What is brand awareness, you ask? It’s a marketing goal that’s often overlooked as it is not attached to tangible outcomes like leads and orders. But the terminology is equally essential to generate revenue as it involves building a valuable relationship with a large audience.
If people don't know your brand, they will not consider it trustworthy enough to buy from it. Brand awareness also impacts consumers' buying decisions when they compare competitive brands selling the same product.
Let's get the basics right –
What is brand awareness, and why is influencer marketing so effective in building brand awareness?
Brand awareness is the extent to which your target audience remembers and recalls a brand when faced with different conditions.
For instance, if you were asked to order a pizza for dinner tonight, which is the first brand that comes to your mind? Whichever brand it is, it has scored the most in brand awareness in marketing.
When it comes to influencers, they already have an audience that trusts their word and looks up to them for new product suggestions based on their personal experience.
Hence, when an influencer introduces a new brand, there are high chances of the target audience accepting it with an open mind.
And using AI influencer marketing platforms, it becomes easier to track the impact of a brand awareness activity by measuring engagement rates on social media. Here are the top 4 ways to increase brand awareness using influencer marketing or a brand ambassador program:
1. Find and collaborate with influencers
The first step in how to build brand awareness is to find the right influencers for your marketing campaign. It can be a bit challenging to find influencers with genuine followers, so utilise sufficient time and resources to do so.
Your campaign budget will also decide whether you can work with a micro-influencer or a macro influencer. Once you have found the right fit, reach out and partner with them to promote your brand to your target audience.
2. Host contests and giveaways
Ask your influencers to host brand-related contests and giveaways through their social media accounts. The posts should include a short story about the brand, the announcement of the contest or the giveaway, the rules, followed by a second post announcing the winner.
This can create a good buzz among the target audience because who doesn't like freebies! You can leverage this opportunity to gain more followers, increase traffic, and increase brand awareness.
3. Launch a brand ambassador program
While influencer marketing can help you raise brand awareness in marketing, a brand ambassador program can ensure a holistic and long-term brand awareness activation. You can employ an exclusive ambassador as the face of your brand, depending on the budget.
A relevant post by them can create waves of engagement as they can reach a vast audience with their fan-following.
It also pays off to work with brand ambassadors to build brand awareness because they genuinely believe in your brand values and are always willing to give a shout-out to your brand when needed.
4. Plan social media takeovers
An influencer takes over your social media account and posts content for a decided period during this event. When influencers take over your social media, they attract your followers and their set of followers. This raises brand awareness among a larger set of audiences and aims at gaining more followers and engagement.
Consider these best practices while building a brand ambassador program:
1. Facilitate easy onboarding
Onboarding an ambassador should include presenting your brand policies and guidelines to them, discussing and agreeing to work terms and conditions, briefing them on brand style and tonality, dos and don'ts of your brand, and so on.
2. Be approachable to ambassadors
3. Give regular updates
Keep your brand ambassadors on their toes by updating them about new launches or campaigns as they would need to clear up their social media schedule to post new content for your brand.
4. Give them freedom of expression
People love your ambassador because they like their authentic style, opinions, and content. So, give them enough freedom to express and communicate about your brand in a way that they think will work best with their audience.
5. Ask them for feedback (and leverage it)
Show that you value your brand ambassador's opinion by letting them be your critic. Take their feedback on new product launches and marketing plans, and leverage it to improve before introducing it to the larger audience. This way, you can avoid some common mistakes that brands make in influencer marketing.
6. Give constructive feedback
Building a feedback culture is essential, whether it is positive feedback or negative. Look at data analytics, and feel free to give constructive feedback on how your brand ambassadors can promote the brand better.
7. Be in constant touch
Schedule weekly or fortnightly catch-up meetings with your brand ambassador and other stakeholders to share updates and progress reports of a campaign. You can also utilise this time to brainstorm together on how you can increase brand awareness in marketing.
Summing it up
In short, it is a common consensus that nothing works better than influencer marketing to create brand awareness. Influencer marketing is a cost-effective way to launch a brand awareness campaign and measure it.
With the right influencers and brand strategy, you can increase your brand's recall in your target consumers' minds and stay ahead of the competition.
About the author
Rachel Smith is a communications executive who works with the content marketing team at Affable, an influencer marketing company that provides AI-driven solutions, allowing you to plan and execute your influencer campaigns strategically.
She develops content around social media and marketing topics that can help her readers understand how to pick the right influencers, measure their impact, and run effective influencer campaigns. In her free time, she loves meeting new people and attending workshops on communication and psychology.
