Wondering why you should be pitching yourself to brands as a content creator? Scoring brand partnerships is just one way that influencers, bloggers and creators monetize their social influence. Whether you have 1,000 followers or 500,000, you'll find that conducting your own outreach to some of your favorite brands and flexing your creative muscle will not only help you bring in revenue, but also land the gig of your dreams!
Keep reading for 5 tips on how to pitch brands for influencer partnerships.
image via @maceyalexandra
1. Do Your Homework It's so important to be educated about the brand you're reaching out to! As you write your pitch, make sure you include why you love the brand, how you're similar in your mission, and what how you or your audience can help them achieve results they are after. Crafting a customized e-mail with a highly-tailored intro will garner attention and show the brand you are invested in a partnership. Steer away from copy + paste emails: you might forget to switch out brand names (oops!) and agencies or brands can tell when you're sending an email that has been sent off to hundreds of other brands.
2. Nail Your Creative Offerings Each creator has a unique skill set and how you position yourself as an influencer has a lot to do with your talents and strengths! It won't matter if you have 500 or 15,000 followers if you feature strengths that could benefit the brand. For example, do you take awesome photos? Let the brand know you're a content creator and as a part of your partnership, can shoot image for their brand for them use in marketing materials. Are your IG stories getting tons of views? Offer to do a stories series with interactive elements like polls or questions instead of a traditional feed post.
3. Give Yourself a Quick Audit One thing that will help capture attention when pitching brands is your professionalism. Be sure to give your social channels a quick audit before pitching to ensure your appearance is clear + consistent across your social platforms, website and marketing materials. Your brand is your business, so maybe sure you're positioning yourself as business owner in your outreach!
It's also a great idea to have a media kit on hand in case they ask for your stats and demographic information. Even if you're just getting started, make all the moves a bigger influencer might make to look like you're invested! Brands want to work with influencers who are just as excited, organized and professional as them to help produce results.
4. Be a Goal Getter When you send off your pitch, make sure you're sending 1-2 quality ideas on how you imagine your partnership coming to life. It's a great way to exercise that creative muscle and give more evidence on why you're such a good fit! Figure out the brands goals (brand awareness, new content, images) and how you can help them achieve those goals. If you make it easy, it'll be hard for anyone to say "no!"
For most brands, ROI (or return on investment) the way to measure a partnership's success or failure, so make it clear that you'll be tracking statistics and the success of the campaign. Bonus points for sending a social media report or overview with stats after your partnership is complete.
5. Know Your Influence + Value As an influencer, it's important to know your value and well, your influence! Make sure you're familiar with your engagement rate, conversion rate, analytics and how much influence you actually have. It's great to have all of your stats recorded so that when brands ask for proof, you have it on hand. It's not always about followers - it's about how many followers take action and engage.
The second best thing to have knowledge about is the demographic of your audience: where they're from, what they're interested in, their age and their gender. Brands work with influencers who reach their target demographic, so if you can provide this it's even easier for them to say yes! Brands love to see stats in pitch emails, so be sure to include them if you can! Have any other questions about how to pitch a brand? Leave a comment below or shoot us an DM on Instagram!