Micro-Influencers Can Be the Right Influencers for You

An influencer marketing campaign is pretty much a word-of-mouth campaign – on steroids! Because a voice on social media is potentially ‘heard’ by a large volume of people, it is a personal referral on a much larger scale. With this increased scale comes a greater need to make sure the person doing the referral is the right person, for your business, your cause and intended audience; you can learn more about influencers and their impact from our previous blog post.

Realty stars, celebrities, professional athletes, and social-media rock stars are the more visible influencers and the ones we often think of first. The issue with these types of ‘star influencers’ is the cost is way outside the budget of most businesses, even more so for small businesses and causes.

Enter the micro-influencer, typically defined as a social-media leader with between 1k to 5k followers. Depending on your own existing social media presence that may seem like either a lot of followers or very, very few. But that is not the point, statistically micro-influencers communicate more than twenty times each week with their followers. More over 80%+ of consumers are "highly likely to follow a recommendation made by a micro influencer."

That means that these micro-influencers are ‘influencing’ every day. Most of what they post include branding, so not just awareness but trust in the brand is transmitted to their followers. Micro-influencers tend to charge much less than the ‘big guys’ which means you can reach the same or even a larger, more diverse audience with several micro-influencers at a better price point. Now lest you think that this is ‘selling out’ consider that micro-influencers are not likely to be persuaded to recommend or market a product or service they don’t support. Many of these micro-influencers are millennials and that’s just not something they tend to do and probably most of all, to the micro-influencer, they don’t want to risk offending or losing their followers. To keep

their loyal followers, just as a business they must completely believe in what they are recommending.

While the reach of a micro-influencer is smaller, it is a more targeted audience. These millennial micro-influencers are following their passions, making their voices and recommendations completely authentic. The range of these interests can be just about anything, a cause like animals or the environment, products like cars, fashion, fitness, travel or personal services such as coaching and meditation. Once you identify the correct niche for your business or cause, you can then determine who the micro-influencers are in that space. You want a micro-influencer to champion your business or cause who is genuine and trustworthy. You might want to start your search on Instagram, the most popular social media site for micro-influencer, followed by Twitter and Facebook. Get more detailed info on finding the right influencers from this post.

More and more businesses are using influencer marketing, probably most of your competitors. Searches for the term “influencer marketing” have more than tripled this year. Find your micro-influencers, get your product or service into their hands and have them create content that you can integrate into your marketing efforts. Then reap the benefits of influencer marketing with micro-influencers.

About the Author Leslie Riehm is the Vice President Corporate Communications at Digital Donations, Inc. Connect with Leslie and Digital Donations on Linked-In and follow her on Twitter.

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https://www.digitaldonations.org/single-post/2017/09/29/Micro-Influencers-Can-Be-the-Right-Influencers-for-You

Digital Donations Technologies Launches Crowdfunding Campaign

Funds to be used for Digital Wallet and Cryptocurrency Development

Melville, NY September 17, 2017 – Digital Donations Technologies announced today the launch of an equity fundraising campaign to raise up to $5MM via Crowdfunder.com. Funds from this round will be used for the expanded development of PayGIV and CoinGIV, an innovative fundraising technology. Together these tools, a digital wallet and a cryptocurrency, allow donors to predesignate a specific charity and donation amount, creating automated sustainable fundraising growth. Keith Orlean, CEO and Co-Founder, stated “In addition to PayGIV and CoinGIV, our GIV Ecosystem includes point of sale, ATMs and mobile devices. The unique and essential component of our technology is Partner Rewards. By joining cause with commerce, a donation request can be added to any financial transaction and provide a brand sponsored reward to the donor, increasing the benefit to the donor, the cause and the business. Charitable giving is a $400BN industry that receives 71% of its donations from individuals. Ease of donating is especially important to millennials who love online and social giving. Having recently surpassed Baby Boomers in population, reaching this audience on their preferred platforms (social, mobile and digital portals) is the future of charitable giving. Raising capital is the next step in funding our growth as we prepare to become a publicly traded entity." Founded in 2014, Digital Donations is committed to assist non-profit industry with breakthrough and cost-effective fundraising technologies. The key to the business is its innovative GIV Ecosystem which integrates at point-of-sale, mobile devices, ATMs and e-commerce checkouts. Through this integration, the GIV technology enables consumers to make charitable donations while making a financial transaction. To review the opportunity to invest in the Future of Giving click or copy this link.https://www.crowdfunder.com/digital-donations-inc-/invest # # # #Forward Looking Statements Statements in this press release including statements regarding either parties’ beliefs, expectations, intentions or strategies for the future, may be considered "forward-looking statements". All forward-looking statements involve a number of risks and uncertainties that could cause actual results to differ materially from the plans, intentions and expectations reflected in or suggested by the forward-looking statements. Such risks and uncertainties include, among others, intensified competition, operating problems and their impact on revenues and profit margins, anticipated future business strategies and financial performance, anticipated future number of customers, business prospects, legislative developments and similar matters.

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https://www.digitaldonations.org/single-post/2017/09/26/Digital-Donations-Technologies-Launches-Crowdfunding-Campaign

Big News on Big Data at Digital Donations

Digital Donations co-founder Keith Orlean recently spoke with InnovateLI, about big data and how he sees transitioning their nonprofit solution into the for-profit arena.

The proprietary data-crunching solution from Digital Donations is designed to capture the information from potential donors and now, customers who visit a website but don’t complete the forms, etc. This unique tool allows you to recapture the potentially lost data and create a connection to these website visitors. Once you have this basic data, Big Data follows with shopping, buying and donating habits. Add in location/beacon technology and a you’ll have a whole new world of actionable data. You can focus on the specific demographics of your ideal customer or donor to provide a truly personalized experience.

>> Read the entire article!Digital Donations is a leading provider of state-of-the-art alternative fundraising solutions connecting cause with commerce in the communities where we work and live.InnovateLIis an online source for information “inside the new economy

About the Author Leslie Riehm is the Vice President Corporate Communications at Digital Donations, Inc.

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https://www.digitaldonations.org/single-post/2017/09/12/Big-News-on-Big-Data-at-Digital-Donations

Influencer Marketing – Finding the ‘Right’ Influencers

There is one thing in marketing that you can count on change. Social media marketing is no different, in fact if anything it changes more quickly and with far more enthusiasm! The latest trend is ‘influencer marketing’ which is exactly what it says: using someone with ‘influence’ to market your products/services. But just what is an ‘influencer’ and how do you find the right one(s) for you?

Social media has created their own form of celebrities, some of whom are not unlike television’s reality stars. But the influencer your business (or nonprofit) is looking for is more than an internet sensation, you want someone who has true influence in your niche via their blog, vlog or other strong social media presence. You aren’t looking for someone with the most followers, but with the appreciable influence.

Most influencers focus on a specific area, there aren’t many generalists. That’s a good thing because its increasingly more difficult to be one, especially on social media. You are looking for the experts, the voices of an industry or product; their opinions, thoughts and other input are used by their followers to make purchase decisions.

The number one reason you want to get into social media influencer marketing are of course, the millennials. As you likely already know the millennials are the largest segment of the marketplace, outpacing the baby boomers. And the generations after them, are even more engaged in social media. They aren’t interested in being sold to or told what to buy, they want to do their own research and they trust the opinions of their peers, if they aren’t just trying to ‘sell a product’.

Influencers must have an authentic voice that shares information and advice they can relate to and depend on. These aren’t usually the celebrities they follow, though some do have an authentic voice and are influential, but more frequently experts in their

niche. This confirms the idea of authentic influencer vs. high volume of followers.

True influencers will only share their opinion of a brand if they truly believe in it. They aren’t looking for a pay-off, in fact you will often hear them saying “this product was sent to me to test by the manufacturer and it just doesn’t live up to its hype. So where do you find your social media marketing influencer who is genuine, has an authentic voice and is a reliable source?

First you must know who your target audience is, if you haven’t clearly defined that or it needs a bit more work, consider creating buyer personas. Shopify® the source for entrepreneurs, has an excellent article on the subject. Once you are very clear on who you want to influence, you can start the hunt for the right influencer.

Consider the following three factors when evaluating potential influencers:

Who is their audience, does it reflect your buyer persona?Is the audience engaged with commentary and questions, how often is content shared by their followers (this helps spread the influencer through peer communication)Are there any ‘red flags’ about the influencer that you feel don’t align with your mission or message? You want an influencer who positively reflects your brand image.

The right social media influencer(s) can help you get your brand in front of your chosen audience. With an impactful message in the influencer’s own voice, you can expect to see positive result and significant return on your effort.

Now get out there and find your social media marketing influencer! Read our previous blog post “Just How Much Impact do Influencers Have?” for additional insight.

About the Author Leslie Riehm is the Vice President Corporate Communications at Digital Donations, Inc. Connect with Leslie and Digital Donations on Linked-In and follow her on Twitter.

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https://www.digitaldonations.org/single-post/2017/09/11/Influencer-Marketing-Finding-the-Right-Influencers