Power up your influencer procurement game with predictive analytics and Social Network Analysis.

In today’s world, influencer marketing has become a crucial component of any successful marketing strategy. However, finding the right influencers to work with can be a daunting task, with 73% of marketers citing it as their biggest challenge. But fear not, for data-driven solutions are here to power up your influencer procurement game.

Sure, finding an influencer may seem simple, but truly understanding their audience – and how they engage with content – is the real struggle. After all, audiences are complex and multi-faceted, and limiting yourself to a certain vertical may not be the most effective strategy. That’s where predictive analytics and social network analysis come in, helping you identify the best influencers to reach your desired audience and achieve your desired outcomes – better, smarter, and at scale. 

The best part? You don’t have to be a data scientist to reap the benefits of these cutting-edge tools. With the help of AI and machine learning, you can easily mine vast creator databases and track influencers’ performance in real-time to optimise your campaigns on the fly.

So let’s take a deep dive into how predictive analytics and social network analysis can unlock the full potential of your influencer marketing strategy and take your brand #AboveAndBeyond.

Three key takeaways before we dive in:

• Predictive analytics helps you identify the right influencers to reach your target audience and maximise ROI. 
• Real-time influencer optimisation allows you to pivot while a campaign is in-flight, ensuring you achieve your objectives.
• Brands need to think outside the box when selecting influencers, and new technologies like Social Network Analysis can help you do it better and smarter. 

Fine-tuning influencer selection with predictive analytics

Every KPI – whether it’s awareness, sales, web traffic or lead generation – requires a unique approach to influencer selection. Traditionally, different tiers of influencer (from nano to celebrity) support different aspects of the sales funnel. But with vanity metrics fading in importance and deep audience insight becoming the status quo, the reality is much less cut-and-dry. 

The smartest approach to procurement is to use a specialist predictive analysis model. What’s that? In a nutshell… using a combination of AI and ML, social listening, and access to vast creator databases, there are platforms that allow you to work backwards to forecast which influencers will help you achieve your desired outcomes. 

The smart recommendations generated by these platforms allow brands to strategise their influencer selections more effectively, and they also provide post-campaign insights to inform your next one. That’s all great, but what about the in-between phase i.e., while a campaign is still live? What if an algorithm could monitor, analyse and optimise your influencers’ performance in real-time? 

The best platforms on the market right now, including our proprietary MG Platform, allow you to do exactly that. 

Optimising in-flight is the smartest route to unlocking ROI 

It’s only natural to assume that the influencer procurement process ends once a campaign goes live. But we’re here to tell you that’s not true. When a platform is capable of real-time tracking, you can go into campaigns in-flight and identify areas for optimisation and improvement on the fly – so you can quickly identify what’s not working and how to fix it. 

For example, your platform’s AI might suggest bringing in additional influencers, dropping any who aren’t performing well, or doubling down on a specific type of content. And since you’ve already fine-tuned the algorithm to your specific KPIs, pivoting based on its automated recommendations will increase the likelihood of achieving the results you want. 

The story doesn’t end there. An effective approach to influencer marketing is all about using data to see even bigger than the bigger picture. 

Beyond predictive analytics and real-time optimisation, there is a fast-evolving area of science and technology that delves even deeper into the world of influence to help you unlock ROI on another level – one of these is Social Network Analysis. And we think it’s the next big thing. 

Extend reach and maximise influence using Social Network Analysis

Social Network Analysis (SNA) is a highly complex and scientific method of measuring the relationships and flows of social connections. This involves gathering, analysing and interpreting masses and masses of data, which no human being could ever possibly comprehend without the support of AI. 

It gets really interesting when you apply SNA to influencer procurement. We won’t bore you with talk of high dimensional network dynamics, nodes and datasets – to put it plainly, it helps you understand the quality of an influencer’s connections. 

Our Head of Platform, Jonathan Aina, described how it works:

“Picture an influencer. They have an audience – followers – that you want to understand, in terms of interests, content interactions and engagement with said influencer. But you also want to understand who follows them. And who follows them. And who follows THEM. And so on. As you’d expect, it becomes a butterfly effect: the deeper you go, the bigger the pool of people and data you’re using to inform your strategy.” 

So what SNA allows you to do is dive into the layers of an influencer’s audience to truly understand the network of influence that they represent. When combined with AI-driven predictive analytics, SNA allows you to work backwards from your target audience and identify the influencers who are best placed to actually influence them. 

Based on certain patterns in the ways that people have historically interacted with social media content – in terms of narrative, format (e.g., GRWM, lunch, routine, product showcase), brand, product, colours, TOV, and everything in between – you can work out which influencers, and what content and creative messaging, are most likely to deliver your desired outcomes. 

It’s probability science, but we can fine-tune that probability using huge amounts of past and live data to find new audiences that you may not have thought of. This is where we need to be challenging the way we consider, as marketers, not only which influencers to use but also which people to target. 

Our Creative Strategist Dan Sutton weighed in on this from a different perspective:

“We need to think outside the box, just like the traditional marketing industry has done since forever – Red Bull is a great example of a brand that’s successfully targeted an unconventional market, such as tired workers who might not necessarily be interested in extreme sports. Brands need to apply the same creative approach to influencer marketing – and to do that, especially at scale, you need the data.”

Think outside the box to find new audiences – but make it smart

The REALLY interesting thing about SNA is its abilit to help you find new audiences that you may not have thought of – intelligently. Because the further down the line of influence you look, the more discoveries you make. 

Imagine an influencer with a niche in sports. Let’s say 90% of their audience is also interested in sports (go figure). But when you look at the next generation – the followers of the original influencer’s audience – you might find that 80% of THEIR audience is interested in fashion. So if you were Louis Vuitton, you’d work with that original sports influencer because you know that, with the right creative brief and a certain amount of test-and-learn, their content will trickle down to the luxury fashion audience. 

This model is agnostic of influencer verticals – it’s purely based on the mathematics of which influencers have the maximum probability of extended reach. AKA the influencers who will generate the best butterfly effect.

Influencer procurement should be more than vibes and gut feelings

In our fast-paced digital world, data-driven marketing strategies are crucial to staying ahead of the competition. Influencer marketing is no exception. By leveraging predictive analytics and social network analysis, brands can identify the best influencers to reach their target audiences, optimise their performance in real-time, and extend their reach through quality social connections. 

With the tools available today, you can make more informed decisions about who to work with, what content to produce, and how to deliver their messages effectively. As influencer marketing continues to evolve, staying ahead of the curve with data-driven insights will be key to unlocking the full potential of this powerful marketing strategy.

At MG Empower, we’ve always got one eye on the future. That’s how we help brands deliver maximum impact and stay ahead of the game. If you’d like to learn more about MG Platform, our proprietary platform for influencer marketing and predictive analytics, and what it can do for your brand… get in touch today. We’re always happy to chat.