Blog

Yet another signal that the influencer marketing space is growing and maturing has emerged. The practice now has its first dedicated college text. The aptly named Influencer Marketing published in November and is edited by professors Sevil Yesiloglu and Joyce Costello, both of whom originally connected as lecturers at Bournemouth University in the United Kingdom. […]

Kim Kardashian is not an influencer. None of the Kardashian-Jenner clan are. Neither is Cristiano Ronaldo. Nor Shaq, Nicki Minaj or Taylor Swift. All of these people are celebrities. Do they have a lot of online followers? Sure. But are the influencers? No. They are celebrities. And there is a difference. I’ve always though the […]

If you’ve ever talked to an influencer at length about working with brands you inevitably hear horror stories of being asked to work several hours to create great content only to be offered free product samples as payment. That, coupled with the more insidious problem of unfair pay among races and genders and the influencer […]

What do you think of when you hear the word “empathy?” The definition of the word is the ability to understand and share the feelings of another. Now, some might equate empathy with psychology and touchy-feely emotional moments. But would you believe that empathy can actually drive better business results? It can even drive more […]

At Winfluence, we like to talk to people who have multiple perspectives on the influencer marketing space. Someone who is an influencer but who also does marketing consulting and understands having to select and manage other influencers for brands. Or someone on the brand side who makes those decisions, but is also an influencer for […]

You could argue that one communications discipline that has changed more than others as a result of the world of social media is public relations. Jim Lin is a PR pro who came to the profession at the dawn of the digital area. He is a digital strategist for Golin, one of the larger public […]

Two advertising executives were walking along the beach when one tripped over a golden lamp. He picked it up, rubbed it, and a genie emerged from the spout. “Wow!” The first said to the second. “I think this means we get three wishes.” The genie shook his considerable finger and explained the ad man was […]

Billion Dollar Boy, an influencer marketing agency based in both the U.K. and U.S., publishes the pay rates of its influence campaigns broken down by ethnicity on its website. This bold act of unabashed transparency is a stark flag in the landscape of an industry challenged by the influencer pay gap and how influencers of […]

One of the topics I explore throughout the book Winfluence – Reframing Influencer Marketing to Ignite Your Brand is that everyone can be an influencer. In fact, the whole point of the book is to say that we need to focus on influence marketing (without the R) so we don’t fall into the trap of […]

When you are invited to be on a podcast, you should really prepare to be a good podcast guest. That’s not just making sure you have your talking points down about what you want to talk about, but what value you can provide to the audience of that podcast. As you might imagine, that requires […]

When you get down to the core of what an online influencer is, these are people who leverage self-publishing tools like blogs, social networks, photo and video sharing sites to create content. Those that create compelling content or engage an audience of people around that content, or both, accumulate a following of people they have […]

The book is officially launched and for those of you who have your copy of Winfluence – Reframing Influencer Marketing to Ignite Your Brand, you’ve probably started in on the book and know the name Tiffany Mitchell now. Her story of the now infamous motorcycle accident opens the book.  To catch those of you up […]