How much does niche matter? What brands are REALLY looking for in your content...

Sonia Elyss joins the Brand Meet Creator table to build on our niche discussion. Do brands care if you have a strong niche & specialty? Is influencer marketing still cost effective as engagement on all platforms plummets? Sonia spills the deets of how detailed brands should be in their content creator selection as the creator climate changes.

Timestamps:

• [2:10] How do you see influencer marketing changing?

• [4:31] Red flags on the brand side of things.

• [6:53] How can a brand show off a "realness?"

• [8:45] Founders of the brand as the main character.

• [11:43] Bringing influencers in to be the face of the company.

• [16:13] What are you looking for when scouting?

• [22:10] We need to learn how to hone in on our organic, "non-salesperson" sales.

LINKS:

Find Harley:

IG: @harleyyjordann

Website: https://www.millennialescape.com/

Find Sonia:

IG: @sonia.elyss

00:00

Welcome to brand meet crater podcast a place where we pull back the curtain of what it means to be all in on social media. So get ready to kick start conversations about the social media world with a little leave nothing off the table transparency or maybe more than just a little you girl has yet to learn the art of a filter. So talk in it's time to bring some solidarity to the influencer and brand space

00:28

Welcome to brand, the creator I'm bringing back Sonia to chat about influencer marketing as it relates to your niche we know we need to niche down to grow, but how directly does it relate to booking partnerships? What do you really need to do to best communicate with those brands and start booking paid collaborations? I am back with my favorite beauty marketing bigwig, internet cheerleader and influencer marketing aficionado Sonia Elise. So let's jump right in to talking about niche. Last week we talked about entering the Creator economy a place where anyone can use that link sticker to create reels you don't need crazy gear or a studio to go viral online. You need creativity and a connected community and a specialty. But we're watching brands hold their budget close to their chest as our engagement drops as things change online. And creators are scared brands are scared about this change. So I foresee 1,000% niche being one of the biggest ways to position yourself to not only grow, we know that we need a clear niche to grow, but also to start booking more partnerships. So yeah, come here, come here.

01:55

I'm assuming on over, shimmy on

01:59

over with your blue eyeliner. I swear every time you're on our store, you're like that's on brand for us that's on brand for Monday. And it makes me laugh all the time. So how do you foresee influencer marketing changing as it regards to engagement dropping and niche?

02:17

So I think that this is a great discussion that I have with brands all the time. And I think it's totally applicable for every creator and influencer out there. Um, I think 2022 is going to be the year of the niche and hyper specificity, which is a crazy way of saying being so tight on your niche that nothing breaks through. And the reason why is because the level of noise, the number of brands, the number of content published every single day is through the roof and increasing every single day. So

02:58

program recommendations just getting higher and higher by the day. There's so much noise.

03:03

Yeah. So I think a big question we're asking ourselves is How do we find our community? How do we find and on the influencer side, that's true community, people who resonate with you people who see your sparkle and hit it right away, you know, that I call my people team confetti, like if your team confetti, like, you know, right away, like as soon as you interact with me, or you watch my Instagram stories, like, you know, if your team confetti? And

03:31

if you're my people off my rails, you know, if you're not, you leave, that's

03:36

for sure. And on the brand side, it's the same, like how do we find our community and by community, we mean people who are going to purchase our products. And the way to find that is by getting so specific on who these people are that there's no way that they don't find you. And that's twofold.

03:55

So I think the red flags on the Creator side, I have a couple of red flags that mean that you are not niched down, we need to work on it. So if you have more than three topics in your bio and red flag, if you have the word lifestyle, or describe your account as lifestyle in any way, shape, or form, no, no, no, no, no get out of here. If you're not growing or have poor engagement, that might also be a sign for me that you haven't found, really what makes you sparkle for a new audience. But what are those key indicators on the brand side?

04:32

On the brand side, it's that the the look or the Edit could be done by anyone potentially, like I'm not knowing that this is hardly for someone else out there. So having sort of that eye or that point of view for us, like without that point of view, it could be anyone and thus it's not going to be anyone. So we want someone to come to the table with their perspective and knowing this is What resonates with my audience? This is what they've clicked on in the past. And if you want this other thing, I can do it. But I'm letting you know, upfront, like that is not my thing. And that is not what my audience wants. And nine times out of 10, we're able to tell the brand, like let's do this other thing, because that's what's going to work. So that is a big one. For me. It's finding that point of view, if everything that you put up in stories is I like this thing. That's a red flag for me. And not everyone likes everything. And like, where is your like, true opinion? Like, where's your honesty? Because me, you build loyal community by being both positive about the things that you love, but also honest about things that you don't like, because I think everybody knows what binds us are the things that we don't like the what we have in common are the things that we hate. And that like, almost binds you more than anything else.

05:51

What brings out your high standards, that's that's the way that I like to put it in my course, what topic brings out your high standards no matter what it is, because I feel like that's like really true to who you are. You're so right,

06:04

for sure, for sure. And I think I look for especially if I'm having an influencer, that is going to be like a brand ambassador, or they're going to be a little bit of a face. Speaking on behalf of the brand. I'm looking for someone who's connected on a deeper level with their community, that they're not just talking about their outfit of the day, their makeup of choice, but they talk about real life things that does that mean, you have to go on Instagram and have a crying fit and talk about your depression or something else like no, you can share what you feel comfortable with. But there has to be a moment of like pulling back the curtain and saying like, I'm not just the perfect person that you see on your feet every day, I have feelings, things hurt me, I have issues with life, you know, that I think also will bind your community to you. And so I look for people who have those honest moments.

06:53

How can you do that on the brand side on as a brand as someone offering a product? How can you show off that realness?

07:03

That's a great question. It really depends on the brand. But I think this year brand values have become really forefront. So like what do you stand for as a brand? Is it that you are organic, that you're locally sourced, that you are supporting certain types of charities? If so, then it's more than just a single post that saying like we donated to this thing, it's more of a constant update, we are working with this charity we showed up to this event. And we also donated money, and talking about like, why they chose that. And not just because it's a theme of the month. But because it resonates with a founder story, perhaps it has something to do with an ingredient that is sourced, perhaps it has something to do with, you know, a life changing moment or a family member who is affected by something. So I think that's how we pull back the curtain on the brand side. And we really connect now of course, there's a lot more brands these days that have founders that are the face, they are showing up in stories they are showing up in the feed. And I do think that is really important for success of most brands, to have that moment because those are real people, sometimes their mothers, their fathers, their widows like they have real life stories that people can connect to in a real way. And then in addition to that, they have a brand. So you're much more likely to purchase from someone who you connect with, when there are 10 products lined up that all seem pretty similar in price pretty similar. And function is one of those products that the founder has showed up and showed themselves and you identify with that story. You're probably going to buy that one every time.

08:45

Do you think we will lean more towards that moving forward? Where the founder is a big figurehead in brands? Like I mean, I know we've seen that all over small business Tiktok space where people have blown up their small business by doing some process or doing whatever but they are the main character showing off their business do you think being the influencer of your own brand is a necessity

09:14

I don't know that it's a necessity to be successful but I think that you will reach success much more quickly if you do have it if you look at some of the most popular and engaging brands especially in the beauty sector right now. I'll take Kylie Cosmetics as an example. Although I get it she is a Kardashian so it's a little bit different. But starting with a relatable face she's also a mother she is like well known she has stories and background in history. People can latch on to that and much more quickly whether the makeup is good or not. I'm not going to give an opinion because I haven't used it yet. But the brand loyalty is so high it's one of the top engaging brands on Instagram in the beauty sector. So I do think that I

10:02

want to watch it like I want to watch watching.

10:05

Yeah, and I think people just have a stronger connection with other people when there's a face, right. But there's also a downside to that, right? Let's take Bobby, Bobby Brown, for example. Bobby was the face of Bobbi Brown for a very, very long time. And at one point, she did decide to sell and leave her company. And part of doing that was giving up her name, and her face. So she has since launched a new beauty product line, and she can no longer use Bobby Brown forever for life. And that's very difficult. And, you know, it causes a lot of problems as well, if you build a certain founder or certain face so deeply into your brand. If there is an exit strategy, if there is something a controversy that happens, you know, you're really rolling the dice on taking a hit and having to start again with a new face and a new founder, later down the road. So there's positives and negatives to both but I do think that exponential growth does happen with a founder that is really the face and engraved with the day to day.

11:12

Yeah. And I'm I am by no means Bobby Brown. But that was actually a big thing for me when I started my company, because I was like, what if I'm going to scale? What if I'm going to hand off tasks and then people book because of me, it's not scalable to be your own everything. It doesn't make sense. So it's just a very weird, it's a weird space because you have to be connected. And yet, you don't want to give up your namesake. It's weird. But that pivots us right into influencer marketing. Because if your brand owner can't be the face of their own business, someone else has got to be the face, someone else has got to give you the tutorial, someone else has got to show you the work then make it happen. So this is something that we've talked about a lot in the creative economy of really bringing on creators to be this face of the brand. Bringing them on to create seven videos for the month reach that reals quota, that Tiktok quota that are huge numbers, instead of doing all of the in house staff. What are you seeing with the brands that you are working with right now in their direction that they want to go moving forward?

12:27

Sure. So I'll take haircare for an example. I work with a haircare brand, and I have for many years and we generate almost all of our content from influencers, we no longer do any sort of large big brand shoot, we found we found it felt disconnected from the end consumer. Having a person that is perfectly quaffed is not relatable, right? We love a salon look. And we love the way we feel when we leave the salon. But can we recreate it to a perfect tee? Most of us cannot. So having the tutorials and the content made by people who are doing their own hair? And yes, we do give them direction. And yes, we do have a professional hairstylist that gives them a consulting call and education moment so that they're not doing something completely crazy. But that strategy has been able to be very successful for us, we get way more content, way more video and we're able to get way more hairstyles, then we were by producing the shoot ourselves. In addition, we get so many more looks right? So we're able to have someone with naturally curly hair, bleached blonde, we're really hitting on all the issues that the consumer has with their own hair, and all of the looks that they want to achieve that they see in themselves. One of the biggest things in marketing and why having influencers create content is really, really effective is because as a purchaser, you want to see yourself in the brand, right? And it's so difficult for a brand to achieve that by creating all their own content because you need to cast so many different types of people. And you have to have so many different types of considerations. So when we use influencer marketing, we're able to go with a super wide net and say, you know, I need three blondes I love someone who has pink hair. I like natural curls. I'm looking for someone who has kind of, you know, a different alternative. Look, I'm looking for a crop Bob, that, you know, we're able to put all those considerations down and just create such a wider breadth of content that end users can see themselves in which we were not able to do before when we created our own assets. So I would say this is something that I'm pushing for many brands. Not only is it cost effective, but We're able to get such a wider array of assets back that we were not able to do before. When I learned

15:07

the cost of some of these shoots, what it really takes to set up a shoot day, I was blown away. I partnered with a photographer, videographer team for a while, a couple of years ago, and when I learned the videographers day rate was like $1,500 for I don't even think that was a day and then editing on top of that, and then 30 images for like 600 bucks, like, it adds up so quickly, hiring models, her hiring, the venue, the lighting, the hair, the props, the literally everything, it blows my mind. So I think this is such an amazing money saving moment to lean into influencers, if you're scouting them appropriately. Because I think that's the biggest thing is we have to on both sides understand that this is a scouting moment, and to put our best foot forward to get booked for these jobs. So when you're scouting, and we talked about this a little bit last episode, too, what are you really looking for,

16:13

what we're really looking for when we start casting are people that we think are going to be able to interpret the brand vision. So in their content, we are seeing that they are testing a lot of different types of content. They're not just posting still images, but they know how to speak to the camera in stories. They know how to edit a reel and do a transition. They have done tutorials or some sort of, you know, instructional video in the past. So we're looking for someone who has experience and has posted like minded content, what the brand is looking for. It doesn't have to be an exact fit, right? We already have a creative director for the brand. We don't need that influencer to be a creative director. But we need to see that they are able to achieve multiple types of content. Because typically when we're hiring someone, especially for content creation, we're not just asking them for one image, it's going to be a wide breadth, it's going to be some still images, some lifestyle images, some video, some tutorials, it's going to be a lot of things. So I need to see that they've done that in their feed or you know Tik Tok previously,

17:24

right? So my brain first goes to what type of content? Do you think they need to perfect? Like, yes, we need to see them engaging on stories. Yes, we need to see some of the community because essentially, your Instagram is a portfolio. But if we're looking for that specialty that like Nisha makes you sparkle, the that really specified content, what do I need to see? And maybe it's not the specific topic? Like maybe we're not a hair girl? But is it the tutorial? Is it the like, more aesthetic look,

17:56

of course, like the aesthetic look does work for some brands, and for other people that are looking for something that's a little bit more approachable, a more natural. One thing I always really look for is in their past partnerships, or maybe it wasn't a paid partnership, but they were incorporating content, they were incorporating a brand into something. How natural was it? are they holding it up just like right by their faces smiling? Or are they giving a video where they're discussing, like, you know, I make a smoothie every morning, and I have just started using this thing. Look, this time I incorporate it, this is how I do it. And it feels really natural as to how they bring it into the content. So that is one thing that I'm always looking for. And I don't think that this applies to any sort of niche, it applies to every niche. If you can naturally engage your community about what you are talking about and not kind of shove it at them randomly. That is like a very good skill set. And I think that happens in video and in speaking in first person. Those two things I find are difficult for to find they're not an easy thing. Not everyone is natural in front of the camera. Not everyone can walk you through their steps, deliver key points quickly and like with flow, and kind of build a storyline. So it's not just all of a sudden, a slide or real about a random a random topic and product.

19:26

I yeah, I really think that storytelling is so important. I mean, I've seen so many products entered, what you would call salesy, pieces of content go viral, if it's incorporated correctly. I totally agree that if we can set up that problem correctly, and you're not being salesy, it's being that almost product placement, like you can have the Kardashians run their show. They have a they have a sponsored thing and a lot of these shows and they throw it in as product placement. They'll do a steal of the hotel They're staying Yeah, they'll do a steal of, you know, a product sitting in the background. And that's how you just kind of throw it in. Yeah. And

20:06

I think that they're the way that you can get good at doing that is by framing the story and seeing how many things you can tag in it that didn't pay you. So for me, it's like if you're doing like your weekend getaway, right, you know, doing weekend getaway, you're doing it for yourself, if you're gonna create content around it as a content creator or an influencer. And you're saying to yourself, I want to build a story here, no one paid me but let me see how many things I can organically work in and tag, right, you have your hotel, you have your car, perhaps you stopped at some sort of incredible food place on the way you maybe you use a crazy packing tip, or a different type of luggage that no one has heard of before, perhaps you've worked in some sort of beauty product that people aren't working like using right now. There's a lot of ways that you can organically and naturally war brands into that experience. Number one, it starts to show other brands that you can do it. And number two, you're honing your own skills as to how to do this in a natural way. So I think taking an it doesn't have to be an always on sort of thing. It can be a moment in time. But that's how I would recommend people hone their skills to make it more natural is to take their weakened moments or to take something that you know is going to be more of an experience and see how naturally you can work various products and tags into that

21:36

we have these two different parties in influencer marketing one side that's like why would I do that for free? Why would I propose any kind of promotion or tag anyone for free? And then we also have this side, that's like doing far too much for far too little. And I really think there is an in between, we need to bring back the organic tagging, because you're right, we all need to learn how to hone in on that non salesy selling, because it can be a story why why even make it salesy, you don't need to sell me, I just think that the age of formal masculine sales is dead and done.

22:17

And I think we are getting into a place now where as we've mentioned before creator economy, anyone can tag anything, right? I can tag a brand and they may want to give me a discount code or make me an affiliate? Who knows. So the the time of Oh, don't tag anyone if they're not paying you seems silly to me. If you're already incorporating it, why wouldn't you tag it? No one's saying you have to include a link to buy? No, I'm saying you have to like break down every ingredient and why people should use it. But that is one of the ways especially for small and emerging brands that we identify talent that we will eventually pay, right? First, we have to know that you like it. There's no way of knowing that you like it unless once one you email us and you say that you love this thing. And that's not a cold email that's like, I love this thing. Like literally, I see that you like this thing and you've used it or we give it back that you used it

23:17

here might Winbox.

23:22

Exactly. So we have to start somewhere with these programs and for brands that don't have just like a heap load of money to put into this. Like we start with people who organically like things that just makes more sense. So yeah, I feel like a goner. The day is where we like don't tag unless we're being paid. Like just tag. I mean, I think that's fine.

23:46

I think that is our big bold capital moment here of just tag, just start incorporating, just start putting it out there because your connection and community will show your talents just as well as that tutorial. Well, it will show off that superpower. So Sonia, thank you so much for jumping on for this episode. Let me know where my BFFs can find you to learn more to follow along.

24:16

Oh, absolutely. Thank you so much for having me. Anyone could connect with me and if you have additional questions about what I do or how you could get involved, you can reach me on Instagram or Tiktok at Sonya so am I a dot Elise Ely s s I love chatting with people. So I hope to see you there.

24:40

Thank you for listening to this episode of brand meet creator if you loved it, rate review, subscribe and of course share. For more on how you can create influence and get paid. Come hang out with me on Instagram at Harley Jordan