Content Creators and Influencers

Many people use the terms interchangeably, but there's a significant difference between a "Content Creator" and an "Influencer".

If you're a "Content Creator", you generate content. You create blog posts, images, videos, and other assorted media to build a following, then use the fact that you have a significant following to get companies to pay you for content you create about their products and services in exchange for money.

(Some creators may consider working with companies in exchange for free products or services if those products and services are particularly desirable, but many full-time creators consider in-kind payments as an underappreciation and undervaluing of their craft.)

If you're hiring a "Content Creator", you're effectively paying for two things: the creation of media for your own business purposes and, just perhaps more importantly, direct access to the creator's audience.

Let's say"KayleyX" (not a real person, to my knowledge) has 250,000 followers and creates content that speaks to new mothers. And let's also say you manufacture and sell the "EZSleep Rocker" (not a real product, to my knowledge), a chair to help newborns fall asleep faster. You might hire KayleyX to introduce the EZSleep Rocker to her audience, hoping that some of them will buy it because KayleyX said that they should.

And if, after watching KayleyX talk about how great the EZSleep Rocker is and telling her audience that they need to buy one, nobody does?

Then you have definitive proof that KayleyX is a Content Creator... but not an "Influencer".

Because an "Influencer", by definition, can influence.

They can not only introduce you to an idea, but also convince you to take action.

And not all Content Creators are Influencers, as illustrated by the example above.

An Influencer might also be a content creator (i.e. if they create influential content), but that's not a requirement for the job.

For instance, your doctor is likely an influencer for you when you have a medical question, regardless of whether or not they have a popular Instagram account.

And if you should find yourself in legal trouble, your lawyer is likely to be the most influential person in your life at that moment, no matter how many followers he has on TikTok.

Is this an oversimplification? Yes.

Do too many marketers still make the mistake of thinking that hiring a "Content Creator" will automatically lead to sales, and thus neglect to determine what an appropriate return-on-investment might look like? Again, yes.

If you're a Content Creator, consider recognizing why businesses are really engaging your services and take a more business-savvy approach.

They're hiring you to drive sales, and they're more than willing to pay you if you do that. So familiarize yourself with the analytics available to content creators on the largest social media platforms, and use your audience data to quantify the sales impact you are likely to drive. Then, instead of asking companies for an arbitrary flat fee in exchange for a set number of posts, negotiate a smaller upfront fee (to cover your basic costs) plus a percentage of all product sales attributed to your channel. Attribution is relatively straightforward when a unique coupon code or special landing page is set up for you, and companies with even a moderate level of sophistication will be more than happy to do this for you if it means they can more readily track your results.

And if you're worried about doing this because you think it will lead to less revenue for you? Think about what that actually means about whatever it is you're charging today, and whether those rates are sustainable as marketers become more savvy.

If you're a business attempting to hire an "Influencer", do your homework.

• Follow the creator on their primary social media platform, and look at not only the type of content they publish, but also the level and quality of engagement that results. If a creator with 250,000 followers consistently publishes content that earns only a dozen likes and comments, that should tell you a lot about the level of reach they can realistically obtain, and you can't influence anyone with content they never know about.

  
  

• Offer a fair compensation package, but don't be afraid to make it "pay for performance". True "Influencers" will be confident in their ability to persuade their audiences to take action, and thus should be excited for the opportunity to earn unlimited upside. (And if you can attribute a sales lift to the Influencer's published content, you should be excited to pay it!)

  
  

• Be wary of "Influencers" who aren't willing (or able) to provide you with data that shows how they performed in past campaigns, or are unwilling to commit to providing you with a detailed post-campaign report about any work you do together. That's a sure sign of an Influencer unable to influence action.

It's perfectly okay to simply hire a "Content Creator", but adjust your sales expectations (and the amount of money you're willing to pay) accordingly.

Content Creators and Influencers can both be very rewarding jobs, and very valuable to businesses that hire them.

But they are not always one and the same.

And the sooner everybody recognizes that, the better off everybody will be.