Any marketing expert will agree that the marketing field has changed drastically in the past two decades, and will continue to change because of the changing technology and lifestyle of people worldwide.
Why Blog Marketing Works
When I started blogging more than a decade ago, advertising on blogs was one of the many ways business owners advertised their businesses online. During that time, search engines were becoming the preferred source of information for most people since one can instantly access information instead of scouring through books, printed newspapers and other written media. As an alternative to spending more on traditional methods of marketing, such as newspaper and magazine ads, or heftier amounts for TV commercials, businesses discovered that blog marketing provided an alternative and less expensive way to create brand awareness through digital marketing.
Why Social Media Influencer is Becoming Popular
These days, however, most businesses have discovered the power of social media influencers in promoting their products. A Data Reportal report published in January 2021 shows that there are 4.20 billion active social media users worldwide and, on the average, each of them spends close to two and a half hours of time on social media daily. This means that with the right strategy on social media influencer marketing, or influencer marketing for short, any business has an opportunity to reach more than 53% of the global population with social media sites like Facebook, YouTube, WhatsApp, Instagram, WeChat, Tiktok, Pinterest, Twitter and more.
Differences Between Bloggers and Influencers
Both blog marketing and social media influencer marketing are examples of digital or internet marketing. While the terms bloggers and influencers may be used interchangeably by others, there are differences between the two that can influence your decision on which marketing strategy to use.
Bloggers own and publish their websites, thus, they are not limited by the restrictions of the terms of service that one has to sign up for when joining social media sites like Facebook, Twitter and the like. When they publish an article, it can stay on the internet for as long as they keep their websites up and running. In addition, bloggers can have these articles show up on search engine sites like Google, Bing and Yandex by applying search engine optimization techniques. Since most people who need a product or service searches online when they need something, the information can be available for them even years after a blog post was published.
Social media influencers, or influencers for short, work with businesses to promote a product, service or campaign on one or more social media platforms. They usually have many thousands, or even millions, of followers who engage with their posts and who can share the influencers’ posts with their own friends on social media, thus, potentially increasing the reach of influencers to “viral” status. Regardless of the number of their followers, however, the fact that most social media platforms only allow you to access their content when you are logged into their sites an, restricts the influencer’s audience. In addition, influencers need to adhere to terms of service of social media sites and may be restricted from doing campaigns that are controversial, sensitive or with any issue that can be considered offensive by some.
Blogger Marketing or Influencer Marketing?
Choosing between blogger marketing and influencer marketing can be tough as both have their own strengths and limitations. While many businesses work with bloggers for the reasons mentioned above (and since most successful bloggers are also popular on social media too!), there are niches that do well with influencer marketing. For example, the fashion industry would do well with fashion influencers while food and travel businesses can collaborate with travel media specialists or influencers. In addition, beauty, fitness, and other products, service or campaigns that are visual in nature can benefit from influencers wide reach on social media.
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