How Influencer Marketing Can Impact Your SEO?
What is Influencer Marketing?
Businesses do Influencer Marketing with the sole aim of establishing trust with their audience. It involves companies collaborating with popular people who have a sizable following on social media platforms to promote their brand.
In essence, this is done to boost brand awareness and exposure.
For a short period, businesses borrow a particular influencer’s trust with their followers and use it to gain their trust to sell their products.
At the grass-root level, influencer marketing is based on the power of word of mouth.
For example, when young users hear from someone they can relate to that particular brand’s face cream doesn’t have side effects, they feel assured and might consider buying it
A survey by marketing agency Mediakix found that 89% of marketers interviewed felt that ROI from influencer marketing is better than other channels. The report also found influencer marketing to deliver 11x higher ROI than other digital marketing methods.
In five years, this social media marketing brand has grown from a $1.7 Billion industry in 2016 to $13.8 Billion in 2021.
The trick is to filter through fake and ineffective influencer profiles. Also, today as almost everyone has taken up the role of an influencer, it is important to pick the ones which produce quality content and those who don’t mislead the audience.
How Influencer marketing can impact your SEO/Rankings?
Social media has proven to have no direct effect on SEO or page rank. But it is a uniquely useful tool to build trust and credibility with your target audience.
Studies also show such profiles directly influence a user’s choice and help them decide on a purchase. A report by Rakuten Marketing shows 80% of 3,600 users surveyed bought something based on an influencer’s suggestion.
This shows that ROI, direct profit and the online reputation of a business can be boosted to a large extent with the help of influencers. And this directly affects SEO and how Google views your business online.
Read on to find seven different ways in which they affect your SEO and rankings.
More Visibility Leads to Increased Organic Traffic
Web traffic is one of the highest-ranking factors for page rank. Google has repeatedly emphasized this, according to Moz. And increasing the attention you get online will directly help in boosting this number.
This is where influencers come in handy. With influencers, visibility is one of the most significant advantages.
They draw the attention of their followers to your website. They let you borrow the trust they have formed with their audience.
This can be achieved by asking them to produce optimized, keyword-rich content with backlinks to your site on platforms like Instagram, Youtube, and Facebook.
In these platforms, 62%-65% of all users access influencer-generated content.
Influencers Are Great Content Creators
The backbone of SEO is content. Google is very particular about websites having authentic, non plagiarized, optimized content that is informational and knowledgeable to its users.
And businesses are now working with influencers to get this done. Instead of writing about trending topics, they make interactive videos, polls, Q&A sessions, infographics, and more.
An influencer in your niche will be an expert on topics that work with your target audience. Hence they make great content creators that will boost your authenticity and overall SEO stance.
Insist on having a brainstorming session with them to develop ideas, content topics, campaigns, give away contests, and more. Make sure your brand ideology doesn’t get diluted.
Big Boost to Brand Awareness
Every brand needs brand awareness. Irrespective of the size and market share, it is crucial for all companies to promote their brand constantly.
Though everyone knows about Levis, they haven’t stopped doing promotional campaigns, singing celebrity endorsements, etc.
This comes in handy particularly during the launch of a new product, opening new branches, and widening customer base. It helps you greatly to stay relevant.
And the main mantra of influencers is their relevance and creation of time-bound content. They come in handy to establish your brand’s dominance in your industry. This is a great way to stay on top of the competition too.
Generate Backlinks from Influencer Content
Backlinks are one of the strongest factors which will boost your page rank. It establishes your domain authority. It mainly conveys to Google how valued, and authoritative your website is.
Emailing your content to editors, experts, markets, marketing agencies is one way to earn non-paid backlinks. Another way is through influencers.
Do not directly lead customers to your sales page or product.
Backlinks should provide users with valuable content. Instead, urge influencers to share links to articles, infographics, and surveys that are available on your blog on your website.
They can attach these links to their interactive videos, profile on Instagram. The same can be done in Twitter during live sessions and in the Youtube description section.
Combine Keyword Research with Influencer Generated Content
Keyword-rich content is the second direct way to get a high SERP after backlinks.
After doing your due research, note down-trending keywords relevant to your niche. Collaborate with your influencers and incorporate these in their content.
Make sure they speak/write/discuss trending topics as per Google Trends information.
For an extra hit, ask them to include these keywords in the meta tag, header tags, and description while replying to followers in the comment section.
Hashtags are also an excellent way to get your keyword count up.
Become More Noticeable on Social Media
A survey by Rakuten Marketing, said 70% of all women users they interviewed on Instagram while 64% of men preferred Facebook to view content produced by influencers.
This data goes to show the benefits your social media handle can reap from influencer marketing. There will be renewed attention on your handles which is great while rebranding, launching new products, and more.
In the same survey, 50% of users said they would follow an influencer for brand discovery. This enables brand exposure as well as the generation of followers for your brand. Social media-influencer marketing goes to add on to your SEO profile too.
Establish Brand Credibility and Trust
Word of mouth is a popular technique that users trust more than paid advertising. Recommendations by family and friends go a long way in increasing the credibility of your brand.
And influencers act as your brand’s friends and enable their followers to gain that trust factor.
A survey by Nielsen shows that 92% trust recommendations more than brand advertisements. Another separate study done by Twitter shows that people trust influencers as much as friends as family.
Gaining trust leads to organic traffic, which in turn leads to higher clicks through rates, and with the help of on-site SEO, you convert these into active sales. All these directly affect your SEO page rank.
7. Useful Influencer Marketing Tools To Increase Your SEO/Rankings
Like how Google Analytics measures SEO progress, similarly, there are a handful of reliable tools available to track the effectiveness of influencer marketing.
They measure performance, reach and lead to customer conversion rate.
Some tools are designed primarily to streamline your content strategy, while others help find the right influencer with niche keyword search.
According to each company’s specific goal, one can get customized progress reports from these tools. They devise different plans for different social media platforms.
This way, you can direct resources and workforce at a particular snag. You will be able to pinpoint glitches much faster with the help of these apps.
Scroll to read more about seven influencer marketing apps that can increase your SERP rankings, organic traffic, social media presence, and overall online reputation.
1.BuzzStream
Buzzstream is a popular app among online marketers due to its ability to rank influencers based on various factors.
This includes domain authority, Moz ranking, the strength of inbound links, and more. All these are crucial factors that build your SEO profile.
Also, it gives a complete analysis of their profile, the kind of content they produce, the keywords they use, etc. With this information, you can decide if a particular influencer will align with your company’s goal and ideas.
The stand-out feature of this app is that it lets you create and send simple, clear-cut emails directly to your hand-picked list of influencers.
Its pricing is affordable and budget-friendly. Hence it is a popular choice among startups and entrepreneurs.
2.Ninja Outreach
This is one of the largest platforms where companies can interact with 25 million bloggers and influencers.
If social media outreach is your primary goal, this is the platform for you. Ninja Outreach lets you explore influencers active on Instagram and Facebook.
It gives the user a free hand to choose between influencers based on essential metrics like keyword search, the number of followers, extent of their reach, domain authority, and more.
This platform focuses on building strong professional rapport with influencers.
It also lets you access individual articles, bloggers, and other companies based on your niche and keyword search.
3.Buzzsumo
This application works slightly differently when compared to others. It focuses on competitor analysis and lets the user devise a solid content strategy.
Its main goal is to provide the user with content that is trending in their niche.
Buzzsumo ranks influencer profiles and posts based on various parameters like retweet ratio, average retweet, domain and Instagram authority and more.
These will boost and complement your SEO metrics by increasing your website’s authority, a high ranking factor.
Based on the content they create, you can directly add them to your list for future reference
4.Followerwonk
This is a good campaign partner for brands that want to expand their footing in Twitter.
Followerwonk’s strategy of analyzing influencers based on location, number of followers works very well on Twitter.
This is a great way to boost Local SEO due to the application’s ability to find bloggers and content creators based on their location.
This method works well for regional brands with a local audience. Dentists, doctors, and lawyers with local practices can benefit the most from this.
One can also monitor and track their own Twitter profile with in-built Twitter analytics.
5.Unbox Social
This is an upcoming platform for influencer marketing that lets users understand and study their market with facts and figures.
It also allows you to spot nano and micro-influencers who have a focused list of followers.
A person with only 10,000 followers can still benefit your cause if they produce content on specific content. Hence, the number of followers is not the only deciding factor to pick a particular influencer.
With this platform, you can keep an eye on your competitors’ work and identify the areas in which you are lagging.
6.Pitchbox
Pitchbox is the best tool for those serious about boosting their SEO parameters. It focuses more on improving SEO rather than just one’s social media presence.
It incorporates SEO analytic tools like Majestic, Semrush, and Moz. Its main goal is to provide its users with influencer profiles that rank highest on domain authority and backlinking ability.
Due to its highly focused approach to SEO, Pitchbox is more expensive than other platforms. This is because it does the work to attain two goals- SEO and influencer marketing.
With their assertive email outreach, the platform says they have a response rate of 62% from influencers.
7.GroupHigh
Like Pitchbox, GroupHigh is one of the premium influencer marketing tools.
This is because of its wide array of content of 15 million posts from bloggers, journalists, content creators, and marketing companies.
One of its unique qualities is finding influencers based on their Ad Network. This is one feature that other platforms do not provide.
GroupHigh brings mainly bloggers from Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube under one roof. Hence, it makes it a good choice for companies that wish to expand their SEO profile through content generation.
They also have an in-built CRM system to manage a company’s list of influencers.
Influencer Marketing and SEO FAQs
1.How to find the right influencer for collaboration?
First, identify your niche industry and do your keyword research. Next, jot down your campaign goals and what you want to achieve through influencers.
Then pick the social media platform you want to run the campaign. Finally, by using apps or otherwise, search for influencers who can work with the above findings.
Check their follower strength, their interests, communication skills before contacting them for a collaboration.
2.In what ways can influencer marketing help my brand?
Increased exposure and awareness to your brand is the biggest takeaway from influencer marketing.
Your products/services will come under the attention of your target audience. You can gain a sense of trust with users and earn credibility for your brand.
Studies also show influencers help with getting a good ROI.
Most importantly, this has a significant impact on SEO, and rankings will build your online reputation.
3.What is the best social media platform to carry out influencer marketing?
Multiple reports have found Instagram to be an upcoming platform to put out influencer-generated content.
A study by Rakuten marketing found 70% of women and 64% of men prefer Instagram for this type of content. And 80% of users purchased after viewing this.
For video marketing, Youtube would be the perfect place to start with.
Facebook and Twitter are two other platforms very popular for influencer marketing as their reach is of mammoth proportions.
4.What is influencer marketing?
Influencer marketing is the method of gaining brand exposure and awareness with the help of influencers.
They have a solid online presence and consumer following on popular social media platforms like Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter.
Influencers let companies borrow the trust they have cultivated over the years to sell their products.
Marketing based on this concept has had results on SEO and SERP rankings as well. This is an excellent way to create backlinks and keyword-centric content as well. All these are considered as high-ranking factors by Google.
Author BIO
Brice Decker Is a marketing specialist in Houston, TX who works as a strategic director for Haitna. He works closely with the SEO team to produce content for content marketing, CRO, and blog marketing.
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