First, let's note one thing: Influence does not mean popularity.

We will come back later.

In Internet marketing, an influencer is an individual who has the power to influence the purchasing decisions of others because of his authority, his knowledge, his position or his relationship with his audience. One of the biggest mistakes made is not seeing the difference between popular websites and web influencers. Influencer marketing therefore involves a brand collaborating with a web influencer to market one of its products or services. Since a web influencer is only one who has this ability to influence the purchasing decisions of his audience.

Web influencers, like offline celebrities, cannot be just anywhere, or just anyone. What makes them influential is less their numbers of web subscribers than their ability to drive action and interaction.
An influencer can be a popular fashion photographer on Instagram, a well-read cybersecurity blogger who tweets, or a respected marketing executive on LinkedIn. In any industry, there are influential people, you just have to find them. Some will have hundreds of thousands (or even millions) of subscribers. But many will look more like ordinary people. They may only have 10,000 followers, less in some cases. Yet they will have earned a reputation as the experts in their field. They are therefore people of reference who provide solutions to people's problems.

When we talk about an influencer, it's more about the ability to influence, than the number of followers. And when we talk about popular web, it's more about the number of subscribers than the ability to influence.

A comedian will naturally have a high number of followers, he will naturally become very popular. Comic people are generally very popular. However, as long as these people are not able to influence purchasing decisions, they remain popular on the web.
We must make this difference. A popular web is a vector of web communication. It is useful when communicating, but influencing purchasing decisions is something else.

Depending on their area of ​​expertise, web influencers, unlike web populars, are people who make the most engaging social posts on their specialty topics. This requires a certain level of knowledge in the field and a certain authority.

An influencer is only an influencer if they can actually influence buying decisions. Choosing an influencer is therefore not easy, you automatically need a strategy, and a mastery of web media as well as a business logic of operational Marketing.


If you need help getting started with your influencer marketing campaign, talk to our team of marketing experts.