In a sea of content and short attention spans, it can be difficult to break through the noise in order to tell the story of your brand and acquire customers. The good news is you can achieve optimal impact and make a difference with a few simple tricks. I know this, because I've done all of this grunt work for you already and have optimized Influencer Marketing campaigns to as low as 2-cents a click!

Here are 5 necessities when crafting your messaging for Influencer Marketing campaigns that will help you break through and stand out:

1) Messages Should Look Like Experiences Not Ads

When you're scrolling through social media sites like Twitter, Instagram and Facebook do you prefer to see posts about experiences or ads? The answer is obvious. When you're creating the messaging for your Influencer Marketing campaigns keep this in mind. For example, which message below is more appealing for a new cocktail bar opening?

Message A: "Grand Opening of Chez Lounge ABC this weekend! Stop by for a free cocktail!"

Message B: "Our saucy Mixologist Heather picked up some market fresh raspberries for her signature Raspberry Martini. Come say hello at our Grand Opening and enjoy one on us!"

"Crave-worthy tidbits" is what I like to call this.... Offer them and you're off to a good start.

“It’s all about those crave-worthy tidbits!”

2) Use Images

This is incredibly self-explanatory. It's no secret anymore that posts with images way outperform posts without them.

Here is an article that offers "20 Sites With Free Images For Your Blog or Social Media Posts" to help!

“It’s easy for people to connect with an image... Use them!”

3) Create Unique Links

In order to track your metrics and optimize your campaign, create unique links for each of your influencers (and/or each of your messages) so that you can track progress, or lack thereof. If you're working with a lot of influencers and creating a lot of messaging, this is grunt work yes, but it pays off and you have to do it. How else will you know how your campaign is doing?

I have traditionally used Bitly, however here is an article that provides "9 Alternatives to Bitly."

“Unique links let you track your progress or lack thereof and optimize.”

4) Include Call to Action

What is the goal of your campaign and how would you like to engage with people? Is it to drive people to your Grand Opening? To capture emails? To drive clicks to your website? Whatever your goal is, make sure you include that call to action. This means it could range anywhere from "Click here for the news" to "Install the iOS App here" to "Mention this post when you stop by for a free cupcake!" The last thing you want is for a potential customer to want more but not know how to get it.

“People can’t take action if they don’t know what to do!”

5) Know Your Audience

What would happen if you're a Seattle Seahawks fan and you received an offer for tickets to an upcoming Denver Broncos game? There's a good chance you wouldn't be interested. Same applies to Influencer Marketing. You may have spotted an influencer in Twitter you would absolutely love to use for an upcoming campaign. This influencer has 40k followers and loads of engagement... They're even in your city! But if that person is an influencer due to "Social Selling" and you're wanting to promote your new clothing line, you're way off base. Another scenario is to picture what would happen if you tried to sell steaks to a vegetarian. Their reaction would be, "Um, no thanks" and they would be turned off.

Save time, money and your reputation... Utilize influencers who speak to your target audience.

“Don’t sell steaks to vegetarians.”

I'm a huge advocate of Influencer Marketing especially as more and more people want to hear about recommendations from their peers vs. brands. It takes a lot of details to get things going as well as a lot of monitoring but I can assure you, if done the right way, your Influencer Marketing campaigns will be well worth the effort.

Thank you for reading and reach out anytime with questions! Twitter: @DanaDyksterhuis Email: dana@boasthouse.com