Are You Ready to be the Next Social Media Influencer?

 Influencer and influencer marketing… are they the same thing?! They actually are not!  An influencer is someone who carries influence over others. Think about your mom, dad, teacher, or even your best friend, those would all be considered influencers. However, influencer marketing is a type of marketing that focuses on using influencers to promote a brand message, product, or service to their larger market (Charello). Influencer marketing has been around a while dating back to the mid-1930s. 

In today's world, there are many different types of influencers, the most popular being social media influencers. Big and small brands are starting to allocate budgets toward influencer marketing, which is now a multi-billion-dollar industry, and influencers are taking full advantage, changing the way that companies market their products completely (Charello). 

There are five different levels of being an influencer. These five levels are called Nano-Influencers, Micro-Influencers, Mid-Tier influencers, Macro-Influencers, and Mega-Influencers. These levels are based on the number of followers that you have and can reach! Being an influencer means you must do more than just being active on social media and posting quality content. You must respond back, comment, like, or even acknowledge your followers in your next post or you will lose some followers. 

Being a social media influencer can be a hard job. You must always watch what you post, face negative feedback from your posts, filter questions and comments from your followers, and most importantly you cannot forget what you as a person stand for which can be easily lost. Are you up for the challenge of being the next social media influencer?