6 Steps to Create Brand Awareness for Your Product or Services

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Consumer recognition is essential for any business. The way the audience remembers and recognizes your business is known as brand awareness. When consumers remember a company’s or business’s products, contents, logos, or anything else related to that product or service, that company or business has developed significant brand awareness. Brand awareness is important because it helps consumers become familiar with the products and services. Customer acquisition is higher when the brand is familiar and the business can bring comfort to the target audience. 

If the target audience is unaware of the business or doesn’t trust the brand, then the customer base and sales are not going to increase. This is where brand awareness comes into the picture. There are some innovative strategies that could help increase brand awareness for any business. 

Identify the Target Audience

Who is your audience and what do you want to communicate with them? This is the first question every brand should ask themselves. Cultivating a strong brand awareness is impossible without understanding the target audience and their priorities. This is the first step in creating brand awareness for your products and services. 

Understand the Industry and Your Peers

The next step is to conduct a good study of the industry and analyze and understand the competitors. Once you understand the industry and competitors, it will be easier to understand the areas to concentrate on. 

A strong Voice for the Brand

One of the most significant aspects of brand building is establishing a voice for the brand. It means an image or motto of the business that will reach the audience through various channels and digital marketing tools. A brand should use all the mediums of communication wisely in order to deliver the key message of the brand to its target audience.

Influencer Marketing 

Another step to building strong brand awareness in the trending digital environment is to choose influencer marketing. The latest industry research shows that the decision-making of almost 60% of young consumers is influenced by digital influencers. One of the most effective ways to accelerate brand awareness is to partner with influencers who have large social media followings. Small-scale businesses and brands approach micro influencers for their authenticity and engagement ratio with the niche community. Influencer marketing is a strong way to establish brand awareness. 

The Power of Content Marketing

Content marketing is another powerful step in establishing the brand among the target audience. Content marketing has the power of telling a story that will resonate with the target audience, which would result in increased brand awareness. Content marketing also showcases what the brand represents and the qualities of the brand. It resembles the brand’s vision and significance. 

Brand Awareness Through SEO

Publishing an article and playing with the keywords is not enough. Good search engine rankings can do wonders for the brand. SEO helps your brand to rank and is easy to find by users. But more than that, SEO helps in creating a strong digital presence. Hence, it gives an incredible brand image to your business, and the audience feels the brand is more credible and trustworthy. 

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How to Grow Your Social Media Profile?

Having a good social media profile is equal to more online exposure. It helps you connect with your audience and improves your digital reputation. Your social media profile is the first one that shows up on the Google SERP when someone searches for your name (unless you are already a celebrity or someone with a popular page associated with you). Similarly, if you are a brand, you need digital attention from the right people to grow your business. So, building an effective social media profile is mandatory for brands, influencers, and others. 

You need the best social media profile so that your target audience can engage with your content. There are ways to grow your followers, subscribers, and audience for your profile. The organic way is to maintain consistency, choose the right platform, content optimization, active engagement with the audience, and many more.

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Choose the Right Channel

The very first and most important decision is to find the right channel for your growth. There are many social media channels and concentrating on every platform at the same time might not be a good idea. It’s more wise to understand where your audience is at. Do some research based upon your area of interest and the audience demography in that particular niche. Be it on Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, Twitter, or Tik Tok, you need to know where I am going to find a strong digital space with all my advantages as well as limitations. 

Profile Optimization

You might already have an account or have managed to maintain an account with the normal amount of social following and interactions. The next thing is to optimise your social media profiles. It starts with simple steps like uploading a good profile photo, video, or logo. And make sure to follow the social media parameters, like for Twitter, the photo should be 400px by 400px. Optimize the bio, description, attach relevant links, add discoverable keywords; these are all part of the page optimization.

Maintain the Consistency and Purpose

There are profiles that post on a daily basis but still fail to engage with the audience. On the other hand, daily posting does get results if done with a purpose. Also, the publishing frequency doesn’t matter if the content is inspiring, helpful, and actionable. So, know your best time to publish social media posts and do it with consistency and purpose.

Follow Other Profiles 

To extend your reach, you may follow other relevant profiles and brands from the same industry. If you are a brand, you shouldn’t be doing the same with competitor brands. But on a personal level, connecting with others is good for profile growth. Share their stories and posts to add value to the conversation and engagement.

Engage with the Audience

Your audience is your first priority. It’s for them that you are creating content, so engaging with the audience should be a big yes. Two-way communication with the audience is a great way to build a strong profile. You can respond to their personal messages and comments and like their comments. This provides good digital acceptance among the target audience and helps to grow the profile.

Collaborate with Others

Another great way of building a strong profile is by collaborating with other profiles. If you are an influencer, collaborating with other influencers helps in a great engagement ratio. Working with micro-influencers provides an authentic following and extends reach. 

Consider growing your profile as an add-on to yourself. When you have a quality profile in all areas, including content, profile appeal, and optimization, then you will automatically drive a quality number of followers. So continue finding values for the profile by trying the most creative methods.

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Should Startups Try Influencer Marketing?

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Startups and emerging businesses always have to face competition from other startups as well as established brands. The majority of startups that fail in their first years fail due to a lack of competency, limited funds, and resources. Well established brands and businesses maintain their success and keep a dynamic strategy for the marketing environment. For new businesses and startups, first they have to create an audience. So attracting the right people towards the business is their first challenge. Later comes engaging with them and converting them into loyal customers.

Today, as the marketing trends have taken shape in digital form, the business strategies have also been advanced. Influencer marketing is the best way to acquire new customers for your startup business. Influencers have a large audience of trustworthy fans and followers. By choosing influencer marketing, you can get people to trust your business. For emerging businesses, micro-influencers are the best choice. You can drive the best results through micro-influencers, and it is the most cost-effective form of startup influencer marketing. As the business environment seeks innovative marketing strategies, 90% of marketers have agreed that they find ROI from influencer marketing better than any other conventional marketing strategy. 

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Most startups don’t have a huge marketing budget and think influencer marketing is out of their reach. But the trick is to adapt strategies that meet your needs and budget. Through influencer marketing, startups are able to achieve the brand awareness they desire. The perks of choosing micro-influencers over celebrities for your startup business are:

  • Increase customer loyalty.
  • Drive leads and improve sales.
  • Reach a more targeted audience.
  • Increase brand awareness.
  • Improve brand advocacy.

On the other hand, startups are not advised to run influencer marketing campaigns without clear objectives. Nobody wants to lose time and money on something irrelevant without clear goals. Finding the right influencer is the only thing you need to worry about when you decide to choose influencer marketing for your emerging business. Choosing the right influencer can boost your brand and campaign far more than you expected. 

Unlike conventional marketing methods, influencer marketing directly reaches your target audience. The process of influencer marketing is super organic and it provides a genuine approach to business results. Influencer marketing also helps to build brand trust and authority. This is because of the strong fan following the influencers have. They have built a strong, concrete relationship with their followers. When you choose an influencer, you can get the trust and credibility that the influencer has developed over time. Their followers become your first audience, so the chances of getting potential customers from the community are high. 

Influencer marketing is a marketing technique that involves social figures from a particular niche. For your startup business, make sure you set the marketing goals and leverage the startup influencer marketing campaign. If done properly, influencer marketing can be much more cost-effective than expected, and this will help your brand or business make a breakthrough and become established in the market.

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Digital Marketing is Being Overpowered by Traditional Marketing

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Until the development of the internet, traditional marketing was the only option to promote products and services. This technique involved marketing through printed media, such as billboards, posters, etc. With the advent of broadcast communication, television has become the most powerful medium of advertising. Later, the internet came, and the whole marketing communication process has changed. Brands and businesses have started using digital channels such as websites and social media for marketing and advertising. This is the new age of marketing, called digital marketing.

Traditional marketing is still relevant today. A TV commercial or a magazine advertisement could still create an immediate impact on the audience. Traditional marketing makes products and services more memorable to consumers. Then why has digital marketing taken over the majority of the marketing space? 

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The Perks of Using Digital Marketing

Traditional marketing is a way of showcasing products and services to a semi-focused audience. On the other hand, digital marketing is all about having an online presence. It demands the digital presence of people, brands, and commodities. 

Digital Marketing is cost-effective.

Traditional marketing media like newspapers, television, magazines, etc., require immense cost and effort. In digital marketing, there is no trouble advertising for millions of people. A newspaper or poster advertisement for 10 lakh people demands more effort and money than simply posting it on social media. 

Wider Reach

The all-inclusive presence world-wide is the main advantage of running a digital marketing campaign. The possibility of reaching all these people in a short period of time is what makes digital marketing so incredible. Traditional marketing can only focus on a particular area, country, or city. Even broadcast communication has its limitations when it comes to reaching a million people in a short span of time.

Brand Visibility 

The success rate of traditional marketing is limited. Digital marketing includes SEO, SMM, PPC, and other forms of content marketing techniques to promote your business. The brand visibility rate is much higher than traditional methods of marketing.

Engagement is High

There is no feedback communication in traditional marketing. But with the use of the internet, people can talk about business and get immediate feedback from potential customers. It leads to more leads and boosts the business. 

Customization

Digital marketing campaigns can be customized based on consumer behavior or target audience preferences. Segmentation, targeting, and positioning are things that only digital marketing can claim.

There are many other merits to digital marketing. In fact, the perks of digital marketing are exceptionally higher when compared to traditional marketing. Things like high conversion rates, sharing capacities, advantages of interconnected gadgets, etc. make digital marketing the most desirable marketing tool for modern businesses. 

In digital marketing, advertising or marketing messages are delivered through websites, emails, mobile apps, search engines, social media, and many more. The most popular digital marketing techniques are already ruling the marketing environment.

  1. Search engine marketing
  2. Content marketing
  3. Influencer marketing
  4. Mobile marketing 
  5. Display advertising
  6. Email marketing
  7. Affiliate marketing
  8. Audio/ video marketing

Content marketing is one of the essentials of digital marketing. It involves creating and distributing content in the form of text, pictures, and multimedia. In B2C, content marketing means the exchange of information through social media posts, blog articles, and videos. The latest trend in digital marketing is the influencer marketing technique. It involves partnering with influencers, celebrities, or social figures who have an existing audience. Influencers use different social media platforms to communicate with their fans or loyal followers. Some of the most popular social media platforms for influencer marketing are Instagram, YouTube, Snapchat, Tik Tok, and Facebook. 

Digital marketing is the modern day of marketing. It is both essential and inevitable. It comes as no surprise that digital marketing is overpowered when the majority of mankind uses the internet. The Internet is the smartest innovation so far, as is digital marketing.

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How to Become a Successful Influencer?

Have you ever looked at a content creator’s social media profile and thought to yourself, “Oh, this is interesting; I could be one.” Well, influencers and content creators rule over social media nowadays. In fact, you can not be online for a day without having an encounter with at least one influencer. With the transitory growth of social media, people are more determinative about a career in content creation. Similarly, they are certain about the scope of influencer marketing and how brands desperately seek influencers from their niche.

The largest percentage of youth (from Millennials and GenZ) are curious about how to start a career as an influencer. They are increasingly seeking all the resources they could have in order to pursue their dreams, especially the youth of GenZ. They are hard-working, pragmatic, financially-minded, and politically progressive. The question is how to become a successful influencer. It is natural for amateurs to think that content creation is all about doing videos. Well, fundamentally, yes, you need to have videos or some sort of content to begin with. But building a community of devoted followers is not an easy job. There should be a consistent effort from the content creator.

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Influencers are social media personalities with an engaged social following. They could be celebrities with a huge number of fan followings or local content creators with loyal and engaging social followings. For fans, influencers are their role models, and they will do anything that their favorite influencer recommends. Influencers are often considered authority figures and experts in a particular niche. Money and fame are the two main factors that drive the attention of youth towards social media influencer careers. Money comes from various sources, like marketers, brands, ads, etc. And fame will be there once you are an established influencer or content creator. After all, people love the power of influencing others.

Just like any other profession, you require talent and hard-work in order to excel as an influencer. At the same time, there are certain rules and strategies that would guide you towards success. 

Find Your Niche 

Do you want to be an influencer? Then create a business account or channel, but before that identify your area of interest. Nowadays, you are allowed to choose one or more categories from fashion, lifestyle, travel, beauty, food, sports, gaming, entertainment, health, and fitness. It is important to choose what you love and are genuinely interested in. Once you choose your niche, try to stick with it. You are also allowed to experiment with your content. But to have that privilege, first you need to be an established influencer.

Select Your Platform

First, you decide what type of content you want people to see. Now decide where you want to show your content. Choose whether you want to be an Instagram influencer or a Youtuber. Find your medium of communication as well. Be a blogger or vlogger, it’s all up to you. But certain platforms might be better depending on your niche. For example, if you want to be a travel vlogger, YouTube could be a better choice since people spend more time on Youtube watching long videos.

Establish Your Aesthetics

The way your profile or content is perceived improves your personal brand recognition. The way your page looks, its colour, layouts, etc are important. If you are a vlogger, the way your video starts, its camera angles, presentation, narration, everything defines you as a personal brand. So make sure you establish your own aesthetic for your content.

Pay Attention to the Audience

When you start something new, people are going to criticize you. You decide to be a content creator, and you may see your own friends teasing you and laughing at your videos. After all, a certain group of people choose to hate you no matter how good you are. On the other hand, you will definitely cultivate a large and genuine audience. Listen to them, pay attention to your legit audience. As an influencer, you need to create content that your audience wants. You may have to pay attention to the comments and messages you get for your content. It’s beneficial to have a strong rapport with your fan base.

These are the fundamental rules or guidelines you need to follow if you want to be in the social media influencer game. There are many external factors you need to consider while starting your social media influencer career. You must maintain consistency with your content. Take a particular time frame to upload your content and stick with that schedule. This will keep the audience anticipating your next video or post. Respond to your followers often to create a strong engagement. Going live, running giveaways, collaborations with other influencers, etc. are other strong ways to connect with your audience. If you really want to be an influencer, start today.

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How Do Small Businesses Get Benefitted Through Influencer Marketing?

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Influencer marketing has become one of the most effective marketing tools for big companies, established brands as well as small businesses. Influencer marketing is where brands and businesses collaborate with social media influencers in order to promote or endorse their products and services. The volume of sponsored content on social media has spiked tremendously over the past few years. 

The latest trend is that one-quarter of small businesses use influencer marketing to scale up their sales and digital presence. It is also being found that small businesses benefit from micro influencers (a type of influencer with a small, but more engaged social following). Brands generally use influencers to build trust with potential customers, increase brand awareness, improve sales, and many more. Small businesses focus more on micro-influencers because they are affordable and cost-effective. Influencer marketing is a strong social media marketing strategy, and there are multiple ways small businesses can benefit from it.

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Increased Sales

The primary goal of any business is to achieve more sales. For small businesses, influencer marketing is one of the best ways to boost their sales. When influencers endorse a product or service, they are actually encouraging their followers to purchase it.

Brand Awareness

Almost 90% of marketers agree that influencer marketing helps to boost brand awareness. With the help of influencers, brands can promote their products and services to a wider audience, and this helps in getting immediate exposure for the brand. Choosing the right influencer similar to the brand niche is essential for turning the audience into potential buyers.

Affordable and Cost Effective

One of the most consequential benefits of influencer marketing for small businesses is that it’s affordable and cost-effective. Start-ups and entrepreneurs usually have limited budgets, so they can choose micro-influencers instead of the traditional paid ads.

Affiliate Marketing Program

Another benefit of using influencer marketing is the advantage of having your own affiliate marketing program. This is a great way to increase sales for small-scale businesses. Brands may facilitate commissions to influencers on the basis of purchases, sign-ups, and other factors. Similarly, small business owners can gain immediate traffic growth to their websites as well. This will again accelerate the chances of more sales and revenues. 

Strong Digital Presence

For any new business, or start-up, gaining a strong social media presence is vital. Influencers are the kind of social media figures with loyal fans or audiences. Influencers are essential to spread the word about your business to a new audience. So, by choosing influencer marketing, you are immediately bringing a new audience to your business. Chances are high that later they could become the potential customers and buyers of your business.

In short, influencer marketing is the best choice for start-ups and small businesses. It allows the business to reach a larger audience, build trust, and increase brand awareness. It is also a cost-effective way to market your business. Similarly, choosing the right influencer also matters for business growth as they act as your brand ambassadors. It would be wise to conduct ample research before getting into the whole influencer marketing game.

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Guerilla Marketing

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If marketing is warfare, guerilla marketing is the most eccentric combat strategy.  It is an unconventional way of marketing for brand awareness among large audiences. The term was first used in 1984 by Jay Conrad Levinson in his book ‘Guerilla Advertising’. It was inspired by guerilla warfare which is a kind of irregular tactic strategy practiced by the armed civilians. 

Guerilla marketing is commonly used to drive public attention and brand awareness by promoting a product or service using unconventional methods to evoke wonder, shock or surprise among the audience. This marketing strategy is aimed at striking the consumer at a more subjective and memorable level. 

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Guerilla Marketing is Creative

Guerilla Marketing is an investment of time and effort. The real investment is intellect and creativity. This alternative to traditional marketing thrives on imagination and original thinking. In 2002 Sony ran a unique marketing campaign, where hired actors would roam around the city asking people to take a photo of them. During the interaction, actors take out their new phones, and would start talking widely about their features and uses. This was guerilla marketing, which is particularly known as undercover marketing or stealth marketing. Some other types of guerilla marketing are as follows:

  • Graffiti 
  • Reverse graffiti
  • Stencil graffiti 
  • Flash mobs
  • Stickers
  • Treasure hunts
  • Publicity stunts
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Guerilla Marketing: Urban Environment & Online 

One of the most effective marketing strategies is associated with the existing environment and having physical presence or interactions with the public. Making use of the urban environments or spaces around the public is part of clever guerrilla marketing strategies. On the other hand, the whole world has become one, connected online with the global village concept. As the whole marketing game has acquired its online presence, guerilla marketing has also found its way into the internet. Some of our daily interactions with online guerilla marketing campaigns are:

  1. Creative landing pages
  2. Viral videos
  3. User-generated content competitions

Guerilla Marketing is Budget-Friendly

Advertising and marketing don’t have to be expensive. As the idea of guerilla marketing is to create a buzz through word of mouth or social media, this type of marketing demands creativity more than investing money.  It is perfect for small and medium businesses to promote their products and services. Guerilla marketing is fairly low-cost in nature. At the same time, for big companies, it is a high-risk, high-reward strategy. Big companies are already established, hence they would always go for proven conventional marketing methods to avoid risks. If it’s successful, guerilla marketing can capture more market share for large companies. But if it fails, it could damage the whole company’s brand image.

Pros & Cons of Guerilla Marketing 

Every marketing tactic has a risk factor. Similarly, guerrilla marketing to has advantages and disadvantages. 

  • They are cheap to execute, whether a simple graffiti or sticker, guerilla marketing is cheaper compared to conventional advertising.
  • It relies heavily on word-of-mouth marketing. It makes people talk about the company or brand.
  • Similar to word of mouth, the publicity guerrilla marketing gets is like a snowball. If the event or activity goes viral, it will be picked up by local news sources and bring even more publicity. 
  • One of the most common disadvantages of guerrilla marketing is authority intervention. Some events/ activities may require permissions such as street graffiti, flash mobs, treasure hunts etc. 
  • Also, unpredicted events may ruin the campaigns, like rainy weather, or traffic jams.

The changing marketing environment has gracefully adapted to guerilla marketing. More creative ideas are being exposed to the digital world. From guerrilla marketing in crypto to marketing in the metaverse, things have drastically changed in the marketing landscape. The future of guerilla marketing is as exciting as the future of digital marketing.

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How Much Does an Influencer Charge? What are the Factors Considered for Remuneration?

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It has been proven in the current marketing scenario that influencer marketing is not only effective but has become the favourite marketing choice for brands. Brands and businesses are investing substantial amounts into influencer marketing. With respect to this new age of social media marketing, what small-scale brands and businesses want to know is how much influencers are charging. Or what are the factors affecting the remuneration of influencers?

Many factors are to be considered in order to compute how much an influencer charges. The costs may vary depending on the platform, industry, brand goals, and influencer tier. An influencer could be a celebrity, travel blogger, stand-up comedian, or any sort of content creator with a dedicated social following. In a broader term, any social media user with a large number of followers is considered an influencer. At the same time, the impact one could make is based on other factors such as engagement ratio, medium of communication, social media trends, etc. Above all these, the proportion of influence matters the most. An influencer should have the power to persuade his/her audience and make the followers take some sort of action. The power to influence the audience, whether to make them buy a product or service or sign-up on a site/event, is what makes an influencer powerful.

A brand must choose an influencer who is relevant to the brand’s industry. Also, the influencer should meet the brand values, and possess similar audience demography. Recent industry graphs show that a brand has to pay between $500 and $1 million for a sponsored post. 

Collaboration Cost of Influencer Marketing

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As discussed, there are various factors to be considered when determining how much an influencer charges. The parameters that impact influencer rates are as follows:

Engagement and Reach: This is basically the number of followers and subscribers that an influencer has. There are different influencer types, like micro, mega, macro, nano, etc. all based on the social following. The wider the audience, the higher the engagement rates.

Content Platform: The amount a content creator charges per post depends on many factors, including the social media platform they choose. Every social media platform possesses a different audience type. Influencers may also charge the same amount per post regardless of which channel it is posted on.

Type of Content: Every content requires the time and energy of the content creator or influencer. The more time and effort they take to create the content, the more money they can demand, or at least expect. Then again, the quality of content matters.

Industry Niche: A brand looks for an influencer who fits into the niche of business. The content creator must be industry-relevant. Popular niches have more influencers, so the rates are likely to be lower than niches with fewer influencers.

Types of Influencers and Rates

The average payment cycle of different influencers are as follows:

Facebook

  • Mega-influencers: $25,000+ per post
  • Mid-tier influencers: $1,250–$12,500 per post
  • Macro-influencers: $12,500–$25,000 per post
  • Micro-influencers: $250–$1,250 per post
  • Nano-influencers: $25–$250 per post

YouTube

  • Mega-influencers: $20,000+ per post
  • Mid-tier influencers: $1,000–$10,000 per video
  • Macro-influencers: $10,000–$20,000 per post
  • Micro-influencers: $200–$1,000 per video
  • Nano-influencers: $20–$200 per video

Instagram

  • Celebrities: Starts with minimum $1 million
  • Mega-influencers: $10,000+ per post
  • Mid-tier influencers: $500–$5,000 per post
  • Micro-influencers: $100–$500 per post
  • Macro-influencers: $5,000–$10,000 per post
  • Nano-influencers: $10–$100 per post

Though an average amount can be assumed based on industry research, the accurate cost of an influencer will always be based on the discussed factors. For brands, stepping into the world of influencer marketing is a great idea. At the same time, the early struggle they are going to face is finding the right influencer with whom they can afford. Brands may either depend upon influencer marketing tools or they can approach a good influencer marketing agency

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Kerala’s Top Tech Influencers

Just like any other Indian state, Kerala has also witnessed a rapid growth in the use of social media recently. Hence, many social media influencers have come up with different types of content. The way the pandemic has affected the lives of people online had a similar impact on Kerala’s digital users. It is no surprise that as the influencers increased, many influencer marketing agencies have also expanded their reach in Kerala. Agencies like Brandaware, and Spiderworks have developed a comprehensive platform for brands to connect with their influencers.

Most influencers irrespective of their niches prefer video content in order to reach a large audience. Kerala has witnessed a rise in influencers who focus on multiple niches including technology. Especially influencers and bloggers with tech-informative content, gadget reviews, tech news, unboxing, tech-infotainment, etc. Let’s find out some of the top tech influencers from Kerala.   

  1. Sujith Bhakthan: He may probably not fit into the usual tech influencer tag. But Sujith Bhakthan is one of the first YouTubers in Kerala who has evolved into a strong influencer. A decade ago, he switched from blogging to vlogging under the ‘Tech Travel Eat’. As the name indicates, he creates content for a multi-niche community. He is one of the popular vloggers in Kerala with more than 1.7 million subscribers on YouTube. 
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YouTube     Instagram    Facebook

2. Mr. Tech Perfect: Nitin Raj is a YouTube tech content creator/ influencer with around 689k subscribers on YouTube. He is known by the name Mr. Tech Perfect and he uploads pure tech videos in Malayalam. He creates technology-based YouTube videos like gadget unboxing, comparisons, reviews, upcoming gadget videos, tech explanation videos, tips, and tricks, etc. He is loved by his fans for the simple and detailed presentation.

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YouTube   Instagram   Facebook

3. PratapGTech: He is known for making videos on unboxing, reviews, and mainly tech news. PratapGTech is one of the influencers who introduced tech news and have been actively facilitating updated information in the tech world. Pratap G is doing quite well as a tech influencer with 869k subscribers on YouTube.

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YouTube     Facebook

4. Jayaraj G Nath: The channel by Jayaraj himself is one of the most subscribed tech channels from Kerala with 1..57 million subscribers. He started to upload tech videos on 24th October 2015 and became an active influencer by posting the content very frequently. He is also known for giving gadget reviews and unboxing the latest products.

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YouTube    Instagram    Facebook

5. Tec Tok by Hareesh: His channel is known for providing high-quality videos on technology including the latest products and gadgets. He is a tech vlogger and film-maker with 123k subscribers on YouTube.

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YouTube   Instagram    Facebook

6. CallMeShazzam: Shaz Mohammed AKA CallMeShazzam is known for posting short-form videos where he acts as a mobile brand. He gives honest reviews on new gadgets and tech reviews. CallMeShazzam is an active influencer who has picked up the use of both YouTube and Instagram for brand building. He has a YouTube channel with the description Tea, Tech, and Sarcasm with a subscriber count of 692k.

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YouTube    Instagram

These are some of the popular social media influencers of Kerala right now. In the past few years, all these influencers have developed a strong network of followers. They have the ability to reach and influence a large audience and eventually influence their buying decisions.

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New Rules and Regulations of Influencer Marketing

By Saran Sundar

So much is changing in the online business world, as for influencer marketing. It is one of the only marketing mediums that has shown sustainable growth during the COVID pandemic. Influencer marketing is a kind of marketing where brands collaborate with social media influencers to market their products or services. As the business is booming, the governing bodies have imposed certain rules. 

Advertising Standards Council of India (ASCI) has unveiled new guidelines for influencers. The final guidelines came into effect on June 14th, 2022. The new guidelines are applicable to all influencers who post content on various social media platforms such as YouTube, Facebook (META), Instagram, etc. You might have noticed that influencers are now adding disclosure labels for their paid advertisements and collaborations. This has been strictly implemented so that a consumer, follower, or viewer does not miss it. The program and advertisement can easily be distinguished on television and in newspapers. But the fact that people might miss out on social media has led to this new rule. For sponsored videos of more than 2 minutes duration, the disclosure label must stay for the entire duration of the video. The government has also come up with a digital domain that would monitor influencers, agencies, and marketers. ASCI has made it clear that every influencer must review the product or service before promoting it on social media. As social media consumption has increased, the distinction between paid advertising and the actual content has become crucial. The new guidelines are encouraged to educate influencers and brands about ethical obligations. By imposing the rules, ASCI helps brands, influencers and consumers ensure that the interests of all stakeholders are preserved through a self-regulatory approach. Similarly, the Australian Marketing Council (AIMCO) released its first influencer marketing code of practice on July 1st, 2020. The code affects everyone associated with the influencer marketing industry, like influencers, talent agencies or managers, PR agencies, platform service providers, etc. The codes are categorized into four sections. 

  1. Selection & Qualification: The brands and marketers should be able to access and review the influencer’s details and audience demographics for authenticity. Similarly, brands should take compulsory action to ensure that the brand is safe and authentic.
  2. Advertising Disclosure: All posts must follow the rules under the Australian Consumer Law and must not make false claims. A disclosure label similar to ASCI should be given, where all posts must feature #Sponsored or #Ad so that people would be able to differentiate between paid posts and regular posts. For video ads, it should be declared within the first 30 seconds.
  3. Contracts and Brief: A valid contract must be put forward and practiced by influencers and brands. It should cover the areas like industry code compliance, brand safety, and reputation, remuneration, intellectual property rights, etc.
  4. Metrics and Reporting: Both the brands and influencers are required to facilitate metrics and sources in order to ensure consistency.

Government bodies around the world are imposing certain rules to monitor the business under influencer marketing. However, all social media platforms come with their own set of rules and regulations. Instagram has its own sponsored content guidelines. Every influencer wants to establish trust with their followers. The more transparent an influencer is, the more authentic their profile becomes. The new rules and regulations for influencer marketing are not only urgently needed, but will also benefit influencers, marketers, consumers, and related agencies in the long run.

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