Influencer Marketing ROI: Tools, Stats and Trends for 2019

By: Holly Edwards, Brand Communications Manager, Everywhere Agency

April 22, 2019

Influencer marketing has 11 times the ROI of traditional digital marketing, and as an industry, it’s projected to climb to $10 billion by 2020.

In a society where people see around 4,000-10,000 ads on a daily basis (yeah, we’re gawking at that number, too), influencer marketing helps brands stand out from their competition. Potential customers follow the accounts of those they look up to and trust for fashion advice, fitness tips or travel recommendations. When trendsetters recommend a product or service, it comes off as more authentic than a brand sending the same message because of the relationships those influencers have built with the followers who trust them.

But that trust comes at a hefty price. These days, the going rate for one sponsored post by an influencer with 500,000 to 1 million followers is between $5,000-$10,000. Big brands are readily shelling out, but it’s crucial that marketers and communicators know how to ensure influencer marketing will help their organizations get the best bang for their buck.

There are a few tools that brands can use to prove ROI when it comes to working with influencers. CreatorIQ (members of which will be speaking at The Social Shake-Up along with Everywhere Agency) is a platform that can help companies keep an eye on the performance of each piece of influencer data. The tool can track link clicks, comments of intent to purchase, how many people the ads reached and how much content was produced. These can then be measured against the goals of a given campaign.

When working with influencers, it’s also important to be able to spot the “bad apples” (i.e., influencers who buy followers and engagements). What’s the use of a great campaign if it’s only being seen by bots? You can do this manually, but it’s much faster to use an influencer screening tool like Instascreener. Not only can this type of tool let you see how many fake followers a particular influencer has, but it can also allow you to see an influencer’s real value, including real engagements, impressions and even CPM.

Beyond boosting sales in the short term, influencer marketing helps businesses meet their long-term goals, whether that’s building stock libraries of UGC from influencers’ calls-to-action or brand awareness that lives on well after campaigns end. Influencer marketing is more than just bringing in short-term dollars and cents: It connects entire communities to brands in lasting ways.

Connect with Everywhere Agency on LinkedIn for more juicy insights from the world of influencer marketing.