There is no point in learning about micro influencers — or anything for that matter — if you cannot act on it. This post, therefore, is about transforming your micro influencer knowledge into action. And, in keeping with the action-oriented spirit of my website, I want to move you from ‘theory’ to practice as fast as possible. However, that does not mean that knowledge (theory) is not important. On the contrary, it is equally if not more relevant than ever. This is because for practical reasons action is only effective when underpinned by the reasons for which they are taken, in the first place.
In turn that means revisiting the core concepts. Never begrudge this seemingly backward step. In fact, this a forward step contrary to all outward appearances. Please allow me to explain.
While we want to take action, we do not want to take any action, but only those that get us to our desired destination — conversions in our case. Actions taken without the informing thoughts (the core concepts) can only be expected to lead to very superficial outcomes. We want to avoid that.
One of the core concepts I have been emphasising throughout this micro influencer series is: alignment of values. Without this, your efforts are likely to produce very few outcomes.
The micro influencer phenomenon embodies another core concept: partnership. Micro influencers work with not for a brand. This is a crucial distinction. Here is scenario that illustrates what I mean.
Let us say that you do find not one but several micro influencers in your chosen niche, how to do you assess fast — at a glance — whether they would be interested in working with you? Short answer: check for alignment of values. When they share the same world view with you, your chances of partnering increases dramatically — subject to further scrutiny of course. My point is this: alignment of values is an effective preliminary assessment — but it is only a preliminary assessment.
More On Partnership
There are mainly two moving parts of this mechanism: you, the affiliate marketer in your chosen niche (beauty; health and fitness; fashion); and the micro influencer. This mechanism only works when both parties stands to gain something — thus mutually beneficial. While this may seem like stating the obvious, in reality, it is the basic notions that we often tend to overlook to our detriment in pursuing the bigger goal — we cannot see the tree for the forest, a common form of blindness.
Just because you find a micro influencer you like, does that mean that they will automatically want to work with you? Before rushing off to ask your chosen micro influencer, ask yourself this question: “What am I offering them?”
This is crucial because when you are starting you may be inclined to think, I have nothing much to offer — and you may be right. Why would anyone want to work with you?
This is a dilemma similar to the one mentioned earlier in a post — you have no followers but without followers you cannot succeed. My answer to extricating yourself from that situation was to find a micro influencer — to leverage their audience. This dilemma, in turn, is also similar to the dilemma of trying to break into job market — you cannot get a job without experience and you cannot get experience without a job. Actually, when you reflect on this subject, life itself is succession of such dilemmas — but has that ever stopped anyone from progressing?
The question is how do we get around the present dilemma? Your answer is below.
Your Three-Step Plan
I have a three-step process for getting out of this bind, the very first step of which is to reach out — or back — to the question of alignment of values, as already mentioned above — follow this through by reaching back into the whole micro influencer series on this website. If you are confident (purely a judgement call) that the alignment is still good, then you are good. Now to the next move . . .
Find at least ten (a nice round no.) micro influencers whose values align with yours — line up your ducks — give yourself the permission to err on the side of too many rather too few. If you find more than ten, keep them in reserve.
I recommend a Google sheet for recording the data with notes against each micro influencer regarding alignment.
The next step is a much bigger one — it involves adopting a methodology and using recommended tools to ascertain whether what looked promising at first sight is actually so . . . sussing out the hunches.
Before moving on to any of that I feel I need to explain that word “methodology,” which these days is banged abut so indiscriminately that it has lost its edge. Put simply, it could mean how something — a fact, for example — was arrived at. What pathways of reasoning were followed? And while that might seem somewhat specialised — not unjustifiably since the provenance that word is research — it is what we actually do every day when we ask someone, “How do you know?.” And that could apply to anything from the price of cherries to esoteric stocks. Of course we have not exhausted the full meaning of that word in this brief account. But then neither is that our intention here. Consider that a working definition of methodology. How do do know?
How do you know that certain micro influencers will work for you? Notice the plural. We have moved from investing in a singular micro influencer to plurals — that itself is a methodological approach. Why have we done that? Because we want to increase our chances of getting micro influencers we could partner with. The more the merrier. That alone increases our overall chances of success — even though we might settle on one or two micro influencers in the end Having many in our stock allows us to be nimble.
There is also a second sense in which the use of methodology is justified here: bringing all the individual actions into a single coherent plan. It is one thing to intuit that a certain micro influencer will work out for us and another thing to test that intuition. Thus the multiple micro influencers. Search, find and refine — that is our overall approach, methodology to be precise.
At a glance that methodology looks like this:
- Action 1 Search — using specific tools
- Action 2 Select — based on the micro influencers’ values — preliminary assessment
- Action 3 Re/Assess for Alignment of Values — using specific tools
Reflections
You will also notice from above that in moving from a broad discussion/description to an abbreviated, schematic representation of the fundamental elements — the three actions — and how they are inter-related, we have also made a methodological shift.
I point this out here because you may want to adopt this strategy in trying to solve the many problems here in your business. Before solving a problem, you need to make it concrete. First, articulate it in words, — write in down (“the problem is . . .”); and then, proceed to schematic representation (the at-a-glance view), bullet or numbered list. I would also like to emphasise that neither the broad discussion (discursivity) nor the schematic abbreviation are superior to the other but are two components of a whole — treat them as such.
What I have done just now is also called a reflective practice (looking back at what actions were taken and trying to understand why) that can enhance your analytical abilities and stay focussed.
This action is also an aspect of methodology — examining our thinking/actions and accounting for them. I hope I was able to demystify methodology for you.
Affiliate Pathways is not simply a website that provides information on affiliate marketing but also an educational tool for structured learning. You will get more value out of it by focussing on the latter — just taking on information will not teach you anything; it is how you implement that information as learning that matters in the end.
Wait
There is also a bonus here.
Aspects of the structured learning process demonstrated here — particularly moving from discursivity to schematic visualisation — can be applied in many contexts (work, life, school). Imagine what you could to with writing a report or an essay with this effective strategy.
Follow Up
We did not do all this work to abandon it here — wondering, what’s my next move? Grab it here: Doing Micro Influencers For Real.