The Episode in 60 Seconds

Who is your brand's most powerful voice? Outside influencers have more sway than official spokespeople. SAP's Ursula Ringham and Rachel Miller join us today to discuss.

• What influencer marketing is
• How influencer marketing is changing the landscape
• How to properly vet potential influencers
• Two case studies of successful implementation of influencer marketing
• The future of Influencer Marketing

Our Guests

Ursula Ringham leads the Global Influencer Marketing team in collaborating with the entire SAP product portfolio in creating innovative content with trusted external voices to build brand awareness and create sales. Before her tenure at SAP, she had stints at Yoh, Adobe, and Apple where she was the partnership manager for Worldwide Developer Relations.

She has a reputation as a storyteller, author, creator, influencer marketer, digital innovator, social media maven, champion of girls education, and an outdoor sports freak.

Rachel Miller is a social media and content marketing strategist. She's listed as one of the top 50 MarTech influencer marketing and B2B marketing experts worldwide. Her background before SAP includes Thulium, TopRank Marketing, and PureMatter. During the pandemic, she is taking her fitness seriously and has earned the nickname "baby hulk" and is a craft beer aficionado.

Show Notes

77% of all revenue transactions worldwide run through systems powered by SAP. - Ursula Ringham

What is Influencer Marketing?

Influencer Marketing noun

1. partnering experts and trusted authorities together with your brand to help guide customers forward into their buying decision.
2. creating innovative content with trusted external voices to build brand awareness and create sales
3. trusted voices that influence the decisions of others
4. people-to-people marketing

Hear a discussion about definitions at 4:15

How Can a Brand Deploy Influencer Marketing?

Starting an Influencer Marketing program with your own people. Bring in those who have understand people, existing success, a strong social following, understand your business, and get that it is people-to-people networking and marketing. —Ursula Ringham

Improving Live Events by Taking Them Virtual

How to Properly Vet Influencers

1. Follow on social media
2. Read their writings
3. Watch their videos
4. Listen to their interviews, podcast and otherwise
5. Discover whom they have promoted in the past, even if your competitors
6. Identify those you trust who are already connected with them
7. Identify their strengths (for example, is someone strong on camera and social, but not a long-form writer. Or, this person asks amazing questions and draws out others.)
8. Know them so well you can name their dog and favorite craft beer
9. Discuss your findings with your team and get their input
10. Talk to them on a video conference if not in person, and get "a feel" for the person

How Do You Measure Influencer Success?

• Identify the true goal. What are you trying to accomplish?
• Closely monitor the effectiveness of your collaborations
• How often is the influencer sharing on social media?
• What level of engagement—likes, comments, shares?
• What type of audience are the attracting through video or podcasts?
• Are they exciting to watch?

There is no true set of criteria because technology is changing so rapidly.

Listen to a success story at 16:00

You have to understand the intent of wanting to work with a particular influencer. It has to be mutually beneficial. — Ursula Ringham

Nobody wants to hear from a brand spokesperson. — Rachel Miller

Hear another success story at 21:11

Check out SAP Industries LinkedIn Live Series

As we live in an age where reviews, references, and third-party validation become increasingly important, having a disciplined, principled, and intentional effort within our companies to connect our value propositions to the market through people that are able to talk about us better than we can talk about ourselves is incredibly important — John Farkas