Over 80% of consumers are open to influencers impacting purchase decisions; however, running a successful influencer marketing campaign requires time, strategy, and expert knowledge.
Most teams will either take influencer marketing in-house or work with an agency. But which is the right option for your business?
Here’s a rundown of what each option looks like, and our recommendation for the best way to supercharge your influencer marketing program.
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Agency Versus In-House: Understanding Each Option
Working with an influencer marketing agency means outsourcing influencer marketing to a third-party team. Even when working with an agency, you need someone internal who manages the relationship; this can mean hiring a dedicated individual or adding this responsibility to an existing team member’s to-do list.
In-house influencer marketing involves running your campaigns with an internal team. This in-house team owns the end-to-end project lifecycle, from strategy through launch.
Whether agency or in-house, technology plays a key role. For example, either an agency or in-house team might use a platform like Later Influence to help them source influencers, manage their campaigns, and report on analytics.
The Pros And Cons Of Working With An Influencer Marketing Agency
Here are some pros of working with an influencer marketing agency.
You can leverage their experience: Influencer marketing agency teams typically know how to start and scale an influencer program.
You can use their subject matter expertise to help with problems: Agencies often have highly skilled and knowledgeable staff members who can jump on calls to help clients work through difficult strategic problems.
You can leverage pre-existing relationships: Many agencies have long-standing relationships with high-quality creators; they use those connections to help your campaigns get great results.
Here are a few cons you need to manage with an influencer agency.
High costs: Agencies charge high retainers and have minimum contract periods. Further, adding new tasks or changes usually results in additional charges.
Scoping and timeline difficulties: Agencies have their own hours, cultural norms, and employee expectations. That might mean their working structures and turnaround timelines don’t match your needs. Many agencies will provide flexibility, but that could result in them asking to re-scope (and re-price) the engagement.
They dictate creator relationships: If you leverage an agency’s influencer relationships, you may not be able to work with these creators unless you go through the agency; this can hinder creativity and result in risky strategic pivots if you choose to part ways.
The Pros And Cons Of Taking Influencer Marketing In-House
When you take your influencer marketing in-house, you gain a lot of benefits that impact your campaigns.
It’s more cost-effective: An in-house employee using an influencer marketing platform can cost less than an agency retainer.
You have control over campaigns: Taking influencer marketing in-house means you benefit from all the learnings that come from campaign management; this helps you run campaigns that are more aligned with your business’ goals.
Develop your own relationships: When you take influencer marketing in-house, you don’t have to worry about losing creators if an agency relationship stops.
You can pivot and scale quickly: If you’re working with an agency, any change might require a re-scope (and a re-price). With an in-house program, you can shift priorities as often as you need, making it easier to jump into trends, address issues, and drive success.
You see the whole picture: In-house influencer marketing means you see the entire end-to-end process. And when you use a tool like Later Influence, you get full-funnel influencer campaign analytics updated daily—no waiting for a monthly report from the agency.
Employing an in-house influencer marketing team also has some cons; here’s what to watch out for.
Finding the right platform: There are dozens of influencer marketing platforms out there. That means your internal team will have to make a case to get a budget for the right platform and you’ll need to find the best influencer marketing platform for your needs.
Building the right experience: Choosing to in-house your influencer marketing without a professional partner can lead to situations where your team doesn’t have the relevant experience to solve a problem.
Accessing subject matter experts when you need them: If you don’t build a network of experts, you might miss out on understanding a valuable trend or tactic.
The best in-house influencer marketing platform is one where you can not just source influencers and manage campaigns, but also access subject matter experts on-demand.
Later Influence provides all that and more in a single, easy-to-use platform.
Get the Best of Both Worlds With an Influencer Marketing Platform
There’s some good news: you don’t have to choose one or the other when it comes to agency versus in-house influencer marketing.
Here’s how it works: Start with an in-house base, and a stellar influencer marketing platform, then partner with a professional team to help round out your needs and support your team.
Here are three tips to make this hybrid method a success.
#1: Think Like An Agency To Build Your In-House Team
As you think about resourcing your in-house team, think like an agency! That means having three core skill sets:
Strategy owner: This person owns the big-picture plans based on business needs.
Project manager: This person manages the actual campaigns based on the strategy.
Relationship manager: This person connects—and maintains relationships with—influencers.
It’s important to note this does not need to be three full-time employees; you can mix these skills in a single role or have multiple team members take on parts of these roles.
This is called taking a jobs-to-be-done approach. You plan what the team needs to accomplish and prioritize those tasks.
If you need a dedicated team member, you can hire these roles (starting with an Influencer Marketing Manager) before dipping your toe into influencer marketing.
But if you’re pulling from your existing team, the key is to give that person (or those people) the right influencer marketing resources so they can pick up all the necessary skills.
#2: Empower Your Team With The Right Technology
With the right influencer marketing platform, you can enable your marketing team to execute high-quality, successful influencer marketing campaigns.
While most influencer marketing platforms only help with particular jobs, Later Influence supports the full influencer marketing funnel, including:
Sourcing influencers through a database of over 10M+ creators.
Campaign management features that make it easy to do everything from contacting creators to approving content to distributing payments after the campaign is done.
Generating business impact data like earned media value and return on investment to easily prove your campaigns’ impact to key company stakeholders.
Full-funnel influencer analytics allow you to see what works and what needs to change in real time.
When you have everything in a single place, it’s easy for everyone to grasp the basics and build from there.
#3: Have A Professional Services Partner You Can Lean On
Here’s the “best of both worlds” part!
Working in-house doesn’t mean you can’t have outside help. Sometimes, for instance, you need niche expertise for a smaller scope, so hiring in-house doesn’t make sense.
That’s where third-party services are valuable.
Working with Later’s Influencer Marketing Services team empowers you with the level of involvement that makes sense for your team.
Our award-winning team helps with components such as:
Influencer discovery: Our in-house experts guide your team to help you find the perfect creators for your campaigns.
Campaign management: Later’s team can help you run the whole program from start to finish, or jump in when you need a second set of eyes on a certain campaign component.
Data-driven influencer marketing: No matter what role the Service team plays in your campaigns, you will always have access to the Later Influence platform to see real-time analytics and track campaign progress.
The key difference is Later’s team is a professional partner, not an outsourced agency team. You always have full visibility while contributing as much or as little as you want to the strategy. The result is more impactful campaigns from day one and capacity building within your in-house team.
Scale Your Influencer Marketing with Later Influence
Building up your influencer marketing muscle in-house is a powerful way to grow your brand.
It not only gives you more control over your relationships and strategy, but you can pivot to business needs rather than agency retainers.
The key is to have the right tool that powers end-to-end influencer marketing—and provides niche expert services when you need them.
In particular, you need pricing plans that make sense for your needs, empowering flexibility for DIY, supported, and managed services options.
Rather than signing a lengthy minimum contract retainer with an agency, you can pick the plan that works for your team. And as you grow, the plan can change when you need it.
Book a demo of Later Influence today to learn more about how it can help you supercharge your in-house influencer marketing.
