Guest Blog - My First Steps Into Influencer Marketing

Or should I say my first thoughts on Influencer Marketing… where do I start!

When I first started my online business in 2012, social media was present but not on the scale it is today – 2021.

I wouldn’t say I avoided it, but it wasn’t something which I was drawn to as a place to advertise my company.

Having a personal account on Facebook, I knew this platform well so naturally I started there, now with nearly 3k followers, over the years it has been good for me as a place to showcase what I do… Specialist foam bed bumpers.

Up until 2020 I seldom went on Instagram – for personal or business, I didn’t post anything or share much business news, only having 40 or so followers, my audience wasn’t exactly Wembley stadium.

My First Steps into Influencer Marketing

I started taking it more seriously in November 2020 when I was introduced to some wonderful families who were known as ‘influencers’. I was unsure how the world of ‘influencers’ and influencer marketing worked, so I asked some questions & did a bit of research, the funny thing was without even knowing it I have actually spent years being ‘influenced’ by various companies, small business and celebs! We all have!

I asked the 5 families with children between the ages of 12 months & 5 years old, if they would like to receive one of our Acosy Bumpers? This is known as ‘gifting’ or a ‘collaboration’, in return for our product they would write an honest post/review, stories and reels on how they found the product worked for them.

I had an amazing response, and I was blown away by the kindest of their words, but the most wonderful thing I found was reading & seeing my products in real life homes up and down the UK!

One of the families we collaborated with on Instagram was @jaxonbakerr_ aka the lovely Jasmine. They have a massive 12.4K following, with an average of 800 to 900 likes per post. Which is incredible, not only were we helping a family with a product… which works and is practical but a potential 12K+ other families and fellow influencers alike would see & hear Acosy Bumpers in action.

We gifted Jasmine and her son the Transitional XL Pack plus an extra deep fitted sheet. After Jasmines post went live, I couldn’t keep up with the responses, within 24 hours there was over 150 comments and 900 likes on her post alone. And my own numbers and page interest was rising. It was such a positive feeling. As part of the collaboration, I also did my own post on Jaxon’s success moving into his big bed… again the response was so encouraging. Within 12 hours of posting, we had reached 172 accounts and 41% of those weren’t following Acosy Bumpers, 57 likes on the post and 46 comments.

One thing I had learned quite quickly was ‘engagement’ this is pretty much what it means, to engage with the accounts that comment, answering questions & general conversation about the post – and who doesn’t like to talk about what they do!

Since November 2020 I have been inundated with offers from some of the most incredible accounts asking to get involved as they love the sound of my bumpers. I was delighted… firstly, because Acosy was getting noticed & secondly families were telling me they loved the look of my products! It has been a delight getting to know our new followers and their families, it has been a real eye opener and I have seriously learned so much from the accounts I have personally worked with on Instagram.

Today my follower count is 333! That is a huge increase considering I started with 40 back in November 2020. In the last 30 days this has risen +22.8%, with content interactions up by +67.7% (figures correct as of March 2021)

This could be due to the fact I love talking!

More Influencer Marketing lined up

We have lots of families that we are extremely excited to be collaborating with in the coming months – each with different needs and requirements for wanting an Acosy Bumper and we can not wait to share these on our social media pages.

I feel Influencer Marketing has been a positive experience so far & that this is the way forward for my business at this moment in time – with social media being an ever moving, ever changing platform and ‘trend’ driven, I am excited to move and grow with it & to be able to share what I do but moreover offer a product that actually works.

Other influencers I have worked with are: