Influencer Marketing Needs An Honest Revamp

Honest relationships don’t start with money. They form organically through shared interests.

Influencer marketing, once the secret weapon of marketers, is at a crossroads.

With the rise of the internet and watchdog agencies cracking down on celebrities for some of the world’s most admired brands, the practice has become defined by most as paying individuals with a strong social media following to post about their products and walk red carpets at branded events. Sometimes it comes in the form of blatant, one-off paid endorsements, as we see with so many cringe-worthy posts. Other times, it’s subtly integrating product into a series of posts.

Brands like influencer marketing because it returns hard numbers that are often difficult to come by when relying on other types of marketing. The ROI on a billboard or TV spot can be hard to nail down, but marketers see the thousands of likes and shares on a social post as checking the awareness and engagement boxes. For many brands, it’s the closest they can get to being able to measure valuable word of mouth recommendations.

But like so many things on the internet, a backlash is setting in. Influencers looking for quick cash before their 15 minutes run out hop from one brand to another, alienating their audiences and destroying the authenticity marketers were hoping to project. Heavy-handed overuse of the practice has undercut the trust many social media users have in these pay-to-play influencers. Because of this, consumers are ignoring influencer marketing in the same way they ignore the traditional paid celebrity product endorsements it was supposed to reinvent. Consumers are smarter and savvier than ever, and it didn’t take long for them to make the connection.

Transactional relationships are not just wasting marketing budgets; they are actively harming the credibility of brands. However, the solution is easy. Brands must return to that initial promise offered by influencer marketing by building long-term relationships with hypertargeted individuals that will result in true alignment and ultimately, more believable marketing programs and partnerships.

Forget about paying a fitness model $10,000 to shamelessly plug your new beverage in a single Instagram post. Instead, build mutually beneficial partnerships with people who actually use and believe in your brand and your message.

I call this concept brand honesty, and at this stage of the game, it’s the only way to market.

Honest relationships don’t start with money. They form organically through shared interests. Brands must look beyond the people racking up the most hype online and instead seek out the ones who have lifestyles and exhibit values that make sense for their products—people who would actually want to use and promote what they’re selling. Once those people are identified, the brands themselves, not the agencies they work with, should own and nurture the relationship in an authentic way.

L’Oreal recognized the importance of maintaining strategic, ongoing relationships with five beauty squad influencers who now create fun and engaging content for the brand, including makeup tutorials and tips through their social channels, in addition to attending live events like Paris Fashion Week.

The benefit of brand honesty is twofold: Consumers believe that the influencers stand behind the brands they’re working with because they actually do. Secondly, because these relationships are real, they are a two-way street. Rather than just paying someone to push your brand message outwardly before the person moves along to the next thing, real influencer relationships bring back cultural knowledge and consumer insights to the brand.

Influencer marketing isn’t dead, as so many have written in recent months. But it does need a new approach as consumers realize they can’t trust what’s being sold to them. But there’s still hope. The way forward for brands is simple: Just like in real life, the only way to rebuild trust is through honesty.