Influencer marketing is at peak right now. Across the globe, brands are roping in influencers to boost sales and engagement. While Shopify is allowing brands build their online stores to directly sell to customers, influencer marketing is helping them establish a strong relationship with their target audience.
In a recent interview for Forbes, Gary Drenik asked Aspire CEO Anand Kishore about changing landscape of influencer marketing amid rise of Shopify, which allows small businesses to sell online independently.
Influencers remain the best way to reach your target audience on social media, especially as more and more users are shopping directly through the platforms.
Anand Kishore, CEO, Aspire
Changing Landscape
Currently serving more than 800 Shopify stores, Aspire provides marketing solutions to e-commerce brands. According to Kishore, the whole marketing landscape is evolving in the Shopify era.
“Marketers are faced with rising costs, ad blockers, and the end of IFDA (among other sweeping new privacy changes), and they are looking for new ways to get in front of their target audiences – influencers are the answer,” Kishore explained in his reply.
“Influencers remain the best way to reach your target audience on social media, especially as more and more users are shopping directly through the platforms. According to a recent Prosper Insights & Analytics survey on media behaviors and influence by generation, 25% of Gen-Z and 21% of Millennial respondents said social media platforms influence their buying habits for the most common consumer products like apparel, beauty, grocery, and electronics, compared to 15% of Gen-X and 8% of Boomer respondents,” he added.
Targeting Younger Ones
Kishore went on to explain how creators are influencing their followers to make purchases they are being paid for. This promotional tool is highly effective in a younger age group audience.
“Younger generations are rejecting ad content for influencer content that feels genuine and authentic. Creators are able to cultivate a following of people that trust them and look to them for recommendations, and successful brands are leveraging this with their creator partnerships to drive not only engagement but ROI,” he said.
“These partnerships then provide brands with first-party insights that can inform full-funnel marketing initiatives ranging from allowlisiting to affiliate programs with a laser focus on driving revenue,” Kishore added.
Shopify’s Bid in Creator Economy
Shopify is trying to capitalize on creator economy. In July, the Canada-based e-commerce giant partnered with YouTube to enable merchants to sell their products using the video platform. This partnership also helps influencers based on YouTube to set up their stores on Shopify to sell their merchandise.
BREAKING MY SILENCE
— Shopify (@Shopify) July 19, 2022
you can now hook up your store to your YouTube channel which means your fans can discover, browse, and shop where they like, comment, and subscribe. check it out 👇 pic.twitter.com/RvoVvyppGV
- How it works: For promotional purpose, YouTubers can now tag and pin products during live streams. The new feature also allows them to feature a store tab beneath their channel, showcasing the entire list of products and show a curated list in a product shelf below on-demand video.
Creators’ Merchandise
Wow, this is huge🚨 @MrBeast just hit 100M subs on YouTube – one of the world's biggest creators and one of the most exciting entrepreneurs on the planet. He’s been a @Shopify merchant since he had 3M subs.
— Harley Finkelstein (@harleyf) August 5, 2022
Congrats on 100M @MrBeast!
Shopify 🤝 Creators
More to come 👀 pic.twitter.com/TZwkx4T2YP
American YouTuber Jimmy Donaldson, who recently completed 100 million subscribers under the brand name ‘MrBeast‘, uses Shopify to sell his merchandise. Following a shoutout by Shopify President Harley Finkelstein, MrBeast revealed how he plans to expand his Shopify business by introducing some other products.
“I have personally been using Shopify to sell merch since we had three million subscribers, which is crazy because we are on a 100 million. Now, we also use it to sell our chocolate bars and so much more,” Mr Beast was heard saying in the video posted by Finkelstein.
Shopify Collabs
In another bid to cash in on influencer marketing, Shopify in August launched Shopify Collabs to directly connect merchants with content creators. This not only helps creators easily discover brands but also allow merchants to reach new consumers.
Shopify Collabs allows creators to establish partnerships with merchants to build curated shops and promote products as per their interests. This saves creators from the cumbersome process of brand hunting. Hence, they can focus more on making content.
