Testing and Optimizing Influencer Marketing Programs

When you’ve gotten an influencer program up and running and have the metrics and reports to prove its success, it’s easy to sit back and think all the hard work is done.

But your program WILL end up plateauing if you stop experimenting and trying new things—influencers in different niches, new formats or platforms, even new campaigns concepts and briefs!

Everything in marketing starts as a test. It's when brands are quick to quit or settle into ‘business as usual’ that they stop building on their success. In this chapter, you’ll come to understand why it’s so important to develop a testing culture and branch out beyond "what's working" to fuel your program’s growth.

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What you should be testing in your influence marketing program?

Influencer marketing is all about finding that dynamic exchange between content and audience engagement. This means that a successful program requires a flexible, test-and-learn mindset in every aspect of your strategy. As Ryan puts it:

“Being as analytical with it as possible is truly critical nowadays. You literally need to be testing creative all the time, canceling out things that don't work and boosting things that do work. Sometimes you have to really go out of your sandbox and innovate and try something completely different.”

Ryan Waranauskas, Founder of Volt Agency.

By implementing a robust testing mindset, your influencer marketing team will uncover valuable insights, optimize performance, and maximize that all-important return on investment. Let's explore common marketing tests you might try and how to set up those experiments to produce reliable, repeatable learnings:

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Partner with various types of influencers

It’s important that you zero in on what kinds of creators perform best for your brand. But you should never stop exploring new niches or creator profiles which have the potential to resonate with your audience.

The varieties of influencers your brand can partner with are virtually limitless; micro-influencers vs. macro-influencers, niche industry experts vs. broader lifestyle influencers—the list goes on.

While you may be limited by factors such as budget (influencers with larger followings typically charge higher rates) experimenting with different types of creators will help you to understand which influencer categories resonate best with your target audience.

You can also test storylines or messages to the same audience using one creator or several who share similar audiences, or you produce ads where you can distribute specific messages to targeted audience definitions.

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Experiment with different placements and formats

Each social platform has its stand-out placement i.e. Instagram Reels, Stories, or Feed. Depending on your key campaign objective, you might test one or all of the different placements offered by a single social platform. Every type of placement offers a different benefit, i.e. Stories are very strong for direct response, as they allow creators to include stickers with referral links and promo codes.

But remember that creator content gives you more play with than just the placement itself. Experiment with different creative approaches for showcasing your product within your chosen placement. Try mixing it up with different content types such as static posts, short-form, or long-form video content. After all, how else will you know which content formats drive the most engagement or conversions for your brand?

However, it’s important to remember that each influencer will have their preferred platforms—don't ask an Instagram creator about their YouTube channel, if it doesn't exist.

As Molly explains, you should intentionally test platforms, channels, and formats by leveraging the strengths of different creators, rather than pushing one creator to try a new format they aren’t used to (or good at) producing:

“We trust the creator to build and create the best content they can per their audience, per their platform, per their expertise. For example, there are creators that we work with that just do static posts and carousels, but their quality is phenomenal and they build it out with really elaborate recipes or photo shoots. I would never go to them and say, hey, I actually want you to make a Reel because Instagram is prioritizing Reels over static.”

Molly Savage, Omnichannel Growth Marketing Leader at Bobabam.

In terms of storytelling methods, there variations are basically limitless. Here’s a short list to get you started:

• Product or service-focused content vs. lifestyle content
• Humorous vs. educational messaging
• Product demos vs. unboxing
• Ingredient or feature highlights vs. one-feature
• High-focus visuals/statistics
• Problem vs. solution
• Us vs. them competitive comparisons
• Routines or other types of concepts

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Test on multiple social platforms

Testing with an influencer across multiple social media platforms where they have a presence can help you uncover interesting insights about where content is most engaging or produces the strongest brand awareness or sales. Each influencer will be strongest on one social platform, so keep this in mind as you measure performance across platforms.

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Optimize the landing page experience

If you're driving traffic to your website, it’s important to test the messaging and UI/UX experience on the influencer's landing page. If an influencer is promoting a beach bag, make sure it’s easy to find that exact beach bag on the website. Don’t make them go search for it on site—trust us, they won’t! Always ensure you have enough stock for products that you’re featuring in influencer programs.

You may also want to test cobranded landing pages with creator partners to boost credibility and drive higher conversion rates. Including elements like testimonials, product picks, and UGC creates a powerful source of social proof. Keep testing the UGC and the products you’re featuring on these pages to find the optimum mix of content.

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Call-to-Action (CTA) testing

Try testing various CTAs to see which ones drive the most desired actions. Common CTAs in influencer content include "Shop Now" vs. "Learn More" or "Swipe Up" vs. "Link in Bio". These can be audio or visual cues, or both.

This also includes testing CTA placement—does the beginning, middle, or at the end convert better for your brand? Compare the effectiveness of different promotions such as discount codes, free shipping, or exclusive products to see which drives the most conversions.

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Try multiple engaging video hooks

The first 2-3 seconds of videos are all it takes to grab a user’s attention. If you want to make the most of each piece of content you’re producing with influencers, you can ask to cut variations of that first few seconds to test in front of the rest of the video content and see what ‘hook’ resonates the best. This is especially important for UGC that you want to run as ads i.e. YouTube ads.

“Advertisers that test 11 times more content in a month tend to see an 11x variance in their return on ad spend between the top and bottom performing creative. What you really need to do is optimize what that opening hook is—that's what is going to capture somebody's attention. You don't need to go and make five different videos. You can make one video with five different openings and the results are going to be very, very different.”

Maurice Rahmey, CEO at Disruptive Digital Agency.

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Test different posting frequency and times

The more times someone sees your brand or messaging, the higher the likelihood they’ll remember your brand and take additional, higher-intent actions, such as visiting your website or purchasing a product. You might test multiple posts with the same creator over time, multiple posts within a specific placement, or frequency targeting or capping with paid posts to encourage higher exposure to the same audience.

In addition to how often your content is shown experiment with different days and times of day to identify when influencer audiences are the most receptive and engaged. This concept can also be applied to seasonality—adjust your creative briefs to the time of year, for example.

“Just because an influencer says that my engagement is the best on a Thursday night doesn't necessarily mean that's going to correlate to the best ROI or the best CPA. You need to track all of that and you need to make sure it's statistically relevant. You can't base everything off of five influencers or influencers that, you know, work for every single brand. You need to have a diverse, roughly 25 to 30 influencers or more.”

Josh Butowsky, Founder at Influencer Response.

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How to set up reliable tests

“Influencer marketing is ALL about testing. If there's one thing I will shout from the rooftops, it is that this job is consistently reporting and looking at the data and then retesting and re-strategizing from there.”

Sarah Crow, Head of Creator Success at Superfiliate.

To ensure your tests provide meaningful and actionable insights, follow these best practices:

Define clear objectives. Before starting any test, clearly define what you're trying to learn and how it aligns with your primary campaign objective. It’s also good to understand how your campaign objective ladders up to larger marketing strategic initiatives.

“Be intentional with your testing. What do you want to learn? I like to develop a testing agenda with specific experiments designed to impact one metric at a time.”

Lissa Regets, Fractional CMO & Digital Marketing Consultant at Ideabox

Isolate variables. To get clear results, change only ONE variable at a time. For example, if you're testing CTAs, keep all other elements of the post consistent or risk false positives or negatives.

Ensure adequate sample sizes. Make sure your test includes enough data points to be statistically significant. This might mean running the test across multiple influencers or for an extended period. If you’re running a paid campaign, this means you’re earmarking enough budget to exit learning phases for the specific test you’re running.

Use control groups. Whenever possible, use a control group (where your audience control definition remains consistent) to compare against your test group. This helps isolate the impact of the variable you're testing. Some brands go as far as doing offline customer control testing to understand feedback and audience behavior to compare online behavior to.

Consider timing and external factors. Be aware of any external factors that might skew your results, such as seasonal trends, competitive noise, or major events such as Black Friday, Cyber Monday, election cycles, holidays, major sporting or entertainment events, etc. How recently a creator partner featured a competitor could also play a role.

Set a predetermined timeframe. Decide on the duration of your test before you begin—and stick to it to avoid the temptation of ending the test early based on preliminary results!

Use robust tracking tools. Ensure you have the right tools in place to accurately track and measure the metrics relevant to your test. Run a few practice tests through an experience fully before turning on a campaign.

Analyze results. Look beyond surface-level metrics to understand the full impact of your test. Consider both quantitative data and qualitative feedback. It’s ok to sit with the data and step back to see the bigger picture.

Document and share learnings. Keep detailed records of your tests, results, and insights. Share these learnings across your team to inform future strategies and tests.

Iterate and retest. ABT: Always be testing! Once you've implemented changes based on your test results, continue to monitor performance and be prepared to retest as needed.

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Implementing an internal culture of testing and learning

To truly benefit from testing, you need to foster a culture of continuous learning and improvement within your marketing team. Encourage curiosity, reward data-driven decision-making, and create processes that make it easy for anyone on your immediate team to implement and analyze tests.

Don’t get caught up in trying to uncover what works today; aim to develop a deeper understanding of your audience and how they interact with influencer content as a whole.

And remember: What works for one creator may not be true for another influencer. Being able to uncover trends and patterns is critical to developing insights you can rely on. This knowledge will help you to stay agile and effective as an influencer marketer, and set you up to keep scaling your program.

And now, we move onto the final chapter of the Field Guide; Once you’ve found your recipe for success, it’s time to scale it!

Why is testing important in influencer marketing programs?

Testing is crucial in influencer marketing programs keep refining your formula and find new types of creators or content placements that can further your goals. Without experimenting with influencers in different niches, exploring new formats or platforms, and testing campaign concepts, your program’s growth will likely taper off. A successful influencer marketing strategy requires a flexible, test-and-learn mindset to uncover valuable insights, optimize performance, and maximize ROI.

What types of influencers should I test in my campaigns?

Testing different types of creators will help you understand which influencer categories resonate best with your target audience. This includes different sized followings,, niche industry experts, professionals, and broader lifestyle influencers. Don’t forget that different types of influencers might be more successful at different goals i.e. a macro-influencer with a large reach will be most effective at driving awareness. Remember: it's okay if some partnerships don't work out—you may still find valuable collaborators for future campaigns!

How do I experiment with different placements and formats in influencer marketing?

Take advantage of the various placements offered by each social platform. For example, Instagram offers Reels, Stories, or Feed posts. Test different content types like static posts, short-form, or long-form video content to understand which placement drive the most engagement or conversions from influencer content. However, it’s important to be mindful that each influencer has preferred platforms and placements they are best at; don't push creators to try new formats they aren't comfortable with or skilled in producing, so this is only going to backfire on your brand. Instead, leverage the expertise of different creators to test platforms, channels, and formats intentionally.

What metrics should I track when optimizing influencer campaigns?

When optimizing influencer campaigns, you need to track metrics that align with your primary campaign objective. For example, if your goal is brand awareness, look at indicators like reach and impressions. Monitor the performance of these metrics across different influencers, placements, and social platforms to identify patterns in what is performing. Also track the performance of various CTAs, promotions, and hooks to determine which elements are driving desired actions, such as website visits. Additionally, consider metrics like posting frequency and timing to identify when influencer audiences are most engaged.

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