Latest / Influencer Confidential / No Followers? No Problem! 5 Ways to Earn on Instagram #249

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No Followers? No Problem! 5 Ways to Earn on Instagram #249 · Influencer Confidential

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Influencer Confidential by Sidewalker Daily. My name is
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  Speaker 1: Nina Zeta and I will be your host. I love
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  Speaker 1: working with brands and influencers on all things business strategy.
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  Speaker 1: Are you ready to learn what it takes to work
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  Speaker 1: in this influencer industry and see behind the curtain? Well,
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  Speaker 1: let's jump in. More and more creators are realizing quite
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  Speaker 1: quickly that they don't need a big following or following
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  Speaker 1: it all to be making money on Instagram. It's all
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  Speaker 1: about how creative are you? Right? And I think a
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  Speaker 1: big part of making money in general is mindset and confidence.
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  Speaker 1: You have people with two hundred followers that don't care,
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  Speaker 1: they're just ready for it. I have people that I've
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  Speaker 1: seen that literally have one hundred and fifty thousand followers
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  Speaker 1: and they still don't know how to monetize. And then,
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  Speaker 1: like I said, the girl with two hundred followers that
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  Speaker 1: is like, I'm gonna go ahead and do it. So
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  Speaker 1: I recently read an article on Forbes that Unilever's CEO
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  Speaker 1: is allocating over fifty percent of their marketing budget towards
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  Speaker 1: social and they're twenty xing their influencer spend. And I
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  Speaker 1: think a big part of what I learned in this
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  Speaker 1: article was that they're going all in on social because
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  Speaker 1: even from an ads perspective, right, like all these companies
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  Speaker 1: are running ads, they don't want ads that feel like ads.
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  Speaker 1: They want it to feel creator made, not brand made.
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  Speaker 1: And that's why UGC is first up on the list
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  Speaker 1: today about monetizing without followers. This is something that when
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  Speaker 1: you think about and you don't overcomplicate it, it makes
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  Speaker 1: total sense. Think about all the content brands need on
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  Speaker 1: a daily basis, right, they need content for their ads,
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  Speaker 1: for their website, for their social I mean, businesses need content.
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  Speaker 1: Businesses in twenty twenty five cannot run without content. And
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  Speaker 1: I think the big mindset block here is that a
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  Speaker 1: lot of creators feel like, well, I'm just getting started.
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  Speaker 1: My content isn't good. It doesn't have to be good
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  Speaker 1: by the terms of being polished and overproduced. You know,
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  Speaker 1: if you have a handheld device a phone, which I'm
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  Speaker 1: assuming you do, then are probably able to create some
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  Speaker 1: content for the brands that you are looking to work with. Now,
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  Speaker 1: something I also think is really really important. When I
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  Speaker 1: say the word brands, everyone tends to think about these
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  Speaker 1: big box office brands. I want to work with Nike
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  Speaker 1: and Lululemon. What about you know, the local plumber down
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  Speaker 1: the street that needs content for his Instagram or what
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  Speaker 1: about the local business that is looking to create you know,
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  Speaker 1: social media style content. Right. So, if you are active
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  Speaker 1: on Instagram and you understand the platform, and you're going
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  Speaker 1: and pitching UGC to these smaller businesses, that's not a
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  Speaker 1: follower thing. They don't care if you have followers. They
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  Speaker 1: care if you can shoot content for them, right, And
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  Speaker 1: I think the quicker creators start to accept mindset and
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  Speaker 1: confidence over everything. The Quicker You're going to go out
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  Speaker 1: and reach out to these businesses. Now, if you want
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  Speaker 1: to know what to say when these brands do reach out,
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  Speaker 1: you want to pivot those conversations into paid conversations, even
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  Speaker 1: if it's not your dream brand. I have a free training.
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  Speaker 1: It is on demand now, so you guys can go
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  Speaker 1: ahead and watch it literally right now. It's not an
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  Speaker 1: hour long, it's free. You're gonna learn and I'm gonna
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  Speaker 1: share with you what to say how to respond to
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  Speaker 1: those types of pitches. So, if you are serious about
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  Speaker 1: working with brands, go ahead and check out our how
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  Speaker 1: to land paid brand deals on demand training there are
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  Speaker 1: affiliate programs out there that do not care about your
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  Speaker 1: following size. Now, there are some, right, like when we
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  Speaker 1: think about the Amazon affiliate, they won't tell us exactly
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  Speaker 1: what that follower a count is. They want you to
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  Speaker 1: have a meaningful following, But for example, the Walmart Creator program,
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  Speaker 1: there's not a follower size for that, right. So we're
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  Speaker 1: seeing creators again, especially people that are jumping on Instagram
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  Speaker 1: and are quite new. You know, they're starting off with
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  Speaker 1: affiliate links that they're able to participate in like Walmart's
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  Speaker 1: Creator program and share those links. Now, are they, you know,
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  Speaker 1: making a significant income rolling in it? Probably not in
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  Speaker 1: the beginning, but as you start to grow, your audience
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  Speaker 1: will learn that you provide this type of links and
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  Speaker 1: they will come to you for it. Right, It's almost
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  Speaker 1: like training them. Something else that I think is really
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  Speaker 1: important is to also understand that sometimes smaller accounts have
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  Speaker 1: higher engagement. The bigger you get, the more that engagement
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  Speaker 1: drops off. Right. It's almost like people think, oh, well,
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  Speaker 1: she doesn't need my like or she doesn't need my engagement. Right,
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  Speaker 1: But when you're smaller, people are rooting for you. People
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  Speaker 1: are cheering for you, So there is a higher level
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  Speaker 1: of engagement when you are first starting and when you're
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  Speaker 1: you know, quite smaller, that actually helps you leverage your
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  Speaker 1: affiliate possibilities. Now, when we think of monetization, Instagram gave
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  Speaker 1: us subscriptions. Okay, Instagram gave us subscriptions which basically allowed
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  Speaker 1: people to have like gated content that you had to
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  Speaker 1: pay to see. What's interesting about this. I had some
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  Speaker 1: influencers try this and they gave up right because they realize,
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  Speaker 1: wait a second, this takes time. You know, this takes
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  Speaker 1: time to decide what's gated, what's what's for everyone, and
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  Speaker 1: what's something that I'm going to charge for. And I
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  Speaker 1: did see a lot of creators kind of get excited
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  Speaker 1: about subscriptions and then fall off. But there have been
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  Speaker 1: creators that I talk to in my program that have
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  Speaker 1: been steady course with subscriptions and slowly building it and
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  Speaker 1: building it and building it and not giving up. And
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  Speaker 1: I think just in general, when you look at monetization,
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  Speaker 1: there's no get rich quick, there's no like, hey, go
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  Speaker 1: ahead and just do something for a few weeks, days, months,
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  Speaker 1: and it's gonna work. Right. The creators that I have
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  Speaker 1: seen that have done well in subscriptions is because they
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  Speaker 1: have you know, been in it for the long haul
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  Speaker 1: and the long game. What's interesting about subscriptions on Instagram
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  Speaker 1: is that, again, you don't need a massive following to
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  Speaker 1: be able to show subscriber only content. So I'll give
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  Speaker 1: you an example. You know, we followed this singing coach.
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  Speaker 1: My daughter is a singer and she likes to follow
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  Speaker 1: her singing content. There's content that is you know, given
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  Speaker 1: for free, but the students of this coach they pay
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  Speaker 1: you know, a monthly fee. They're also going to be
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  Speaker 1: able to get subscriber only stuff. And when you look
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  Speaker 1: to someone as an expert, or you look to someone
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  Speaker 1: that you're really looking to learn from, people are gonna pay. Now.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe from an influence her perspective, people may not want
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  Speaker 1: to pay to see like behind the scenes of your life.
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  Speaker 1: Maybe they do. There's some influencers that have that tug.
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  Speaker 1: I know there's people I follow that I would probably
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  Speaker 1: pay to see, you know, things that maybe they wouldn't
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  Speaker 1: share with everyone else. And from a strategy perspective, I
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  Speaker 1: think this also gives influencers a little bit of a
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  Speaker 1: leeway of what type of content they compose and what
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  Speaker 1: type of content they can keep for themselves or charge
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  Speaker 1: a premium to. Right. So that's something I talk about
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  Speaker 1: a lot with our influencers. You don't have to share everything.
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  Speaker 1: You can decide what you want to share. You know,
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  Speaker 1: I think about my personal account. I don't share my kids.
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  Speaker 1: I don't share my husband, I don't share my mom,
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  Speaker 1: my dad, none of that. Right. But let's just say
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  Speaker 1: there was a world that I did want to let
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  Speaker 1: people in. Maybe that's something that's for my subscribers only,
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  Speaker 1: or some sort of subscription based you know, community. And
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  Speaker 1: again that's something that's a strategic decision that you can make,
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  Speaker 1: but it's not follower dependent. Especially let's just say I
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  Speaker 1: think about like from a fundraising perspective, this is where
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  Speaker 1: people got to get creative in order to see the return. Now,
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  Speaker 1: a lot of people on in Instagram are going to
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  Speaker 1: try to pick your brain or ask you questions, especially
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  Speaker 1: as you start to produce helpful, useful content. I see
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  Speaker 1: this a lot with my travel creators. People will send
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  Speaker 1: them in the DM oh, well where did you say
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  Speaker 1: or where did you go? Or how did I do that?
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  Speaker 1: You know all that stuff. Now, you, as a business
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  Speaker 1: owner will then have to make a decision. You know,
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  Speaker 1: are you going to charge for your time? Are you
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  Speaker 1: going to create like a PDF, a sellable course, a
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  Speaker 1: sellable link, something that's like, hey, you want this information,
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  Speaker 1: here's a link, go purchase. Are you willing to give
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  Speaker 1: it to for free for your audience? Right? These are
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  Speaker 1: all micro decisions that you can make. You don't have
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  Speaker 1: to give it for free. You don't have to have
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  Speaker 1: an educational free blog post. You could say, hey, this
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  Speaker 1: is my knowledge that I have required and there's a
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  Speaker 1: fee for that. Again, that's not a follower type, you know,
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  Speaker 1: activation that just requires you thinking on your feet. I've
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  Speaker 1: also seen creators do this with brands and their followers
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  Speaker 1: when they're starting. You know, brands have questions or someone
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  Speaker 1: has a question. Okay, well here's a pick my brain slot, right,
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  Speaker 1: and I charge hourly for that or charging thirty minutes
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  Speaker 1: for them. Sometimes creators are like, but why would anyone
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  Speaker 1: pay me? Why wouldn't they if they have questions and
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  Speaker 1: they want to get them answered. Unless you're a charity,
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  Speaker 1: there's going to be a fee behind it. So it's
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  Speaker 1: also something for you guys to consider when you are
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  Speaker 1: thinking about how do you want to present in the world.
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  Speaker 1: You know, I have some people who say give for free,
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  Speaker 1: give value, you know, put yourself out there, help people
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  Speaker 1: and then they'll come to you. That's totally one way
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  Speaker 1: of doing it. I also have another girl that says,
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  Speaker 1: I don't do anything for free, like, if you need
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  Speaker 1: me or you want me, you gotta pay. Again, these
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  Speaker 1: are business decisions. But when you think about Instagram and
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  Speaker 1: you think about selling direct, whether it's a pick your
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  Speaker 1: brain slot, a consulting slot, a sellable course, you know,
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  Speaker 1: a PDF, whatever, a zoom call a group, zoom call
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  Speaker 1: a workshop, you can put a price tag behind these things.
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  Speaker 1: You don't have to wait for permission or you don't
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  Speaker 1: have to do it for free to get experience. There's
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  Speaker 1: an old school mentality that you got to do things
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  Speaker 1: for free to get prepared. You don't have to do that.
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  Speaker 1: You can charge from the first day. Whether people or
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  Speaker 1: pay well or not, that's a whole different question. But you,
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  Speaker 1: as a business owner, you can make those decisions, and
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  Speaker 1: you can do those tests, and you can try it
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  Speaker 1: out for yourself and see what works and what doesn't. Now,
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  Speaker 1: the last thing I want to share with you regarding
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  Speaker 1: sponsorships on Instagram, people be like, well, I can't do
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  Speaker 1: a sponsored post. I don't have followers. If someone comes
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  Speaker 1: to you looking for a promotion across promotion, they're looking
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  Speaker 1: for you to do something, you can put a price tag.
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  Speaker 1: I don't care what your follower count is. Now you
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  Speaker 1: may not be in a position to go actively pitch
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  Speaker 1: for that. But if someone comes to you they're like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: I love your page, or a family friend or someone
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  Speaker 1: wants to do that, you can charge. You don't have
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  Speaker 1: to wait to hit a follower mark or a benchmark
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  Speaker 1: in order to do that. Okay. So, while I don't
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  Speaker 1: want to say, hey, go pitch if you have five
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  Speaker 1: hundred followers, when it comes to influence, you can pitch
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  Speaker 1: five hundred fowers for UGC brand deals. But when it
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  Speaker 1: comes to influence, if someone comes to you, it's fair game.
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  Speaker 1: So food for thought. You know, don't limit yourself by
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  Speaker 1: your follower account, don't limit yourself by your engagement. If
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  Speaker 1: there's a demand, you can supply that service for whoever
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  Speaker 1: comes through your way. I hope you enjoyed today's episode.
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  Speaker 1: If you did, make sure to rate, review, and subscribe
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  Speaker 1: to our show and visit Sidewalkerdaily dot com for more
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  Speaker 1: resources on all things influencer marketing and social media until
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  Speaker 1: next time.