As social media becomes increasingly integrated into all areas of life and business, including recruitment, the value of influencers is likewise becoming more evident. Working with a micro-influencer, in particular, can be a powerful tactic in your overall strategy to appeal to targeted talent.
Know Your Influencers
Micro-influencers have follower counts in the 10,000 to 100,000 range. This compares to:
- Nano-influencers with between 1,000 and 10,000 followers
- Macro-influencers with 100,000 to one million followers, and
- Mega or celebrity influencers with more than a million followers.
Any or all may work for you and your employer brand, depending on the specific goals, needs, and budget for each recruitment campaign.
How to Select and Use Influencers
The best way to use influencers is to find the ones that best showcase your brand and market niche, and understand your industry. You can do this by:
- Focusing on the right fit. The influencer who best aligns with your needs and is the right fit for your company and its culture is more important than the number of followers they have. Micro-influencers often target niche communities, making it easier to reach specific target audiences. While social media followers have become known as the currency of the 21st century, small-scale influencers can often produce more bang for your buck.
- Engagement rates also trump the number of followers. More relevant than follower counts are engagement rates, the level of interaction followers have with an influencer’s content. These rates can be measured in terms of reach, likes, impressions, shares, and/or comments. Due to their more intimate audiences, micro-influencers often see higher engagement rates.
- Picking influencers whose expertise is established. Credibility is key. In addition to an influencer being a subject matter expert, there must be coherence between their content and values. After all, they are representing your brand. Before contacting an influencer, carefully scrutinize their recent posts and perhaps which other brands they’ve worked with, to solidify your comfort level in partnering with them.
Reap the Benefits
Once you’ve found the right influencer, you can begin to reap the benefits of working with them. These include:
- Positive ROI: Micro-influencers can help you reach more candidates at a more affordable price point than macro- or mega-influencers.
- Access to multiple platforms: While Instagram has been known as the initial choice for influencers, productive brand/influencer relationships are also happening on YouTube, X, Facebook, Snapchat, TikTok and LinkedIn, as well as countless smaller platforms.
- Trust: One word says it all. Influencers build personal relationships with their audiences, and this reflects back on you and your employer’s brand. The best influencers work hard and continuously to build an image, a reputation, an interactive community, and a loyal fan base.
- High-quality content: The content generated by influencers is more authentic than stock images or videos. As an added plus, in many cases, you can keep and repurpose it for your website and other marketing materials.
To learn more about how influencers could be an asset to your social recruitment efforts, contact Haley Marketing today.
