The excitement of receiving your bulk order from your clothing manufacturer is quickly followed
with the realisation that you now need to sell these garments and get them in front of as many people as possible.
With the social media boom several years ago, one way of showcasing your garments and promoting your
brand was quickly established by sending popular influencers garments in return for advertising your product on their platforms.
In the early days, this could often be free of charge, in exchange for sending them out some clothing.
A brand I jointly owned before starting DSA Manufacturing reached out to a main cast member on the only way is Essex in 2013
and asked him if he would be happy to post a picture on his social media if we sent him a few pieces of our clothing.
Not only did he accept, he invited us to a charity football match,
sitting in the dugout to watch the game and met us in person afterwards to have a chat about the brand and collect his new t-shirts.
This t-shirt was also pictured on a daily mail article being worn by the influencer.
A sweet deal for our brand for the cost of just a few t-shirts.
Good things always come to an end and influencers started charging for posts, which can now range from small sums to monstrous figures,
depending on the influencer. These days you will likely be dealing with agents rather than the influencers directly.
Pictured below meeting Dan Osbourne at a charity match to handover gifted clothing in 2013.
How much does it cost for an influencer post
As per information provided by the website RivalIQ
here is a guide on current fees (in dollars) for influencer social media posts:
- Nano-influencers:1,000–10,000 followers – $10 – $100 per post
- Micro-influencers:10,000–50,000 followers – $100 – $500 per post
- Mid-tier influencers:50,000–500,000 followers – $500 – $5000 per post
- Macro-influencers:500,000–1,000,000 followers – $5000 – $10,000 per post
- Mega-influencers:1,000,000+ followers – $10,000 + per post
- Nano-influencers:1,000–10,000 followers – $5 – $25 per post
- Micro-influencers:10,000–50,000 followers – $25 – $125 per post
- Mid-tier influencers:50,000–500,000 followers – $125 – $1,250 per post
- Macro-influencers:500,000–1,000,000 followers – $1,250 – $2,500 per post
- Mega-influencers:1,000,000+ followers – $2,500 + per post
Things to take in to account when choosing an influencer
- The size of your brand. Think logically with this. If your brand has £10,000 worth of stock, it does not make sense to spend £10,000 on an influencer post. Even if the traffic it brought sold out your products, you will be working at a loss (without consideration of customer retention for future orders) – Scale your marketing budgets and influencer budgets in line with your brands growth. Slow and steady wins the race, unless you have a big financial backing behind you.
- Does the influencer fit your brands image? This is a very important consideration to make. You want to choose an influencer that engages with your target audience and fits in line with your brand ethos. It is pointless sending a hoody for your fishing brand to a professional golfer when the majority of their engagement will be with golfing enthusiasts.
- Check the influencers engagement level. The average Instagram engagement is 0.67%. Anything above 1.4% can be considered a high engagement account. You can check a profiles engagement on websites such as Phlanx by simply inserting the influencers Instagram handle.
Is influencer marketing worth it
In short, yes, if done correctly. As well as the traffic the posts will bring,
you will also have the content to use for your digital marketing and social media platforms.
For example, paying Kylie Jenner £1,000,000 for a post will unlikely generate £1,000,000 worth of sales,
but it will give you her face to use continuously on your digital marketing campaigns which is likely worth it for a major sized brand.
If you are a start up brand, be savvy with your approach.
Look for small fashion influencers (10,000+ followers) who take good content and have high engagement.
Negotiate a deal for a free post if you send clothing with future fees for posts if successful.
Not only can it generate sales but will also give you good content to use on your platforms without having to spend out of models,
photographers and studios. Primarily, influencer posts have always been associated with Instagram
but look at alternative platforms such as Tiktok, which is growing at phenomenal rate.
Look at Youtube clothing reviewers, which again can be posted to your platforms and utilises yet another platform.