Media & advertising: From fans to clients

Popular DJ, music producer and radio presenter Themba Mbongeni Nkosi, better known as Euphonik, has over half a million Facebook followers, and close to 800,000 fans on Twitter. Also, it seems he’s a potential gold mine for brands.

Euphonik is one of a handful of local celebrities who have been dubbed influencers — high-profile people who shape opinion and change consumers’ relationships with brands by means of social media.

Davin Phillips of specialist agency Communications Services Africa says: "The media landscape is changing at such a rapid rate that influencer marketing is no longer a consideration but a must-have.

"Smartphones have evolved from being strictly operational devices to forming an expanded platform that allows users to consume content and streamline the way they receive and interact with information. To survive, brands need to introduce strategies to stay current and meet users’ expectations of a customised online experience."

Influencers help brands "get a piece of a consumer’s mental availability via personalised content, which in turn gets passed on and amplified to their followers".

A McKinsey study backs this view. It finds that "marketing-induced consumer-to-consumer word of mouth generates more than twice the sales of paid advertising". And in customers acquired through word of mouth there is a 37% higher retention rate.

Strategy is critical to the process, Phillips says, and once the key message and audience have been identified the right influencer needs to be "cast" based on his or her digital footprint among an audience the brand needs to reach. Thereafter an "engagement plan" has to be activated in which moments or events are created or identified, and the brand’s attributes can coalesce with "the influencer’s personal narrative".

Setting up a real relationship is critical for brand-influencer success, he adds. What is involved ranges from owning the influencer’s personal events calendar to driving media through strategic alignment and creating brand content for the influencer to disseminate through his or her platforms. Ideally, a mutually beneficial relationship develops when content tells the influencer’s story, and through association the brand is part of that.

The key question is how an influencer is matched with a brand. Notes Phillips: "One would look for a well-connected person with the power to shape the desired consumers’ purchasing decisions." Authenticity is key to attaining credibility. "It is not just about bringing the influencer into the brand world, but about bringing the brand into the world of the influencer." The fee paid to influencers is determined by the size of their fan base but also by what is required of them.

While several local marketers suggest influencer marketing is simply a new phrase for celebrity endorsement and a passing fad, it is worth looking at that McKinsey study again. Millennials spend 30% of their total media time on content created by their peers, and 92% of global customers trust user-generated content and word of mouth more than advertising; while 81% of social media posts by friends influence purchase decisions.