The Influencers in Public Relations

What are influ­en­cers in pub­lic relations?

Quantifying is often chal­len­ging, espe­cially when mak­ing sense of human beha­viour. But most of us are faced with cat­egor­ising influ­en­cers in social media anyway.

While you can find dif­fer­ent types of online influ­en­cers on vari­ous plat­forms, I’ve chosen to look more closely at the media com­monly tar­geted by businesses.

Here we go:

How To Categorise Influencers in PR

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The Influencers in Public Relations

In PR, influ­en­cers are indi­vidu­als who have man­aged to grow a sub­stan­tial audi­ence, which has the poten­tial to affect a spe­cif­ic organ­isa­tion either pos­it­ively or negatively.

“Influencers in pub­lic rela­tions are emer­ging stake­hold­ers who gen­er­ate a state of opin­ion in the digit­al com­munity that sur­passes tra­di­tion­al pub­lic opin­ion.”
Source: The Role of Prosumers in the Interactive and Digital Processes of Public Relations ¹Polo, M. (2020). The Role of Prosumers in the Interactive and Digital Processes of Public Relations. 161 – 174. https://​doi​.org/​1​0​.​4​0​1​8​/​978 – 1‑7998 – 3119‑8.ch012

Establishing and main­tain­ing good rela­tion­ships with stra­tegic­ally chosen influ­en­cers for the organ­isa­tion is often crit­ic­ally important.

I recom­mend using the fol­low­ing tiers and nam­ing con­ven­tions for cat­egor­ising dif­fer­ent types of influencers:

• Nano influ­en­cer. Nano influ­en­cers are indi­vidu­als with a small yet engaged fol­low­ing, typ­ic­ally between 1,000 and 10,000 fol­low­ers (but this will vary based on both the plat­form and the niche), often focus­ing on niche interests and hav­ing a sol­id per­son­al con­nec­tion with their audience.
• Micro influ­en­cer. Micro influ­en­cers have a mod­er­ately sized audi­ence, ran­ging from 10,000 to 50,000 fol­low­ers (but this will vary based on the plat­form and the niche). They are known for their expert­ise in spe­cif­ic fields or indus­tries, lead­ing to high­er engage­ment rates and a loy­al fanbase.
• Macro influ­en­cer. Macro influ­en­cers pos­sess a more sig­ni­fic­ant fol­low­ing, usu­ally between 50,000 and 1 mil­lion fol­low­ers (but this will vary based on the plat­form and the niche). They have estab­lished them­selves as influ­en­tial fig­ures in their respect­ive fields, often col­lab­or­at­ing with brands for pro­mo­tions and partnerships.
• Mega influ­en­cer. Mega influ­en­cers are high-pro­file indi­vidu­als with over 1 mil­lion fol­low­ers (but this will vary based on the plat­form and the niche), often includ­ing celebrit­ies and pub­lic fig­ures, who have a massive reach and can shape trends and drive con­sumer beha­viour on a large scale.

Learn more: The Influencers in Public Relations

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How Influencer Ranges Vary Depending on Platform

To account for how dif­fer­ent types of cre­at­or-based plat­forms work, I use this mat­rix to cat­egor­ise social media influencers:

A few con­sid­er­a­tions for this matrix:

Different Platforms, Different Influence

On vary­ing cre­at­or-plat­form influ­ence, Mary Keane-Dawson, Group CEO of TAKUMI, writes:

“Our research showed how trust is earned over time, with con­sumers tend­ing to trust influ­en­cers on leg­acy plat­forms such as YouTube more (28%) than those on new­er plat­forms such as Instagram (22%) and TikTok (15%).

However, influ­en­cers on both YouTube and TikTok fared well when com­pared to more tra­di­tion­al brand endorse­ments. 37% of 16 – 44-year olds trust a YouTube influ­en­cer more than a high-pro­file fig­ure or celebrity. Meanwhile on TikTok, almost a quarter (23%) of the same age group agreed they trust a TikTok influencer’s recom­mend­a­tion over a friend.

And the sur­vey shows how trust is con­vert­ing into sales for brands. Over a quarter (27%) of con­sumers have been influ­enced to pur­chase a product or ser­vice by cre­at­ors on YouTube in the past six months, fol­lowed by 24% of con­sumers on Instagram and 15% on TikTok. This increases to almost a quarter (23%) of 16 – 44 year-olds on the plat­form, show­ing how dif­fer­ent demo­graph­ics inter­act dif­fer­ently with each platform.”

Influencer Marketing vs Influencer Relations

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Influencer Marketing vs Influencer Relations

There are two main types of influ­en­cer mar­ket­ing and two main types of influ­en­cer relations:

Influencer Marketing

Influencer advert­ising = the influ­en­cer will pub­lish the brand’s pre-made con­tent in their channels.

Influencer spon­sor­ship = the influ­en­cer will read a script to con­vey an offer­ing fol­low­ing the brand’s instructions.

Influencer Relations

Influencer col­lab­or­a­tion = the influ­en­cer show­cases the brand’s offer­ing by cre­at­ing con­tent sim­il­ar to the influ­en­cer­’s reg­u­lar content.

Influencer out­reach = the influ­en­cer receives invit­a­tions, demos, or exclus­ive mater­i­al without strings attached.

Advertising and spon­sor­ships are what we typ­ic­ally refer to as influ­en­cer mar­ket­ing. Collaborations and out­reach are typ­ic­ally referred to as influ­en­cer rela­tions.

Organisations look­ing to util­ise the poten­tial reach of rel­ev­ant influ­en­cers will be wise to pay atten­tion to these dis­tinc­tions. ²Silfwer, J. (2020, January 15). The Influencers in Public Relations. Doctor Spin | The PR Blog. https://​doc​tor​spin​.net/​i​n​f​l​u​e​n​c​e​r​s​-​i​n​-​p​u​b​l​i​c​-​r​e​l​a​t​i​o​ns/

Learn more: Influencer Relations Is Not Influencer Marketing

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