4 Deadly Mistakes That Influencers Make
Influencers inspire, entertain, and educate.
They create value by publishing videos, podcasts, articles, photos, books, or other original content. It’s all about sharing their passion.
If you’re an influencer, you may find it challenging to turn your passion into a business. You don’t want to become a sell-out that’s just in it for the money, but you know you could help a larger audience if you had more resources.
And the truth is — your most loyal followers want more from you!
They want more of your content, passion, and ideas. And the way to scale that up in a BIG way is to turn your hobby into a business.
I’m Not An Influencer
I’m the guy behind the curtain.
I’ve helped influencers turn their passions into real businesses.
This all started back in 2003. Before Facebook, YouTube, Tumblr, Twitter, Pinterest, Instagram, or SnapChat even existed.
In fact, this was long before “influencer” was a mainstream term. I’ve spent the last 14 years helping influencers turn their hobbies into seven-figure businesses.
Of course, the social tools have evolved over the years. I’ve helped people build businesses using traditional websites, Facebook, YouTube, Twitter, Instagram, and email marketing.
The strategies for these tools have evolved a lot.
But what hasn’t changed is the goal. And that’s to help influencers inspire, entertain, and educate people so we can all live better lives.
With this in mind, I’d like to share four deadly mistakes that I see many influencers making today.
1. Being Too Reliant On Gatekeeper Platforms
This is incredibly common. Many influencers don’t have control over their brand. They have limited access to their followers. And worse still, they have no control over how that access may be further restricted in the future.
One of the great advantages of the Internet is that it puts power back in the hands of individuals. It creates an opportunity to connect directly with your audience. And as a result, traditional gatekeepers like television networks and magazines have less power.
And yet so many influencers are happy to send that power right back to the next generation of gatekeepers. They do this by giving up control of their audience and even identifying themselves as being a “YouTuber” or as being “InstaFamous” (Instagram).
The problem is that these platforms are independent businesses. And their interests don’t always align with those of their influencers.
Some classic examples include significant changes to the Facebook news feed and the recent “adpocalypse” incidents on YouTube.
These kinds of changes cut the reach and income of content creators due to the abuses of unrelated publishers.
Let me be clear. Using platforms to create, publish, distribute, and syndicate your content is great. And it’s smart to leverage these channels to build and grow your audience.
But becoming overly reliant on any one platform and ceding control to another business is a big strategic mistake.
2. Failing To Establish A Clear & Unique Brand
Influencers often fail to frame their content and their brand in a way that connects with who they are and what they do.
I suspect many dislike the idea of being “categorized” and may feel that having a brand identity would be restrictive. They might think it would limit their content, audience, and creativity.
But, the most memorable brands are those with a clear identity that connects with a need, desire, or concept in people’s minds.
It’s not just a brand or influencer’s name that we remember, but rather it’s the associations that we create along with that name.
Think about the number of videos, articles, or websites that you’ve casually browsed over the years. The overwhelming majority fail to establish a clear brand and are quickly forgotten.
Now consider this.
What specific companies come to mind when you think about:
- Smartphones.
- Coffee.
- Fast food.
What individual famous athletes come to mind when you think about:
- Basketball
- Swimming
- Boxing
- Golf
It no surprise that many people think of Apple, Starbucks, McDonalds, Michael Jordan, Michael Phelps, Muhammad Ali, and Tiger Woods when considering the categories listed above.
These are universally recognized brands.
You can likely think of some of your favorite influencers and quickly come up with a sense of who they are and why you follow them.
That’s because successful influencers brand themselves into the minds of their audience. Not just as a generic “YouTuber” or as being “InstaFamous,” but as a brand that relates to a specific topic, field, or concept.
Something that matters to their audience.
People need to be able to associate you with something that they already understand. They need to get a very quick sense of who you are, why they should remember you, and how you might be able to help them.
Otherwise, you’re just another name they will quickly forget.
3. Focusing On Total Fans Instead Of Super Fans
Influencers often try to use broad or generic content in an attempt to attract a larger total fan base. Unfortunately, this waters down their brand identity and leads to much lower engagement.
They may reach more casual fans in the short term, but these are the kinds of people that only have a passing interest. They aren’t likely to remember who you are, what you do, or even why they followed you in the first place.
This is why it’s so important to establish a clear brand identity.
It gives you a chance to attract and retain super fans. People that are far more likely to consume your content, come back for more, post comments, and share your content with their friends.
Ironically, it’s these super fans that tend to increase your overall reach when it comes to casual or passive visitors as well, because they drive up your engagement metrics and share your content.
For this reason, I always recommend focusing on super fans. The casuals will come and go, so you don’t need to worry about them. But as an influencer, you need to know what your super fans want so that you can deliver on their expectations in the future.
4. Not Creating A System To Nurture Super Fans
The unfortunate reality is that many potential super fans will lose track of you. They will forget who you are, won’t come back to your content, or may not even come back to the platform that your content is on.
As a result, they may never comment, like, share, or engage with you or your content in any meaningful way ever again.
These kinds of missed opportunities are a BIG loss. Because any one super fan can provide a valuable connection, important referral, or unique opportunity that takes your brand viral.
Some influencers have a sort of “soul mate” idea when it comes to super fans. They assume true fans will find them, quickly fall in love with their content, and keep coming back for more.
But that’s rare. Things just aren’t that clean and simple.
As an influencer, it’s important to be doing everything you can to attract, nurture, and retain super fans.
The single best tool for this is email marketing, but unfortunately many people write this off as being old-fashioned. Or worse, they associate email with spammers that give it a bad name.
That’s because many email marketers abuse the system.
But there’s a right way to do it.
It starts with sending only your very best and most well-received content to new subscribers. The articles or videos that your loyal fans always enjoy.
Then track engagement using a popular email automation tool like ActiveCampaign, InfusionSoft, or Drip. If a new subscriber doesn’t click links to your very best content — you automatically STOP emailing them.
But, if they do click a few links and engage with your best content, the system can automatically add them to a list of super fans for future email updates.
There are of course many ways to further improve, optimize, and automate email marketing. But the goal is always the same. You only want to send email to your most loyal fans. The ones that actively engage with your updates.
Your email list will quickly become a powerful asset. It provides you with leverage over gatekeeper platforms. And it gives you the freedom to connect with your fans without needing someone else’s approval.
