While traditional media relations remains vital to a company’s public relations campaigns, the impact of B2B influencers is growing quickly. Word of mouth influences over 90% of B2B transactions, so it’s crucial to leverage influencers including advocates such as business partners, clients, and employees.
Encouraging influencers to share news, opinions and even successes on platforms ideal customers already engage with allows for more organic introductions to the business.
Before incorporating B2B influencers into your PR strategy, here are some considerations:
Media channels: LinkedIn makes it easy for potential clients to connect with influencers and allows posts to reach larger audiences with more fluid dialogue. Industry-related influencer blogs and podcasts also can be great avenues to find a more specific market segment with greater conversion probability.
Key performance indicators: Before engaging with an outside partner or industry influencer, determine the influencers’ engagement and follower levels and then establish realistic goals for the campaign. Quantify expectations to understand impact on the partnership’s leads, sales, and impressions goals.
Look beyond traditional influencers: The best B2B influencers are only sometimes industry thought-leaders with hoards of social media followers. Often, existing customers, employees, and prospects can share word-of-mouth recommendations that organically attract new clients.