New guidelines for influencer marketing

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DUDUZILE RAMELA: Let’s take a look at the world of influencers now. Influencer marketing is here to stay. That is safe to say. So why not create guidelines for best practice like most industries? Well, that is where the Interactive Advertising Bureau (IAB) comes in. IAB has published a white paper called Best Practices for Influencer Marketing in South Africa.

What does this all mean? Well, we speak to the IAB’s Danilo Acquisto, he’s a senior digital influencer marketing committee member. Thank you very much for your time this afternoon. It may be obvious to many, but for those of us who are not quite clear, what is an influencer?

DANILO ACQUISTO: Duduzile, it’s so nice to chat to you, and thanks for the time this afternoon. The influencer marketing industry is such an interesting one. Defining an influencer seems to be one of the categories that was most of demand of our business. What exactly is an influencer? Is putting a celebrity on a billboard considered an influence campaign, or is that considered some other kind of endorsement? So our job was to try and initially start defining these.

So an influencer is somebody who uses their own platform and their own media to distribute messaging in their own tone of voice, not necessarily some other kind of category.

So we’ve basically defined at least four different categories in the influencer space, a celebrity, a social media influencer, an expert or a customer. Each of those has their own various different definitions of what they stand for. But a social media influencer is an individual content producer or group of producers who have gathered a social media following because of their personality, lifestyle or content style, writing and or opinions in their own social media platform with their own voice.

DUDUZILE RAMELA: I guess this white paper is quite timely. You take a look at what is making headlines more so today, that case in Utah of a mother who has been sentenced to some 15 years because of abusing her children. She was a social media influencer with her children. She had a YouTube channel, and we saw them on this YouTube channel. But just outline for us some of the guidelines that you propose.

DANILO ACQUISTO: It is always going to be something that the industry will need to factor in is the risks associated with any kind of media and advertising. When you’re associating with an individual person, brands and companies need to consider the fact that these individual people have various different changing personalities, and their public interest may improve or decline over time, and it’s important to be able to mitigate those risks.

So this white paper that we have released to the IAB members includes a number of categories within it. It precedes a document that was our definitions document, which is really just, like you mentioned now, defining what influencer marketing is.

But we cover everything from metrics in influencer marketing, how important are and how to measure certain metrics for your own success.

Also, we tackle the very hard questions, when should I consider incorporating influencer marketing? How do I mitigate risks? How do I amplify? What to consider when determining the legal ramifications? Do I have to pay influencers? What risks are there and how can I mitigate them? What are the main operational risks of influencer marketing? All of these are addressed in the white paper.

DUDUZILE RAMELA: Absolutely. What of the concept of ethical influencing? I saw something recently where someone proposed to their partner at a local food outlet and someone tried to shame them, but then brands came out to sponsor the wedding. One said, we’ll sponsor the car. One said, we’ll do your hair. So they turned it around on this person who tried to shame this couple because they proposed at a particular food joint.

DANILO ACQUISTO: It’s such a fascinating and beautiful part of what makes influencer marketing so special, and I think South Africa is sitting in a poised position to be able to take on the world in this way because of the fact that brands are really struggling to speak to diverse communities with single messaging.

The power of influencer marketing is being able to partner with people who have got a trusting relationship with their audiences already in various different sectors with different body shapes and interests and needs and wants; and being able to deliver messages to those audiences through this particular influential person.

I think given our diversity in this country, I think it’s one of the biggest marketing challenges to marketers is ‘how do I speak personally to these many diverse groups of interests and people with a personalised message?’ And influencer marketing really is the solution to that.

So I love the idea of this virtue signalling in some way and people trying to use opportunities to do good by seeing what is trending on the internet and how to jump on those trends. Influencers make a really great vehicle for that because it’s great content creation turned around in a fast time and spoken through an authentic voice, which I think is really beautiful.

DUDUZILE RAMELA: Danilo Acquisto, thank you very much for your grace and for your time this afternoon. He’s with the IAB, he’s a senior digital influencer marketing committee member.