How to Write a Better Influencer Marketing Campaign Brief
As with any partnership, communication is key. When partnering with influencers to sponsor your products, it’s important that everyone is on the same page about messaging and communications. It’s tempting to simply offer up a few guidelines, but to really get the best results you have to walk a fine line of setting boundaries and allowing the influencer to be an authentic ambassador for your brand.
What Should Your Influencer Brief Include?
Your influencer brief should be a blueprint for communications. It should highlight important information about your company and your mission. More importantly, it should share with your influencers the focus of the campaign, including your goals. An influencer brief should also outline features and benefits of your products or services in the form of talking points so your influencers understand what information is most important to share (or not share) with their audiences.
In addition to outlining messaging, give the influencers specific guidelines for the visuals you are seeking. Are you looking for static shots or videos? Do you want them to post in their feed or in their stories? What should or shouldn't be in the background? Does your tagline need to be said a certain way? It’s very important to set their expectations and outline their responsibilities in order to create a cohesive groundswell of content for your campaign.
On the logistical side of things, you also need to highlight payment and legal terms in your influencer brief. When partnering with an influencer, make sure payment terms are clear. When will they get paid? How much will they get paid and what, if anything, will keep them from getting paid? Also think about the lifeline of the assets you are requesting and make sure you get full rights to those images so that you can use them in all forms of media and communications down the line. You never know when something can hit big and what opportunities lie ahead for you and your brand.
What Shouldn't Your Influencer Brief Include?
An influencer brief needs to be clear and guide influencers in the right direction, but what you don’t say is as important as what you do say. Remember you are hiring influencers for their experience in communicating with their niche audiences. They understand what their audiences want and need more than you do. You need to trust them to do their job in the most effective way they can for their audience and not micromanage their communications. As long as they hit on the important points you’ve outlined in your brief, how they communicate those points should be up to them. After all, their audience cares about their brand and not yours—yet.
When putting your brief together, make sure it doesn’t mandate too many scripted elements to allow your influencers the creative freedom to do what they do best so that their communications come off authentic and don’t feel like a sales pitch. Their audience doesn’t want them to sell to them, they want them to share with them.
What If I Need Help Writing an Influencer Brief?
Writing an influencer campaign brief may seem intimidating, but it doesn't have to be. Keep it simple, outline the responsibilities of the influencer, and let them run with their communications. In the end, you will appreciate the abundance of new followers that come your way thanks to your combined efforts.
At Elevate My Brand, we’re the experts in all things digital. We run all kinds of influencer campaigns across industries and audiences. If you want an experienced team of experts to give advice or to write the brief and run the campaign on your behalf, give us a call today!
Biana Lerman, Account Executive
Elevate My Brand