Introduction: Marketing 2023

In the world of marketing, two distinct strategies, field marketing, and influencer marketing, have emerged as essential tools for brands seeking to engage and resonate with their target audience. This is because more than ever, companies need to bring their brands to life online and off. The connection a consumer feels toward a brand can be a deciding factor in what brands they choose to support. Therefore, it is essential for brands to use these two strategies. 

As defined by Cassy Aite of Hoppier, field marketing revolves around face-to-face interactions, enabling brands to showcase products and services in real-world settings. Whereas influencer marketing focuses on working with the right social media influencers to convey brand messages and reach the right audiences.

By combining these two strategies brands can maximize the impact of their marketing reach and create the presence they need to be a part of a consumer’s world. approaches create a powerful synergy that elevates brand visibility, credibility, and reach, uniting the tangible and the digital for maximum impact.

Understanding Field Marketing

Field marketing is so powerful because it allows a brand to create personalized brand experiences and hyper-target different segments in their audience.  This is one of the strongest marketing techniques because face-to-face interactions, enable brands to engage directly with customers in real-world settings and get direct, instantaneous feedback. This tactic also enables brands to create individualized messaging for each of their different markets.  Ultimately, event-based marketing facilitates authenticity and credibility that a brand cannot replicate online. Powerful field marketing tactics such as trade show appearances, tabling, sampling, and pop-up shops are prime examples of this.  Example companies that have successfully utilized this technique are listed below.

Graduate Hotels

By strategically activating college ambassadors at each of their hotel locations, they were able to hyper-target specific communities and tap into the communities of their top fans. Since their top fans are college students, they were able to reach new audiences such as college parents, student family members, and friends. Tapping into student ambassador to do field marketing was essential because each hotel is specific and customized to represent the unique essence of the town each branch is located. 

Akademos

Akademos is an online book store and course material management platform that is partnered with 170+ campuses. Because the brand is online, it’s hard for them to stay connected to their partner campuses without a physical presence. As a result, they use field marketing and brand ambassadors to stay connected with their partner campuses and to ensure that students know how to get access to school textbooks via their platform. By having student ambassadors host back-to-school help tables, educate others on their university’s online bookstore, and distribute flyers on campus, Akademos is able to stay engaged with other campus communities. 

Influencer Marketing: Establishing a Digital Presence

Influencer marketing is the most mainstream form of online marketing today. As defined by Influencer Marketing Hub, influencer marketing is the collaboration between an online creator and a brand to market one of its products or services. An influencer is an individual who has the power to affect purchase decisions because of their authority. 

This strategy is so powerful because it allows brands to give a face to the brand that their audience can identify with. While this form of marketing is relatively new, the foundation is built on the principles of traditional advertising. More than anything, people trust recommendations from others. By leveraging different types of influencers to promote a product, brands can utilize word-of-mouth marketing to create hype.

There are 4 different types of influencers and can be classified by their follower count. 

• Nano influencers (1K–10K followers)
• Micro-influencers (10K–100K followers)
• Macro influencers (100K–1M followers)
• Mega or celebrity influencers (1M+ followers)

While the follower count does determine not the power an influencer has, it can inform how a brand can utilize an influencer in different strategies. Brands typically work with influencers on a short-term basis through one-offs, or on a long-term basis via campaigns or an ambassador strategy.

One-off Influencer Activations

One-off transactions are influencer collaborations that occur only one time only. This type of collaboration is best used in combination with macro-influencers to create initial hype. Through this activation, brands can focus on singular, specific events such as a sale or new product launch. They can be easier to plan, but they are less effective in the long run. 

Ex: Alix Earle Partnering w/ Benefit to Show Her Favorite Products 

 Long-term Influencer Activations (Ambassador Marketing)

Long-term influencer activations, such as ambassador marketing, are ongoing activations that last for an extended period of time. This type of strategy is best used in combination with micro-influencers such as customers, employees, and brand advocates. This strategy allows brands to activate influencers in a variety of ways in social media and field marketing for promotion. 

Ex: HWLF activating 10k ambassadors to create content

Conclusion

Ultimately,  field marketing and influencer marketing, are two powerful strategies for brands to utilize to connect with their intended audience. With the increasing need for brands to establish a tangible and digital presence, activating the right influencers is vital to represent a brand is vital. However, it is equally important for a brand to be a part of its consumers’ real-life world.  By merging these approaches, brands can maximize their marketing impact, uniting physical and digital realms for enhanced visibility and credibility.