Basic ROI influencer marketing:

• “Reach” — how many people have seen your post;

Reach can be calculated on YouTube by the # of views as shown here:

On Instagram, calculating reach is difficult as not all people who follow the influencer will see every single piece of content. With platforms like Instagram, we recommend to focus on engagement (below).

• “Engagement” — how many people have ‘liked’ your post;

  

The easy formula goes like this:

# of engaged users (Likes + Comments) ÷ total #of followers x 100 = % rate.

An average influencer will have an engagement rate of 1–4%.

• “Sentiment” — how many people have commented on your post and left positive sentiment or negative sentiment on your post.

You can analyze sentiment based on comments followers of the influencers leave, you can see if they are generic, fake, positive or negative. Be wary of negative comments/sentiment as some of these bots can target any influencer and leave these comments.

Read how to spot fake influencers.

Advanced ROI influencer marketing:

• “Affiliate” — how many people have purchased a product with a unique tracking code;

Seen as a more passive version of using direct sales with influencers, measuring your ROI through affiliate sales means that the influencer has a passive mention link of your product/e-commerce page in their post. If one of their followers clicks though and makes a purchase, the influencer will cash in a small fee. This is often less than a direct sales approach which gives the customers a larger discount for a limited time or event and the influencer will receive a larger cut of the sale.

• “Content Repurpose” — when you repurpose influencer content (created for your brand) as part of a Facebook/Instagram paid ads campaign;

 

Influencers create beautiful content: video, images, gifs…the creative possibilities are truly endless. This is where influencer marketing is set to soar.

Brands like Felix Gray saw the power of influencer marketing content and took the top performing influencers content and launched them into a Facebook/Instagram ads. This further reinforces their influencer marketing loop and when paired with affiliate, delivers powerful results.

• “Direct Sales” — how many direct purchases are made via the influencer, tracked by unique coupon/discount codes during a limited or on going time frame.

  

Daniel Wellington is known as a pioneer in the early days of utilizing influencer marketing by using coupon codes. He had already an ambassador program of 100,000 influencers across the world by the year 2016 and that scale and experience allowed his program to be more successful.