Knowing how to easily find effective brand ambassadors on Instagram is key to leveraging all of the marketing benefits of the platform, but many social media managers struggle with this.
Here, we’ll walk you through everything you need to know about Instagram brand ambassadors and how to use them to amplify your brand to their followers.
First off, what is a brand ambassador?
A brand ambassador is somebody that forms a long-term relationship with your business and becomes one of many faces for your brand on social media. Traditionally, they have a genuine love for the brands they’re associated with and share the same values that your company does.
They’re a person that tends to embody your company culture and philosophy, but as a non-employee, and amplifies those values to their audience.
The ultimate goal of a brand ambassador is to help promote your brand and its products and services across various platforms.
Who qualifies to be a brand ambassador on Instagram?
Before you can find the perfect person to represent your brand as an ambassador on Instagram, you need to know what kind of person you’re looking for.
So, who qualifies as a high-quality brand ambassador?
Active Instagram influencers are the most obvious choice for ambassadors.
Their Instagram activity is already built around brand promotion to some degree and they are always looking for new opportunities to partner with companies.
In many cases, they are willing to post a paid review for a business, even if they don’t have that much interest in it. However, they may also be interested in a long-term partnership with a brand that they are passionate about.
Existing & repeat customers
There’s no better brand ambassador than an existing customer.
There’s a reason why people rely so heavily on customer reviews when buying products online. A person that has legitimately bought, used and endorsed your brand carries a lot of weight.
Repeat customers can be an even stronger authentic voice for your brand. Repeat purchases show a genuine love for your products and that passion can really shine through in the content they ultimately create as brand ambassadors.
Why are Instagram brand ambassadors so effective?
Some businesses decide to focus strictly on influencer marketing, which is great.
However, there are many benefits that come with partnering with a brand ambassador:
- Increase brand awareness
- Boost qualified website traffic
- Influence leads and sales
Although there is a lot of nuance to tracking the performance of brand ambassadors, these are great starting points for your program.
They can increase brand awareness
Increasing brand awareness is one of the primary benefits of working with a brand ambassador. Social media is a very competitive space and can be difficult to build a large following on.
Working with a brand ambassador is a great way to cut through the noise because you can take advantage of a potentially large audience that they have already built.
They can boost qualified website traffic
Driving traffic to your website is the first step towards increasing sales, and brand ambassadors can help influence that.
As long as you select the right ambassador with the right audience, you have the potential to connect with highly qualified pool leads and prospects, who are likely to visit your site.
Using brand ambassadors to drive traffic is becoming increasingly effective as around 47% of people use an ad blocker, which means that traditional paid advertising campaigns are often ineffective.
They can influences leads and sales
The very nature of a brand ambassador is to endorse specific products and services. This can translate into traffic that is directed further into your funnel than other content types.
And that can have a big influence on your conversion rates.
Studies show that 74% of people trust social networks when making purchasing decisions. Combine that with highly targeted traffic and you have the potential to influence a higher conversion rate than a lot of traditional marketing tactics.
What companies typically have Instagram brand ambassadors?
Many different kinds of businesses can benefit from Instagram brand ambassadors but they are particularly effective for certain industries.
- Food & beverage companies
- Fashion brands
- Fitness & wellness brands
- Airlines & travel brands
Needless to say, but if your products and services benefit from a visual medium, Instagram is going to be ripe with ambassadors to choose from.
Food & beverage companies
Food and beverage is generally a very popular topic on Instagram. Many profiles consist of people posting pictures from restaurants as well as photos of food products they buy at the store.
These types of accounts can make for the perfect brand ambassadors for companies in the food and beverage industry. Health food companies can also partner with fitness or wellness accounts to promote their products.
Fashion brands
Fashion is another naturally popular topic on Instagram with lots of people posting photos of new purchases and giving fashion tips.
People that post about fashion are always looking for new products to show off and they will be willing to partner with brands they love. Their followers look to them for fashion advice and their opinions are very influential.
Fitness & wellness brands
Fitness and wellness are very popular amongst Instagram users. Fitness bloggers often use Instagram to post videos of their workouts and give advice on reaching fitness goals.
Finding the right apparel and equipment to feature in workouts is big part of that. Followers aspire to be like the fitness bloggers they follow on Instagram, so they are more than willing to take a recommendation.
Airlines & travel brands
Travel companies like airlines often leverage Instagram brand ambassadors to promote themselves. Travel vloggers can be offered free flights or free stays in hotels etc. and they will create promotional content like review videos in return.
People that travel a lot tend to have a strong preference in terms of the airlines they fly with or the comparison sites they use to find hotels, making them the perfect candidate to be a brand ambassador.
How do you find Instagram brand ambassadors?
An Instagram brand ambassador can do wonders for your business, but finding the right person is essential.
If you follow this process, you can easily find effective Instagram brand ambassadors.
1 – Find influencers that already align with your brand
When you are looking for influencers it’s important to find ones that already align with your brand and create content that reflects the type of company that you are.
You can easily find Instagram brand ambassadors by using tools like Popular Pays, which allows you to search for influencers based on various criteria like:
- Location
- Demographic
- Keywords
- Content-Type
Once you have found some potential candidates, you can then see a breakdown of their following, their previous posts, and the impact that they have.
Using this information, you can find the perfect ambassador for your brand.
Related Reading: 12 Instagram Influencer Tools To Grow Huge Followings
2 – Scan your customer engagement on Instagram
If you want existing customers to be brand ambassadors for your business, you should look at customer engagement already happening on Instagram.
Check your mentions and tagged photos to find people that are already sharing your brand and singing your praises. If people are already promoting your brand organically, there’s potential that they would be interested in a brand ambassador position.
Popular Pays’ Stories mention tool can quickly find any Instagram Stories that have already mentioned your brand. This is a great way to quickly share these endorsements with your own followers but it’s also a great way to collect lists of potential brand ambassadors.
You will also get direct messages whenever someone mentions you or tags you in a photo, so keep on top of your notifications and start building a list.
3 – Put out a call for ambassadors
Being proactive and finding people that might be suitable ambassadors is important, but you should also let them come to you. Put out a call on your Instagram profile to let people know you are looking for people to partner with the brand.
When asking for people to apply, clearly lay out the benefits and offer competitive incentives for posts as well as free products and access to other exclusive privileges.
People that are already invested in the brand should be genuinely interested in joining.
4 – Communicate your core values
Once you have found your brand ambassadors, make sure that you communicate your core values to them clearly.
It’s not enough for them to know the key features of your products, they need to embody the brand as a whole. So, make sure that you spend time discussing your business with them to ensure that they fully understand the message that you are trying to convey.
Find the best Instagram brand ambassadors for your business
Instagram brand ambassadors are one of many great ways to leverage the marketing potential of the platform.
Successfully using Instagram brand ambassadors can drive more qualified leads to your site and increase sales in a meaningful way, but choosing the right people is key.
If you follow the steps outlined above, you can easily find effective Instagram brand ambassadors for your business. Once you build those relationships, your marketing efforts will be improved in a significant way and that will be reflected in your sales.
Interested in speeding up the process of finding brand ambassadors on Instagram? Request a demo from Popular Pays and we can show you how it’s done!