By Dino Dogan
To this day, Air Jordans are the highest selling sneaker Nike has ever produced.
When we started Triberr two and a half years ago, we had a simple mission. To solve big problems for little bloggers.
The biggest problem for most bloggers was getting eyeballs on their content. But eyeballs are not the last mile.
The last mile is enabling bloggers to make a living doing what they love. And so, the Michael Jordan for Nike model of Influence Marketing was born.
Today, we are announcing the roll out of the brand new way for bloggers to make a living. By being a brand ambassador. Be like Mike.
Michael Jordan for Nike
Having a celebrity endorsement is a tremendously effective way of promotion. And bloggers are the celebrities in the online world.
Watch this video of Dan Cristo, Triberr co-founder, talk about bloggers as celebrities.
Having Michael Jordan represent a brand like Nike is a no brainer. But there are 2 problems with it:
- There is only one Michael Jordan to go around, and
- Most brands can’t afford a Michael Jordan
So, most brands would be happy to hire a minor celebrity, and they do. But since our lives are increasingly lived online, finding the right celebrity to represent a brand has become increasingly more difficult. The celebrity not only has to have the trust of an audience, but s/he must be congruent with the brand.
And since eyeballs are now scattered across millions of channels (blogs, forums, social networks, etc.), hiring a single celebrity may not do the trick.
Triberr now enables brands to hire 100s of mini-celebrities/bloggers to execute a campaign as a brand ambassador.
Bloggers Are Influencers
As bloggers, we work hard to build an audience. We work hard to build trust, credibility, and influence.
At the same time, we must master a wide range of skills.
[list_circle] [li]Writing[/li] [li]Editing[/li] [li]Graphic design[/li] [li]Technology[/li] [li]Video editing[/li] [li]Composition[/li] [li]Photography[/li]
…I could go on and on.
And each and every one of the skills mentioned above has an infinite number of sub-skills that we must master.
Our time and effort, as well as the audience we build, is incredibly valuable to brands.
And while there are three types of influencers, we are focusing on only one. You.
Watch this video by with Dino Dogan, Triberr co-founder, for more.
The Time Is NOW!
There is a unique set of circumstances that have contributed to our ability to enable bloggers to make a living in this new and unique way.
We provide brands with the tools and the methodology to recruit, manage, and track, 100s of bloggers.
And while a brand like Nike may never hire a single blogger as a brand ambassador, they just might hire 100 bloggers to represent a brand in a collaborative way for a period of 2-3 months.
A 100 bloggers who blog about fitness -for example- could move the needle for Nike in a significant way. I talk more about this concept in the video below.
The influence marketing piece starts at 4min and 46sec.
Will It Work?
YES!
I know it works because we’ve already done it.
For the past 4 months, we’ve been running Influencer Marketing campaigns with a small set of brands and bloggers. We are now rolling out a greater number of campaigns to a greater number of bloggers.
The first few campaigns were a smashing success, and over the next few months, we’ll expand our Influencer Marketing program to more brands and more bloggers.
FAQs
Q. What is Influence Marketing?
A. Influencer Marketing is a new form of marketing where companies hire influential bloggers to promote and endorse their brand, products or services.
Q. What is a campaign?
A. A marketing campaign is a lot like a political campaign. A brand recruits passionate supporters/bloggers who can help “elect” the product or service next time the audience member is on the market.
Q. What is a brand ambassador?
A. Bloggers are contracted to represent a brand in a genuine and enthusiastic way both online and offline, for a period of 4 weeks or longer.
Unlike traditional monetization strategies available to bloggers (affiliate marketing, ads, etc.), bloggers are fairly compensated for their ambassadorship.
Q. How is Triberr different from other influencer marketing platforms?
A. Triberr is different in several ways.
Our blogger outreach effectiveness is over 50%. This is unheard of. More than half of bloggers we contact to participate in these campaigns, end up joining. The industry standard for recruiting bloggers into a campaign is below 5%.
Part of our success is due to the fact that we offer fair compensation for blogger’s effort. No other platform does this. In fact, other platforms offer no way of compensating the blogger.
Furthermore, the campaigns are executed collaboratively. There is incredible amplification power in executing a campaign with 50 other bloggers.
Q. Is this like sponsored posts?
A. No. Sponsored posts are a lot like one-night-stands.
Brand ambassadorship is long term (1 month or longer) genuine and congruent representation a blogger can be proud to take home to meet the parents.
Q. Is this product review?
A. Not exactly. A brand may send you a product, which you may decide to review. One way of knowing you’re suitable as an ambassador for a particular brand is if you’re already using the product.
Q. How many brands can a blogger represent effectively?
A. Five.
We’re limiting the endorsement deals to 5 unless the brand decides you’ve done such a great job they want to hire you for a second/extended campaign.
We decided on 5 because most of us are able to effortlessly promote about 5 brands as we walk out of our house. For example:
The minute I step outside of my house, my neighbors can see me wearing my red Nike kicks, Harley-Davidson hoodie, Triberr T shirt, Gap jeans, and rocking my iPhone headset. Without even trying, I am implicitly endorsing all of those products.
Now, bloggers can be hired to explicitly endorse products they’re congruent with.
This is a start of something beautiful
We will communicate lot more with you guys as we continue to roll out these new opportunities.
In the meantime, feel free to ask questions and let us know what you think.
Welcome to the world of possibilities.
