Over the past few years, the internet has become saturated with influencers: professional and amateur athletes, fashion and beauty gurus, singers, writers, and just about every other entertainment industry member, and as the trend continues to snowball, the income from their efforts is also steadily rising.
There’s no question that if you want to generate serious income from your activities, you need to establish a dedicated online brand with a large social media following. But what’s less obvious is how you can develop a brand and remain in control of it—your income.
Six Ways to Make More Money as an Influencer:
Whether you’re a former professional athlete, an all-star musical artist, or a renowned author and entrepreneur, there’s an established blueprint you can follow to ensure that the cash flows in. Here are few ways to make money as an influencer:
1. Promote Products, Services, and Events on Instagram and Other Social Media Platforms
Starting a brand is only half the battle: the other half is leveraging it to create genuine, long-term, monetary growth. Instead of building the “brand” solely to get a new product to market, you can convert your following into brand advocates. You can build relationships with businesses that work with your ideal clientele, or you can work with brands who sell complementary products that will help create a consistent lifestyle for you and your audience.
To start monetizing your following, create a business page for your brand and connect it to Instagram, Facebook, and other social media platforms. Don’t worry about being the “best” influencer you can be—what you need to do is connect with people on a genuine level. There are a lot of sites that offer services to influencers like fansrevenue to make money.
2. Leverage Your Influence as a Speaker
Even if you’re not planning on leaving the comforts of home, you can make money off of your social media following. A good speaker will sell a room with their speeches, which means you can charge anywhere from $200-3,000 an hour for a series of live, in-person events in your area. For that, you don’t need to travel far; you can host the events virtually, on social media, or with other people in your community.
By selling the real-time events to your followers, you can leverage your influence to generate serious money, and at the end of the day, that’s the most important thing: ensuring that your brand is sustainable and ensuring that you can continue to work for it.
3. Leverage Your Community to Drive Product Sales
Brands and companies want to build relationships with the influencers who buy their products. With the right approach, this can lead to a seamless revenue source for both parties: you create content for the brand, and they promote you.
Instead of selling too many branded apparel items that will likely go to a competitor, you can focus on the type of product you sell most often—e.g., furniture and decor. You can leverage your followers, with some basic design skills, to make your store stand out and entice shoppers to make an impulse purchase.
4. Get Paid to Promote Products on the Services and Products You Offer
There are countless ways to capitalize on the assets you already have: monetize your followers by working with brands and companies to promote their products. When they post a series of ad banners on your page, you can create a program that’ll allow you to get paid to promote their products, based on your follower count.
5. Use Other Influencers to Create Your Own Brands
Influencers aren’t just another type of marketer: you can use them to create your own brands. For instance, if you’re an entrepreneur, you could use this strategy to introduce your new products to the world through your followers, and then you can package your products and deliver to the market.
That said, you can’t leverage everyone you know as a business partner, but you can leverage their existing connections. So, if you have a good relationship with an influencer, reach out to them, and see if you can create a new partnership with them to promote your products and brands to their followers.
6. Sell Merch to Your Followers
Influencer marketing is all about sales and profit. Whether it’s on your own or through a partnership, you can generate sales and earn a profit by selling your follower’s merchandise. One option is to create a clothing line, either for your brand or a competitor, and you can sell directly to your followers through your social media page.
Or you could create a range of products – smart home gadgets, fashion products, or even coffee mugs—and partner with other influencers to market your product. You can also create an ecommerce platform that will help you sell your own merchandise and other brands.
Conclusion
Influencer marketing is not as confusing as it may seem at first. In fact, there’s a ton of ways to monetize this strategy, and even if you’re just starting out, this’s a guide that will guide you through the process. Just make sure you keep your revenue streams organized so that you’re able to maximize the benefits of your efforts.
