You know all about influencers. Here, Sophia Cohen, Head of Influencer Marketing at Moburst, discusses the unique value of creators.

Much has been written about the impact and importance of influencers in paid social media campaigns. While the effect that influencers have shouldn’t be underestimated, there is another powerful option when it comes to content generation that is high-impact, relatively lower cost, and results in incredible ROI: and that is creators.

What are creators, and what is a Creators Network? Read on to discover one of the hottest and most effective trends when it comes to making your social channels work for you.

Introducing the creator
Let’s start by defining what a creator is, what it isn’t, and how it differs from a traditional social media influencer.

To start with, an influencer posts their messages on their own channel.

On one hand, this is very effective as it comes across as genuine and authentic, and brands have immediate access to the captive audience that is the influencer’s followers.

On the other hand, however, there are a number of challenges with this approach; the brand cannot control the way in which the message is delivered, and the audience is in a sense limited to the influencer’s following. This type of marketing can also be high-touch and relatively expensive.

Creators are different because they are professionals at – you guessed it – creating content. This content is perfectly in line with the platform that they’re experts in. So for example, a TikTok creator will know the dances and music that are trending right now on the platform. They aren’t paid actors, they’re digitally-savvy individuals whose talents can and should be utilized by brands who understand the importance of fitting their message to the medium.

This content that’s produced by the creators is used on the brand’s channel, not the creator’s. It lends a tremendous amount of authenticity to the brand itself, and most importantly, by being consistent with the social media platform’s uniqueness, it results in significantly higher traction and really impressive ROI.

In fact, creators -generated content receives a 4x higher click-through rate and a 50 per cent lower cost-per-click than average ads.

The benefits of creators
Having creators on board for marketing campaigns provides extensive value to brands. As mentioned, the creators give the brand a sense of authenticity and “belonging” on the platform. Users connect better with the brand, as they can see they’re not “trying too hard” or even worse, totally not getting the particular social media platform.

If a brand just replicates its Facebook ads on TikTok for example, it will lose tons of fans who can immediately sense the brand doesn’t get the platform. Ads will create friction instead of feeling native, costs go up and results go down.

Another area of value is the timeline; working with influencers can take a significant amount of time when measured from the first interaction to the final post; there are approvals needed from both sides, iterations, and then a final product that needs to be signed off.

Working with creators has a much quicker turnaround time; the average is around five days from start to finish. This is due to a number of factors, one of which is the fact that the content is owned by the brand and can be used across all of their channels, such as their website, paid media and banners, which gives it more control over the timing and creative process.

At Moburst, we’ve created a Creator Network, known as our “Army of Creators,” that is on hand to impact any campaign.

Why is the Creator Network so important?
Having access to the Creator Network is nothing short of mission-critical. This is a pool of creators that specialize in particular platforms, and even specific verticals, such as beauty, fitness, spirituality and health, business and coaching, tech, lifestyle and motherhood, DIY, and food.
So a brand running a campaign in one of these (or any other) verticals can put out the requirements to the Creator Network, and those interested will reply; these replies and creators then get vetted to ensure the right fit, and very quickly incredible user-generated content (UGC) is available to be used by the brand in a native, effective paid social media campaign.

Accessing your Army of Creators
Building up a network of creators doesn’t happen overnight. The process requires relationship-building, a lot of vetting and qualification, as well as ensuring the right creators are being used effectively in the perfect campaigns.

The team at Moburst has done the heavy lifting already; they have established and nurtured the relationships with creators, and have set up a proprietary platform that allows clients to match with the most effective creator for their campaign.

So for your next social media marketing campaign, consider creators. Influencers offer a ton of value in their own way, but it’s creators that are generating really unbelievable results. If you want to see what creators can do for your brand, get in touch with the team at Moburst.