Best influencer marketing platform

Our goal of this article is to provide you with a top X list of some of the most popular influencer marketing platforms and software.

Unsurprisingly, with the increasing popularity of influencer marketing, the number of influencer marketing platforms has more than doubled over the last year. Reviewing some of the top influencer marketing platforms is not an easy task; luckily we’re here to help you.

Note: If your brand has limited human resources, lack of experience or time, an influencer marketing platform might not be for you, approaching an influencer marketing agency like Influencer.Agency is your way to go. 

As most marketers are just starting with influencer marketing we will not only provide you with the best influencer marketing platforms, we will also give you some tips regarding your influencer campaigns and strategies.

What is an influencer marketing platform?

An influencer marketing platform or software is a technology that helps brands connect with influencers and the other way around. From nano- to micro- to macro influencers, influencer marketing platforms allow brands to quickly and easily search, contact, negotiate, manage and communicate with an influencer. Next to the possibility to optimize influencer marketing campaigns and report on them.

Naturally, each influencer marketing platform has a slightly different pricing options depending on the features the platform offers.

How to do influencer marketing on Instagram?

You’ve probably considered starting with influencer marketing on Instagram. Instagram is the most popular social platform for influencer marketing, but finding the right influencer can be a bit of a challenge, especially when you’re new to the game. The mistake that many marketers make, and that you’re not going to make is: too much focus on the number of followers. The number of followers is important, but there are some other factors you should consider:

1. Instagram engagement rate

The number one factor you should focus on when looking for an influencer is their engagement rate. The engagement rate describes the level of interaction an influencer usually receives on their content (e.g. likes, comments, shares). The higher the engagement rate, the better.

As this is such an important factor, make sure your influencer marketing platform shows an influencer’s engagement rate at a glance. A rule of thumb: your influencer should at least have an engagement rate of 1%. The more followers an account has, the lower the engagement rate tends to be.

2. Quality of the followers

The quality of the followers is closely related to the engagement rate, if you see an account with a lot of followers and a very low engagement rate. It is very likely that it’s an account with fake followers. Other factors that could tell you something about the quality of the followers are: the avatar of an account, the followed vs. following ratio, number of posts and likes / comments given vs. received. To analyze the quality of an Instagram account you may want to use HypeAuditor.

3. Content they publish

As much as we love tools at Influencer.Agency, we recommend you always take a look at their Instagram account yourself. What type of content do they post? What type of content did they post 3 months ago? 6 months ago? Is there a right fit with your content?

4. Number of followers, finally! 😉

When talking number of followers, we generally divide them into ranges of followers, from nano to mega.

Nano                1.000 – 10.000 followers

Micro               10.000-50.000 followers

Mid-tier            50.000-500.000 followers

Macro              500.000-1million followers

Mega               1million+ followers

The number of followers is important, you want to reach a decent amount of people with your influencer campaign, just don’t focus on it too much without looking at the other aspects.

5. Budget

Just as engagement rate is closely related to quality. Budget goes hand in hand with number of followers. Usually, the more followers, the more a collaboration will cost you.

            How do you negotiate with Instagram influencers?

How do you connect with influencers on Instagram?

This is the perfect time to point out that influencer marketing isn’t just about finding an influencer with the audience you would like to reach. Found the right influencer on Instagram? Not sure how to connect? Don’t just offer them money so they can say good things about you.

Keep in mind that influencers have spent a lot of time building their brand on Instagram. They are usually quit protective of their reputation. Although influencers are promoting brands all the time, their promotions need to come across as genuine to their followers.

When connecting with an Instagram influencer, go for the personal approach. Focus on similarities between the influencer and your brand. Don’t talk money, talk added value first and then money.

Free influencer marketing platform

Pretty sure you don’t need an influencer marketing agency? Then you will have to do it yourself. In order to do this you have to identify the influencers that are active in your niche. Maybe you already have a good idea who are the top influencers in your niche, maybe you don’t have a clue. In both cases it might be smart to do some research. We’ll talk paid influencer marketing platforms later on; first we will discuss just two free tools. Many paid tools offer a trial of a month, but after that you just have to pay.

HypeAuditor

HypeAuditor analyzes any Instagram account with over 1.000 followers for fake followers and fake engagements. They call themselves the most advanced fraud-detection system. Although this tool is not entirely free, some features are. It is possible to get some insights on audience demography, audience interests, follower growth and average likes and comments.

Socialbakers

Socialbakers has been in the social media analytics for quit a few years, recently they developed an influencer marketing platform. They offer a couple of basic free services:

• Influencer search tool
• Influencer hashtag search tool
• Instagram performance quadrant profile
• This is our favorite tool of socialbakers, it shows you how you / your influencers perform compared to your / their closest competitor(s), they look at audience engagement and activity volume.

Self-service influencer marketing platform

Often influencer marketing platforms are self-service, most platforms don’t provide any help on content creation where most influencer marketing agencies do. However, times are changing and some platforms have an add-on to their platform.