There’s an argument to be made that influencers are the “IT” channel in marketing. That trusted, third-party recommendation or referral is extremely powerful and often far more effective at communicating big ideas and marketing messages to consumers.
Big brands are eating it up. The influencer marketing industry is growing by billions of dollars per year. The creator economy is booming.
One area where influencers and content creators can have a huge impact on a brand is their purpose-driven or cause marketing. But the impact can be both hugely positive or hugely negative.
There’s a conundrum brands face when trying to message their sustainability, social justice and other cause-related initiatives. On one hand, reaching out to influencers means you have to peel back the curtain a bit and be more transparent about what you’re doing to help along said cause. But doing so means the creator in question may find flaws, gaps or black eyes and you can bet it will be hard to keep them from sharing that about your brand, too.
On the other hand, if you sit on issues like sustainability, social justice, diversity and others, you and the topic only get mentioned when a PR crisis erupts. At that point you don’t have the relationships built with influencers to effectively explain or put out the fires.
Nick Guy has figured out a way to solve for this. He’s built a creator-led agency in the United Kingdom called The No Logo Agency that offers up purpose-led creators, vetted and qualified, for brands to engage who want that all-important influence partner to help communicate their cause marketing and other initiatives.
Nick even says that influencers are the secret weapon brands can use in the battle for sustainability recognition. We’ll ask him to explain and share his thoughts on the conundrums and more.
Other notes mentioned in the show:
- The Influencer Marketing Show New York – June 20-21 – New World Stages
This episode of Winfluence is presented by CIPIO.ai. We help brands solve a couple of big problems. We also have free solutions for creators you need to know about.
For the brands out there, what CIPIO.ai does best is source authentic and high-performing user-generated content you can use to fuel your paid, owned, earned and shared content strategies. UGC performs better. We help you get as much of it as you want. If you also want those users to post the UGC on their channels to become influential voices for your brand, our software helps make that happen, too.
For you creators, when you authenticate into CIPIO.ai’s platform, we have a free media kit you can use to market your influence, content and channels to brands. You can customize it, then pop out a PDF or a web version to share. You can even create different versions for different clients on the fly. We also have an incredible referral program that pays you 20% commission on the first year’s revenue from any brand you refer to CIPIO.ai.
You can learn more at CIPIO.ai. And if you’d like to set up a call with me to personally show you the platform and how it can benefit you and your brand, jump over to jasonfalls.co/cipio, fill out that form and we’ll set up some time to talk.
CIPIO.ai – We’re building a Community Commerce Marketing Super App that has something in it for you and your business. Come see us.
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The Winfluence theme music is “One More Look” featuring Jacquire King and Stephan Sharp by The K Club found on Facebook Sound Collection.
Nick Guy Transcript
Do you want Instagrammers or tiktoker to post about your brand or do you actually want to engage creators who influence their audience to buy your product? If you’re in the ladder of those two, you’ve come to the right place. Welcome to win. Influence the influence marketing podcast. Hello again, friends. Thanks for tuning in to win influence the influence marketing podcast.
There’s an argument to be made that influencers are the it channel in marketing that trusted third party recommendation or referral is extremely powerful and often far more effective at communicating big ideas and marketing messages to consumers. Big brands are eating it up. The influencer marketing industry is growing by billions of dollars per year. The creator economy is booming. One area where influencers and content creators can have a huge impact on a brand is their purpose driven or cause marketing. But the impact can be both hugely positive or hugely negative.
There’s a conundrum brands face when trying to message their sustainability, social justice and other cause related initiatives. On one hand, reaching out to influencers means you have to peel back the curtain a bit, be more transparent about what you’re doing to help along said cause. But doing so means the creator in question may find flaws, gaps or black eyes and you can bet it will be hard to keep them from sharing that about your brand too. On the other hand, if you sit on issues like sustainability, social justice, diversity and others, you and the topic only get mentioned when apr crisis erupts and at that point, you don’t have the relationships built with key influencers to effectively explain or put out the fires. Nick guy has figured out a way to solve for this.
He’s built a creator led agency in the United Kingdom that offers up purpose led creators vetted and qualified for brands to engage, who want that all important influence partner to help communicate their cause marketing and other initiatives. Nick even says that influencers are the secret weapon brands can use in the battle for sustainability recognition. We’ll ask him to explain and share his thoughts on the conundrums and more that’s coming up on wind influence. This episode of influence is presented by CPO dot A I it and well, I guess I can say we since it’s my day job, uh we help brands solve a couple of big problems. We also have free solutions for creators you need to know about for the brands out there.
What we do best is source authentic and high performing user generated content that you can use to fuel your paid owned, earned and shared content strategies. U G C performs better. We help you get as much of it as you want or need. If you also want those users to post the U G C on their channels to become influential voices for your brand, our software helps make that happen too for you creators. When you authenticate into CPO dot A I S platform, we have a free media kit you can use to market your influence content and channels to brands.
You can customize it, then pop out a PDF or a web version to share. You can even create different versions for different clients on the fly. We also have an incredible referral program that pays you 20% commission on the first year’s revenue from any brand. You refer to CPO dot A I, all you do is fill out a form and refer them. We take care of the rest and if they sign up with us, you get money for a year.
You can learn more at CPO dot A I. And if you’d like to set up a call with me to personally show you the platform and how it can benefit you and your brand. Jump over to Jason Falls dot co slash CPO, fill out that form and we’ll set up some time to talk CPO dot A I. We’re building a community commerce marketing super app that has something in it for you and your business. Come see us the secret weapon brands. Have to showing the world their sustainability and other purpose driven initiatives.
Nick Guy from no logo agency is next on influence. Nick. I’m excited to get into uh no logo and what you’re doing with purpose led creators there. But before we dig into that, give us the Nick Guy story. How did you evolve into leading a creator agency? Great. Well, thanks for having me, Jason. Um I’ve always been sort of fascinated by the power of images to tell stories. And um I studied history of art at university. And as part of that, I was looking at the um use of images in the abolition of slave trade. Uh So I’ve always been really fascinated by how images can tell stories. Um And then I went into investment banking for five years, which is AAA definitely a different kind of uh journey uh just exploring like business and how to uh I suppose, learn about, you know, um I suppose training and business and I saw an opportunity to sort of bring both my passions then together.
I really interested in, you know, creators um creativity and then also business. And so I set up no logo about 5, 500 years ago, ready to sit in the middle, helping creators work with brands. So kind of being, being in those two worlds uh creativity and also business. So that’s how I got got started in this industry. Very nice. Well, and, and let’s dive a little bit deeper then into uh no logo.
You’re not just a, a, you’re not a talent manager or an agency that sources influence for, for brands. You call yourself a creator, you have an agency and a media technology company, but one that’s focused on sustainability and purpose led initiatives now, certainly a noble pursuit, at least in inference, tell us what all that means. Maybe in comparison to an agency that runs influencer campaigns for brands or even a talent management firm that sources creators for brands and agencies. Yeah, sure. So um our approach is really, as you said, Jason, in the overarching sense is to um you know, work with creating brands that are taking care of people on the planet. So that’s kind of the overarching, you know, thematic. Um And then within that, yeah, we’re creative first. So we um originally started by representing creators, I suppose, you know, like the talent talent management business. Um And we, we still do that. So we still support, you know, a leading group of creators in this space specifically or primarily in, in the USA, but also Europe, um you know, really leading voices in sustainability. But what we, I suppose saw was this need to um you know, a support creators that can’t have full management support. So I think something sort of the stats about 88% of creators make less than $50,000 a year, right? And there’s a sort of a level where you just can’t help a creator with a sort of full management support um if they’re not making a certain level of, of money. So we set up our own platform where we can really support smaller or creator aren’t necessarily followed as much, might not be able to charge as much. But still they have an amazing story to tell.
They have amazing value. And so our platform enables creating brands to partner to discover each other and partner together, but it’s kind of different as well because it’s, it’s private. So we vet every party, we make sure the quality is where we think it should be and the values are aligned and then they can work together so I can talk more about that. But yeah, it’s sort of a hybrid approach really. We have kind of really bespoke management for a certain group of creators and brands and then we can use technology to really streamline, streamline that and streamline other work very good. So let’s diagram the process a little bit more.
I’m a fortune 100 brand. Let’s say I’m rolling out a a cause marketing campaign in Q four of this year. Uh let’s say it’s around clean water and I want the world to know what my company is doing to help keep our water tables full and pure and, and such. So I come to you what happens then? Yeah. Sure. Well, we actually recently did a campaign around um uh around, around um uh taking, taking care of the environment, particularly around water. So this is quite a um yeah, so what, what we do from that perspective is um we, we understand uh what the brand is looking for, but also we’re really looking at the values of, of that brand and sort of the importance they place on the types of craters they’re working with.
We then um and, and I suppose on the flip side, the creators we work with, we’re really focused and the creator in our network, we’re really focused on really understanding what are their values and the parameters of the types of brands they work with. So, um from my perspective, um you know, I suppose sometimes in this industry, creators can be seen as billboards or their ad units and it’s just like, OK, um find some creators that we’re just gonna do work. Um for us, it’s really about this, it’s really about a symbiotic alignment between both creators and brands, making sure both of the values are aligned. So we’ve got, we can talk about it in a bit. We’ve got a lot of creators who are, you know, very specific about the types of brands they work with. And so our role is really understanding what is this brand looking for and what types of creators and then also understanding what are these creators values and ideally using our platform to streamline that. So when a brand comes to us.
One of the things we do is we’ll often post this opportunity to our network of creators on our platform. And uh it’s pretty simple. Um But creators can basically post creative ideas of how they would execute that campaign, just like almost like a Twitter post, like love it. I’m interested in this for this reason. I love to be involved so creators can kind of post post ideas. Um And then from there, we’re obviously then helping um with our platform, helping to match the right creators with the brand, um helping to make sure that’s the right ideas. And then alongside our, our, our team, our platform that then kind of we run the campaigns through our platform. So legal agreements, signed contents reviewed um uh and uploaded through the platform and then, you know, results and stuff are, are worked through and that’s something we’re also further developing. So um it’s not necessarily rocket science, but I think uh the key in this space is actually the match and making sure that that is is gonna be right. OK. So if I’m a creator that wants to champion clean water or, you know, other purpose driven initiatives, do I apply to be in your database uh that you use or do I have to be scouted by your team? How do you identify the right creators for brands? Yeah. So um we have a few different avenues. So the first is, yeah, we’re, we’re out there sort of scouting for the right types of creators and, uh, exploring who we might want to, you know, we might, and they might want to work with closer on a longer term basis.
Um, and that’s, I suppose the more traditional management and then, um, uh, there’s also just, you know, our team scouting creators that might want to, might be a good fit for our platform and they join and then there’s not as a sort of exclusive relationship, but there’s a sort of uh work that goes through that. And then I suppose what we found is that um a lot of uh we, we’ve had creators like, obviously recommend their friends. Obviously, it’s a really, in a sense, it’s a really small, you know, world. So although it might, we might be talking about millions of followers, different connections, like ultimately, a lot of these creators know each other in these kind of spaces. So uh we’ve had obviously, you know, creators recommend their friends to us and we’ve also had creators um that might come to us from other agencies because um they’ve actually become more conscious about the types of brands they want to work with and the ways in which they want to do that. And the, the agency they’re with uh isn’t perhaps set up or um reckon is aligned with them. So a lot of our creators will turn down work with very interesting major brands because it doesn’t align with their values.
And, you know, our whole, our whole business ethos is, you know, the creator has full autonomy to say yes or no to a brand, we will explore, it will make suggestions. But if it doesn’t fit with them, then, you know, they can say no to her whoever and that’s actually not necessarily done across the board in this industry. So uh we’ll have, you know, creators come to us because they don’t want to work in fast fashion anymore and their agency is still, you know, sending fast fashion to them. So, um yeah, we have a, you know, a really, a really great team who knows how to find the right creators and then kind of support them. Um And we actually have um in our team, we have uh some, some support for like actual wellness, support for creators as well.
So, uh we’ve got someone with a phd in organizational psychology. Um Amy and she actually coaches creators and helps them to really think through how are they building their business? How are they approaching the work that they do? Nice. That’s great stuff. We are talking to Nick guy from no logo agency over across the pond in the UK.
At least for those of you on my side of the Atlantic, we’re honored to have a fair amount of listeners in the UK as well. So, Jolly Good, uh I’ll even add a U to honor to the transcript for you just uh to, to be fair there. Uh When we come back, Nick and I are going to dig into why content creators are the secret weapon in the sustainability battle and more. Don’t go away. Hey, gang, before we get back to the show, I want to share a little bit of information with you about an event coming up that I’m gonna be a part of that.
I want you to be a part of if you are a longtime listener to this show, you know that uh I am uh heavily involved with the influencer marketing show in New York City each year, I am one of the two co-host of the two stages there uh in New York and that is coming up June 20th and 21st in New York City. I MS New York navigating the creator economy, an unbelievable list of speakers, both from the brand side, the thought, leadership, industry, expert side, lots of folks from the top agencies will be there. Lots of the great solutions providers and thinkers in the space are gonna be there as well. It is really an amazing event. It is put on by the hello partner folks who are based in the United Kingdom. And the influencer marketing show started there last year, they brought it to the United States for the first time I was honored to be asked to co-host uh last year up in New York City there at the New World Stages and it’s coming back to the same venue again, June 20th and 21st. Uh 2023. Just coming up here in a few weeks.
The uh the website to go to, to learn more is influencer marketing show dot com. There’s a couple of different shows. So make sure you click on the New York version and book your tickets. I can’t wait to see you there. I will be co-hosted one of the two stages again this year. And uh also co-hosted a panel uh where some folks and I are going to explore the creative gap in influencer marketing uh execution. So we’re gonna talk about the difference between just a laundry list of sponsored posts and actually having uh sharp creative concepts uh to drive your influencer marketing strategies forward, influencer marketing show New York City, go to influencer marketing show dot com.
Click on the one for New York, book your tickets. I’ll see you there, June 20th and 21st. All right, let’s get back to the show.
Welcome back to influence, talking to Nick Guy about sustainability purpose driven campaigns for brands and how content creators play a big role in that. Nick, you’ve said that influencers are the secret weapon for the issue of sustainability. How so? Well? Yeah, that’s a good question, Jason say, you know what we um you know, I suppose what we’re most people listen to this podcast or recognizes how these kind of creators, the the impact their voice has. Um uh you know, these people are reaching millions, millions of millions of individuals, often young individuals across the globe.
So, um you know, what we see is that um just like when brands work, the creators, they really listen, when creators are talking about particular initiatives, their community, you know, takes it really seriously um and can really get behind it. So, um you know, we’ve seen um creators run like beach clean ups, um do all sorts of different activities and really engage their community to get involved. Um I think also what’s really interesting is that creators, you know, creator, the pro protagonists of their channel, they bring people into the story of their lives and if they can showcase a way of living sustainable, that is achievable and that is very powerful because I think, you know, a lot of us want to live more sustainably, but we might not a know how to achieve that or we might be told we need to do certain things that just, we actually just don’t know how to do it. So I suppose these creators are so powerful because they bring their audience into actual day to day activities that people can themselves do to make a small difference. So we also have, you know, creators, we work with who talk about um imperfect sustainability. And I really like that term as well because uh you know, some of those were also bombarded or told we must do this, we must do this. Um you know, and there’s a lot of pressure or even like climate anxiety. And I suppose the a lot of these creators are very uh you know, really effective because they’re saying, look, even I, I’m an expert in this space, I’m passionate about this, but I still am learning and I this is, you know, I’m still don’t get it right every time. And I think that’s actually really powerful, particularly for a young generation to see.
Look, we are on a journey we all need to improve. But like that is, is a process. So, um yeah, we, we definitely seen, you know, we have creators who talk about, you know, it could be some things like how to use like food waste and clever ways how to repair your clothing. It ranges from all sorts of things. But I think uh I think when you’ve got one of your like icons telling you how to repair clothing instead of buying new clothing, it can be really powerful. Yeah. And, and I’m, I’m glad to, to hear that there’s uh some level of uh I guess reason at play there. Uh you know, with the um uh you know, with the, the whole, you know, movement to not be uh not bully people because they aren’t doing it or aren’t doing it perfectly.
It’s typically not a black and white world. It’s typically measures of gray. So, you know, I might not be as sustainable as you, but it doesn’t mean I’m, you know, intentionally hurting the environment so good to hear, hear that. And I, I guess the, the whole idea of influencers as a secret weapon for sustainability, it really kind of underlines the overall point that influencers are a secret weapon for anything, right. They’re third independent, third party advocates for a brand to cause a message. So uh it certainly uh rings true in what you’re doing.
So, the biggest problem brands typically face in issues like sustainability is that they don’t want to wait until something goes wrong to have those influencer relationships. But some may think they don’t want to proactively engage with creators for fear. They might be too nosy uncover the uncomfortable truths about how little sustainability actually measures up for that brand. What, what’s your advice for brands in that conundrum? They don’t, they know they have to be involved somehow but they know they’re not perfect. Um Is there a way to isolate those creators who have that sort of, you know, uh cushion for folks um and are are willing to work with brands. How do they, how do they, they fight through that conundrum? Yeah, this is a good question and I suppose it also relates to that earlier question you were asking around how, how, how would a creative work with the brand? I think one of the things that I think is really interesting here is, um And so we’re, we’re constantly thinking about is how do you bring the creator higher up into the sort of marketing funnel um or marketing process? Uh So, um again, just as a high level, you know, when, when we see brands come to creators either in this, you know, particular space and say, hey, this is the brief, make it happen like it, it kind of loses a lot of the um the value of the creative of actually understanding, well, how would that creator communicate to their community? They’re the experts, they’re the community creators like um how, how would they communicate and what do they actually think would be best? So I think for, for a lot of brands actually actually sort of stepping back a bit and saying, OK, look, these creators, particularly sustainability creators who are often very experienced in this space, both in terms of the actual practicalities of how to live a sustainable life and what is sustainable, but also how to communicate that effectively. Uh I’m always really interested in sort of suggesting that why don’t you actually bring these creators higher up into your meetings into like higher level discussions? Like we’ve seen creators um ultimately become like advisors to companies. Um you know, it doesn’t have to be like on a board level, but, you know, kind of could be a strategic creative advisor, could be um uh more of a sustainability advisor. But um bringing them into that conversation and actually just being really authentic and honest and saying this is where we’re at as a business.
This is what we’re trying to achieve. Like we’d love your viewpoints on a, how can we maybe improve that? And b how can we communicate that effectively? Um That, that I think is a really good starting point is sort of slightly flipping around and instead of thinking, OK, how can these people just tell my story? Actually, how can they help me really define this story, right? Good stuff. You know, uh I, I wanted to ask you about this topic.
It’s, it’s kind of sort of had its moment in the sun, I think. But for a hot minute there, a few months ago, the the practice of de influencing was suddenly very popular and I think some of that was creators pushing for more sustainable practices from brands. But frankly, most of the de influencing content I saw was just influencers whining about bad product experiences. The topic of the influencing fell flat with me because bitching about bad service or a shitty product is how all consumers use social media when they encounter such experiences. I thought it was kind of a, a whole lot of hashtag about nothing. Frankly, I wanted to ask you though, did I miss something because no one’s really talking about it anymore? So I think a group of tick talkers had a Hissy Fit and now we’ve moved on with our lives. What’s your take on the topic? Yeah. So, um, yeah, from my sense, yeah, it felt like it was, uh, or what I’m hearing from creators, you know, originally it was about sort of telling people about products and what not to buy and then it kind of transitioned into this more kind of concept of how can we live more like sustainable or minimalist lifestyles and that kind of became more mainstream.
So, um I think from our perspective, you know, all these things, I suppose the trends are sort of big discussions and maybe it was also a bit of a discussion around around kind of influencers or their community, sort of also challenging the types of work. They do, you know the types of brands they’re working with um like and, and really like people having to then really think about as a creator, is this brand, right? For me and my values and as a brand is this creator, right? For me and my values. But I think um you know, what we saw with, with creators we work with is a lot of them have actually been talking about these issues for a very long time. So this was obviously like a trend and it became like a kind of buzzword. But there’s been a lot of creators for a long time who’ve been really, really discussing like, OK, look how can we, how can we be really conscious with how, how we consume. Uh So I think from our side, um it’s always something that’s been discussed, it was maybe something that just kind of popped up and became like a, a big theme at a time for various reasons. But I, I think, I think, I think it’s probably broadly a good thing. I don’t know, my, my sense would be, it’s a good thing in a sense of it’s really powerful for us all and brands and creators to be really thinking, OK, what are we buying and for a creator and a brand? Ok. If I want to work with partners, do they really align with my values? And is this really something that I want to be promoting?
Well, I I appreciate that, that uh resetting of, of what my reaction was. And I think certainly from that perspective, if it’s, if de influencing was and or is an opportunity to have us stop and think about the brands we’re purchasing and doing business with and whatnot for sustainability or other reasons, then I’m all for it. I think what happened with me is by the time I got to go scroll tiktok and look through the de influencing. Hashtag what I saw was just a bunch of people whining about brands, they, it wasn’t about sustainability, it was about bad customer service, it was about faulty products, it was about just, you know, shitty marketing, whatever. Um And I think that faction of the conversation became the bigger conversation, which unfortunately probably pushed all the good stuff about sustainability down a little bit. But I appreciate your perspective on that because I, I certainly don’t want to give the de influencing conversation, uh, any disrespect.
Certainly, if it, if it sustains and, and holds a conversa pun intended, uh, a conversation that’s really good for us. So I appreciate your perspective on that good stuff. Uh Nick, before we go, uh tell people where they can find you the agency and all that magic on the interwebs. Yeah, sure. So, um somewhat differently, we don’t really have a presence on social media. Um So it’s perhaps slightly ironic for a company in the space. Uh You know, we’re really about, I suppose elevating the our partners on social media so you can find us on linkedin. Uh It’s no longer agency. Um And um you can find me on linkedin, Nicholas guy. Um And I’m always um uh if you, if you email the company, uh I actually, I see you quite a lot of those emails so you can email them. My name’s Nick. You can probably figure out figure out my email as well. Um You got the company. Um So I love, I love to hear from anyone either via linkedin on our company, um or my personal linkedin or just email our company or email me.
If you can figure out my email address, then I’d love to, I love to hear from you. That’s awesome stuff. We’ll make sure all those links are in the show notes except for the email. You can figure that out on your own. Uh You’ll find those at Jason Falls dot co slash Nick guy or hit Jason Falls dot com and click on articles in the up right to look for the episode. Nick. We very much appreciate what you’re doing the earth. Uh may have a fighting chance because of people and agencies like you. So thanks for sharing some of that with us. Great. Thanks for having me, Jason. Appreciate it. You know, when you drill in there and realize what Nick and his team have done is made it super easy for brands to source big voices in sustainability. You do realize he’s making a nice thing available and doing good, so good on you, Nick. Uh check out those links at our show notes as we said, find them at Jason Falls dot co slash Nick guy just like it sounds in IC K G U Y. If you enjoy win influence, help us grow and tell someone about the show, you probably know someone who might want to know more about influence marketing, send them to winflo pod dot com or share a link to this episode on your social network of choice. If you have a moment, drop, influence a rating or review on your favorite podcast app, we are on them all. The show is now on video as well. Just look for Jason Falls influence on youtube to see the show as well as hear it. Influence is a production of Falls and Partners and presented by CPI O dot A I. The technical production is by MP N Studios. Win. Influence airs along MP N the marketing podcast network. Thanks for listening, folks. Let’s talk again soon on Influence.