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Just a couple of decades ago, you had to be working for a seriously large organization in order to consider influencer marketing. Partnering with a national sports star doesn’t come cheap. But today, with so many media outlets like, fame has become more accessible and produced celebrities or micro-influencers. Some of these micro-influencer have followings in a particular niche. Smart marketers are finding way to align with these influencers, a strategy that has shown such value that even large organizations are getting involved.
What Is Micro-influencer Marketing?
We’re all familiar with influencer marketing. Brands have been putting the names and faces of well-known actors and public figures on their products decades before the internet was even a thing. But today, with platforms like Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat and Twitter giving anybody the opportunity to amass a following, some brands have shifted their focus away from A-list celebrities, and towards niche-famous Internet stars who may not be household names, but are known of in the right households.
By going this route, brands can tap into specific target markets with each influencer they work with. Plus, the average micro-influencer will be far more affordable to work with in comparison to a Hollywood actress.
Interestingly, a study that analyzed more than 800,000 Instagram accounts found that as an influencer’s numbers of followers increases, the rate of engagement decreased:
- Users with fewer than 1,000 followers got likes 8 percent of the time
- Users with over 10 million followers only got likes 1.6 percent of the time
- Users with less than 1,000 followers generated comments about 0.5 percent of the time, compared to 0.04 percent for those with 10+ million followers – a difference of nearly 13x.
This actually indicates that, despite being the cheaper alternative, micro-influencer marketing campaigns may yield better results than a traditional macro-influencer marketing campaign.
Related Article: Why Social Media Is So Addictive (And Why Marketers Should Care)
Which Tech Companies Are Engaging In Micro-influencer Marketing?
While there are plenty of ways to approach B2B influencer marketing, but we thought we’d take in how the big names in tech and software are using micro-influencers to spread their messages. Unsurprisingly, all five tech companies listed below can also be found on our list of tech companies engaging in Instagram marketing.
1. Adobe
In 2017, Adobe launched the ‘Made by you’ campaign, aimed at inspiring UK university students to design or build something innovative using Adobe Creative Cloud. They partnered up with student marketing agency Seed to deploy pop-up events at university campuses across the UK — with the help of some local influencers.
Adobe drafted in names such as Steven Bartlett, CEO of UK based Social Chain, illustrator Dan Mumford and designer Joe Prytherch to run workshops, deliver keynotes and of course, leverage their combined social media presence to push the #MadeByYou hashtag.
2. Squarespace
Squarespace has a history of teaming up with niche YouTubers and YouTube channels including the educational channel MinutePhysics and pop-culture star Philip DeFranco.
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They took slightly different approaches for each channel. Sometimes they simply sponsored a video series, other times they asked popular YouTubers to review the Squarespace platform for its user-friendliness and feature set.
3. Cisco
Cisco used the now defunct Vine app to partner with well-followed Vine stars like Frank Danna to inject some B2B messaging into a social platform that was fuelled by unprofessional humor.
Together with their selected Vine stars, they produced and published bite-sized videos that focused on data and analytics, cybersecurity, innovation and the internet of things (IoT).
Related Article: 6 Successful B2B Influencer Marketing Approaches
4. SAP
To bolster the messaging coming out of their largest customer-facing event and user conference, ‘Sapphire’, SAP partnered up with IT influencers like Eric Kavanagh to record videos and broadcast live from the event.
Using Facebook live, SAP was able to reach thousands of people who couldn’t attend the event while at the same time harnessing some thought leadership from respected names in the IT industry.
5. Microsoft
Microsoft partnered with the National Geographic to tackle the former company’s “Make What’s Next” campaign — a move that proves that an influencer doesn’t always have to be one single person, it can be an entire brand.
While the snaps were published on Instagram channels like @natgeo, @natgeotravel and @natgeaoadventue — the images themselves were taken by micro-influencers in the photography space, including @NickZaneMiller and @KrystleJWright.
