 Now, for those that don't know what influencers are, these are the people that can influence the decision of purchasing with their followers. Okay, typically speaking, this type of people, they have some following on their account for a specific topic. People follow them because they enjoy what they talk about in their lives, in the brand or whatever niche that they're in. Now collaborating with these people allows your brand to be exposed to their following. And typically what happens is that you're going to provide a free product to these influencers. And in turn, they share their experience with their followers. And if their followers enjoy it and actually were convinced by the influencers, then they would come back to you and purchase from you. So that's what influencer marketing is all about. Now, depending on the size of the their following, they would either charge you a fee to promote for them from anywhere from hundreds of dollars to thousands of dollars. Now, typically this is going to be like a very, very high scale influencer. Okay, and that's not the type of influencers that we're going to be reaching out to. Others would just ask for free products for their followers. So for example, they would be like, Hey, you know what, I want three or four different products. So then that way I can conduct a giveaway to my followers. So then that way they can provide even more value to people that follow them. Or they simply just want to promote for you. So then that way they can create value to their customers and followers as well. Now the three reasons why promoting with influencers are so important and effective. Number one, because they are credible and trustworthy with their own followers. Second, because now we can actually leverage off their exposure exposures that they have spent years building this following and we can get exposed to them real fast. We don't need to create our 10,000 followers, right? Because that takes a lot of time to create. Now, lastly, it also increases your brand value when you work with all these cool kids are on the block. Now let's dive into the reason why specifically. Okay, credibility and trustworthiness. Okay, consumers trust influencers more than advertisements of your specific brand. So when you are telling people how great your product is, it carries no weight at all because everyone toots their own horn, everyone talks about how great their stuff is. No one would be like, yo, my stuff is not that great. Whereas an influencer's reputation is on the line. So for example, if they're willing to promote your brand, if they say that your stuff is good to their followers, it creates 10 times more credibility to the audience. And on top of that, these influencers spend years gaining the trust of their followers, and which is the reason why you can leverage off their credibility and their trust with their following as they promote you. And trust, once again, I always say this, trust is the only reason why anyone will be buying anything from you. Mix up high exposure and be able to leverage off their high exposure. Influencers all have their niche market, whether it be in yoga, whether it be in health or in just motivation, inspiration, because that's how they grow their subscription base, people go to them for a very specific reason. So the followers in the market that you probably don't have access to or that you don't want to spend the time building, now that you get to tap into hundreds and thousands of real life potential customers in a real short period of time, because of this collaboration, you get to get your brand exposed to their followers. And that's what leverage is all about, you leveraging off their customers. And they're basically what they have spent years creating. Now a pro tip to this is that in module one and lesson four, we didn't exercise to find out who your client avatar is, right? So for us, it's Michelle. Now it's a good time to actually check out their Instagram of influencers that they follow. So then that way, for example, if you're selling a vegan protein bar and you check out who Michelle follows, and it just so happens that Michelle follows a yoga influencer, then that is a very good influencer to reach out to because it really matches the value that your client avatar has with their brands and also their consumptions. Now, the last reason why influencers are so important is because it also helps create brand value for your specific product. Why is that the case? Because you are basically associating yourself with people who are the cool kids around the block. I always say this, right? It's like being friends in high school around the cool kids influencers. Nowadays, they are the cool kids, right? So being friends with them and having them promote for you is a really great way to elevate your brand and bring it to light as well when you're first launching. Now, four ways to reach out to your influencers and to create a collaboration deal. First up is to research them. How do you know of influencers locally around where you live? Second, create a list of all these research that you've created, and then now it is time to reach out. How do you cut through the noise and reach out to them? And lastly, how do you maintain that relationship with them? So researching local influencers. Examples, it could be bloggers, photographers, stylists, and use the rabbit hole method to locate these influencers. How do you do that? We're going to dive right in. But if you want additional training on influencer partnership and collaboration, definitely go to the bonuses, right? Go back out into the portal and find one of the bonuses that talks about influencers. And we go in depth about that as well, very similar to what we're talking about in this lesson. Yeah. So what is the rabbit hole method? First up, in your search bar on Instagram, search for locational based hashtags. Okay. And as you can see right here in red, you can just type in your location, whether you're in Vancouver or whether you're in LA, New York, and then add a food related keyword at the end. Majority of the time I would just put in foodie. So for example, I live in Vancouver, which is the reason why I would put in YVR foodie or YVR food influencer, something like that. And the top result is what I would click into. Once I click into the top hashtag results, as you can see YVR foodie, I'll click into it. And then I would see a ton of pictures. And within those pictures, I would choose the ones that has the highest quality. Why is that the case? It is because normal people like you and I, we take good pictures, that's okay. But influencers, it is their job to take great photos. And that's the reason why it is very easy to be able to locate who the influencers are just by looking at the image themselves. And typically speaking, that's how I, that's my frame of mind when I'm choosing which picture to click into. So for example, these ones, I'll click into it because they look nice. Once I click into them, check their profile to see if they're influencers. And a lot of times they will say what they are. So for example, as you can see in the red rectangle box, it says Vancouver foodie right there. And then and on top of that, look at their accounts to see how many followers they have. Typically speaking, I want to be able to locate influencers with at least 2000 followers. Once again, 2000 followers is my threshold, mainly because anything lower, I don't think is substantial enough. And that's the reason why I want them to be able to build a solid foundation before I reach out to them before I know for a fact that they would be able to create results for us. And then once you click into who they follow as well, you're going to be able to see that they follow a lot of influencers as well. As well. So for example, once I click into who they following, who's following them, you can click into following and you can see all these different people and they're all influencers as well, mainly because in the influencer network, they really are a very tight knitted community. So it is really easy for you to be able to uncover more and more influencers just by seeing who they follow. And I have already highlighted to you that these are already all influencers in town. Now, another method is to look at their posts and see who liked and commented on their posts. On top of that, additional hashtags, for example, we started off with YVR foodie. Now, if we want to be able to go into that rabbit hole, we look at different hashtags that they have put in their whole group. Once you can see here, YVR foodie is one of them. YVR food, YVR eats, and those are all additional hashtags that you can do your rabbit hole digging and diving into. Once you click into that hashtag, then you uncover even more photos that you can click into and then even more influencers would show up. And as you continue on this process, you're going to be able to find a lot of different influencers, different accounts and different types of following. Once again, look for the ones that have locational based hashtags because I don't want an influencer all the way across the world to promote for me. I don't want someone to work that is located in New York to promote for me because our customers just don't align, right? We want to be able to find someone who is local. And so by using this technique, you're going to be able to find different influencers who are local and on top of that different hashtags that you can continue this rabbit hole method. Another bonus is that restaurant accounts will often repost photos from influencers. So if there are any accounts and food establishments that you follow, simply look at the tagged posts. As you can see here, the rectangles, once you click onto the little icon on the left lower hand, then it would pop up food influencers that you can click into that has taken that picture for them. And that is another great way for you to find influencers as well. Now that you have understood the rabbit hole method, you can actually go into the link below, download the list that you can start compiling all these influencers for you. So organize these influencers by the number of followers, the type of influencer they are and their contact info. And a lot of times their contact info is located on their Instagram profile. And as you can see here, this is the list of influencers that we have created from this whole rabbit hole method that we have done. You want to be able to have a mix of influencers from different amount of followers. And the reason why is because the following, the follower accounts really dictate what type of influencers that they are. A great starting point of influencers that you should reach out to are people that have around five to 10,000 followers. And the reason is because this type of influencers are keen in finding new products to promote to their followers because they need to create content on the daily. And that's why there's so much more incentivized to promote a brand like yours. They usually only require you to give them free products and they'll be happy to promote for you. Now, from 10 to 20 K is also a great starting point. This group of influencers has now gained some traction and regularly, but different brands would reach out to them and for them to help promote. So they are getting used to getting free products all the time. So you don't, you stop having as much leverage with this type of influencers. They might only still require you to give free products and they'll be more than happy to promote for you. But at this point in time, I have seen influencers ask for $50 to $100 to promote for them. And typically speaking, I don't work with those people because I would love to be able to grow a long-term relationship with my influencers. I like to be able to invest in them from five to 10 K because as you go on and creating these collaborations, they will continue to grow. They would grow from five to 10 K to 10 to 15 K to 15 to 20 K followers. So as they grow and if you already have a relationship with them, many times they don't want to be able to charge you money because they're like, you know what, these guys know what they're doing. These guys are pleasant to work with. And I'll talk a little bit more about how to maintain that relationship later on in this lesson as well. Now, when it comes to followers with 20 to 50 K followers, they have some success and they have been doing influencer marketing for a while now. And these are accounts that you should look into as well because they have a lot of pull. Now this group of influencers are going to be much more selective with the people and brands that they work with because they have found their voice. They have found that niche and they're doubling down on that. And that's the only reason why they're able to grow to this amount of followers because their voice is super important. Their brand is much more defined now. So if they're very, they're much more vocal about the brands that they support, whether it's vegan only, right? Or whether it is a small mom and pop restaurants only, right? That's how they're able to grow their followers. So at this point in time, they'll most likely work with you if and only your items are aligned with their voice and their brand. And on top of that, once again, they might be asking for a small fee, which is very, very acceptable because if you get your product promoted with their followers, you're going to be able to see quite a bit of return. Now 50 K to 100 K people, these guys have made it, okay? They have found their voice and they found their cult following. And this group of influencers usually typically charge you $100 or more if they really like what you have to offer, okay? They might be able to do it for free. But nonetheless, we don't want to tap into this group of influencers at this point in the game. Now it is time for you to reach out. Why would they want to work with you? Identify these things first. What is it that you're selling, your voice, your values, and your mission and your purpose? Identifying those allows you to find commonality when you're reaching out to them. You need to understand what's in it for them. They are always thinking about what's in it for them because it's never about you. Once again, it's never about you. This whole process is about the influencer. It's not about how great your stuff is. It's not about the fact that you are the first vegan cookie. I dive deep into this as well in the bonus. Once you come out of the portal in the membership area, click into the bonus area for the influencer bonus module and you're going to be able to see a little bit more about what I'm talking about. Now, how do you reach out? Ask influencers to conduct food reviews of your product. When you're reaching out, either an Instagram DM or email is completely fine. Now, when you're writing, you're going to be asking, Hey, so I understand where to reach out now. What do I write? What should I say? Use the ADA framework. What is the ADA framework? It means initially your first message should grab their attention. What will grab the influencers attention? Majority of time, once again, I'm telling you, this is all about the influencer. It's not really about you. So anything that complements your influencer is a great way to grab their attention. And then what would interest the influencers interest to keep reading? Now that you have grabbed their attention, you can actually put in different topics that would interest your influencer. And usually at this point is when I bring up my own brand that has that commonality with them and that would peak their interest. So for example, if they're focusing on, let's say a vegan fried chicken sandwich, oh, it just so happens that I run a vegan vegan fish and chip shop as well. Okay, you know, that's interesting. My wheels start spinning as an influencer because I'm like, hmm, if I'm already doing vegan and promoting for this vegan chicken place, hey, my followers might like the vegan fish place, brand new, first of its kind in Vancouver. Cool. That's interesting. Now it is time to present the desire, what's in it for them, whether it's a collaboration, whether it is a paid gig, whatever the case may be, what's in it for them. And lastly, what do you want them to do, right? That's the data format when it comes to reaching out and you should definitely follow this template when reaching out because they get bombarded with messages almost every day. And if your message is not clear and if your message doesn't follow this specific framework and you're just always talking about me, me, me, me, me, you're gonna lose them. That's why you need to follow this format. And once again, this whole template is in the link below. Feel free to download it and use it to your liking. This is what we use to reach out to our influencer. So I'm sharing with you what works today. Now as a bonus pro tip, as you can see here, how do you get noticed on Instagram? Now, keep in mind that your influencers are always getting flooded with hundreds of message. So how do you increase your chance of being seen? First up, comment on their captions regularly, guys. Make sure you comment on them so then that way they can get familiarized with your brand and just basically what your handle is. Now, and on that note, always leave a genuine response. Don't just send an emoji because that's just a lack of effort. Okay. And when you're ready to reach out, when you're ready to be like, oh, I want to do a collaboration with them, like five to 10 of their most recent posts. As you can see on the left, this whole GIF, when you like five to 10 of their most recent posts, this is what my feed looks like. This captures my attention. Some guy in Vancouver just keeps liking and commenting my stuff. And I'm just like, oh my goodness, this guy is like, I know this guy now because they keep popping up on my feed. Follow them, comment on their latest posts for them to check their DM. And then you reach out through the DM. DM, it stands for direct message by the way, or email. Okay. As a bonus to hack sometimes, if I really, really want to work with that influencer, I will go on their Facebook platform as well to like and comment their posts as well and do the same method that I'm sharing with you. Now, how do you maintain a relationship? If they reject you guys, don't take it personally. Majority of the time it is always because of timing, because they're either very swamped or it might just not be the right timing. When you're giving them free stuff, they will want to promote for you. Okay. So don't take it personally if they say no, thank them because like I said, it's always a timing issue. And this allows you to turn turn back to them down the road after a few months. Hey, you know what? Thank you so much for for entertaining this. But you know what? I know timing is not right right now. Is it okay if I reach out in three months time? And if you have that consistency, they will appreciate that, they will respect that, and they will most likely work with you a few months down the road when timing is not an issue no more. But if they say yes, make sure that you're responsive, make sure that you're not leaving them hanging. Okay. Be organized with this whole process. The more organized you are, the more professional you may seem. And the more likely they're going to be working with you. And on top of that, be thankful. They don't have to do this for you. They're doing it for you. It's out of basically their own goodness and their goodwill. So make sure that you are being thankful for them. Now it is your turn. Create a list of minimum 20 influencers from the template below. Use the rabbit hole format. Okay. Now craft out your message by using the data format. With each influencer, you need to cater that message a little bit to make sure that you grab their attention. Okay. And personalize the message to each of these influencers. At least get three influencers to try out your product and share their experience with their followers.