Become An Influencer

What Is An Influencer?
In short, the definition of an influencer, is a person with a social media following. However, what qualifies you as a good or bad influencer depends on who you ask. Some people may say that you need a large following to be a good influencer. Others might argue that it’s not about the number of following that makes you a great influencer, rather it’s the quality of your content. A third person might say it’s the loyalty of your following that show whether you are a great influencer or not. A common ground we all can agree upon is that an influencer is someone who has achieved popularity on social media platforms. In todays world, both companies and consumers base an influencers popularity with credibility.

An influencer is someone who has the capability to move and influence people. Whether this be done through inspiration, education or manipulation. We do not recommend the later as most influencer who use manipulation to gain a following, are ultimately exposed and loose their influence and following. A simple way to check if a person is an influencer is to look for a verified YouTube, Instagram or/and Twitter account.

The past couple of years, almost every major industry has seen a major rise in influencers. Influencer marketing is a hot topic and trending more than ever. It has basically become a mainstream marketing strategy and is no longer limited to a select few brands or businesses. Being an influencer has become a way for millions of people around the globe to ear their living. It’s a competitive industry. Persistent effort is requires to become successful.

Pros

• Flexibility
• Free gifts
• Somewhat easy money
• Fame
• Inspire people

Cons

• No income guarantee
• Your account may get suspended
• Bullying comments and dm’s
• One mistake can ruin your career

Pick Your Niche

To become a successful influencer it’s important to pick a niche you are interested in talking about on social media. In order to spend your days sharing original content with people, you need to find a topic you are excited about. This is essential before you start on your path to becoming an Influencer. Choose a niche that you can consistently create content about. You should also have some level of expertise in the field in order to establish yourself as an influencer. Maybe even something you are passionate about. This will make or brake you when times get rough. Don’t worry, there’s a niche market for everything. There is an audience out there for almost every topic on earth, and it is possible to build a sustainable business with it. Identify your target audience by asking yourself these essential questions:

• What do I love?
• What are my strengths?
• What are my passions?
• What are my interests?
• What do I enjoy?

You don’t have to limit yourself to just one niche. It’s possible to combine two or more topics. Just make sure that the individual niches align with one another. As an example, you can combine fitness and fashion. You can also combine fitness and beauty with food. 

So, it’s really not mandatory for you to stick to one niche. There are infinite possibilities for you to cover your passions in a interesting and compelling way. Your unique voice in the field. Here are a few top niches you can consider:

• Gaming
• Beauty
• Health and Fitness
• Fashion
• Travel
• Tech
• Lifestyle
• Food
• Sports
• Entertainment
• Business
• Parenting

Choose Your Platform

Once you have picked your niche, it’s time to choose which social media platform(s) you prefer to engage with your audience on. This does not mean that you should use all of the social media platforms out there. Depending on your niche, certain platforms might be better suited for your content and gaining a following than others. Not all social media platforms work the same way. And, not all of your content needs to be shared everywhere. You should choose one main platform where you are going to focus most of your content. You can still be active and share content on other networks, but find the one single platform where you will be spending most of your efforts.

There are many factors to consider when selecting your prime social media platform. Research into other influencers in your niche and identify which are their main social media platforms. It’s no secret that your main platform will also depend on your type of niche. Fashion influencers tend to invest most of their content and gain most of their following on Instagram, while YouTube and Twitch is the go-to platform for gaming influencers. Engage with your audience on the social media platforms where they are already spending most of their time. Here are the top five influencer social media platforms in 2022:

• YouTube
• Instagram
• Twitter
• Facebook
• Tik Tok

Your Contact Strategy

To ensure that you stay focused on the task at hand make sure you have a social media strategy. This plan needs to summarise everything you want to achieve with your social media accounts. Research the most popular influencers in your lane. Look into what times during the day they post. As an influencer knowing when to share content is just as important as knowing what content to share. Organise the days and schedules that you plan on publishing your content across each chosen platform.

The fastest way to becoming an influencer is simply by sharing high-quality content. It’s extremely important to publish authentic and unique content that resonates with your audience. This is the best way to keep your audience coming back for more content. Regardless of your niche, your content should be meaningful and valuable to your audience. Give your audience variety. Upload content in different formats such as photos, videos, text, blogs, etc. Run giveaways or contests on with the brands that you collaborate with.

Creating solution-oriented and high value content, that resonates with your followers, is the fastest way to success in this industry. As you share your expertise and build trust with audience, they will seek for more information from you. Once they start following you, you just need to make sure that you continue to create content that benefits and add value to their lives.

Share and Publish Consistently

One of the great keys to having success as an influencer is to post content consistently. Publishing on a constant basis is one of the most effective ways to success in this industry. Post useful and relevant content for your followers. Delivering quality content on a regular basis, will create a sense of anticipation among your audience. Not only that, the platform algorithms will reward you by showing you to more similar minded users. The algorithms of most social media platforms promote accounts that post often more than those who don’t post as often. This will not only boost your audience engagement but also increases your reach. The more you are able to engage with your audience, the more people will be influenced by your character and persona.

It’s totally up top you whether you choose to post daily, weekly, or at any frequency that you’re comfortable with. Just keep in mind what I just mentioned about that some platforms are more dynamic in nature and require a higher posting frequency if you want to become a success on that platform. As you post content consistently more people that are within your niche will begin to follow your profile and you will start building your own community.

Collaborate With Like-Minded Influencers
This may be the fastest and simplest way to gain a following as an influencer. Collaborate with someone who is already a successful social influencer within your chosen niche. This will help you get your business up and running. When you are just starting out, partnering with someone famous in your niche can work wonders. A collaboration basically gives you access to their fan base and allows you win their attention and following to your social media profile. Finding collaboration influencers may be tricky, but not impossible. As mentioned, look out for people within your niche and bring something of value. How can you bring something to the table? What can you offer your colleague? Most popular influencers don’t wish to be taken advantage of, so they will have certain requirements. Some well known influencers even charge a certain fee for such collaborations. Depending on your level and journey as an influencer, you should know whether to collaborate with a micro or macro influencer.

Engage With Your Followers

When posting content on social media, you will get likes and comments on your posts. When you are just starting off and you have a small following, it’s important to reply your audiences comments and dm’s. It is a good practice and shows your appreciation to audience. Another smart way to engage with your audience is to ask them a question. Start a conversation about a topic within your niche. Interactions like these help build personal connections with your followers. Other people will see that you engage with your audience and will start following you. Keep in mind that many people on social media are lonely and simply seek connection. A friendly connection can lead to a loyal follower. Hence, do your best to respond to as many of your followers as possible. It makes them feel special to you if you answer their comments or respond to their opinions or questions.

Once, your audience becomes too large to respond to every comment or question, people understand and accept that you aren’t able reply their comments and messages.

The Business

If you follow the above steps and do things correctly, you will soon start receiving dm’s and emails from brand and companies wanting to collaborate with you. This is it. It’s time to come out and declare yourself as an influencer. An influencer who is interested in brand sponsorship and collaborations. You can make it easier for these businesses to reach out to you by putting your email on your social media profiles. Announce to the world that your are open to business. Make it easy for them to reach out to you.

There are numerous influencer platforms where brands and influencers can find each other. Sign up. These platforms are a huge blessing for you to find brands in your niche who are looking for collaborations. Don’t be shy. Build a name for yourself and network with brands within your niche. This might take some time and hard work, but will help you form long-term brand relationships that might lead to sponsors that can help fund your life as an influencer. Keep in mind, that businesses pay some of the highest-paid influencers thousands of dollars a post for a single post or upload. So this industry is not in short of money. Neither is it a business that will grow out of trend anytime soon. So, becoming an influencer is definitely worth taking into consideration, if you find the whole concept attractive.

Social Media Manager

What Is A Social Media Manager?
As a social media manager, you are responsible for managing the social media presence of a individual, business or brand. You are the one responsible of monitoring, executing, filtering and contributing to the social media presence of a business, product or brand. As a social media managers your goal is to ensure the growth of engagement and following of your client with the ultimate aim being to execute the social media strategy that will support your clients business goals.

As a social media manager, you will be put in charge of your clients social media channels, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, LinkedIn and/or YouTube. You often work within an organisation's communications, marketing or public relations department. You will be expected to measure engagement data and help better the clients return on investment (ROI).

Managing all of these various responsibilities requires social media managers to cultivate and develop a number of crucial social media marketing skills. This job will require you to posses skills like data analysis and copywriting. Communication. Organization. Creative skills. Attention. Budgeting. The more you focus on cultivating these skills, the more you’ll be able to show results that your clients will value and appreciate.

A Social Media Managers Role

As a social media manager you have understand the mechanics of how most businesses see social media as a way to drive traffic to their website to buy products or services. Hence turning traffic to revenue. Businesses and brands are willing to pay a lot of money for this. As long as the revenue is higher that the money invested, business will most likely continue pimping money into this method.

Businesses and brands run digital marketing strategies that are focused on building relationships with their target audiences. Hence, you need a clear understanding of your clients target audience. Then you can create and share engaging content to that exact audience. For this you need a detailed strategy. There will be times where you might work with a team. Other times you will be required to create marketing strategies by your self. Remember, that you are the company’s voice on social media. The role includes a lot of copy writing. Hence, your grammar should be in place. You will be responding to their audience comments, dm’s and managing partnerships with influencers.

Your job is not only to gain new following, but also to maintain their current followers. Here are a few tips and tricks to include in your social media strategy for a brand or business:

• Create a editorial schedule
• Share content across all social media channels
• Respond to comments
• Reply DM’s
• Create campaigns
• Keep the brand voice active
• Track all activity through engagement ratings and analytics
• Present findings to upper management
• Recommend improvements to increase performance

Social Media Manager Services

As a social media manager, the need or requirements of your clients may vary. Here are the most common elements that you should be prepared to offer:

• Social Media Account Setup
• Social Media Content Creation
• Social Media Scheduling
• Social Media Strategy
• Social Media Analytics
• Social Media Consulting
• Social Media Graphic Design
• Social Media Videography
• Social Media Customer Care

Skills Of A Social Media Manager

As a professional social media manager, you need to posses and cultivate a few skills to help you complete your job. Here are some of the essential skills required for you to do you fulfil your duty as a social media manager:

• Writing skills. Cultivate your copywriting skills. You need to write content for social media posts and descriptions across platforms such as Facebook, Twitter, Instagram YouTube and TikTok.

• Communication skills. You will be required to communicate both with team members, followers, customers and influencers.

• Time management skills. You need to be able to prioritise your assignments and tasks.

• Tech skills. You need to master you preferred graphic design software or application. This will be your tool to present unique results.

• Creative skills. Your creativity will help you create unique and valuable content. Strong creativity skills lead to greater engagement and happier clients.

• Marketing skills. As a marketing manager, you should understand the basics of social media marketing, running campaigns, and targeting different audiences.

• Social media skills. Luckily most people have grown up using social media and have basic knowledge of how one sets up and runs a social media profile.

• Legal skills. Understand and stay updated on the terms and conditions on the various platforms to ensure that your clients profiles are always in good standing.

• Video creation and editing skills. Some clients may required that you create videos for Instagram Reels, TikTok and/or YouTube Shorts.

• Analytical skills. As a social media manager, it's important to have strong analytical skills. This involves monitoring analytics and data. This skill will help you better create insightful reports for your clients.

• Visual skills. You need some level of visual skills to create digital content to share on social media pages. Content that will draw attention.

• Team-player skills. Some clients may require that you team up with other content creators such as videographers or graphic designers to produce some content.

• Community building skills. Many brands and businesses are looking for social media managers who can build a community on platforms such as Facebook or discords.

Educational Requirements

There are really no educational requirements within this industry. Marketing degrees are a relatively new trend. As more and more online courses are emerging, you will likely be able to find an affordable one that you can finish in a few days or weeks. However, in marketing, your portfolio and work experience are what clients will be looking at. Your degree will not help you win clients if you no work experience or a well arranged portfolio to showcase. Hence, do your prime effort in building your portfolio and gaining experience.

In case you prefer starting with a course and getting a degree, I recommend you get a free one with one of the following platforms: 

• Google Analytics Academy

• Twitter Flight School

• HubSpot Academy

Multiple Niches

As more and more brands and businesses are building a social media presence, do not narrow down to a niche. Let your potential clients know that you are willing to work with any niche. Here are few of the most popular niches that companies are seeking social media managers for:

• Fashion
• Media
• Education
• Consumer goods
• Finance
• Technology
• Healthcare
• Lifestyle

Setting Your Rate
The average social media marketing manager salary is somewhere between $50,000 and  $120.000. The salary ranges can vary widely depending on many important factors, including education, experience, skills, your portfolio and the number of years you have spent in the industry. Social media manager salaries also vary depending on the country where you work.

So, what’s the proper way to rate your service? Well, my advice is as always to start low and build your prices up as you grow your experience and portfolio. So keep these three elements in mind as you set your rate:

• Education
• Experience
• Location

Keep Up With Trends 

As you know by now, social media managers have numerous duties and roles. Social media marketing is a wide concept. They are required to developing social strategies that strengthen overall business plans and goals of brands and companies. There are specific techniques such as email lead generation that you’ll have to get acquainted with. Only by having a clear understanding of all popular marketing strategies will you be able to help your clients connect with their followers and customers with a high ROI.

In this fast evolving internet world, a successful social media manager needs to stay ever updated with the latest trends. Even if they are the unseen face behind a brand or business, they are the voice being heard. They are the ones ensuring that a brand or business remains relevant to their customers. So, keeping up with the latest trends and presenting new ideas and methods will ensure a long and satisfying relation between the social media manager and their clients.

Logo Designer

 

The Basics of Logo Design

Before you embark on the journey to become a logo designer, you should understand what a logo is and what the purpose of a logo is. A logo is most often created to uniquely identify a company or product. A logo can be a symbol, word, mark or icon. A logo does not sell the company directly nor rarely does it describe a business. Logos are used primarily for identity purpose, and nothing more. It should not describe what the business or product does, but rather identify the it in a way that is recognisable and memorable. With emphasis on it being in its simplest form.

As a logo designer you need to have creative abilities. Your also need a firm understanding the history of branding and why it’s so powerful and used in marketing. A logo designer is responsible for presenting a product or brand to clients and customers. A well designed logo creates an immediate impact on whoever sees it. 

On the technical side, a logo designer should posses a certain level of skills with software used to create logos. This means a strong working knowledge of Photoshop, Adobe Illustrator and other graphics software. As a logo designer you need attention to detail. A well designed logo needs to be timeless. A logo designer also needs to be good at visualising. Taking and idea and bringing it to life. Since clients often won’t know exactly what they want, it’s a logo designers responsibility to communicate well and help them turn their vision to an idea, which the logo designer can then bring to manifestation.

As a logo designer there are infinite ways your designs may be used.

Here are some of the more common use cases:

• Business branding
• Social media profiles and banners
• Advertisements
• Website logos
• Signs and banners
• Product packaging
• Marketing products
  

The Process

As a logo designer you need to cultivate and evolve your own style of working. The way you go from an idea and into the process of designing, and to finally ending up with a logo. Write down a strategy. Your personal way of working. Here are some key elements that you might want to include in your plan:

• Research
• Reference
• Brainstorm
• Sketch
• Design
• Reflect
• Present
• Revise
• Deliver

The Logo Designer Business

Before you can start designing anything you need to have a good understanding of the business. The more you understand about the business, the better the final results will be. Your work will not always get approved first time you present it. Actually, it’s more likely you present a design preview and let the client review it, so you can build it to your clients satisfaction. Research, before starting. What product or business are you dealing with? Research their competitions logos. This is an essential step to be ahead of all the other logo designers. Passion for positive results is essential for this type of career.

Even though there are no educational requirements in this career field, a degree in graphic design will definitely make you stand out between other designers. To build unique logos, and make a name for yourself with the industry, make it a habit to think outside the box.  Other degrees that might help you become a successful logo designer, could be everything from a degree in business or communication.

A portfolio where you display all your previous work will do wonders for you. This can be an Instagram profile or simple website. List all your previous work. This is the fastest and most powerful way to showcase your abilities and skills. Just as with other online gigs, expect to face strong competition for the gigs. That’s why earning a degree and building a stand out portfolio will help you make it.

The Power of a Logo

A good logo is one of the most vital elements of a business or products marketing campaign. A logo is placed on products and merchandise and should be an instantly recognizable face of a brand. Hence, a lot of thought should go into designing a logo. Before embarking on designing a logo, you should interview the client and ask what they wish their logo to signal. Ask for their values. Maybe it’s trust. Then Google the word trust and go to images to see what type of images show up in the search results. What type of elements emit the aura of trust? Commit to learning about how logo’s connect physiologically with their “viewers”.

Study the most famous logos from successful cooperations and understand what makes them work so well. It’s not illegal to get inspiration. Just make sure you don’t copy. You donate want to get into any copyright issues. Keep a logo simple. Memorable. Logos are the cornerstone of any successful business or personal brand. Your clients want their logo to explain who they are and what you do. That’s the power of a logo!

Some Tips and Tricks

• A logo speaks louder than a thousand words
• Imagination is key
• Think outside the box
• Colour is key
• Keep it simple
• Make it memorable

Your Designer Portfolio

Creating a unique portfolio is as already mentioned one of the most important way to become a successful logo designer. A well put together portfolio proves that you get things done. It tells the potential clients that you have experience. This is how you build a personal name and brand. Create a unique and powerful logo for your own logo business. This will give you confidence when interacting with potential or existing clients. Confidence is key when you share ideas with a client about the vision of their brand logo. When building your portfolio remember to network. Join communities on Facebook. If need material for your portfolio, offer to create free logos to friends and family with small businesses or organisations. Practise. Don’t stop until you have a good number and variety of logo to showcase on your portfolio.

Rating Your Service

Every company has different needs and expectations. To get your business up and running, be open to negotiations. You can always list set prices once you have build yourself a good following of clients. And your business is booming. When negotiating your rate take into consideration how many concepts are required by the client? How many revisions will be needed? How much research is required? How big is the company? Draw up a customised quote for each client. Set your prices based on your present talent, skills and expertise. If you need help setting your rates, research what your competition is charging. This will help you set a realistic rate that customers will accept, so you can actually start making some money.

Stay Motivated

A mission statement is useless without a plan to execute on it. Develop and write down your personal business plan. Set short and long term goals. The purpose being to to have a clear understanding of what you want to accomplish and how you will achieve it. Designers can often get completely caught up in their work. It’s important to set time off for yourself during the day. Allow yourself the freedom to take a walk. Meditate or exercise. Eat properly and drink enough water. This will help you stay focused. Set goals and deadlines and enforce them. This can be a challenge. But essential to become successful. Cultivate your self-discipline. Be organized. Maintain focus on your business. Building your entrepreneur business requires your time, dedication and practice. As a freelance logo designer it’s your own responsibility to stay motivated.