You will be able to judge whether a creator's audience matches your buyer before you approach them.
Farah once paid a fashion creator with a very large following to post about one of her blouses. The video was polished and got plenty of views. It brought in two orders. A few months later, a working mother with a modest following, who posts about getting three kids to school and herself to the office by 8.30, wore one of Farah's blouses in a video about her morning. Farah had given her the blouse. That video brought in more orders than the first one, and dozens of messages asking about sizes.
The difference was not the size of the audience. It was who was in it. This lesson shows you how to judge that before you approach anyone.
A creator's value to you depends on how many of their followers are your buyers. A large audience that is mostly the wrong people is mostly wasted. A small audience made up largely of your buyers can do more for you, and it usually costs less.
Follower counts are also easy to inflate, and views can come from anywhere in the world. A creator based in Singapore can have an audience that is mostly overseas, which matters if you only deliver locally. So start with the question you have used throughout this course: who is my buyer? Then look for creators whose audience is made of that person.
This applies to people who would never call themselves influencers. A teacher who posts study tips, a dad who reviews playgrounds, a nurse who explains shift life, a hawker who films his early mornings: each has an audience, and some of those audiences will match your buyer closely.
The quickest way to judge an audience is to read the comments on a creator's recent posts. Not the number of comments: the comments themselves.
Who is commenting? Look at a few of the accounts. Are they people like your buyer, by age, situation and location? What are they saying? Comments asking where to buy something, how it works or whether it suits them come from people who act on what they see. Comments that are only emojis or generic praise from accounts with no posts of their own tell you very little, and a large number of them can be a warning sign.
Mei Ling looked at a parenting creator she liked and found the comments full of mothers asking about party venues, school holiday plans and where to buy things for their children. That was her buyer. Another creator with ten times the following had comments mostly from teenagers. Both were good at what they did, but only one audience was for her.
Also look at how the creator replies. A creator who talks with their commenters has an audience that trusts them, which is what you are hoping to borrow.
Once a creator looks promising, ask them for their audience data, from the analytics their platform shows them. The useful numbers are where their audience is located, by country and sometimes city, the age range and gender split, and the average views on recent posts rather than their single best one.
Ask for a screenshot taken directly from their analytics screen, recent and dated. Be wary of a media kit that shows only follower counts and likes, or screenshots of one viral post. A creator who works with brands regularly will be used to this request. One who refuses to share any audience data is telling you something.
You are not trying to catch anyone out. You are checking that the people you are paying to reach are the people you want to reach.
Not every collaboration needs a creator. Other businesses that serve the same buyer, but do not compete with you, can be excellent partners. A florist and a cake shop both serve people planning a celebration. A tuition centre and a children's bookshop both serve parents who care about learning. A modest workwear label and a hijab brand both serve the same working women.
These partnerships can often be done as a swap rather than a payment. You appear in their video, they appear in yours, or you film something together. Mei Ling and a florist in Punggol made a video together about putting together a party table, each filming their own part, and both posted it. Neither paid the other, and each reached the other's buyers.
When you look for partners, think about what your buyer does just before and just after buying from you. The businesses they use at those moments are your best candidates.
In the activity you will find ten creators or partner businesses in your niche and note, for each one, who seems to be in their comments.
Find ten creators or partner businesses in your niche and note, for each, who seems to be in their comments.
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