Advertising and promoting brands has changed vastly in the last few years. Here is why it’s better to turn to micro-influencers, bloggers and niche digital publications to get the word out about your product or service…

Back in the day, advertising methods and marketing were a lot simpler compared to how it is done now – but not necessarily as effective. Companies simply bought ad space in papers, magazines or billboards and waited for orders and business to roll in. There are many problems with this method, however. It is very hard to track just where your business is coming from and if people had even seen these adverts. This is why the rise of influencing and micro-influencers has been so beneficial for both business and brand. It benefits both sides of the party for many reasons. Sites such as Get Blogged are great for connecting brands with bloggers and vice versa. Here’s why traditional advertising methods aren’t so good as the rise of influencer marketing takes over…

You can measure results

Through marketing a product or service with an influencer, blogger or digital publication you directly measure the results that come in. You can use tracking links, which show you exactly where the clicks have come from and how many. You can see which website or blog has been the most successful and you know which campaigns work and don’t. This can all be used for future marketing techniques.

You can target specific niches

While a billboard or newspaper ad is targeting a very specific niche, dedicated online blogs allow you to focus your marketing on a more dedicated audience that are more likely to interact and purchase your product. For example, by placing an ad for a beauty product in a dedicated beauty blog or site with a large beauty section, you are more likely to yield results. While it might be seen by more people in a larger publication, the rate of interest and engagement is likely to be a lot smaller.

It can be cheaper with more success

Micro-influencers and bloggers charge a less than a mainstream publication and can actually yield better results for your advert. Through means such as blog posts, Instagram posts and newsletters, these can be dedicated directly to the audience you want to engage with and gather better results. It has been found in research that Instagram accounts with a certain amount of followers start to have a worse engagement to follower count ratio. After all, accounts with fewer followers but more engagement are much more valuable to your brand. There’s no point if a posts get thousands of likes, but no one comments or actually buys what you’re trying to sell.

It is considered more genuine

People buy from people. No longer do people trust claims put forward by brands about how good their products are, they want to know if it really works. Bloggers and micro-influencers offer the opportunity to show your service or product being used, tried and tested (and hopefully loved!) to an interested and dedicated audience. It is considered more genuine and therefore more likely to be trusted by those looking to buy. They know what they are getting when they buy a product and if the influencer or blogger is trusted within the industry, their words are very valuable and reputable.

It can build your SEO and Google ranking

A large part of building your SEO and improving your Google ranking includes getting backlinks. If your site is linked to within an article from a micro blogger or digital publication, it contributes towards achieving a higher Domain Authority. This is the magic number which is created by search engines to display how valuable and authoritative they see your website as. The higher your Domain Authority, the higher you rank in Google and the more likely you are to be seen by future potential customers when they are searching for products similar to yours. You can use influencers to help build your Domain Authority with a dedicated blogger outreach programme. It’s important to identify the difference between no-follow and follow links (you can’t purchase links as it is against Google guidelines.) So just do your research beforehand. Even if a no-follow link is included, it means potential customers can read about your product and click straight through to your website and to buy your product without having to remember a name and save it for later – as would happen with traditional print advertising methods.

What are your thoughts on the above? Do you find the new methods of advertising and promoting your products a lot more useful than traditional ones? Let us know below!