know how successful each post is or as an average to evaluate how an influencer can create content that resonates with its audience and is used to evaluate the effectiveness of an influencer’s content.
The engagement rate can be calculated using different interaction measures better to understand specific aspects of a content creator’s audience. You can decide to include any active action the audience takes towards a post to create a “total” engagement rate.
This is generally what you will find indicated as the engagement rate. However, using such a catch-all metric will not be as effective in evaluating specific aspects. For example, if you want to create discussion around your campaign, you may prefer to look specifically at comments when calculating your engagement rate to individuate creators whose audience is already highly vocal about related topics.
Why are engagement rates important in influencer marketing?
Engagement rates are critical in influencer marketing because they provide insight into the effectiveness of an influencer’s content. A high engagement rate indicates that the influencer’s content resonates with their audience and their followers actively engage with it.
Many social media algorithms promote highly engaging content showing it to more users, and, more often, how they calculate engagement rate changes from platform to platform.
But engagement rates are not everything. Learn about other essential metrics in our Analytics 101
Engagement rates are essential in an influencer marketing campaign. Similarly to what is said for organic content, users are likely to engage with sponsored posts if they find them interesting.
Since highly engaging content is boosted, investing in content creators with a high engagement rate not only means that many people in the influencer audience will see and react to the content but also that many in adjacent niches will be proposed such content organically, expanding the reach of your campaign.
Evaluating in comparison with other metrics with other metrics, such as reach and impressions, can provide a comprehensive understanding of the effectiveness of an influencer marketing campaign. Reach refers to the number of unique individuals who have viewed the influencer’s content, while impressions refer to the total number of times the content has been viewed.
By comparing engagement rates with reach and impressions, brands can evaluate the effectiveness of their influencer marketing campaigns and identify areas for improvement.
Factors that affect engagement rates
Engagement rates reflect the level of interaction and responsiveness between influencers and their audience. Factors such as content quality, relevance to the target audience, content type, and follower count all have an impact. By understanding and optimizing these factors, brands, and influencers can enhance their strategies and achieve higher engagement rates, resulting in more successful influencer marketing campaigns.
Quality of content
The quality of an influencer’s content is one of the most critical factors affecting their engagement rates. High-quality content is more likely to engage followers, encourage them to interact with the influencer’s content and increase their likelihood of sharing it with their followers.
Influencers can improve the quality of their content by investing in high-quality visuals, incorporating informative and entertaining captions, and creating authentic content that aligns with their brand.
Relevance to the target audience
Another critical factor is the relevance of the content to the influencer’s target audience. The influencer’s content should align with their followers’ interests, values, and preferences. Since content creators are generally more in touch with their audience than the marketers who hire them is essential to consult with them on how to structure an effective brand collaboration.
Type of content
The type of content an influencer creates can also impact their engagement rates. The content should align with the influencer’s brand and interests while being relevant and engaging to their followers.
Concurrently different platforms promote different content in different ways: Instagram, until recently, had a preference for Reels, while LinkedIn favorites documents. Your campaign should keep in mind these differences to be able to create content that will perform best.
Size of following
The size of an influencer’s following can also impact their engagement rates. While big influencers with larger followings may have a broader reach, their engagement rates may be lower than micro-influencers or mid-tier influencers.
This is because smaller influencers often have a more loyal following, and their followers may feel a stronger connection to them. Brands can work with influencers of different sizes based on their marketing objectives and target audience.
Authenticity
Another factor that can affect engagement rates is the influencer’s authenticity. Followers can tell when an influencer is not genuine or promotes a brand or product that does not align with their values. Authenticity is crucial in influencer marketing, and influencers who are transparent and authentic in their content are more likely to build a loyal following highly reactive to their posts.
Brands can work with influencers who align with their values and ethos, ensuring the partnership feels authentic and genuine.
How to improve engagement rates in influencer marketing
Enhancing engagement rates is crucial in influencer marketing, as it determines the effectiveness of campaigns in capturing and retaining audience attention. Influencers can significantly improve engagement rates by engaging with followers, optimizing post timing, and collaborating with fellow influencers.
These strategies foster a deeper connection with the audience, increase content relevance, and expand reach, resulting in more successful influencer marketing campaigns.
Engaging with followers
Engagement is a two-way street, and influencers who actively engage with their followers can significantly improve their engagement rates. Responding to comments, addressing questions, and showing genuine interest in their audience’s opinions fosters community and connection.
Influencers can create a more interactive and engaging environment by initiating conversations, asking for feedback, and encouraging followers to participate. This increases engagement rates and strengthens the relationship between the influencer and their followers, fostering loyalty and advocacy.
Timing of posts
The timing of posts plays a crucial role in maximizing engagement rates. Influencers should analyze their audience’s behavior and identify the optimal times when their followers are most active on social media. By scheduling posts during these peak times, influencers can increase the visibility and likelihood of engagement with their content.
Collaborating with other influencers
Collaborating with other influencers is an effective strategy to boost engagement rates. By partnering with influencers who share a similar target audience or complement their niche, influencers can tap into a new pool of followers and expand their reach.
Collaborative content, such as joint videos, guest posts, or shoutouts, not only exposes the influencers to each other’s followers but also creates a sense of novelty and excitement. This often leads to increased engagement as followers are curious about the collaboration and eager to participate in the conversation.
Conclusion
In conclusion, engagement rates hold immense importance in influencer marketing. These rates serve as a vital metric to gauge the effectiveness and impact of influencer campaigns. Engagement rates provide valuable insights into content’s success and engagement levels by measuring the level of interaction and responsiveness between influencers and their audience.
High engagement rates indicate that influencers effectively connect with their audience, foster brand awareness, and drive meaningful actions such as likes, comments, and shares. Furthermore, engagement rates help brands assess influencer marketing campaigns’ return on investment (ROI) and make informed decisions about collaborations and content strategies.
With the ever-evolving social media landscape, authenticity and transparency will remain paramount. Audiences increasingly seek genuine connections and relatable content, leading to a shift towards micro-influencers offering niche expertise and more authentic engagements.
Additionally, as technology advances, metrics, and analytics tools will become more sophisticated in measuring engagement beyond likes and comments, incorporating qualitative factors such as sentiment analysis and feedback. Moreover, with the rise of emerging platforms and formats, influencers, and brands must adapt their strategies to optimize engagement rates in these new spaces.
In summary, engagement rates are a vital metric determining influencer marketing campaigns’ success and effectiveness. Influencers can continuously improve their engagement rates by emphasizing quality content, understanding the target audience, engaging with followers, optimizing post timing, collaborating with other influencers, and staying ahead of trends.
With the evolution of influencer marketing and the dynamic nature of social media platforms, influencers, and brands must remain adaptable and innovative to maximize engagement rates and achieve long-term success in the ever-evolving landscape of influencer marketing.
Davide
September 7, 2023
Guides
Mid-Level, ROI Measurement and Optimization
How To Get Results: Influencers And Pre-registration For Games Launch
Pre-registration campaigns for mobile games are more and more common. They rely on generating hype in communities connected with the game to drive interest and expectations about the game. Pre-registration campaigns connect with influencer marketing and social media user-generated content to expand the campaign’s reach further and show the community already built around it.
Why pre-registration and influencer marketing
Mobile games significantly benefit from pre-registration since it is an excellent way to stand out and incentivize potential players to get involved with the game from the beginning. Particularly in the case of games with prominent multiplayer features having a community involved right off the bat is going to be an essential part of the success of your project.
Influencer marketing uses influencers with online followings in relevant communities to promote your products or services less invasively than traditional publicity. Because influencer marketing relies on people who are organically followed and have built their reputation in a field, it can target particular niches and allow us to engage with them.
You can check out other ideas on combining gaming and influencer marketing here for the best results.
Define the right audience
Targeting the right audience should be one of the prime concerns of any marketer. And this includes the proper age group, interests, and even the right countries. A good target audience definition can create a successful marketing campaign. Defining the right target audience is especially important in a pre-registration campaign since it entirely relies on involving people with something that still needs to be released.
Pre-registration campaigns for mobile games are more and more common. They rely on generating hype in communities connected with gaming to drive interest and expectations about the upcoming release of a game.
However pre-registration campaigns are most effective when they’re not organized by themselves. By flanking it with the involvement of relevant influences is going to be possible to obtain a much greater audience involvement and reach.
Why pre-registration and influencer marketing
Mobile games benefit from pre-registration as a way to generate early interest in the launch, establish a community, and incentivize participation and interactions with other marketing initiatives. Particularly in the case of games with prominent multiplayer features a community involved right off the bat is going to be a huge help to the success of the project.
Influencer marketing uses influencers in relevant communities to promote products or services less invasively than other marketing channels. Because influencer marketing relies on people who are organically followed for their content and have built their reputation in a field, it can target particular niches and allow them to access these audiences and engage with them.
Combining a pre-registration campaign with influencers’ involvement is going to provide the best of both worlds and boost the success of the game launch.
But in order to do it right, there are a few things that need to be taken into consideration, in the following paragraphs we will illustrate step-by-step how to ace it.
You can check out other ideas on combining gaming and influencer marketing here for the best results.
Define the right audience
Targeting the right audience should be one of the prime concerns of any marketer. And this includes the proper age group, interests, and even the right countries. A good target audience definition can create a successful marketing campaign.
Both pre-registration and influencer marketing campaigns have a heavy emphasis on the audience. While pre-registration campaigns need to be finely tuned to speak to the right people, influencers are able to access highly segmented audiences allowing them to precisely target the campaign aim audience.
Once identified a target audience, it is time to go ahead and understand what will motivate them. Not all communities reply the same way to the same stimulus. For example, European gamers are more likely to pre-register for a game if a discount is involved, while APAC players may do so just to obtain exclusive in-game items. Giving your audience the right incentive is vital to engage the communities.
Once you have the target audience figured out, you can start working on finding influencers that will be able to effectively access it. Using services like CreatorDB will make it easy to individuate the right influencers for your campaign by browsing a large influencer database and being able to perform searches using advanced filtering options and parameters.
How to use influencers for boosting pre-registrations
As for the target audience is essential to have well-established the goals of your marketing campaign. In the case of a campaign aimed toward game pre-registration, it would mostly be done by setting a quota of users to pre-register. When picking influencers, there is a considerable debate about whether it is better to go with prominent names that hold accounts with millions of followers, small influencers with a few thousand followers, or something in the middle.
There are good reasons on both sides: more prominent creators bring your message in front of many more people at once but obtain a lower engagement rate on average, and small creators have fewer but much more dedicated followers.
Another significant difference is how smaller creators often cater toward more specialized niches while larger ones tend to attract much broader, less focused demographics. It is essential to consider that, especially if your marketing strategy wants to break through specific groups.
Learn everything you need to know about micro-influencers here.
But much of the decision should come down to which influencers are going to be able to better target your desired audience and achieve your goals.
Once chosen the influencers, think about your messaging strategy. Unlike other forms of advertising, influencer marketing is often discouraged from having a script set in stone that each creator should follow.
Many campaigns still want to keep a unified approach to their messaging and that is going to be important to ensure that everyone can easily recognize every piece of content as a part of the same campaign.
The messaging strategy should be able to create a connection between the influencers’ styles with the game branding and content.
By leaving the influencers enough creative freedom, they are able to craft messages that resonate with their fanbase better than any other message could.
How to launch a pre-registration campaign
Google Play allows games to be searchable in the app store and in pre-registration for up to 90 days, even if many large studios seem to be given extensions.
In general, a pre-registration campaign should be started 1 to 2 months before the launch of the game to be able to maintain the hype and excitement around the project.
Since the pre-registration campaign is a prolonged effort, it is important to be able to have a sustained push when it comes to marketing. Activating many relevant small content creators throughout the duration of the campaign is a perfect way to keep the target audience engaged with the game and aware of the launch.
Generate buzz through influencers to improve pre-registration
Pre-registration campaigns are proven to lead to higher daily installs and improved day-one to day-seven retention.
By promoting pre-registration through relevant influencers is possible to mobilize and engage with online communities. Doing so the marketing message would be amplified and have a great chance to gain traction.
In order to better attract interest and registrations is helpful to offer exclusive content or discounts for the ones that participate in the pre-registration. This approach can be taken a step further by including content tailored around the influencers’ likings or signature traits.
Including and encouraging user-generated content in your campaign is another good approach to extend the buzz around the campaign and boost audience involvement and community-building efforts.
Sharing early access or game demos with the influencers is another crucial way to generate hype around your game and drive in pre-registering users.
Showing off parts of your game can give your audience a sense of what will be and create excitement and anticipation.
Conclusion
In conclusion, a pre-registration marketing campaign can be an excellent tool for mobile game launch since it enhances the game’s visibility and works towards establishing a community around the game even before it has been found. They can be boosted by collaborating with influencers, which is especially important since they can work towards mobilizing online communities and groups to participate in your game or marketing campaign actively.
That’s why we at CreatorDB offer a series of services that can accommodate your needs: our proprietary software will help you identify the right influencers in no time. But if you are looking for a more hands-off approach, our agency team can deliver end-to-end influencer marketing campaigns across the globe. They flaunt expertise in 10 of the most spoken languages and are used to individuate contact and manage content creators for our clients. Contact us to learn more about what influencer marketing can do for you.
Davide
August 31, 2023
Industry Trends
Advanced Influencer Strategies, gaming, Mid-Level
6 Terrific Halloween Ideas for a Nightmare 2023 Influencer Campaign
Halloween: the holiday that millions celebrate across the world. There’s no doubt that everybody loves Halloween – make the most of this annual tradition by collaborating with influencers on Halloween-themed content! If you want to pumpkin-spice up your influencer marketing for Halloween this year, this is for you.
Why use influencer marketing during Halloween
Halloween is a prime moment to execute an influencer marketing campaign. As during other holidays, people are more likely to spend time on social media and engage with brands and they are prone to shop.
Moreover, Halloween is a very visual holiday: costumes and dressing up are a main part of it, and many will prepare decorations for the house and so on.
To find inspiration and tutorials many look to influencer content on social media making it a prime time for brands to organize partnerships and campaigns.
By partnering with influencers for a campaign around Halloween a brand will have access to a highly interested audience.
With the spooky season coming there are going to be many dedicated content categories that will emerge and that can be integrated with a marketing campaign.
In this article, we will introduce six content ideas for brands to use when partnering with influencers. Is always possible to mix and combine to create some unique approaches.
It’s all about the scare, cook or bake a scary treat!
Sweet treats are a hit all year round, so why not add a spooky edge to them this Halloween? Keep up with the trends by working with influencers who can show your audiences how to cook or bake a scary treat. Choose influencers who are up to the challenge!
Google-sponsored influencer Rosanna Pansino delivered exactly that with her last-minute recipe video – check it out!

Pumpkin season or ghost season? Show yourself carving a pumpkin!
There’s no surer sign that Halloween is coming than seeing jack-o’-lanterns everywhere! Carving pumpkins is synonymous with the spooky season, so select an influencer who can show their carving talent this.
Influencer DaveHax showed us how easy it is to put everyone in the right mood by carving jack-o’-lanterns.

Dress-up your fur babies this Halloween
Everybody loves fur babies! If your company offers products or services for pets, then this is the perfect time to partner with an influencer who can showcase the spookier side of their pets this season!
Take a look at YouTube influencer Stephanie Moratto, who is known to have a lot of fur babies and pets. Since she loves her pets, she grabbed this opportunity to dress up all of her dogs!

Spooky Halloween makeup
If your company is all about makeup, then partnering with a makeup guru is one of your best shots this Halloween! Choose an influencer who can show off your products as part of a makeup idea video.
Youtube star Stephanie Toms is an excellent makeup guru who came up with an excellent,scary looks!

DIY your terrifying Halloween decorations
You can foster creativity and imagination by partnering with content creators who focus on how to make your own decorations for a haunting party!

Mix Fun and Terror
Collaborate with content creators in the costuming scene to find and show how Halloween can be also a moment for laughs.
@rosannapansino
My best Halloween Costume yet! What are you going to BEE this year? 🐝 #fyp #halloween #halloweencostume #funny #tiktokhalloween
♬ original sound – Rosanna Pansino

Davide
August 29, 2023
Industry Trends
Advanced Influencer Strategies, Mid-Level
Granfluencers are the Trend That is Fascinating Social Media
Social media may appear a young people’s business but these perceptions haven’t stopped a new wave of influencers from carving their niche in the space. Granfluencers is their name and while they cover very different topics they are all 65-and-more years old.
In a sea of young, pretty, impeccable bodies for many is refreshing to encounter a wrinkly face that shows the sign of time passed while dispensing the knowledge they accumulated in almost an entire lifetime.
For marketers, granfluencers are a precious source of trust and candor, none would doubt their grandma, right?
Not only that but they also bring the value of their experience and wisdom to the table, things that are almost impossible to have been acquired by younger generations, yet.
Many granfluencers started during the pandemic. They were looking for a way to keep themselves entertained while connecting with others. They rapidly discovered that were not only their peer to find their content interesting but also many younglings could feel captivated and inspired by them.
Since they appeared for the first time, granfluencers have evolved into a real phenomenon. Many of them started collaborating together and created geriatric versions of the content houses, the most popular being appropriately called Retirement House, which collected over 5 million subscribers on TikTok.
What are Granfluencers?
They are old, they are cool, and they are here to rule. Granfluencers are showing that social media are not exclusive to the younger generation but can be a powerful tool for anyone.
The name, portmanteau of grand plus influencer, wants to show how their most visible differentiating characteristic is their 65 and above age.
Typically we expect older people to be weak and frail, to spend most of their time napping, and be overall boring, granfluencers are subverting these expectations by showing how there is fun and joy even after retirement.
Granfluencers have been able to bring themes related to older age to a younger audience and disprove some of the myths about getting old. Research has found that their three most common themes are breaking stereotypes about aging, explaining the vulnerabilities of old age, and, finally, exposing ageism. Overall the content created by granfluencer is positive or when negative is mostly self-deprecating.
Thanks to their content and efforts granfluencers have been able to bring the problems and challenges of aging and later life stages to the young audience that populates TikTok. They are helping to create a better understanding of older people’s limits.
While not the definitive solution, granfluencers are showing themselves as an important step in breaking common age-related stereotypes. Their example is showing that even in older age people can be living an active life.
What are the unique characteristics of Granfluencers?
Like normal influencers, granfluencers post about their hobbies and passions: Baddie Winkle, with 3.2 Million followers on Instagram, shares about fashion. TravelingBlackWidow shows how you can still enjoy adventures in foreign lands even in your retirement years. Meanwhile, Bo is going to teach you all the dad wisdom he accumulated.
- Granfluencers show that aging is not the end of their world. There are still many ways to enjoy your life even in later years.
- Their message is powerful and unique. Able to transcend age groups and resonate with younger audiences
- They are grounded and real. Showing that it is enough to be oneself to be happy and fulfilled.
- They remind us of our limits. Both as things that we need to accept but also not as insurmountable obstacles to living life to the fullest.
Why Granfluencers are important for brands?
As discussed above granfluencers are a largely positive phenomenon that is helping break stereotypes and misconceptions around older people.
For brands partnering with older influencers is a unique opportunity to show their inclusivity and norm-breaking stance.
On a more practical side, a granfluencer partnership can deliver a strong surprise, especially if the sponsoring brand is not particularly targeted at older folks.
Overall any brand can find the right angle to partner with a granfluencer. Baddie Winkle, whose real name is Helen Vanwinkle, has taken numerous partnerships with large fashion and makeup brands like Sephora, Fashion Nova, and Skechers. But even more unexpectedly she signed collaborations with Bumble, Svedka Vodka, and LG. In all these partnerships the main focus of the campaign was to show that age is not a limiting factor and that elders can still doll up, party, and enjoy themselves. Helen’s character with her over-the-top attitude and colorful attires is very well suited for this kind of partnerships.
Makeup brands are some of the strongest endorsers of granfluencers, and for a good reason: by reaching out to older audiences they are going to tap into a large customer base that is often neglected when it comes to fashion and beauty products. Concurrently by partnering with elder influencers, they are able to break the traditional makeup ad formula that would see a young and attractive girl being the main character. Not only this unique approach is going to deliver more striking and memorable ads but is also working towards showing the brand image as inclusive and attentive to the needs and desires of different groups of people.
Charlotte, the Traveling Black Widow is instead more focused on her partnerships: they are mostly locations where she is traveling that sponsor her Instagram. Thanks to these she is able to bring to her audience how is possible to enjoy traveling in many different places even during retirement and that older people shouldn’t be confined at home.
Another interesting case is the one of Aura Frames: their core target audience is much closer to the granfluencer demographic than the previous examples. Still, many older and family-oriented people may not come across them or expect them to be complicated or of no use to them. By collaborating with many granfluencer Aura Frames was able to establish itself as one of the big players when it come to Eframes.
Conclusions
In the truly open and inclusive nature of the internet, granfluencers are here to represent the elders and break the myths around aging. Just by their mere existence, they can help us all remember that aging isn’t the end of the world and there are still plenty of opportunities to enjoy life at its fullest after retirement.
For brands, granfluencers are a new powerful vector to drive attention. They not only appeal to the young crowd but they can also help to connect with older generations and present products and services that they wouldn’t have felt comfortable with by themselves.
Yi
August 10, 2023
Industry Trends
Advanced Influencer Strategies, Granfluencers, Mid-Level
AI Influencers: What They Are And How To Use Them
Introduction
AI influencers are here, but they are not going to take over and completely replace human influencers. Still, if you are a marketer, is important that you keep up with this trend and know how working with virtual influencers can boost your marketing results.
AI influencers, sometimes referred to as virtual influencers are a particular type of influencers that emerged in recent years.
Their appearances are virtually generated and their posts are curated by a team of experts.
With AI tools becoming an integral part of our lives and making it easier and easier to generate entirely synthetic content, AI influencers are becoming increasingly common.
In this article, we will discuss the history of AI influencers, their impact on influencer marketing, and their future trajectory.
What Are AI Influencers?
AI influencers are an improper term in the sense that as of now none of them is AI-powered: their images are generated using AI technology or good old CGI but their interactions are managed by a human team.
Nonetheless, many of these influencers use AI as part of their narrative: LilMiquela and many others include AI in their name or bio to create a narrative of high tech and sophistication around their character.
Currently, the closest to a true AI influencer is Kuki which is integrated with an advanced chatbot and offers the possibility to talk with Kuki herself.
What’s the history of AI influencers
The concept of AI influencers can be traced back to the early 2010s, with the creation of virtual characters for gaming and entertainment purposes. As AI and computer graphics advanced, these characters became more sophisticated, leading to the birth of virtual influencers.
The above-mentioned Lil Miquela is considered the first hyperrealistic AI influencer and at the time of her release in 2016, there was a major debate about if was a real person or not.
Many brands have developed their own AI influencers starting from their mascots. The most successful is CB de Casa Bahia, the face of a major retail brand in Brazil with over 10 million followers.
While initially AI was just in the name while the images were CGI creations in the past year, with the explosion in popularity of stable diffusion and generative AI, have emerged profiles like Milla Sofia whose images are generated by an AI model.
With the advancement of generative AI, virtual influencers will become more and more integrated with the real world and offer a more engaging experience to fans.
Why Some Brands Choose AI influencers over human content creators
According to Influencer Marketing Hub data, 59.8% of marketing professionals have worked with AI influencers, and another 15.5% are planning to do so in the future. Over 60% of the ones that had collaborations with virtual influencers consider themselves satisfied.
These data are encouraging for the future development of AI influencers and show how brands are interested in experimenting with new and innovative ways to reach their customers.
virtual influencers offer a unique appeal to brands as they allow brands to maintain complete control over the messaging and branding. Also since they don’t have an existence outside of social media they are very unlikely to be caught in scandals or controversies.
Since AI influencers don’t exist as people outside of their social media feed but they are managed by a team of professionals it is easier to have them allying with the specifics of a marketing campaign.
How to use AI influencers in your marketing campaign
The data about the effectiveness of AI influencers are still non definitive but what can be seen is that similarly to human influencers the fit with the product is the most important factor for a successful campaign.
Audiences enjoy the innovation of AI influencers but they often still find human influencers more relatable and are more likely to be purchasing an ad involving a human influencer.
Still, virtual influencers are a great way for brands that want to show an innovative image and place themselves at the forefront of a trend that is not going to stop.
Hugo Boss Rebranding (2022)
In the spring of 2022, the 98-year-old brand Hugo Boss underwent a huge rebranding effort in order to increase its appeal to the younger generations. The campaign included many traditional influencers like Kendall Jenner and Hailey Bieber.
Along with them, they partnered with Nobody Sausage and Imma two of the largest AI influencers around. Integrating virtual influencers in the rebrand was a powerful signal that the future of Hugo Boss is going to be focusing on tech and innovation.
Showing themselves embracing new and emerging trends even older and more traditional brands can showcase a vibrant spirit that is going to appeal to the young crowd.
Miquela for Samsung
Miquela Sousa has collaborated with prestigious brands such as Calvin Klein, UGG, Prada, and many others. Among her exceptional work, one particular paid sponsorship stands out her collaboration with Samsung’s #TeamGalaxy.
The fusion of Miquela’s self-proclaimed robotic identity with advanced technology, like the latest Samsung phone, is a match made in digital heaven. Miquela Sousa’s presence as a virtual influencer has redefined the concept of brand ambassadorship.
With her captivating persona and futuristic identity, she brings a unique allure to the brands she collaborates with. By leveraging Miquela’s influence, Samsung has effectively connected with a tech-savvy audience and embraced the essence of modernity, ultimately enhancing their brand image.

Noonoouri for Dior
In 2018 Noonoouri substituted Natalie Portman in the Dior “Rogue” campaign. With her cartoonish appearance and exaggerated eyes, Noonoouri was a huge break for her predecessor.
The commercial copied the original, with Noonoouri dancing while applying makeup. While it would be a standard ad for the cosmetics industry the use of an AI influencer is creating a sense of novelty and unexpected that allows the ad to be much more striking.
The Future of AI Influencers
AI tools like Midjourney, and ChatGPT are becoming integrated with many other services to provide a more personalized and effective experience for the users. With these tools becoming more precise and reliable we can expect to see them integrated with virtual influencers soon.
If the first generation of AI influencers had AI only in the name, the second generation is going to be fully backed by AI technology. Soon we will be emerging influencers whose story arc is completely decided by an AI model.
The integration of “true AI” tools in AI influencers is going to allow these influencers to better connect with their audience. As in the case of Kuki, AI models can be tailored to chat with users while keeping in character.
Once this kind of implementation will be proven reliable we can expect many brands to start developing their own AI influencers and relying on them as brand ambassadors while also including them in much of the online material of the brand.
Conclusion
In conclusion, AI influencers have opened up a new frontier in the world of social media marketing. While they present exciting opportunities for brands to engage with their audience in novel ways, they are still in the early stages of development. As AI technology progresses, AI influencers will become more and more common while also providing better value to brands.
Davide
August 3, 2023
Industry Trends
Advanced Influencer Strategies, Influencer Marketing Strategy, Mid-Level
How to Boost the Customer Journey with Influencer Marketing
The customer journey visualizes how customers go from discovering the brand to becoming loyal advocates. Thanks to it is possible for marketers to spot the right time and place to engage with potential customers.
Developed in the late ‘90s to better understand how customers interact with brands to make their purchase decisions, the customer journey is a formidable tool to understand how a brand can better nurture its customers.
In recent years, the rise of influence marketing as an effective marketing strategy has created infinite new opportunities to engage customers at different stages of their journey in a manner that many find less invasive than traditional marketing.
What is influencer marketing?
Influencer marketing is a form of marketing that involves collaborating with individuals who have a significant online following to promote a brand, product, or service.
Influencer marketing leverages the influence and popularity of social media personalities and content creators to reach and engage with highly segmented potential customers through their decision-making process.
By partnering with influencers who align with their target audience, businesses can tap into their credibility and authority, effectively accessing the trust and loyalty established between the influencer and their followers.
Influencer marketing often involves sponsored content, product placements, or affiliate marketing. Successful influencer marketing campaigns can yield significant results by harnessing the power of authentic and relatable endorsements to connect with potential customers on a more personal level.
What is the customer journey?
The customer journey is a 5-step process that exemplifies how an individual goes from becoming aware of a product or service to being a loyal customer of it. It involves understanding the customer’s needs, preferences, and pain points at each stage, to provide a seamless and satisfying experience that fosters loyalty and advocacy.
By mapping and analyzing the customer journey, businesses can identify areas for improvement, optimize their processes, and tailor their marketing efforts to better cater to their customer’s needs and expectations.
Each potential customer will go from not knowing about a brand or product to knowing about it, this is the awareness phase, and at this point, there is no intention of buying the product but just a passive learning moment.
The awareness phase is followed by the interest phase, which is characterized by the potential customer researching more about the product, and similar products, to understand which one fits its needs the best.
After collecting enough information, the customer would pass to the decision phase, here is when the actual sale is made.
The next phases are very important to create a lasting connection with the customer and turn a one-off sale into a returning customer. The loyalty phase is the first after-purchase moment and is focused on maintaining the engagement with the customer to empower their decision and strengthen the relationship.
After successfully establishing loyalty brands should focus on developing the advocacy phase at this point the customer is not just happy with his choice and will come back once again in need of the same product or service but will also present the product/service to people in its circle.
Why do Brands need Customer Journey?
The customer journey is a powerful tool by which brands can get closer to their customers and understand the process they go through before and after the purchase of a product or service.
By mapping the customer journey, marketers can understand when potential customers are going to be more susceptible to being approached and what kind of information they are looking for at different points.
Overall the customer journey allows marketers to focus their efforts and resources on those moments and messages that matter.
How can influencer marketing help all the stages of the customer journey?
When leveraged correctly, influencer marketing can effectively target each step of the customer journey and improve the results of any brand’s marketing efforts.
Influencers have established a trusted relationship with their audience and their opinions and suggestions are often taken into consideration when making decisions about purchases.
Way too often influencers are only considered for the awareness phase and get neglected that one of the things they excel in is community building.
Potential customers are increasingly looking at social media and influencers for suggestions and opinions about products and services. So not only they can boost brand awareness but influencers are going to be a repeated and trusted touchpoint between potential customers and brands.
While traditional advertising largely relies on being placed where the customer is going to see it, advertising through influencer marketing is going to be shown where the customer is actively going to look for information.
Because of its unique properties influencer marketing is an excellent way to establish a brand image and a relationship with customers.
But let’s go with order and see how each of the phases of the customer journey can be targeted by different approaches to influencer marketing.
Awareness
The awareness phase is where influencers are usually employed and this is because they allow for access to a unique and highly segmented audience.
In this phase, the goal is to reach as many potential customers as possible while introducing them to your brand. Conversions or purchases are not going to be a priority for now.
To kick-start awareness:
- Collaborate with relevant influencers. This way the brand will gain access to its audiences and show itself as a player in the industry.
- Cast a wide net with micro-influencers. Micro-influencers are great when it comes to maximizing reach, and therefore awareness, while targeting a selected audience.
- Product seeding campaign. Send your product to many influencers and earn unadulterated exposure to their audience.
Interest
In this phase of the customer journey customers are looking for more information, they have questions and they are looking to find answers.
The influencer’s role here is to help them navigate various options and point them to the best fitting for them.
In this phase is important that the potential customers start building trust in the brand, recognize it as a valuable player in the industry, and be proud of its product.
Campaign ideas to nurture this phase are:
- Reviews. Have a content creator go through the product and explain what it can do, which features are available, and how they can help in situations that relate to their audience. Using influencers in this role is especially helpful to cover many niche use cases that may not be as obvious outside of particular communities.
- Personal experiences. They allow the influencers to relate their experiences with your product and create a more genuine connection with the audience.
- Q&As. Organizing live events hosted by influencers in which they can take questions and solve any doubt about the product.
Decision
The potential customers are about to lose their potential status and become real customers. Now is where your unique selling proposition comes into play.
Even when trust and recognition are established is still important to be able to give that extra incentive to be different from the competition.
This is when is important to use:
- Access to exclusive deals. Creating special offers for specific content creators is a great way to push their audience to make the purchase.
- Direct-to-shop feature. Allowing users to reach the product from the post or story that mentions it without having to search for it.
- Giveaways and ruffles. Encourage conversions by creating the possibility of obtaining a prize or a special experience tailored around the influencer’s niche.
Loyalty
After the purchase is important to give the customers a reason to stay in the community, strengthening the trust bond created previously.
For this phase is crucial to show that the brand is seriously committed to its values and truly cares about the community around it.
The loyalty phase can be nurtured by:
- More suggestions about the product. Giving new insights about what the product can do and how it can be useful beyond the first impression.
- Designating brand ambassadors. Transform some of the long-term influencers into brand ambassadors giving them a more prominent role and connection with the brand.
Advocacy
In the advocacy phase, the goal is to shift the customers from passive supporters to active and vocal advocates for the brand.
This phase needs to foster engagement with the brand and content creation, to push for creativity and participation.
Advocacy can be promoted by:
- Creating campaigns focused on user-generated content. Activate the community by organizing special campaigns through your brand ambassadors to generate organic content around your brand.
- Incentivize user reviews. Create discounts or special rewards for those users that leave a review.
Davide
July 31, 2023
Guides
Advanced Influencer Strategies, Mid-Level
All the Influencer laws you need to Know (Free E-Book)
In today’s digital age, influencer marketing has emerged as a powerful tool for brands to connect with their target audiences. However, as this marketing strategy continues to evolve, influencer laws surrounding it vary greatly from one country to another.
Some nations have established specific rules to govern influencer marketing, while others rely on existing marketing regulations to address this rapidly growing industry. Surprisingly, there are even countries where influencer marketing remains unregulated.
In this article, we explore the diverse landscape of influencer marketing regulations around the world, shedding light on ongoing debates, emerging trends, and the importance of understanding legal frameworks in different jurisdictions.
In the end, you will find our comprehensive guide to influencer marketing regulations, a full ebook to help you create a law-complying campaign anywhere in the world.
What are the regulations for influencers?
Influencers fall under many different regulations depending on the country they operate in and where their audience is based. And while each country has slightly different laws and bodies governing influencers and influencer marketing there are three things to look out for:
- Disclosure regulations: how is required to flag the sponsored content in order to be complying with the local authorities
- Advertising Authority Code of Ethics: many countries do not have specific regulations about influencer marketing but refer to already established practices by the local self-governing advertising authority body.
- Common practices: while some countries may not have regulations in place there are often self-imposed practices that are respected and even if is not mandatory to follow them is the best practice to follow them.
When there are regulations in place countries have followed three routes to create their code of conduct:
New influencer laws:
Countries worldwide have taken different approaches to influencer marketing regulations. While some nations have implemented comprehensive guidelines, others are still in the process of considering or developing regulations. When new regulations are introduced often revolve around disclosure requirements, transparency, and consumer protection, aiming to ensure that influencers and brands maintain ethical practices and provide accurate information to their audiences.
Leveraging existing laws:
In the absence of targeted influencer marketing regulations, several countries have turned to existing marketing guidelines to regulate this industry. These regulations may encompass advertising standards, consumer protection laws, and general principles of fair competition. By applying these broader marketing regulations, governments seek to maintain a level playing field for all advertisers and protect consumers from misleading or deceptive practices, even in the context of influencer marketing.
Ongoing debates and experimentation:
Given the rapid growth of influencer marketing, many countries are actively debating and reevaluating their regulations. Governments and regulatory bodies are exploring ways to strike a balance between fostering innovation and safeguarding consumer interests. Some key areas of debate include the definition of influencers and their legal responsibilities, disclosure requirements, the role of social media platforms in monitoring content, and the distinction between organic and sponsored content.
World’s regulations
As influencer marketing regulations continue to evolve, it becomes increasingly important for marketers, influencers, and brands to stay informed about the legal landscape. To aid professionals in this dynamic field, we have compiled an exclusive ebook that collects the current regulations and guidelines from various countries around the world. This comprehensive resource provides an invaluable reference for understanding the legal requirements and best practices in influencer marketing, regardless of the jurisdiction.
Download it here:
Get your E-book
This article is part of our series on influencers’ regulations. You can find the other articles here:
Regulation in Asia
Regulation in the EU
Regulation in English-speaking countries
Influencer regulation in Latin America
Davide
July 4, 2023
Industry Trends
Mid-Level, Regulatory Compliance
Why Cross-posting? The Ultimate Guide to Cross-post
You are partnering with an influencer and they have a presence on multiple social media, should you want them to cross-post the same content on all their accounts or should you want content specifically crafted for each platform? Both options have their strengths and weaknesses and this article will go through what they are and why you should keep both options in mind. By the end of it, you will know when to choose cross-posting and when not to.
By now, every marketer should be very familiar with influencer marketing and its advantages, after all, social media are becoming more popular than search engines when it comes to product discovery, and almost 3 in 4 people trust influencers when it comes to product recommendations.
But if you lived under a rock for the last 10 years here is why influencer marketing matters to you: influencers, or content creators, gathered a following online by publishing content around their passions and areas of expertise. By doing so, they have been able to establish a trusted connection with their followers that see them as reliable sources in their field. For marketers, this means that partnering up with the right influencers is going to give access to extremely segmented target audiences.
Influencers often focus their efforts, or they are successful, on one social media but have a presence on other platforms. This situation makes it possible for marketers to require them to post on multiple social media to obtain more exposure and capture a larger audience.
To take advantage of this opportunity one may be tempted to ask the influencer to just prepare one piece of media and publish it across all of their networks. While there is nothing inherently wrong with it this strategy can easily feel tone-deaf to the part of the audience that is not from the main platform.
To understand why this is the case, it’s important to know that each social media has a different tone and caters to different interests of the users: people visit Instagram for highly visual content, while if you spend much time on Twitter you are likely to be interested in short text content. From there is easy to see why the same content is unlikely to perform well when cross-posted to other platforms.
On the other hand, cross-posting present the advantage to be quick and doesn’t require additional work after the original piece of content has been prepared to allow it to cover multiple channels and keep the costs and time low. In certain situations, a campaign may be targeted to a specific channel but you may still want it to be spread to other channels to maximize reach while not developing new creatives for each social media.
As you can see choosing between cross-posting and creating content for each social media from scratch is not a choice devoid of nuance and should be something to be considered when designing any influencer marketing campaign. Important factors to consider that we will see in detail through the article are the objectives of the campaign and the platforms’ characteristics.
Why ask an influencer about cross-posting content?
Cross-posting is the practice of creating a single piece of content and using it across multiple social media. Can be done both by influencers and by brands on their owned channels but here we are specifically discussing the case of influencers cross-posting branded content across their accounts on behalf of a sponsoring brand.
Reach and exposure
Crossposting presents many advantages. Most notably it increases the reach and exposure of a campaign: since the average social media user is active on 6 different platforms covering as many of them as possible is going to help reach them multiple times and provide a longer-lasting and stronger impression of your brand. Concurrently each social media audience is slightly different and having branded content circulating to most social media platforms is going to ensure that it gets exposure to diverse audiences.
Time and cost efficiency
Another benefit is the efficiency both regarding production time and costs for the creator and the marketers. Using a single, or a few, creative make for a much shorter cycle when it comes to designing, creating, editing, and reviewing. By cross-posting the same content you can obtain very fast campaigns that embrace multiple channels but don’t require as much effort as carrying out different campaigns for each social media platform.
Speed of execution
Last but not least, cross-posting is perfect in those cases in which a brand may be afraid to present itself with a fragmented image and messaging. Dealing with different social media, each with its unique aspects and tones can be a challenge for many marketing teams: while trying to appease the quirk of each platform to better gain visibility one could easily lose sight of the brand image. Therefore, not differentiating a campaign to especially fit a platform but using material based on the brand’s core values across all social media can be an easy and effective way to deal with maintaining a solid and coherent brand identity.
Overall cross-posting offers an interesting option for any marketer that is looking to rapidly deploy a campaign that encompasses different domains and platforms. While it sacrifices tailored approaches to each different channel it has the advantage of being fast, cheaper, and delivering a unified look and feel of the brand.
Why create unique content for each social media platform?
On the other hand, creating unique content for each social media is going to play into the uniqueness of the format and tone that each platform has. Many marketers are swearing at it. In a recent Hootsuite study, was found that the 18% of the marketers that prepare different content for each social media is also the segment with the highest confidence in the value of their content.
Each platform has specific limits and rules around what kind of content can be shared: famously Twitter limits the number of characters to 280 for each post. Concurrently each social media algorithm is going to react differently to different types of content translating into more or less exposure of it to the audience depending on the platform preferences.
It should be clear by now that creating unique content for each platform is going to allow it to be fitted for the specific audience and taste of the platform itself.
But how does creating unique content for each platform translate to benefiting your campaign? There are three main ways it can be a real game changer for your marketing efforts:
Fit the platform
By creating content tailored towards each platform-specific feature and with in mind the audience’s characteristics and tastes users are more likely to engage with your content. Being able to create content that is not just relevant to your brand and your marketing goals but that is also fitting in the culture and liking of the specific audience it approaches would make it more relevant to that audience and entice engagement in the form of views, likes, and comments.
Authenticity
Content especially crafted for specific platforms increases the feeling of authenticity and resonance with the audience. As we saw before the average social media user is on multiple platforms. If you promote on different platforms is likely that the same user will come across more than one of your messages.
Having each of the messages purposefully crafted for the platform it is shared on is going to give them a more humane look at the brand itself which would be presented slightly differently each time. Furthermore, small variations in the messaging or the approach of each message have the chance to strike a different cord and allow one to engage with the same audience in different ways maximizing your potential success.
Platforms’ strengths
Each platform’s unique strengths can be used to achieve optimal results for your campaign if played correctly. And having content specifically created with a platform in mind is going to optimize your results by offering your audience an almost 360-degree view of your product.
For example, you may want short and direct videos about the most eye-catching parts of your product on TikTok, where short video content is king, but a long and in-depth review of all your product features and the influencer’s personal opinions for a video posted on YouTube, where long format video content is going to perform best. Similarly, Instagram is the country of high-quality pictures, and short video content, while Facebook allows and boosts long descriptive captions.
In conclusion, creating content specifically crafted for each platform is going to be a winning choice in terms of engagement, perceived authenticity, and effective messaging. All these benefits come with a non-zero cost: longer times of production obviously and majorated costs due to the creation of new content for each platform.
Cross-posting or not cross-posting
While both cross-posting and not cross-posting have their advantages and disadvantages jumping to any conclusion is important to know and understand what are the factors that will weigh heavily on the outcome of your campaign and the success of the cross-posted, or not cross-posted content.
First of all, is important to keep in mind audience demographics, after all, they are who is going to consume the content. Understanding how they use different social media platforms, which they use and which they don’t is going to be an important first step.
For example, you may decide to cross-post content to a platform that has a low concentration of your target audience while creating new content for those platforms where they most often hang out. Concurrently is important for you to know what are their preferences in content: a platform may be mostly about video or text but certain communities may use them for other features not as popular.
Taking your time and learning about the communities your marketing campaigns are targeting is never a waste of time.
Platforms limitations
Learn about the limitations of each platform and consider how they are going to be fitted with the content you want to share on them, especially if is content created for another platform. There is always a workaround for those limitations: a long text could be split into many different tweets to fit the character limit and similar approaches can be taken for videos as well. But is important to consider how that will fit in the larger picture of the campaign and the brand image.
Brand identity
The campaign goals and how the guidelines around messaging and brand identity should be another point to be taken into consideration when deciding if you want to cross-post or is better to generate original content for each social media. As we discussed before the fewer creatives are used easier it is to maintain a unified and coherent brand image at the expense of fitting in with the etiquette of each platform.
Influencers’ approach
Finally is important to take into consideration the differences that each influencer has in how they approach and use the different platforms: they may be not active on some platforms, making it superfluous for any brand to require them to post through those channels. In other cases, it may be that certain channels are completely dedicated to specific parts of their image and therefore more or less desirable for a brand to be promoted there.
Cross-posting best practices
Hybrid approaches to cross-posting
While is important to decide what to do about cross-posting or creating unique content for each platform is to be kept in mind that they are not mutually exclusive by design. While it may seem counterintuitive a hybrid approach can be the best solution in many cases.
For example, a TikTok video can be posted as an Instagram Reel with no difficulty and the creation of unique content can be reserved for other platforms where short video content is not going to perform as well.
A content waterfall can be another way to approach it. While production is focused on a major piece of content specifically tailored for one platform, the other platforms receive content related to the main one but adapted to their kinks.
For example, the main piece being a long-form review video for YouTube, highlights of the video can be edited together into a short video to go on TikTok and Instagram while photos and written versions of the review can be used to be posted on Facebook and Tumblr.
With this approach is possible to keep the production time and costs low while still providing a unique experience to the user of each platform.
Experimenting with cross-posting
Base your approach on the best information available to you. While both strategies have pros and cons your decision should be based on how they work for your brand in the specific. Therefore, is important to conduct tests on both approaches and evaluate how they affect different metrics.
This way will be truly possible to understand which approach is the most effective for the needs of the brand. Once there are data and a clear understanding of how different approaches can help the brand then is time to act.
Conclusion
The decision between cross-posting content or creating unique content for each social media platform is not a simple one. Both approaches have their strengths and weaknesses, and it’s crucial to consider various factors before making a final decision.
Cross-posting offers the advantage of increasing campaign reach and exposure. By leveraging multiple social media platforms, you can engage diverse audiences and leave a lasting impression on your brand. It also provides efficiency in terms of production time and costs, allowing for rapid campaign deployment. Moreover, cross-posting ensures a unified brand image across different platforms, maintaining a solid and coherent identity.
On the other hand, creating unique content for each platform plays into the specific format and tone of individual platforms, tailoring it to the audience’s characteristics and preferences. This approach increases engagement, authenticity, and resonance with the audience. It allows you to strike different chords with the same audience, maximizing your potential for success. Furthermore, leveraging each platform’s unique strengths optimizes your campaign results by providing a holistic view of your product to the audience.
Ultimately, the decision should be based on various factors, including audience demographics, platform limitations, campaign goals, and influencer preferences. It’s important to understand how your target audience uses different platforms and their content preferences. Additionally, considering the guidelines around messaging and brand identity is crucial in maintaining a unified brand image.
While cross-posting and creating unique content may seem mutually exclusive, a hybrid approach can often be the most effective solution. Combining elements of both strategies allows for flexibility and optimization. For example, adapting content from one platform to another or creating a content waterfall approach can be viable options.
To make an informed decision, it’s advisable to conduct tests and evaluate metrics to understand which approach works best for your brand. Each brand’s unique needs and objectives should guide the decision-making process. By leveraging the best information available and analyzing the impact on different metrics, you can determine the most effective approach for your influencer marketing campaigns.
In the dynamic landscape of influencer marketing, staying adaptable and open to experimentation will lead to refined strategies that resonate with your audience and drive meaningful results.
Davide
June 15, 2023
Guides
Advanced Influencer Strategies, Cross-posting, Mid-Level