How to Identify B2B Influencers to Drive Growth (2024)

The guide to developing a purpose-driven influencer marketing strategy

Are you a purpose-driven business owner interested in learning how to identify B2B influencers and leveraging the power of influencer marketing to grow your brand and reach a wider audience? In this episode and post, we’ll dive deep into the insights of Niklas Hartmann, the Founder, and CEO of ReachOn, who has successfully built a strategic and targeted approach to influencer marketing

You’ll learn from Niklas’s experience and hear about his journey, from his passion for purpose-driven brands to the analytical approach he took to maximize the benefits of influencer marketing for his own business. By the end of this post, you’ll clearly understand how to develop your influencer marketing strategy that aligns with your company’s mission and build long-lasting relationships with influencers that will ultimately drive revenue growth and brand awareness.

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About Niklas Hartmann

Niklas Hartmann is an influencer marketing expert who began his journey at the young age of 18. As the Head of Influencer Marketing at Reachon, Niklas has worked through the industry, helping companies execute successful influencer marketing campaigns. His expertise lies in influencer identification, negotiation, and campaign analysis.

Niklas has a wealth of experience in B2C and the ever-growing B2B influencer marketing landscape, always emphasizing the significance of purpose-driven brands in achieving success. With a friendly and conversational approach, Niklas readily shares his insights and experiences, making him a valuable guest in influencer marketing.

In the ever-evolving digital landscape, the importance of strategic and targeted influencer marketing cannot be overstated. As a purpose-driven business owner, capitalizing on this powerful tool can help you expand your brand’s reach, engage with your audience on a deeper level, and, ultimately, boost your bottom line. But with countless influencers and marketing channels at your disposal, it’s crucial to develop a clear strategy that aligns with your goals and target audience. In this blog, we’ll walk you through the essential steps to crafting an influencer marketing plan that drives results and positions your brand for long-term success.

Here are the steps required to identify B2B influencers to drive growth:

1. Define your target audience and goals

Are you thinking about using influencer marketing to boost your business? It’s a smart move, but you must clearly define your target audience and goals before you start. This foundational step will guide your strategic decisions and ensure your efforts are focused and consistent.

Knowing your target audience helps you find the best influencers that will resonate with them, increasing the chances of success at every stage of the marketing process. In addition, establishing explicit goals provides a measurable metric to gauge the effectiveness of your campaigns and adjust your strategy as needed to maximize your ROI.

According to Niklas Hartmann, Founder, and CEO of ReachOn, aligning your influencer marketing campaign with a specific mission or vision that captures the essence of your brand can help drive revenue growth. Hartmann suggests researching and identifying the most suitable influencers to partner with and reaching out to at least 70-80 potential candidates before selecting the top-performing individuals that meet your established criteria.

Defining your target audience and goals is essential to maximize your potential for success. By focusing on your intended audience, you can select the most compatible influencers who resonate with their needs and interests, forging authentic and long-lasting connections. In addition, by having well-defined goals from the beginning, you can assess the performance of your influencer marketing initiatives against measurable benchmarks, allowing for continuous improvement and optimization of your strategy.

So, to make a lasting impact with your influencer marketing campaigns, start by defining your target audience and goals. Then, the strategic compass will guide your efforts toward reaching your desired outcomes.

2. Research suitable influencers and collaborations

If you want to make a real impact with your influencer marketing, it all starts with finding the right connections. This means researching and identifying influencers who share your company’s values, goals, and target audience. A good influencer can help you expand your reach and drive more leads and revenue to your business, while a bad one can do more harm than good. That’s why it’s essential to dedicate the time and effort to finding the right influencers and collaborations that can bring value to your company.

According to Niklas Hartmann, the key is to cast a wide net and reach out to as many potential influencers as possible. He recommends contacting at least 70 to 80 influencers to find the best ones to promote your brand effectively. Hartmann also emphasizes the importance of thinking beyond monetary compensation and finding ways to create meaningful collaborations.

One effective strategy is to partner with LinkedIn influencers to promote your company’s podcast. This can increase listenership and expand your reach to new audiences. In addition, building relationships and collaborations that complement your existing marketing strategies can create a more comprehensive and effective approach to influencer marketing.

Ultimately, the key to successful influencer marketing is authenticity. You can create long-term relationships that benefit both parties by doing your homework and finding the right influencers who align with your brand’s values and mission. This can lead to new market opportunities, strategic partnerships, and lasting customer relationships while maintaining your brand’s credibility and trustworthiness. So take the time to research your options and find the right influencer collaborations that can help your business thrive.

3. Develop authentic, purpose-driven content

Creating authentic and purpose-driven content is the key to success with influencer marketing. You can establish a deeper emotional connection with your target audience by aligning your brand with a specific mission and crafting content that reflects your values. This approach boosts your brand’s credibility and nurtures long-lasting customer relationships. By providing value and fostering genuine connections, your brand can resonate with your audience, increasing reach, loyalty, and revenue.

According to expert Niklas, purpose-driven brands tend to perform better in influencer marketing campaigns, especially when they have a clear mission to help a specific population segment. And expert Hartmann emphasizes the importance of a strong internal culture, which leads to more authentic and engaging content that resonates with the target audience. By showcasing your company’s passion and dedication to its mission through case studies and white papers, you can strike a chord with potential customers and drive growth for your brand.

Through his experiences, Hartmann has found that the most successful influencer marketing campaigns prioritize authenticity and value, delivering content that reflects the brand’s enthusiasm and purpose. By establishing your brand as purpose-driven, you can create a meaningful bond with your audience, who will feel supported by your brand rather than just sold to. This equitable relationship can lead to long-term customer retention and satisfaction, generating lasting success for your brand.

Developing authentic, purpose-driven content should be a core element of your influencer marketing strategy. By centering your brand around a mission and values that resonate with your audience, you can increase customer trust and loyalty, driving growth and success for your business.

4. Tailor content to specific channels and audiences

Expanding your reach and building connections with your ideal audience is crucial for growth as a business owner. That’s why developing a strategic and targeted approach to influencer marketing is so important. But how can you ensure that your content resonates with the right people? Guest speaker Niklas Hartmann has some insights on the matter.

One critical step is to tailor your content to specific channels and audiences. This means understanding and adapting your message to meet different groups’ unique pain points and desires. For example, if you’re collaborating with LinkedIn influencers, you must create content that appeals to their specific followers. Sometimes this might require modifying your brand message or communication style.

Niklas also emphasized the importance of experimenting with different post types and formats to identify what resonates best with diverse audiences. By consistently testing and analyzing data, you can make informed decisions about the type of content that will drive the most engagement and lead to positive outcomes for your influencer marketing campaigns.

So, consider the significance of seeking out and tailoring content to specific audiences. By doing so, you can align your goals more closely with those of influencers and their respective followings. This can lead to mutually beneficial partnerships and a more personalized customer experience. So, let’s work together to create a lasting connection with your ideal audience!

5. Utilize data and analytics to track success

Influencer marketing is all about building meaningful relationships with your audience. But how do you know if your efforts are paying off? That’s where data and analytics come in. By tracking the success of your campaigns, you can identify areas for improvement, make data-driven decisions, and optimize your influencer marketing efforts.

Niklas Hartmann, an expert in influencer marketing, stresses the importance of using analytics to inform your campaigns. He recommends treating influencer marketing as an analytical field, collecting and analyzing data to better assess your partnerships’ impact. For example, by monitoring the results of a collaboration with LinkedIn influencers, businesses can determine the success of their campaigns and make necessary adjustments to maximize their return on investment.

Incorporating data and analytics into your influencer marketing strategy is essential for purpose-driven business owners looking to grow their brand and reach a wider audience. By tracking the performance of your campaigns, you can ensure that you’re providing your target audience with relevant and engaging content that builds trust and drives results. In addition, this enables you to make informed decisions about future campaigns and partnerships that best align with your overall marketing objectives. Ultimately, leveraging data and analytics in influencer marketing allows you to be more strategic, leading to increased brand reach and revenue through purpose-driven marketing efforts.

6. Negotiate and build lasting relationships with influencers

Are you looking for a way to expand your business’s reach, increase brand awareness, and grow your revenue? Influencer marketing might be the answer you’re looking for! Building solid relationships with influencers who share your company’s values and goals can create mutually beneficial collaborations that amplify your message to a wider audience.

According to Niklas Hartmann, a strategic approach to influencer marketing involves meticulous research to identify suitable influencers and develop a list of criteria to evaluate their effectiveness.

Once you’ve found the right influencers, successful negotiation sets the stage for future opportunities, allowing you to optimize your campaigns and increase revenue or opinion leadership. These authentic collaborations help strengthen the human connection between your business and its audience, fostering trust, brand loyalty, and growth in your customer base. By establishing long-lasting relationships with the right influencers, you can take your business to the next level genuinely and purposefully.

Identify B2B influencers to drive your growth

Adopting a strategic and targeted approach to influencer marketing is invaluable for purpose-driven business owners looking to expand their brand awareness and revenue. With the guidance provided by Niklas Hartmann and the key steps laid out in this article, you’re now equipped to create an influencer marketing campaign that will resonate with your audience and reap significant rewards. Remember, the key to success is being willing to learn, adapt and grow in response to data and audience feedback. Implement these steps, and you’ll be on track to forming long-lasting relationships with the right influencers, helping you powerfully grow your business.

What other steps are you taking toward increasing brand reach and revenue through purpose-driven influencer marketing.? Comment below and let me know.

Some topics we discussed include:

• Define your target audience and goals before starting an influencer marketing campaign.
• Be consistent and show up every week to create content for your audience.
• Collaborate with other influencers to grow your reach and audience faster.
• Use long-term strategies such as working with podcast hosts or creating joint posts with other influencers.
• Invest in your employees and help them become in-house influencers in their respective niches.
• Use LinkedIn to find and approach potential influencers in your industry.
• Use AI technology for influencer identification and executing influence campaigns.
• Measure the effectiveness of your influencer marketing campaigns to justify the investment.
• Ensure compliance with regulations and authenticity of influencer partnerships.
• Incorporate influencer marketing into your overall marketing strategy for maximum impact.
• And much, much more.

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Connect with Niklas

• LinkedIn

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