So you want to monetize your blog, or perhaps you’ve been at it for a while and want to put a finer point on your social ROI and your interactions with business partners. The good news for content creators is that brands and the agencies that represent them are hot on the trail of finding social media influencers who can spark a deeper connection with target audiences. The not-so-good news? Partnering with an influencer can be a bit like dating: Is there any chemistry? Does one party see potential in the other, perhaps in an unexpected way?
The key insight here is that with a little bit of prep, one can take the unpleasant surprises out of the matchmaking process. Our team at CMD started working in the intersection between brands and influencers before Twitter was a gleam in Jack Dorsey’s eye, and I will be participating in a panel on blog marketing and monetization at BlogHer later this month. I’m looking forward to hearing from the BlogHer community about finding a good pairing for their business goals.
In preparation for the session, here are some thoughts on the fundamentals of a solid partnership:
1. Desperately seeking shared interests
Specifically, in the target audience. Is your content addressed to the same audience that an agency or brand is seeking out? When defining your audience it pays to be as specific as possible and to think beyond standard demographic shorthand. Just saying that your content targets women ages 25 to 34 doesn’t cut it in today’s environment, where big data analysis rules many marketing decisions. Brands and agencies need to know more psychographic and behavioral data—for example, whether those women ages 25 to 34 represent connected moms or road warriors—and what content of yours resonates with them most.
2. Must be highly engaged
Engagement is one of those marketing words that’s bandied about as if everyone fully understands what it means. The truth is that agencies and brands often define engagement in different ways, and it’s important to understand the specifics involved. To one brand, engagement may mean user actions on your content, such as comments; to another, it might add up to web page views and time on site. The first step here is defining engagement for yourself and your own community, regardless of social platform. Then understand how your intended partner defines engagement and find the common ground together.
3. Ready for commitment
Make sure that you and your partner have an agreed-upon vision for the outcomes, so there’s no unexpected conflict later on. It’s important to ask partners: What does success mean to you? An example of this might be a target number of signups during a certain timeframe or benchmarks for engagement, such as likes, ratings or comments within your community.
Salesforce’s blog recently posted an excellent overview for those who want to go deeper into the subject of social media ROI.
For all the not-so-lonely content creators out there, if you’ve forged a great partnership with an agency or brand, we’d love to hear about it. Share your thoughts with us and a link to sponsored content that particularly resonated with your community.