With the success of ‘gig economy’ jobs like, Uber, Post Mates and more, it’s reported 40% of jobs will be freelancer gigs by 2020. Much of the labor shift is due to the increase in technology as well as millennial desire for flexible work life. Niche sites geared to helping you find the perfect ‘gig’ are popping up regularly. Contently, is NYC based startup focused on matching freelance journalist with brands needing content support. These on-demand employment opportunities provide a great bridge while someone may be transitioning employment, adding extra income, or just want a new change of pace in their life.
Growing even faster is the phrase, Social Media Influencer. By building an audience who is actively engaged with your content, brands are willing to fork over the big bucks. Brands see this as a great way to target their specific niche market. It is proving to be a powerful place to spend advertising money due to the focus and authority that influencer brings to the table.
Becoming a social media influencer is all about 2 things, 1) Having the right audience 2) Having an engaged audience. Just because you may have 100k followers on twitter, it won’t have any value unless you show how engaged they are with each tweet. Same goes with Youtube. Building a solid subscriber base is important, but each video better show a nice view count to prove your audience to be active.
Just talking about a bunch of different topics will not be enough to garner the audience required. Finding a focus or a niche is going to be key. You’ll need to OWN IT. Be everything about it. Share your opinion and knowledge to be considered an expert. Staying focused will help you drive engagement as the go-to expert. It’s much easier to be cited from credible sources when they look to you as knowing what you’re talking about. Example: I recently shared some of my opinions in hiring and what the difference is between recruitment and talent acquisition. I got a nice backlink plus a quote from a very credible technology company.
Get off the soap box. I love reading a good rant…but I want to feel one of two things at the end, motivated or educated. Who are the influencers you look up to? I’d step out on a limb here and say nearly 100% of them have educated you. We tend to look up to influencers who educate us. So…educate your audience. Create compeling data, insights, tips, ideas all about your niche. BE the expert!
Oftentimes educational content will run thin. It’s okay. There are only so many ‘gems’ you can share about each topic. However, find other compeling content to share. You’d be amazed at how quickly you can build a social audience when share other peoples content. Your audience will look to you to not only be an expert, but a great conduit to ALL THINGS about your niche.
Power tip: Share other influencers content. Find out who already has a large influence in your space. Share their content. By engaging with that influencer, their audience will notice. You’ll be able to gain some credibility and traction by leveraging other influencers audience. Watch how users like, Sara Dietschy created a crazy popular video “How To Casey Neistat” gained some serious traction just by engaging with other influencers. Sara took the time, made a high quality piece of content and BOOM, the girl is crazy popular! Okay, that sounds like it was super simple, it’s not. She put in a ton of hard work. Notice the attention to detail in the video that sky rocketed her personal brand!
Populate your social channels. The more you can share, the better. Now, I don’t believe there is an exact science to how many times you should share to gain audience traction. I’m a big believer in getting as active as you can be. You’ll see what’s working well, and what’s not. Find the right platform for you. Starting out on 2 social platforms is where I’d recommend. Each platform is going to be unique is engagement style. You’d be amazed at how different the audiences react on Twitter vs Facebook vs Instagram. What works well as a strategy on Instagram might be terrible on Snapchat. Remember to stay educational. Keep that content going though!
Your audience is going to see you as an influencer. They will trust what you advise. Be sure to always add a call to action. Something simple can be the best form of engagement. Gary Vaynerchuck never ends a #AskGaryVee Youtube video without asking his audience to answer his #QOTD in the comments section. Something simple, but very effective to drive engagement is asking your audience to screenshot your post, then share with their friends to win a prize. Be sure to great creative on hashtags all around driving curiosity.
Bonus: Want to learn about the future of Snapchat from powerful influencers? Watch below: