You can also watch this interview on my Youtube Channel

*PS. Below you will find an auto-generated transcript of this episode.

Arek Dvornechuck: Hey, what's up branding experts. Arek here at Ebaqdesign. Welcome to On Branding Podcast, and today our guest is Tomer Hen, who is the founder and the CEO of Mobco Media. So Tomer is a serial entrepreneur with over a decade of experience in digital marketing industry. So, his clients include the leading Fortune 500 brands like Amazon, Audible, and MasterCard, just to name a few. And Tomer has been recognized by Forbes as one of the 30 promising entrepreneurs under 30. So basically, Tomer works with e-commerce brands, helping them grow their brands by developing authentic relationships with influencers. And this is what we are going to talk about on today's podcast, influencer marketing, and particularly how to work with micro influencers. So that you are able to market your brand without having to spend a fortune on those shoutouts. Hello Tomer thanks for joining us today.

Tomer Hen: Yeah. Thanks, Arek for having me. That's pretty exciting to be here.

Arek Dvornechuck: Thank you so much. So, maybe we should start with some basics. So, can you just define for our listeners for those who don't know What's the difference between micro influencer marketing? How it differs from regular influencer marketing.

Tomer Hen: Yeah, I think that there's so much noise out there when it comes to influencer marketing relationships, micro, macro, seeding, gifting, all of that and I get this question a lot, but I think the basics of what I want to emphasize is that eventually we don't use influencer marketing. We build relationships with people because it's very easy for us to forget as brand founders or marketers, that those influencers are eventually, they're just normal people who have some influence over your audience, and if you can build and nurture those relationships with them, you can get, or you can tap into their audience or borrow some of their influence on their audience so they can talk about your product and then drive more revenue, customers and sales over to your brand or store or service, whatever. And so, this is just one way to define. So, when we think from that lens, There's not much difference between micro influencer marketing to macro influencer. Obviously, there are some different tactics that you can use and business models, but the basics of building relationships with other human beings it doesn't change whether you speak to someone with 20,000 followers or 2 million followers. Now, just the definition, there's no like official definitions for that.

But when we talk about micro influencers, we usually talk about influencers who have a relatably, low number of followers, usually below a hundred thousand followers. Many people define it below 10,000 followers. So, it really depends. We're mostly talking about working with a big number of influencers. I think this is the biggest difference when we compare macro influencers or celebrities you can't work with 20 or 200 influencers who have over a hundred million followers, but you can work with a thousand influencers who have 50,000 followers, and this is the biggest differentiator between both of these tactics, but eventually, if a brand remembers that a relationship is a relationship, they will win. Either if they work with a 20 million follower influencer or 20,000 follower influencers.

Arek Dvornechuck: So that's an important distinction. It's very costly basically, it comes down to, the money you spent on those shutouts, right? Obviously micro influencers, there are ways to go about that, which we're gonna talk about today. And we can basically start building those relationships, as you mentioned. It's all about those relationships. It all comes down to the basics, right? These are all people; they have influence over their audience. And usually they have smaller audience, but, because they have smaller audience, they're not going to be as expensive and they have probably no more authentic relationship with their audience because they have smaller audience. So, let's talk about the process. Can you help us just figure out what would be the typical process of figuring out. How to, you know, find those influencers, how to find those people who have 5,000, 50,000 followers. And let's say we have a brand we sell some products, right? B2C brand. We sell some products. And what's the typical process of figuring out, creating this list of those influencers and reaching out to them?

Tomer Hen: So, I think. The real question that you're probably asking, and it will provide more insight and value besides the technical aspects of how to find them. I will be happy to provide a link to a short YouTube video that I made on step-by-step process and how to find those influencers with free platforms, you don't have to pay any platform for it. But I would like to provide some more insights on how do we choose the influencers. So, consider that you know how to technically find them and you can find it on the video. The important part is how you filter them and how you choose who you wanna work with and engage and, who you don't. So first obviously is the follower account. I would say that if you are. Targeting micro influencers. Anyone with over probably two to 3000 followers and above could work well for you. I would advise if you are looking for a micro influencer strategy and you are not looking to pay for shout outs, and there's a strategy where you can work with many micro influencers without paying them anything except sending a free product of your brand. So, anything between probably two or 5,000 followers to a hundred thousand followers could do. If you could choose up to 80, that will even work better. The other part that you need to look at is their engagement. Many people know that they can make money as content creators and influencers, so they just buy followers. They buy likes. And it's very easy to buy followers and likes. What's harder to find or harder to buy is comments. So, my hack is to look at comments or the number of comments that this influencer gets on every post. And if you see an abnormal, if you see two comments and they've got a hundred thousand followers, And 5,000, like only two comments. That doesn't make sense. But if you see a healthy number of comments on their post, not necessarily the likes, but the comments, you know that their profile is genuine and also that their audience is pretty engaged. The other part that I would look at is for influencers who actually post content about products they use.

We see a lot of those morning routines or night routines or Product reviews or unboxing or day in my life kind of videos. So, if you see that they create a lot of that content, you know that if you reach out to them and you ask them, you offer to send them a free product. If they like it, they will most likely post about it because they're always looking for more content like that. That's their type of content. But many times, you see an influencer with great following count and great engagement, but all they do is promote their business or them promote they coaching service or they promote whatever, and they never talk about their personal life. They never talk about products they use, et cetera. So, these are influencers that most likely, unless you pay them a healthy amount of money, they would not post about your product and it's just gonna be a waste of time and money. The other thing that I would consider is obviously their fit of their content and their audience to your audience. If you find that they create content that is very engaging, but it just doesn't speak to your audience. It wouldn't make sense to work with them. It could be nice, but it wouldn't be nearly as effective of working with someone who speaks directly to your person. Even if that means that this person has way less followers than the other person, they are most likely have more influence over their audience because we need to remember that likes and followers doesn't equal influence.

It means that they have nice content, but when they really know who you're talking to and they're very targeted, they will also influence them to buy, and this is what you really care about. You don't care about engagement; you really care about people buying your product.

Arek Dvornechuck: No, that's a great point. I have some notes I have some takeaways for you guys who are listening. Basically, Tomer explained on that, first of all, you need to pay attention because there are. Many fake accounts it's easy to buy likes, it's easy to buy followers these days. And if you are doing some research, and we are gonna link to those tools, by the way and your YouTube shorts and stuff like that for some technical knowledge. But basically, you are looking for engagement and that means not necessarily likes, but. More likely comments because they're harder to get. So that's a real indicator of engagement is comments, how many comments they get from the audience. And basically, you wanna find influencers who preferably post about the products they use. So like vlogs, daily vlogs and stuff like that. Unboxing videos and stuff like that.

And then you just offer them a free product. and that doesn't cost you a dime, right? They have a smaller following, but you're gonna send them a few free products. I had many brands reach out to me. I have a blog. They say this chair is free. Like, I have a lot of free stuff they send me just, for the mention for the link backlink or instant story shoutout or things like that. And I don't have a huge following, I have a small following. So, it definitely works and as you mentioned, doesn't cost a dime, but, on the other hand, if you wanna work with those big influencers, they're gonna ask you for a lot of money, for a shout out. And then of course, you mentioned also about finding a great fit. You need to look at their audience and see if there is a fit between, their audience and if there is an overlap if the content their posting speaks to your audience as well.

So that's about it. And then can you talk to us about What are the best types of brands or products that are particularly suited for, micro influencer marketing? Or are there any industries that are no better than others?

Tomer Hen: Yeah that's, a great point. I wouldn't say that there is, and I get this a lot, but I wouldn't say that there is. A specific category that works better because again, influences influence and good products are good products. Social proof is social proof across the board, whether it's B2B, B2C, supplements, food, whatever it is. But I could tell you that from a, economic point of view, there are two factors that you could consider if your brand will be a great fit for micro influencer campaigns. If you have those two factors. One, your gross margins are more than 50%. That's a great fit for influencer marketing because the perceived value of your free product is way higher than what you would pay to create it. So, you have a leverage over spending those same $25 over a Facebook ad or paying a UGC creator, you can just send a free product to someone and they perceive it as. $50. it only costs you 25 or less. So, if you have even higher margin than that, that would work even better. The other thing is, I would say that's a bonus, but it's not a must, is if your product is a consumable product, as in skincare, supplements, food whatever it is that people consume over and over, and they will have the incentive to get more of these products from you. So, if there's an influencer that constantly creates content for you and they know that they can get your supplement every month, or they can get your cookies every month, or whatever, if they just keep creating that content, you will have a lot of leverage and you will be perceived as a valuable relationship that they would like to keep. So, if they found a supplement that they liked, I could just give you an example of one influencer that I send my supplement to. I have, I own a supplement company called Switch Supplements that is made for entrepreneurs. So, I sent a free bottle of our supplement to an influencer who had a very big email list, and it's kind of an influencer to other entrepreneurs. And then he reached out back to me a couple of weeks later and he said, I love this product. It's a game changer. I don't use any nootropics, but this one I really love. How can I get more of it? And I said, I got you. I don't want you to buy it. I'll just send you some more. And he's like, but I need to support you in some way. Like, how can I do that? How can I support you? Because I was so nice to him. And then even when he asked me, where can I buy it, I could just send him the link to our store and say, hey, I got another sale. Or I could send him a coupon code, but instead I said, I got you. I'm gonna send you three more bottles. Because for him it's about spending, $70 or $50 on a supplement. For me it cost way less than that and for him, it would help me, he could just post it about it on Instagram, it'll take him 30 seconds and he just got, a free product that is valued at $70.Or if I send him two bottles, that can be $140. Again, the perceived value is way higher, and this is how you can systemize it and turn it into hundreds of brand ambassadors that's perceived so much value from you while your cost is really lower than that. It's like getting a free dessert at a restaurant, right? You know, it cost them. A dollar to create it, which for you, the perceived value is so much higher than you just perceive it as a great experience and this is what we want to create with other influencers. So yeah, these are my 2 cents. One is consumable products work really well. Obviously, it works really well for other products like apparel and things that you can send over and over just work really well. The other point is if your gross margins are more than 50%, you will have a really great chance of succeeding with that.

Arek Dvornechuck: Okay, so gross margin over 50%, usually products that you can consume over and over again. So, skincare, supplements, food, these are the best. Products that we buy, every day, every week, every month, and so on. Often. And by the way, I left, you sent me also those supplements, which are really great.And especially the one, sometimes I have problems sleeping. I left them, but we gonna link to them. I left them in the kitchen. Switch on and switch off.

Tomer Hen: Yeah. So, it's kill switch and on switch.

Arek Dvornechuck: Sorry, kill switch and on switch. Exactly.

Tomer Hen: So, you like the kill switch.

Arek Dvornechuck: Yeah, definitely. It puts me to sleep after like 30 minutes or so I'm super sleepy, and sometimes I have problems, falling asleep because I overthink stuff. But yeah, it's, great. It's great. So, we gonna link to that.

Tomer Hen: You see influencer marketing in action right now?

Arek Dvornechuck: Yeah, there you go. Yeah, exactly. There you go. And yeah, so we are gonna create a banner on our podcast page. I forgot to bring it. I should have it on our podcast, but you guys gonna see what I'm talking about. Yeah, it's a great example. And by the way, thank you for sending this. And it's a perfect example of how it all works. Okay, so we've got this and maybe we can just wrap this up with some mistakes that, usually for example, entrepreneurs or business owners or even marketers make when it comes to working with micro influencers, what are the typical mistakes that brands usually make?

Tomer Hen: So, there are a few of them that I think just kill your chances of making this correctly. But I think this is where the opportunity relies on. And why is that? Because most brands are doing those mistakes. So, if we learn those mistakes and we do the exact opposite, you will have the opportunity to just shine out of all the competition because we really have to, put this in perspective, the good influencers are getting dozens, if not hundreds of messages every day from brands who just want to extract something from them.

They want to get access to their audience, they want to get their content, they want to get, sales out of them, and they're just being bombarded with hundreds of messages every day and every week. So, your goal is to just shine out over everybody else. So how do we do that? There is one way where you can say hey, I'm gonna pay you $10,000 for a post. And obviously, you'll get a response, but if you don't wanna spend these amounts, or if you don't wanna spend any amounts at all, to be honest, how do you do that? How do you create that relationship with someone who is used to get, dozens of messages saying, I'm going to pay you for access to your audience, and you wanna send them a free product and get access to their audience. How do you do that? And that's very important. Before we dive into the, mistakes, it's very important to remember that because if you see through that lens, you will have a much easier life on getting access to these people, it's like, you know, hitting up with the hottest guy or girl in the party, right?

You need to have something and you need to create more value before you just approach and ask them to date or dance with you. The number one thing that, or the number one mistake that brands are doing is to ask for something way too early in the process. And when I say way too early, I know that based on everything we talked about, that you need to build long-term relationships and provide value and. add value to this relationship. But still 99% of the brands are saying, hey, can I send you a free product? And in exchange you'll post about us and this influencer got 500,000 or even 50,000 followers. They will ask for a couple of hundreds of dollars, if not four figures, just for a single post.

And you ask them to send a product that costs $50 that they never heard about. They don't know if they would like it or not, and they need to commit. To post about you to their audience that they've built for years. I'm just emphasizing all of that because this is the reality and this is what many brands forget, and you will get positive responses, mostly from very low-quality influencers with very low engagement that other brands are just not willing to work with them. If you want to get the good influencers that actually create influence and make other people buy, lead with value, lead with a give and don't ask for anything. And this is super important. And if there is one thing that I want the listeners, I would like the listeners to take from that podcast is that point, just lead with value. Don't ask for anything and hold the ask as much as you can. Don't try to extract something out of that relationship and see it as a very transactional one. Like I reached out to them, I offered something. They never replied or they said, no, I'm just going, I'm just moving to the next one. Because over time this is not a strategy that you can sustain because brands are getting more sophisticated, influencer are getting more sophisticated the market becomes way more in order. So, if you don't lead with value, if you are not a well-known brand that everybody knows they're already buying, and then you offer to send 'em a free product in exchange for a post, great. But if you're a brand that's doing less than 5 million, most chances that are nobody, never heard about you, right? Most chances. And so, if you just lead with value and you do the exact opposite of what everybody else is doing, which is. Asking for something and you say, hey, you know what? We're not asking for anything. We just love your feedback and we appreciate your content. Here's a free product. Would you like it? And they're like, yeah, sure. And if they ask you, and that's a bonus point. And a pro tip, many of them will ask you, what would you expect in return? And this is your chance to really shine out of everybody else and say, actually, I don't expect anything in return. I just want your feedback and I really appreciate your content, so I'd love to send you some of our product because they're like, oh, really? You don't want anything from me? And then they're open to receive it. Even free products, they receive dozens of free products every month. They never even open most of them. And that's the reality. So, if you want to get their attention of even trying your product and testing it, not talking about posting about it, you need to keep doing the exact opposite of what all of the other brands are doing, which is trying to ask them for something.

Just lead with value, keep the communication with them, and then obviously not all of them will post about you, but if you can get 25% of them to post about you and your product cost $20 to produce. That means that you get an influencer that posted about you authentically for $80. They created a content, they talked about it to their audience. They tagged you on their profile with, 50,000 followers, whatever. And it cost you $80, right? Because you had to lose four products to get this one piece of content. It's a great deal that every brand should take. If you can systemize it and turn it into 50 influencers who are doing that for you. This is where you create real massive influence for your brand, and then people are starting to see you all over the place. Oh, I saw that influencer talking about it, and this influencer. And eventually they will buy, it's like showing an ad over and over, but the audience is very likely to listen to that ad because it's someone that they trust. It's not an ad. Just look at Influencer, I don't like the term influencer marketing. I really like influencer relationships because if you look at it for the long term, instead of trying to hook up with those influencers, you will gain way better results and it would, it shouldn't take that long. Like you could see results within two to three months if you do this right.

Arek Dvornechuck: No, that's definitely great tips. So basically, just to sum up you need to be aware that they're getting many messages. Those influencers, as you mentioned they're bombarded by messages. And I know it from my own experience. People message me, text me all the time asking for backlinks and I don't even know them to be honest. Like, why should I link to you? I know you wanna get a back link, but if someone approaches me like, Hey I'm gonna write a guest post for you. I already know that they want backlink. They don't even ask for that backlink. But I'm gonna be more inclined to actually offer a backlink because they were different, they didn't really ask they just gave me a a guest post, for example, you send me a product, right? So that way I'm more inclined to promote you. I know I should link to you, as reciprocity, right? So, lead with value, as you mentioned. Give, and then ask or just ask for feedback and they will naturally wanna, give something in the return. Definitely a lot of, I believe, our listeners are going to enjoy this podcast, great tips.

We've discussed some problems that entrepreneurs or marketers make. And you gave us some great tips. Just to sum up what's the best way to connect with you?

Tomer Hen: Yeah. Thank you. I had a great time. I really like this subject and I'll always like talking about it with great people. Thank you for having me. So, I'm very active on Twitter, so you can find me on Twitter. Just look for Tomer Hen. I'll provide a link for your reference. And feel free to DM me with any questions that you have. And the other free gift that I would like to give is an influencer relationship profit checklist that I've created, that my team uses when we work with other brands that help them grow with influencer relationships. We have a checklist that we follow every day and every week, and we just created a document that every brand founder can just easily follow. And see success if they just follow this checklist. So, it's absolutely free. And I'll provide a link in the show notes for you to follow. And if you have any questions about that checklist, just reach out on LinkedIn or over email and I'll be happy to help.

Arek Dvornechuck: Awesome. So, we're gonna link to your website. You're gonna provide us with the link to the checklist so you guys can check it out. But again, the company is mobcomedia.com and you also have a personal website tomerhen.co.

Tomer Hen: Yeah. Yeah, actually the personal website I would believe is more relevant. Like doing other stuff for really big brands and not really doing any e-commerce. Yeah, if you just go on my personal site, that'll be great. Or Twitter or just email me at tomerhen.co.

Arek Dvornechuck: Okay. Awesome. Thanks for coming on the show. I appreciate that.

Tomer Hen: Yeah. Thank you Arek.