How to Promote Your POD Products with Influencers?

Before, there were simple marketing principles such as concept, strategy, creation, and implementation. Nevertheless, with such an approach, there were constant difficulties finding suppliers and sellers, implementing high-quality advertising, and promoting products. With technological development, demand has grown, and consumer habits have changed. In general, marketing began to change: people buy not goods or services. They come to sellers for emotions, attitude, and history. They believe in the magic of a product made especially for them.

Due to the variety and lack of advertising, buyers can overlook or ignore decent products. The constant advertising influence awakens a sense of rejection in the modern user. It filters out informative "noise", increasingly resorting to ad blockers, refraining using social networks or even any electronic media. For brands, such measures mean a decrease in conversions.

Effective marketing requires smart solutions for each segment of the target audience. So, today influencer marketing is the leading strategy for attracting potential buyers. According to Tomoson's research, it generates $6.50 in profit for every dollar spent. This rule also applies in POD business. Potential clients can ignore even the greatest product if opinion leaders don't start talking about it. Read on to know how to get influencers to wear your clothes.

Table of contents

Let's define what is the influencer marketing

Key influencer marketing trends

How and where do you find influencers?

Conclusion

Let's define what is the influencer marketing

So, influencer marketing is a form of brand promotion on social media that includes covert advertising of commercial products or services by bloggers. Such a person or group of people have a large audience influenced by them.

Non-aggressive ads can hide behind recommendations, unobtrusive communication, or the use of things in everyday life. For example, for a print on demand clothing ad aimed at the millennial generation, traditional marketing will be ineffective. Based on statistics, only 1% of people of this age trust advertising. About 91% of consumers trust reviews before buying. Online product reviews influenced 93% of people before they decided to purchase them. Bloggers build a brand's online reputation, increase brand awareness, and drive sales. Their reviews make a potential consumer familiar with the use of the product.

There are several basic types of influencer campaigns.

Affiliate Marketing

The opinion leaders talk about themselves and make recommendations by introducing information about the partner into the story. At the same time, short branded links increase awareness and trust.

Promo codes

What do consumers love the most? Discounts on goods, of course. Discount coupons are easy to place as graphic elements in video and audio files.

Practical jokes

To increase awareness, you need to create excitement. Unboxing a print on demand product on Instagram or YouTube will help to gain attention. For the product to arouse desire, create the illusion of a struggle for it; in other words, arrange a competition.

Of course, investing in other people's brand promotion can seem like a true gamble. The truth is that before taking such a crucial step, test the channel of influence and its viability. And the first thing you should do is decide on a goal. What do you want: increase brand awareness, attract new customers, or promote repeat sales of products? Each of these purposes includes a series of blogger actions.

Compare the results of your marketing campaign with the metric obtained from the blogger's work. Successful promotion of print on demand stores is directly related to a relevant leader who fully meets potential buyers' needs. After all, they'll push the audience to think about the importance of buying a product.

Key influencer marketing trends

New social networks emerge every year. Their content directly depends on the user audience. Also, the type of interaction between potential customers and the brand is changing. Influencers should always be up to date to promote your product effectively.

By 2022, the influencer industry will have a turnover of about $15 billion. Thus, now it's necessary to think about increasing the budget for opinion leaders' services. But what can you expect in marketing this year?

The growing popularity of micro-influencers

Depending on the subscribers' number, there are four main types of bloggers. Audience reach ranges from a minimum of 1,000 to 100,000 subscribers of nano- and micro-influencers. They tend to have a high level of engagement. As brand ambassadors, their recommendations are truthful and valuable. They are the ones who forge close bonds with their followers.

Long term partnership

To capitalize on this trend, entrepreneurs need to create a package of sponsored publications for a specific time frame. That is profitable because a one-off project won't attract a lot of sales. Moreover, usually before buying a person spends some time in thought. A series of consistent advertisements from affiliate companies will push him to make choices faster.

The emergence of new social networks

Last year, the simple TikTok concept exploded the world's social network ratings with 18% of global penetration. This audience is between the ages of 16 and 64. It became possible to place ads in 15-second videos, which naturally influenced the increase in brand conversions.

In Clubhouse and Reels, there are solely voice messages and invitations only. The technology of brand promotion in them has changed cardinally. The sample of users significantly weeded out audiences that could be attracted using more traditional methods.

Niche specialization

Bloggers choose the niche they know best. Continuing to accumulate their experience, they'll become demanded by certain brands. Top companies will choose such a promotion strategy. After all, the industry vertical of work on a project is effective, as it can significantly increase conversion.

Authenticity and honesty

Recently, the content has become more authentic. That means the blogger must be confident in the info product, which will resonate with the audience. For instance, the constant print on demand clothing advertising in the electronics channel will drive subscribers mad.

Genuine admiration for the product will become helpful and increase the number of clicks and sales. Instead of a regular advertisement, it's better to make a brand Q&A presentation and show how to use a particular product. The honesty of the manufacturer and influencer is above all.

How and where do you find influencers?

One of the most important questions about working with influencers is how to get them to promote your product. If you aren't an active social network user and don't know which of the bloggers is the best in your niche, you should do some research. Marketers use several tools for different target audiences. For example, if teenagers wear your brand, consider Snapchat, Instagram, or Youtube. Those who are older will choose Facebook. If you're focusing on B2B trading, then Clubhouse is the perfect solution. 

Tools to find influencers to promote the product on social media:

• Upfluence is an application supported by artificial intelligence. It provides content analysis, shows the level of engagement.
• AspireIQ. It helps to find people who share similar values with your brand.
• HypeAuditor. This program defines bloggers by the quality of their subscribers. It collects data from various sources and organizes them.
• Influence.co. This program is a kind of social network that allows you to find and maintain long-term partnerships.

If you sell POD clothing, then part of your target audience is bound to be YouTube fans. Here are several merch companies for YouTubers also supported by the YouTube Merch Shelf.

• Design By Humans and Teespring. These programs will allow you to sell branded items in a kind of fan shop. The former specializes in the sale of T-shirts and sweatshirts. There are also accessories and even art objects. The shelf of Teespring products under the video will surely interest the blogger's subscribers. For the partner, it'll be a profitable investment.
• Juniper is a platform for advanced users. It allows you to find unique, customized products.
• Crowdmade is ideal for growing your POD business. Many highly demanded products you can sell on the platform.

Conclusion

Restless events that changed people marked 2020. Priorities, demand, and habits have changed abruptly. They became a spurt to create fundamentally new marketing. Brand promotion on social media has become an integral part of the strategy. Its future has come now. 2023 will be a year of trends and experiments for influencers as well as entrepreneurs themselves. There is still a lot of work to be done!