All good marketers know that getting your message across does not mean broadcasting "at" people, hoping they will listen. It is about talking "to" your customers and giving them the information they want.

Opt-in marketing channels have long been one of the most effective ways to provide information your customers seek, reach existing and new customers, and drive revenue.

Today with the dominance of social media, having a strategic network of opt-in influencers and brand ambassadors consistently talking about your brand is the number one way to create connections, communities, and long-lasting brand awareness.

If you are a brand marketer, you should prioritize your brand ambassador and influencer marketing as much as your other opt-in channels, such as email or followers.

Here's what you need to know about influencer marketing and prioritizing opt-in channels for your brand.

What are opt-in marketing channels, and why do they matter?

The name says it all. Opt-in channels allow customers to choose whether they receive your marketing, increasing the chance a customer will engage and convert.

According to a study on 2023 retail trends, 86% of customers want to hear from businesses they frequent, including on channels like email, platforms like Facebook, or via text messaging.

Opt-in channels have evolved a lot over the last several decades. One of the earliest opt-in channels was the catalog subscription, which allowed customers to receive catalogs from their favorite brands. Then came email marketing, which allowed brands to send targeted messages to customers who had opted into their email list. With the rise of social media, marketers have prioritized audiences on platforms like Facebook, Twitter, and Instagram and can speak to those followers.

With each channel, your customer comes to you and says, "Yes, you may market to me. I'd like to hear what you have to say." That’s incredibly powerful.

The Challenge

Getting people to opt in to hear from your brand isn’t the easiest. We’re all inundated with ads online, and while 83% of Gen Z say they shop online, about 33% also say they block or unfollow brands every week.

That seems dire for brand marketers. Building your subscriber list from 0 to 200 to 2,000 is a big task in and of itself, in addition to creating enough content to keep your customers engaged and interested in hearing from you.

So how do you go from broadcasting “at” and risking getting blocked, unfollowed, or unsubscribed to productively talking “to” your customers?

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The Solution: Influencer Marketing with Brand Ambassadors

At Fohr we promote that influencers can help you enter the conversation, not interrupt it.

The next evolution of social media is focusing on building a group of engaged customers who share, review, and recommend your products, service, or business to other potential customers.

In the current marketing landscape, this is the number one solution for effectively communicating with your audiences and getting new customers to opt in to hear from you.

It’s not about the story that brands tell in the next ten years; it’s about the ones your consumers do.

Plenty of brands are already investing in this form of marketing. 52% of brands already run brand ambassador programs to build deeper, more genuine relationships with creators.

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5 Reasons Why Brand Ambassadors Are Your Best Opt-in Marketing Channel

According to Stackla, 61% of consumers would be more loyal and more likely to buy from a brand if they were invited to be part of a customer advocate community or content creators.

Creating a group of highly engaged, passionate brand ambassadors requires a long-term, strategic approach to your influencer marketing, but the benefits are countless. To name just a few:

1. Community trust. More consumers than ever have a platform of their own via social media, reaching millions of people and speaking to a following that trusts them and their recommendations. Ambassador marketing or influencer marketing is the power of word-of-mouth marketing at scale.‍
2. Influencer audiences are double opt-in potential customers. Leading influencers and brand ambassadors have high standards for the brands they choose to partner with; after all, their reputation is also on the line when making a recommendation. When you’re working with an influencer or brand ambassador, especially over a long period of time, not only has that creator opted into partnering with you, but their audience has also opted into following them and hearing from the creator about the brands they love.‍
3. Content and UGC that tells your brand story. With a community of content creators regularly talking and posting about your brand, your message consistently reaches ever-widening circles of people in relevant ways. Influencers and brand ambassadors also creates a diversity of content that feels real and authentic to them and their followers.‍
4. Data shows you exactly what’s working. You can set goals based on your key KPIs and optimize for those KPIs after every influencer activation. That way, you’re growing and nurturing a group of the best performers for your brand’s specific objectives.
5. Your brand ambassadors become a self-sustaining marketing engine. You get to know them and they you, and that long-term relationship means you’re building a semi-autonomous group of creators that will be your business's most significant growth driver.

Influencer Marketing Tech that Works

At Fohr, we offer tech solutions to streamline how brands find and build relationships with the influencers who love them. We have custom-built Ambassador Management Platform (AMP) pages and full-scale programs for brands such as Sephora, OXO, and Blink Fitness.

An AMP page is a customized, centralized place for your influencer community, returning customers, and biggest fans to apply to become brand ambassadors for your company.

For influencers, it looks a lot like a sign-up landing page. But for brand marketers on the backend, it’s a one-stop shop for building a database of the brand ambassadors who are powering your opt-in strategy for 2023 and sharing your brand messaging with communities who are eager to listen.

Find out more about AMP or book a demo to see how our custom tech solutions can fit your brand needs.