As more and more brands jump into influencer marketing, the higher the chances that competing brands will be knocking on one influencer’s door.

This raises the question of whether we should even recruit influencers who have worked with our direct competitors.

Most marketers we’ve spoken to tell us they don’t mind. As long as:

• the product category allows it

• the specific product doesn’t conflict with yours (Like, you’re not both promoting a face mask enriched with snail goo)

• and the collaboration isn’t ongoing and/or long-term

So, when is it a bad idea to work with influencers who have worked with competing brands? 👇

It’s a no…when exclusivity is the norm in your product category

In some product categories, it’s weird if an influencer only uses one brand at a time. Think clothes, accessories, makeup, and other fast-moving consumer goods. In these cases, it actually is real for an influencer to be sponsored by H&M on Monday and Zara on Wednesday. 

That’s how consumers shop for clothes.

In other product categories, it’s weird if an influencer uses two products from different brands at the same time. Think coffee machines, TVs, mattresses, or cars. The audience's ears would perk up if an influencer showed off Sonos speakers on a Friday and Bang & Olufsen speakers on a Sunday. 

If you sell a high-ticket product designed for long-term use, you don’t want a creator to promote your product today and a competitor’s product tomorrow. The audience wouldn’t trust the influencer, and your partnership would lack both credibility and authenticity.

Take Deeper Sonars. Their flagship product is a portable sonar for anglers. It’d smell fishy if an influencer used two sonars simultaneously. 

For this reason, Head of Partnerships Valeriia Chemerys, asks for exclusivity for the entire duration of the relationship:

Anglers aren’t the only ones who can sniff out these bad-faith partnerships. 

Don’t do it…when an influencer is a long-term partner or brand ambassador of a competing brand

You also want to avoid creators who are currently brand ambassadors or in long-term partnerships with your competitors. They may have non-competes or exclusivity deals, so you couldn’t work with them even if you wanted to.

Even if they’re not exclusive, a long-term partnership means that the creator's audience strongly associates the creator with the competing brand. Again, you and the creator both risk coming across as entirely inauthentic.

It’s smarter to wait until some time has passed. The contract with the competing brand has ended, and the audience's associations have weakened. Then, it’s your time to strike.

Until then, be patient. There are many other creators you can work with.

Having said that, it can be really powerful if you have a superior product and can convince the creator of that. And if you can revolve the post around how the influencer prefers your product today? Even better.

Take, for instance, makeup artist Genevieve Turley. In September, she tried a pair of fake eyelashes from Ardell Beauty. It…didn’t go well. 

Flash forward a few weeks, and a competing brand —Bonded—gifted Genevieve their lashes. She even starts this video by saying, “Remember my lash fiasco…” And then continues to show how easily this pair goes on.

If you can tell a story like this with your product and the same creator your competitors used? Super powerful.

Nope out…when the audience doesn’t respond well

Like I said, most influencer marketers don’t mind if a creator has previously worked with a competing brand. This can be a positive signal that the influencer has an audience of potential customers and knows your space pretty well. Which is important in some niches.

If your competitor thought they were a good fit, it stands to reason that they’ll be a good fit for you, right? 

Not so fast. 

You want to check the performance of that collaboration. What if the audience didn’t respond well to the competitor’s collaboration? Have you read the comments? Did the piece of content perform unusually poorly? This can be a red flag that the audience wasn’t right.  

Dig into those audience demographics, analyze the post, and check the comments. This will give you a good working theory of why the collaboration didn’t work. If you decide the audience fit is actually wrong, you can safely skip working with this creator. 

Or, you’ll decide that the audience is perfect, but the content isn’t good enough. In this case, you can recruit the creator and have a good example of what type of content won’t work. 

What’s everyone else doing?

When vetting influencers, all but one influencer marketer in our survey said they always check to see if an influencer has worked with competitors. For a large majority (62%), it wasn't a big deal if they had.

If your product category allows, the audience is a good fit, and the influencer isn’t a long-term partner or brand ambassador, go for it. Everyone else is doing it.

Iconic #Sponcon

Modash’s product designer sent me this paid partnership between Winston Da Ween and Pet Supplies Plus. 

This is the fourth year that Pet Supplies Plus has worked with Winston to help him find his Halloween costume. With 400K+ views, 647 comments, and close to 10K shares and saves, I guess the takeaway is that if you have a winner (or wiener, in this case), hold on to them. 

Send examples of iconic sponcon to me at [email protected]. Bonus points if you’ve worked on it. 

See you in the next issue of ROI!
Eleni Zoe xx
Marketing @ Modash. Say hi on LinkedIn or visit Modash.

📌A NOTE ABOUT WHAT YOU JUST READ

The tips in this newsletter might not be right for your specific case. Use good judgment when deciding whether to take advice from the internet—even mine. My team and I survey & interview influencer marketers whose advice and observations come from their direct experience. ROI is meant for you to connect the dots and be inspired or challenged to think about your influencer marketing in a way you haven’t before.