Measuring the Impact of Influencer Marketing: Beyond CPMs and CPEs

It’s no secret that influencer marketing is no longer a trial category, buried as an appendix page in a broader marketing plan. Marketers have come to realise that influencers are highly effective at promoting brands and products to incredibly engaged audiences. As a result, they can have a serious impact for brands through sponsored content.

Historically, the measurement of organic influencer marketing campaigns has largely been confined to the realm of media efficiency metrics like CPMs and CPEs. These metrics, however, fail to capture the true impact of influencer content.

One of the challenges with relying solely on CPMs and CPEs is that in this category, influencer fees include the cost of creating content, usage rights for that content on other media, as well as media value of them posting organically to their social media channels. This results in significant variability in influencer fees. These fees can fluctuate based on factors such as the type of content requested (still content, short-form video, long-form video, etc.), usage rights, and the "fame premium" associated with certain creators. This variability makes it difficult to compare efficiency metrics across different influencer campaigns, let alone with other media.

When comparing the efficiency of influencer campaigns with other media, many marketers make the mistake of directly comparing CPMs and CPEs. This is akin to comparing apples to oranges because of the complication of influencer fees encompassing the costs of creative ideation, production, and usage rights. To accurately compare ROI, you'd need to factor in these additional costs and lump them into the costs of the media you’re comparing with influencer marketing.

The key takeaways here are:

• Treat influencers as premium inventory: If selected and briefed correctly, influencers can provide contextually relevant content for their audience.

• Benchmark against similar campaigns: When comparing influencer marketing campaigns, ensure you're benchmarking against campaigns in a similar category with comparable talent, production, and usage rights.

• Compare apples to apples: If comparing with other media, make necessary adjustments to account for differences in costs and value.

One of the unique advantages of social media is the opportunity for direct audience feedback. Analysing comments on influencer content can provide valuable insights into the effectiveness of the campaign and brand salience. However, not all engagement is created equal. A strong CPE doesn't guarantee positive sentiment.

Sentiment analysis offers a robust way to gauge the reception of sponsored content. It can reveal the proportion of positive, negative, or neutral comments, and identify whether the commentary is relevant to the brand, simply compliments the influencer or is completely irrelevant. By benchmarking these sentiment scores, you can gain valuable insights into your campaign's performance relative to competitors or past campaigns.

To complement sentiment analysis, brand lift studies can provide additional data on organic and paid social platforms. These studies can measure changes in brand awareness, favourability, and purchase intent.

By combining these approaches, marketers can gain a more comprehensive understanding of the impact of their influencer marketing campaigns. Moving beyond traditional metrics and leveraging the unique opportunities offered by social media can provide valuable insights into campaign effectiveness and inform future strategies.