How to Bring Influencers into Your Brand

In every industry, brands seek out influencers for partnerships, hoping to collaborate with them to amplify their digital presence. Influencers can be both gatekeepers to their audiences, and authenticators of brand messaging, serving as extended voices of the brand itself.

In our regulated industry, of course, influencer marketing works in different and specific ways. Our goal is to improve lives by helping to deliver care to the right patients – a far more complex idea than most consumer brands face. But it’s more important than ever to work with influencers, and to do so with expert precision:

• 53% of people ages 30-55 living with a chronic health condition follow a health influencer
• 83% are likely to speak to a healthcare professional (HCP) about a new treatment if recommended by a health influencer 
• 85% will take action by visiting a website a health influencer partners with

Get clarity from the beginning

What do you want your content to accomplish? What types of content do you want? Being extremely clear about the goals you hope to achieve helps to determine whether an influencer is a good match for your brand.

Ask probing questions about the influencers you’re considering. Is their voice respected? Are they solving problems? Do they reach an audience your brand hasn’t reached? An influencer who cares deeply about sharing accurate information that improves people’s health can be an excellent partner… but an influencer who is less passionate about the specifics of the condition in question can be a disappointment.

Focus on micro-influencers

To that end, micro-influencers – those with tens of thousands of followers – can be extremely important to investigate. While they don’t have the millions of followers of mega-influencers, they’re more focused, more likely to get engagement, and also, more trusted. The authenticity that a brand builds through an influencer partnership is vital to its success.

Social listening efforts can help you to find influencers with authentic connections who are likeliest to be your best brand ambassadors. And a robust regulatory process, begun months in advance, ensures that influencer content, and comment monitoring and moderating, is part of a thorough regulatory process, as with all other marketing content.

Demonstrate true empathy, now and always

Brands that try to pay lip service to understanding usually discover that their halfhearted attempts fool no one, and alienate many. Brands that demonstrate empathy and understanding, and thoughtfully offer help, are much likelier to fare better. (For example, if patients with a certain condition often suffer mobility issues, they should not include going for a run in a list of stress-relieving activities.)

These efforts start from the beginning: in the diversity of the organizations and the partners on board, and in the very initial thoughts behind the campaigns. They’re developed with thoughtful research and education, and they take into consideration the wider world.

Often, our industry defaults to noninvolvement in social-media conversations out of an abundance of caution, but currently, not addressing the realities and difficulties of today’s world is often seen as being out-of-touch or even socially irresponsible.

In summary

We are seeing a de-evolution of the brand voice, and a de-evolution of its power, as people become increasingly more accustomed to a media landscape in which they get information from a kaleidoscope of smaller, more specific, voices. People want to hear from people. Brand perception and favorability is less about what brands say about themselves and more about what others are saying about the brand. Micro-influencers, who have limited reach but deep SME knowledge, can amplify the brand voice and lend credibility and authority to messaging, all while connecting with consumers where they are, on their terms.