Fake followers are a concern for any marketer working with influencers. The recent New York Times article drove the issue of fake followers to the forefront. At Traackr, we are all to aware of this issue.
Since 2009 Traackr has focused on building authentic, impactful relationships between brands and influencers.
Traackr's influencer marketing platform makes it easy to gauge the authenticity of an influencer and detect anything inconsistent. Here are a few examples of how Traackr supports your data-driven influencer vetting process.
Reach, Resonance, and Relevance Scores
Our three R’s allow any practitioner to, at a glance, understand an influencer’s:
- cross platform reach (follower number),
- resonance (the frequency with which their followers engage with the influencer’s content); and,
- relevance to the specific and customizable topic of interest at any given time.
This high level lens enables practitioners to identify influencers with a satisfying follower range, screen to see if their followers are engaged across platforms, and find influencers that are “on topic” before digging deeper to analyze the depth of an influencer’s alignment with their brand. A low resonance score will naturally be a signal of fake followers.
One Central Activity Monitoring Channel for Each Influencer Across Social Channels
One post, or even a handful of posts, is often not enough to determine if an influencer has the right social presence for your brand. Traackr allows you to live listen to all of an influencer’s social activity and gives you the ability to dig deeper into any post at any time. With access to influencer’s content across channels, you’ll be able to ensure the quality of the content produced and detect anything suspicious.
Transparent Visibility into All Comments and Interactions with Social Posts
Engagement is important, but unfortunately it can be faked. However, a recent study that we’ve conducted for one of our largest clients has shown that the level of fake engagement is actually pretty low. The reality is that buying followers is pretty cheap but buying engagement can quickly become very costly, as engagement will need to be bought for many posts to have any impact.
Within Traackr, you have full access to not only the raw number of likes, comments, retweets or shares of any unique piece of content, but also the ability with one click to read through those comments, or a selection of them, to screen for veracity. Are these comments dynamic and informative, or do they reek of spam? Does the engagement on a specific post stick out as an outlier compared to other posts without reason?
Robust Influencer Intelligence & Analytics
Traackr’s analytics suite allows you to understand not only the impact of each campaign you run with a designated group of influencers but also to track and understand consistency and engagement with any topic. You can customize tracking to monitor engagement ebbs and flows, and understand the why behind them. That way, you can check the level of engagement over time and detect any post that may appear suspect compared to the average engagement per post or around a topic.
Audience Growth Statistics for Each Influencer Across Channels Trending
A startling increase in follower count across channels or on any one social channel is often a tell tale sign that someone has purchased followers. Traackr’s trending influencer statistics allow you to monitor for alarming spikes and subsequently analyze content to determine if these spikes are organic (due to a new partnership or viral post) or inauthentic (fake) growth.
Influencer Audience insights
An influencer’s audience is just as important as their aesthetic and social presence in moving the needle for your brand. Traackr’s audience insights allow you to screen for psychographic and demographic information for each influencer you are vetting. Armed with this information, you can understand if they speak to the right age group, geographic zone, profession, and affinities, i.e. your brands addressable market. You can also determine if there is something potentially indicative of fraud, i.e a US based influencer with a massive following in Serbia and little anywhere else.
Practitioners concerned with fake followers and fake engagement impacting their influencer marketing efforts can leverage Traackr, combined with the best practice of thoughtful influencer diligence. We hear from our customers that there is no substitute for spending time screening an influencer’s profiles and reviewing a sample of posts and engagement, to ensure they are the right fit and generate real impact.
The data Traackr provides and qualitative insights gleaned from our transparent platform ensure practitioners can maintain focus on forming reciprocal relationships with real people who consistently align with their brand’s values.