Influencer marketing has made a name for itself due to the effectiveness of promoting products and services through influencers’ content on their social channels. By now, it’s no secret that followers really feel connected with and trust their favorite content creators and, consequently,  their opinions and recommendations (we like to call it word of mouth 2.0).

However, as these classic partnerships with influencers improve and bring better results, brands and marketers are thinking of a way to innovate and leverage content creators’ power even more. “How?”, you might be wondering. The answer lies in co-creation.

Forward-thinking brands have been pushing the limits of traditional partnerships and getting influencers more involved in the creative process of product development, and everyone is starting to realize that this is greatly beneficial from a 360-degree perspective. Therefore, products, collections, designs (you name it) - anything that is created together by the brand and an influencer from the very beginning can not only maximize the effectiveness of influencer marketing but also can improve product development from a creative perspective.

Here are 14 reasons why fostering a co-creation environment involving influencers from the very beginning is something you should be (at least) considering for your brand:

It can be highly beneficial for the influencer’s audiences:

• The audience is exposed to new products and/or new brands
• Puts the audience in a privileged spot, since events, products, and collaborations are often announced first on socials and the audience will be the first in the know
• The audience gets deeper exposure to the brand, its values, and behind the scenes moments
• Co-creations can provide inspiration, tips, and information for the audience

It can provide many advantages for the influencers themselves:

• Co-creations are a great way to generate a ton of new beautiful content for their own feed
• Influencers get to partake in big campaigns that their own influencer role models are a part of
• They get to work and associate with their favorite brands
• They get to act as a trusted source of review for their audience
• They are exposed to new brands, exclusive products, events and more

And finally, influencer co-creation can be very valuable to brands:

• Co-creations give the consumers an intimate exposure to the brand
• Co-creations capitalize on person-to-person advertising in the most effective way possible
• Co-creations authentically (and not obviously) alter brand perception through partner association
• Brands can have a better idea of which and how products work best with their target audience since influencers should represent them, and for this reason, they avoid making mistakes in product development
• Influencers feel more involved, and therefore show greater commitment to business objectives and brand values
• Influencers are more likely to create earned content for the brand.

Still not convinced? As an illustration of how co-creation is the way forward in influencer marketing, we gathered some examples of brands that successfully pulled out this new and more integrated form of collaboration.

Danielle Bernstein vs. Onia

The influencer Danielle Bernstein is the person behind the account @weworewhat, which currently counts with 2.2M followers. In 2018, she launched a swimwear collection in collaboration with the brand Onia. Sales reached 1.8M within only 12 hours.

Arielle Charnas vs. Nordstrom

The account @somethingnavy from Arielle Charnas (263K followers), launched her collection with Nordstrom in 2018. It amassed over $4M in sales on a single day and caused the retailer’s e-commerce website to crash thanks to a rush in traffic.

Camila Coelho and Aimee Song vs. Revolve

Camila (8.4M followers) and Aimee (5.4M followers) were the first two to launch a collection with the fashion brand Revolve. Both collections were sold out within hours in some regions after the launch.

Designers vs. Moncler 

Every year, Moncler partners with certain designer influencers to reinterpret its iconic down jacket. With the launch of the Moncler Genius Project, the number of impressions of the brand in 2018 increased by 40% and the unique visitors to Moncler’s website grew +59%, which ultimately led to increased traffic to the stores in the next days.

For all the above said, it’s obvious that influencer co-creation can be a powerful tool. These content creators already have the authority and credibility with the target audience brands want to reach, so why not involve them in the creative process of product development and enhance their leverage even more? Influencer co-creation creates mutual value for brands, influencers, and their audience, and it really is the way forward in influencer marketing.

Emilie Tabor, founder at IMA.