PSA: An influencer I worked with totally misread our campaign brief

We hired a micro-influencer for a green product. She shared about it, but her words made it seem bad. It blew up online in a bad way, and we had to fix it. Now I check every brief twice. How do you make sure influencers understand your plans?

4 comments

4 Comments

spencera771mo ago

One fix we use is a mandatory 15-minute kickoff call for every collab. Go over the brief line by line and highlight the non-negotiables, like which product features to stress. Have them send a draft of their post for approval before it goes live. This extra step filters out creative interpretations that miss the mark. I also bullet point the call-to-action separately so it's crystal clear.

leo_black761mo ago

Yeah that kickoff call idea is solid. Read a case study where a brand went too far with rules though, like giving exact sentence prompts. The influencers ended up posting basically the same ad copy word for word and it felt fake. Gotta leave a little room for their own voice or the audience sees right through it. The draft approval is key for stopping real disasters but trying to control every single word kills the vibe.

amy_craig281mo ago

Seriously smart. What happens when an influencer still misses the mark after that call?

sean85410d ago

The marketing podcast I listen to always says to include a visual mood board with the brief.