As the online creator economy has expanded, so has the world of influencers. You can build brand awareness by directing your company’s advertising budget toward influencer marketing campaigns—though you don’t need to rely on a megastar to push your product on major social media channels. The right influencer for your small business might be a micro influencer who provides high engagement for affordable rates.
Micro influencer platforms help you connect with the influencers best suited to your brand. Here’s how you can use these platforms to find brand advocates.
What is a micro influencer?
A micro influencer is a person with significant, but not enormous, follower counts on top social media channels. There is no hard-and-fast definition of what makes a person a micro influencer, but they tend to have at least 10,000 followers on the low end and 100,000 followers on the high end. Alternatively, accounts with 1,000 to 10,000 followers may be considered nano influencers. Influencers with a greater number of followers are called macro influencers. As there are no strict definitions for these terms, their parameters may evolve over time.
What is a micro influencer marketing platform?
A micro influencer marketing platform is a marketplace where brands can find influencers with at least 1,000 followers on major social media platforms. Many influencer marketplaces go far beyond a directory of influencer profiles. They also offer influencer relationship management tools that help you execute micro influencer campaigns across your marketing channels. They can help you draft influencer contracts and pay influencers, with the platform taking a cut of the proceeds.
Key features of a micro influencer marketing platform
A good micro influencer marketing platform will include several critical features to aid your influencer marketing efforts. These include:
- An influencer search engine. Use this to filter influencer profiles as you search for ambassadors and branded content creators who align with your company image and marketing campaign.
- Recruitment tools. Some platforms analyze your campaign goals and identify influencers who are likely to connect with your target audience. They can also conduct influencer outreach and invite influencers to apply for open campaigns.
- Influencer analysis. Platforms often showcase vetted influencers who have built an engaged audience devoid of fake followers. This gives you peace of mind that you’re choosing from authentic influencers who can reach real people.
- Influencer management tools. Influencer platforms provide legal contracts that govern the relationship between brands and micro-influencers. They also facilitate payments.
- Campaign management tools. A micro-influencer platform can help you with campaign management, including content creation schedules and posting schedules.
Benefits of using a micro influencer marketing platform
When you’re running a growing business, the best influencers to partner with to promote your business aren’t always celebrities. The internet’s most famous people might charge a lot to attach their image to your brand. Micro influencers are more likely to come across as authentic, and research shows they get an engagement rate that’s up to three times better than macro influencers.
Additionally, working with a micro influencer network can be easier than working with agents and managers who represent celebrities. Many micro influencer marketing platforms standardize contracts and payments, so you can focus on the actual campaigns.
5 popular micro influencer marketing platforms
When it comes to finding the right influencers for your brand, it helps to work with a reputable platform. Here are some of the best influencer marketing platforms for small-business owners looking to work with micro-influencers.
1. Shopify Collabs
Shopify Collabs is Shopify’s tool to help you connect with and manage influencers on YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, and Twitch. Shopify Collabs lets business owners create custom influencer applications, discover suitable influencers, send gifts, and pay them affiliate commissions—all from one central hub. The Shopify app is used by tens of thousands of merchants, including immi and Moonboon, to collaborate with creators.
2. Klear
Klear helps ecommerce brands find relevant influencers, with special emphasis on influencer discovery within your existing network of followers. It may be that you’ve already attracted the attention of successful TikTok influencers or Instagram influencers but aren’t aware of their online sway. Klear can connect you with these micro-influencers from your network and help facilitate a business relationship. The platform also vets its recommended influencers, keeping you away from fake influencers with inflated follower counts.
3. Stack Influence
Stack Influence has an influencer network of more than 11 million social media users. The platform’s micro-influencers typically average fewer than 20,000 followers. It breaks these influencers into categories like beauty influencers, mom influencers, tech influencers, fitness influencers, and more. This helps ecommerce companies land on the social media accounts that legitimately relate to their core business.
4. Neoreach
The Neoreach influencer marketing agency stands out for its data analytics. Before you even launch a campaign, Neoreach helps you study competitors and audience demographics and then pairs you with the right influencers for your ambitions. In many cases, its micro-influencers set rates far below what a macro influencer might charge.
5. Traackr
Traackr is a platform for ecommerce business owners who want a full suite of data-driven influencer marketing software. It can help you develop a micro-influencer marketing strategy and then connect you to the right influencer, but its services extend further. Traackr helps you with product seeding (where you provide your product to influencers as a free gift) and affiliate programs (where influencers get a cut of the revenue from their referrals). It also offers robust campaign analytics.
Micro influencer marketing platforms FAQ
Can influencers sign up for multiple micro-influencer platforms?
Each micro influencer platform has its own rules regarding exclusivity. Many allow influencers to list their services in various places, but they strictly govern referrals that come via their own platform.
Are micro influencer platforms solely focused on Instagram?
Micro influencers exist on many social media networks including YouTube, TikTok, Twitch, Facebook, and Discord. In many cases, these platforms help them reach particular niches. Instagram remains a very effective platform for micro-influencers, but it isn’t the only option out there.
Are micro influencer platforms more cost-effective than traditional influencer marketing?
Yes, micro influencers typically charge less for their services than macro influencers, but they typically get a higher engagement rate on their posts. This makes micro influencers a cost-effective choice for ecommerce marketers.
Do micro influencer platforms only work for specific industries?
Micro influencers can work across a wide range of industries. However, they may wield the most influence within a niche community. If you’re trying to sell a special type of guitar pick, it would be wise to choose a guitar-focused micro influencer over a world-famous celebrity who doesn’t play guitar. But you wouldn’t want that guitar micro influencer pitching unrelated products like coffee or shampoo. They’re most effective in their own niche.
Can a brand on a tight budget still benefit from using a micro influencer platform?
Even if your company is on a tight budget, you may be able to find micro-influencers within your price range. Most micro influencer platforms let you post job listings that establish a pay scale. You can also browse influencer listings to see what the minimum rates are. You may have the most luck enlisting nano influencers, who typically have between 1,000 and 10,000 followers.
