What do you think about the future of influencer/ambassador marketing with the recession, downfall of ads, etc.?

[ycee]

While having a content channel and email list is the best, I've observed that influencer marketing and related channels (affiliate, ambassador marketing) are taking off among both ecommerce and SaaS brands nowadays.

I see two trends here:
- Ads are not working as well as they used to.
- The current economy warrants only profitable growth.

The rise of these channels makes sense to me because:
1. You don't pay until you validate it: You can start working with influencers as "ambassadors" and only pay-per-sale, making it way better than the pay per impression model of ads.
2. It's easier to niche target with nanoinfluencers.
3. It's unit-profitable growth.
4. People trust recommendations more than ads.

Has anyone here tried Influencer/Ambassador marketing lately? Curious to hear your thoughts and results!

 

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[Martin Z]

While having a content channel and email list is the best, I've observed that influencer marketing and related channels (affiliate, ambassador marketing) are taking off among both ecommerce and SaaS brands nowadays.

I see two trends here:
- Ads are not working as well as they used to.
- The current economy warrants only profitable growth.

The rise of these channels makes sense to me because:
1. You don't pay until you validate it: You can start working with influencers as "ambassadors" and only pay-per-sale, making it way better than the pay per impression model of ads.
2. It's easier to niche target with nanoinfluencers.
3. It's unit-profitable growth.
4. People trust recommendations more than ads.

Has anyone here tried Influencer/Ambassador marketing lately? Curious to hear your thoughts and results!

It's a powerful thing because it is social proof. When a fitness influencer with 10m followers on Insta says supplement X grew his arms by an inch, people will believe him and are more likely to buy that product. Social proof is a huge thing in the E-commerce space.

 

[MattL]

Influencer marketing = celebrity endorsements. It's not something new, it's just that we have more celebs to choose from than Tiger Woods and Roger Federer.

Like Martin said, it's all about social proof. More specifically, it's about having big enough proof to balance your claims. A legendary copywriter wrote about it here.

RE: the "ads aren't working as well as they used to"

I think we have different views on what constitutes an ad. To me it's something that promotes a product, an offer, a lifestyle, a change, an action.
Whether that's in the form of a 30 second spot during the Superbowl or a insert in a comedian's podcast it's still an ad.

That being said I don't know what to think about the claim that ads "don't work as well". Advertising is generally speaking a reflection of culture and norms and whatnot. If everyone looks up to youtuber X in niche Y, then it's a no-brainer for a company in that niche to embed their promos into the youtuber's content.

That being said the internet, YouTube and nanoinfluencers have given marketers a lot of new tools and tactics to work with.

 

[Kevin88660]

While having a content channel and email list is the best, I've observed that influencer marketing and related channels (affiliate, ambassador marketing) are taking off among both ecommerce and SaaS brands nowadays.

I see two trends here:
- Ads are not working as well as they used to.
- The current economy warrants only profitable growth.

The rise of these channels makes sense to me because:
1. You don't pay until you validate it: You can start working with influencers as "ambassadors" and only pay-per-sale, making it way better than the pay per impression model of ads.
2. It's easier to niche target with nanoinfluencers.
3. It's unit-profitable growth.
4. People trust recommendations more than ads.

Has anyone here tried Influencer/Ambassador marketing lately? Curious to hear your thoughts and results!

It works best when you already have a strong selling proposition.

You have a product that is already selling well at $9.90 through your own channel. You collab with an influencer to run a two week promo selling it at $7.90. You will see crazy sales number.

The logic is influencer don’t become influential recommending expensive/shit product. Most People are not stupid enough to buy something just become an influencer says so.

In another words strong influencer are becoming the new walmart with huge pricing power to negotiate lower pricing for the consumers.

In short if amazon is replacing walmart, influencer could be replacing both.

This model is already happening NOW in China where hundreds of millions dollar worth of goods are sold in one hour by one influencer on lipsticks.

If this model spills over outside China to the rest of the world, and yes influencer can sell, but at YOUR expense, they probably ask you to lower your price. Take it or leave it.

The trend is good for influencer, not so good for merchants.

 

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