Influencer Marketing Examples – Lessons From Big Brands
What if a marketing strategy let you build trust, increase brand awareness, open the doors for engaging content opportunities and boost purchases? Wouldn’t you be ready to invest in it? Yes, we are talking about influencer marketing – the marketing strategy that has been steadily gaining traction over the past few years. Brands big and small have their own approach to influencer marketing but nearly all of them work with influencers for several campaigns throughout the year. But how do you start? What kind of influencers do you work with? What kind of campaigns can you plan with them? Let’s look at some influencer marketing examples from big brands to answer all these questions.
- Why should brands take advantage of influencer marketing?
- Influencer marketing examples – 5 brand campaigns that show how it is done
- 1. Staying authentic – Dior’s 67 Shades of Skin campaign
- 2. Making strong first impressions – The History Channel Curiosity Campaign on Tiktok
- 3. Going with the multi-channel approach – Dunkin’ National Donut Day campaign
- 4. Working for a cause – THE FIFTH x YouTube Originals: Pride Campaign
- 5. Think long-term partnerships – Sephora Squad
- Give your influencer marketing campaigns a makeover with Kimp
Why should brands take advantage of influencer marketing?
The concept of collaborating with famous personalities to get a brand’s message heard is not new. Earlier, there were celebrities endorsing brands. And with the advent of social media, we now have “influencers”. These are social media celebrities – people who have a good following on social media. In other words, people who have earned the trust of their audience by consistently creating quality content.
Influencer marketing is nothing but the collaboration between a brand trying to reach out to its customers and these social media celebrities who have the trust of the customers that the brand is trying to reach out to. Before we talk about influencer marketing examples, would you like to hear about some benefits that influencer marketing offers?
Boost engagement
Promotion is easy these days with so many channels to get in touch with customers. But what’s more challenging is getting consistent engagement, especially with customer content consumption patterns changing constantly. That’s one area where influencer marketing can make a huge difference because content generated by influencers is known to bring about 8 times better engagement than regular brand content.
Influence purchase decisions
Nearly 49% of consumers trust influencers for purchase recommendations. In addition to this, you should also remember that a majority of brand exposure and product discovery happen on social media these days. Now considering both these factors, communicating through a trusted influencer on social media will be a good way to introduce your brand to new leads and convince them to make a purchase.
An ROI that you cannot ignore
One of the most effective ways to track the efficiency of a digital marketing strategy is to measure its ROI. The fact that brands can earn an estimated $5.78 for each dollar spent on influencer marketing provides a good reason to invest in this strategy. And the best part is that working with micro-influencers can be more rewarding and yet less expensive than working with a celebrity. So, influencer marketing can be a cost-effective high ROI step for small businesses too.
Having discussed some of the benefits, let’s now get to those influencer marketing examples we have been talking about. Hearing about the success stories of brands and looking at the type of content that brands create for their influencer campaigns can spark your creativity and help you make the most of this strategy.
Influencer marketing examples – 5 brand campaigns that show how it is done
1. Staying authentic – Dior’s 67 Shades of Skin campaign
For its 67 Shades of Skin campaign, Dior worked with Buttermilk, an influencer marketing agency, and collaborated with 67 influencers for this single campaign. These were influencers of various ethnicities and skin tones. It was truly the most authentic way to promote a line of foundation designed for “every skin tone”.
Influencers from around the world were chosen for this campaign and the brand posted content for 67 days including 67 regular posts and 167 Stories. The campaign reach of 2.6 million and the popularity it garnered for Dior, the brand awareness it created all speak for themselves.
Kimp Tips
What can brands take away from this influencer campaign of Dior? The focus was on diversity and inclusivity. So, instead of choosing well-known models, the brand went with influencers of different origins. That’s a brilliant idea to incorporate into your influencer campaign. When you shortlist your influencers, ensure that you have a clear understanding of the goal of the campaign. Choose someone who fits the role perfectly rather than someone with a massive following on social media.
Dior’s campaign went beyond just posting on social media. A custom landing page was created for the selected influencers to record their responses and for the brand to track the overall experience. At the end of the day, your influencers are your customers too, when they get to experience your product. So, gathering feedback from them gives you valuable insights to document.
2. Making strong first impressions – The History Channel Curiosity Campaign on Tiktok
With an engagement rate of about 18%, TikTok has become one of the most popular platforms for business marketing. Even big brands like The History Channel take TikTok seriously.
When The History Channel first joined TikTok, it collaborated with an influencer marketing agency, NeoReach to come up with the Curiosity campaign. This one involved 7 influencers from diverse niches. But the theme was the same – “history”.
Each influencer posted a video talking about the history of their niche or a particular product related to the niche. With its account reach of more than 21 million and video videos of over 12.2 million, the campaign was a hit. The campaign helped The History Channel make a strong impression on its audience right away and thus helped the brand build its audience base on TikTok strongly.
Kimp Tips:
You don’t get a second shot at making a first impression. That’s why we would say that it’s never too early to start working with influencers. If you think that your social media presence is still not too strong, then that gives you enough reasons to work with influencers. As The History Channel did, you can always make your mark on the platform you choose by introducing your brand through influencers. This way you get to benefit from the existing following of your influencer and gain credible and relevant followers from day one.
Videos are indispensable in influencer marketing. Having a robust plan for your marketing videos helps you explore diverse social media platforms like TikTok and YouTube. So, sign up for a Kimp Video subscription and start creating branded videos inspired by these influencer marketing examples.
3. Going with the multi-channel approach – Dunkin’ National Donut Day campaign
The Dunkin’ National Donut Day campaign of 2016 is one of the best influencer marketing examples that shows how omnichannel marketing is done. For this campaign, the brand worked with 8 influencers from niches like music, lifestyle, and others to reach out to consumers and get them to visit a nearby Dunkin’ outlet on National Donut Day.
The 8 influencers took over the brand’s Snapchat page and shared pictures from the stores and exclusive discount codes for fans too. The brand also came up with Geofilters that consumers could activate at the outlets and share their pictures featuring their favorite donuts. This one not only utilized the following of the influencers and earned followers for the brand but also opened up a lot of new brand conversations on social media.
With 40,000 social media mentions and 6.5 million engagements, this campaign was truly a creative use of influencer marketing to boost omnichannel marketing.
Kimp Tips
When it comes to an omnichannel approach, you need to have strongly cohesive designs distributed across all the channels you wish to focus on. Though the Dunkin’ campaign was particularly focused on Snapchat takeovers, influencers spoke about the campaign on other platforms like Twitter, Instagram, and Facebook too. That helped the brand grab more eyeballs across diverse platforms.
Branded Geofilters and influencer takeovers were among the most noticeable elements of the campaign. The overall aim was to keep the campaign fun and engaging. The playful filters added to the vibe.
Want to create custom GIFs, filters, templates, and other digital content to promote your events and influencer campaigns? A Kimp subscription can take care of them all.
4. Working for a cause – THE FIFTH x YouTube Originals: Pride Campaign
Around LGBT Pride Month, brands come up with a variety of campaigns to show their solidarity in supporting the LGBTQ community. In 2021, YouTube made heads turn with its influencer campaign in collaboration with The Fifth, a social creative agency.
This campaign was about celebrating Pride month with a purpose. The campaign brought in TikTok influencers and YouTube influencers to a common point and hosted a series of live events. And the result was a whopping 9 million impressions. The campaign was the starting place of the #GiveWithPride trend and the donations raised were given to Akt, a voluntary organization serving the young LGBTQ community.
In this particular campaign, there were both celebrities and social media influencers, particularly from the LGBTQ community. The campaign was named The Best Cause-Led Campaign at the Influencer Marketing Awards.
Kimp Tips:
The first step to any influencer campaign is to lay down the goal. This goal does not always have to have direct ties to making a sale happen. At the end of the campaign, if you manage to win the hearts of your audience, you are earning more than sales – your audience’s trust. And that goes a long way in your business growth. That’s exactly what you get with a cause-led influencer campaign. This makes the above YouTube campaign one of the best influencer marketing examples for brands looking to do more than just boost their revenue through influencers.
5. Think long-term partnerships – Sephora Squad
Sephora Squad is a creative influencer program where the brand allows actual consumers to join the brand’s influencer community. Every year, the brand sends out an invitation for applications. Interested influencers fill out the influencer application form and then get testimonials from their followers on the provided link.
The influencers get to work with the brand for a 12-month period and enjoy perks like early access to products, a chance to connect with other influencers, and also get featured on the brand page.
One thing that sets apart Sephora’s campaign from the other influencer marketing examples we discussed so far is that here the brand does not reach out to specific influencers through third-party agencies. Most of the people who sign up for the influencer program are existing customers of the brand. So, this is also a way to strengthen customer loyalty.
Kimp Tips
Sephora’s idea of influencer marketing is all about growing together and building community. The brand arranges mentorship and lets influencers grow with the brand. When influencers know that there are long-term benefits for them in the partnership and not just a one-time incentive, they tend to be more invested in the brand. That’s when they turn into genuine advocates of the brand. So, this is definitely an idea worth trying.
Many brands like Amazon use this approach to help micro and nano-influencers grow their following while also helping the brands expand their presence. The relevant perks that influencers get motivate them to create and share content regularly and therefore get more of their followers to follow the brand too. That ensures continuous exposure for the brand and for the influencers this means a significant boost in their following. Everyone gets a slice of the pie!
Give your influencer marketing campaigns a makeover with Kimp
From the above influencer marketing examples, which one is your favorite? With these campaigns having sparked your creativity, are you raring to go with your influencer marketing strategy? Having a supportive design team that can get all your marketing designs for the campaign designed in no time will eliminate bottlenecks and set things running smoothly. Try a Kimp subscription. You get unlimited designs for various print and digital marketing media.
We even have a free 7-day trial. Register now and see how it works.