We cannot deny that social media and influencer marketing are having a huge impact on companies and brands worldwide. Many brands are moving budgets from traditional marketing to influencer marketing to be able to stay up to date-with the market.
We had a little chat with Luana Basso, a Social and Influencer Marketing Consultant, who has been in the industry for the past six years working in fashion, luxury, and beauty.
How did you start?
My first job was for a sustainable sportswear company in London that was working with bloggers – that’s what we used to call them back in 2016. We worked with them for events, shooting, and mostly brand awareness. The team was extremely small, but that helped me understand different sides of the business. I got my first press release published on Refinery29, planned my first event, and did many other thrilling things.
And then what happened?
Social Media were becoming the place to be, and they changed the way of doing business. Companies – and influencers – were trying to grow their Instagram accounts with perfectly curated aesthetic feeds.
Then the Influencer Marketing business exploded. There are still people out there saying it’s not a real job, but companies are allocating more and more budget to build an influencer strategy.
Clueless Marketing – the agency where she is working freelance ndr – forecasted massive growth for UGC creators a few years ago. And now, if you open TikTok, you can see those creators making bank everywhere.
But the short-video format changed the game again.
Definitely! With TikTok, and Reels on Instagram we saw a big change in Marketing. Nobody cares about the perfect feed anymore, I scroll through beautiful feeds every single day, but besides that, they have nothing to say, their followers don’t engage, and their views are very low.
With video becoming so popular it is crucial to catch your audience’s attention, tell them something, entertain them, and so on.
As I said, brands are moving their budgets from advertising to influencer marketing, and influencers are currently building six-figure careers.
Competition is fierce, and some brands don’t even know where to start.
Best platforms for influencers/creators?
If there’s one thing I always say to my talents is that they don’t need to be on every platform, if they think it’s not sustainable. Find a couple that works and stick to those.
YouTube is always a must, not only for brands but also for creators who are always able to charge more money off that. In my experience, I can say it’s the most profitable.
Another aspect to consider, and a secret I share with my talents, is building their website/blog, and a newsletter. Social Media can fail, be banned, and so on. Your audience needs to connect with you on another level.
What would you say to brands that are starting and are just confused?
Most of the time, brands focus on mass-outreaching and sending products to everyone. That’s the worst thing you could do.
Like everything else in marketing, you should set some objectives for your influencer campaign. Start small, you don’t need to work with 20/30 influencers. Build relationships, and find the perfect ones for your brands.
They need to relate with the brands so their audience will trust them and relate with your brands too. Influencer Marketing is changing, it’s all about community now, about trust.
And what would you say to influencers and creators?
Your fear of looking cringy is holding you back.
Start somewhere, build your community, and do not promote everything just because you get free stuff and money. Always read the contract to be sure the brand didn’t throw terms such as usage rights and whitelisting.
Check this amazing platform FYPM to see everything about rates and brands’ budgets. It is truly the best!
If you are creative but don’t want to post on your account or brands don’t want to work with you because you don’t have a big community, start with UGC and work your way up.
Are you also working with brands? I know you got quite some viral reels on your Instagram account.
I would say that is not my priority as of now, I love working with brands and influencers on a Social Strategist and Influencer Manager level.
I occasionally worked with some brands as an Ambassador or created UGC for them.
While I was in New York I used to post more on Instagram and I had several viral reels, and that definitely helped with some projects and building my brand.
You also wrote an e-book. What was the idea behind that?
Let’s start by saying that affiliate marketing is nothing new, and it’s not the secret ingredient people need to become rich. After the pandemic, my FYP was all about this “guru” selling a $397 course to become an affiliate, become rich and get that financial stability, and I was quite shocked, to be honest.
Affiliate Marketing is nothing new, we’ve been using that in Marketing for ages, but this guru tricked people into believing that was this new great idea to become a millionaire while working 2 hours a day.
Plus, during my Master’s Degree, we were discussing this in class, as now many magazines rely on affiliate links to make money, and my professor wasn’t quite sure what that was so I explained that to her. After that, she was like “oh, you should write a book about it”.
So she kind of gave me the idea, and then I published this e-book that covers the basics of Affiliate Marketing, especially for creators and influencers.
That’s great! It was amazing chatting with you. Thank you.
Thank you so much for this opportunity, I am always more than happy to chat about Influencer Marketing and Social Media.
