Elaine Malone - wbsdigital

Virtual influencers – the future of digital marketing?

Elaine Malone — Fri, 22 Apr 2022 10:44:42 +0000

The Creator Economy has grown dramatically over the last few years. More than 50 million people globally consider themselves content creators, and you can see the appeal. A hobby that many started in their bedrooms has now become a lucrative career.

According to a 2022 report by Influencer Marketing Hub and Refersion, the influencer market grew from $1.7 billion in 2016 to $9.7 billion in 2020. That is projected to reach $16.4 billion by the end of 2022, and this is only set to increase further as brands continue to invest heavily in influencer marketing.

While some people believe that influencer marketing is just a fad or that the demise of influencers is coming, the data shows the opposite. Influencer Marketing Hub found that more than 75% of brand marketers intend to dedicate a budget to influencer marketing in 2022. Of that, 68% of respondents intend to increase their budget over the next 12 months while only 3% intended to decrease their budgets.

There’s no denying the power of influencer marketing in today’s digital age.

When it come to influencer marketing something that comes up time and time again is authenticity. It’s a buzzword that is thrown around within the creator community, with experts advising influencers to ‘be themselves’ and ‘be transparent’. The recommendation is that influencers need to be both aspirational and relatable in order to succeed.

However, the growth of digital has seen a new breed of influencer emerge. Influencers that only exist virtually. These influencers cannot inherently be authentic because they themselves are not real. Is this the future of influencer marketing?

What is a virtual influencer?

Virtual influencers look and act as real people online but as the name suggests, these influencers do not actually exist. They aren’t real or human. Instead they are generated by computers and exist virtually within a curated digital world.

They are created by tech-savvy digital teams who have crafted them from scratch – everything from their physical appearance to their fictional personalities. Because of the nature of their creation, they are often referred to as CGI (computer-generated imagery) or AI (artificially intelligent) influencers.

Although the concept of virtual influencers started in 2016, it isn’t exactly new. We grew up with cartoons and characters like Mickey Mouse, Tony the Tiger and Jessica Rabbit. We also had the Gorillaz, an English virtual band created by Damon Albarn and Jamie Hewlett. The four animated members of the Gorillaz appeared on our TV screens. They won awards, performed live tours and appeared on MTV Cribs as digital creations.

Virtual influencers really started gaining traction when they popped up on Instagram in 2018. One of the first to appear was Miquela.

The most popular virtual influencers

Lil Miquela

Miquela Sousa is a self-proclaimed 19-year-old robot living in LA. The Brazilian-American model was created in 2016 by Brud, a Los Angeles-based startup led by Trevor McFedries and Sara DeCou. In January 2019, TechCrunch reported that Brud had closed a $125 million investment round sparking conversation that virtual influencers are the future.

Although hard to believe, people are invested in Miquela’s life. Miquela amassed over one million followers on Instagram by April 2018 and over 3 million as of April 2022. She’s also active on Twitter, Tumblr, YouTube and TikTok but it doesn’t stop there.

Miquela has worked with the likes of Calvin Klein, Prada and Nike. She has been featured in a number of different publications including Vogue, Business of Fashion and Nylon, and pictured with Millie Bobby Brown, Bella Hadid and other celebrities. Miquela was even named one of Time’s 25 most influential people in June 2018.

Bermuda

Bermuda is an LA-based “It Girl” and aspiring musician, who wants to inspire young entrepreneurs in the tech and beauty sector. We first came across her in April 2018 when she hacked Miquela’s account. Bermuda replaced photos of Miquela with photos of herself. However, it turned out that Miquela and Bermuda were both created by the same team.

Miquela and Bermuda had an on-going feud before finally becoming friends. Yes, virtual influencers have friends and foes. They also fall in and out of love. Bermuda’s ex-boyfriend Blawko, another virtual influencer, shared their breakup story in a YouTube video which has multiple comments on it thanking him for being “so real” and honest about his history with Bermuda.

While Miquela is the most popular virtual influencer, Bermuda often gets referred to as the most controversial. She’s described as problematic and trashy. She also regularly got called out for being a Trump supporter – though she has apparently changed her views on that.

Shudu

Shudu Gram is a South African model in her 20s who started her Instagram account in April 2017. She describes herself as “the world’s first digital supermodel” and has worked with the likes of Cosmopolitan, Vogue, Fenty and Balmain.

Described as the “Princess of South Africa”, Shudu quickly gained popularity on Instagram as viewers expressed awe at her beauty and her page went viral with fans using the #BlackIsBeautiful hashtag.

However, this virtual influencer caused a lot of controversy as Shudu was in fact created by a white man, a fashion photographer from the UK called Cameron-James Wilson. While some call him out for cultural appropriation and racism, others have praised him for creating a wider diversity of virtual influencers, which they believe will push the industry to become more inclusive.

Why brands are working with virtual influencers

The major appeal of virtual influencers is that they can be moulded more easily to fit the needs of the brand. Brands have more flexibility and control over content with virtual influencers, and less risk of them making mistakes or drawing negative attention. It also signals that your brand is on top of the latest trends.

The fashion and tech industries have taken to virtual influencers like no other. Lil Miquela attended the Prada FW18/19 show in Milan, sharing her day on the brand’s Instagram Story. That same year, Shudu Gram was announced as part of Balmain’s virtual model army. Prada have even created their own virtual model to promote their perfume line. And in 2020, Burberry introduced a CGI digital double of model Kendall Jenner for their summer collection.

When it comes to the tech-world, virtual influencers exist beyond human possibilities. The fact that they are themselves digitally created makes them a great fit for tech brands. Lil Miquela featured in Samsung’s 2019 #TeamGalaxy campaign promoting the idea that just like Miquela, a Samsung phone can offer limitless possibilities.

The controversy surrounding virtual influencers

As we’ve briefly discussed above, one of the major issues with virtual influencers is that they can be created by anyone and designed in any way. Should Cameron-James be allowed to profit from Shudu? Should brands use Shudu to promote their products and benefit from seeming diverse? These are questions that have been raised.

Can we trust virtual influencers in the same way? It seems so, as research conducted by UK’s Mindshare Futures revealed that 54% of all UK consumers find visual entities appealing on some level.

Human influencers are often called out for supporting multiple brands, being dubbed “sell-outs” for their Instagram Feeds being heavily sponsored. But how do virtual influencers compare in this regard.

And while human influencers are slated for their unrealistic lifestyles, virtual influencers also sell an idyllic picture-perfect one. They’ve been crafted by a team of designers, does this set another layer of unrealistic standards that is already so prevalent on social media?

Conclusion

Influencers initially gained their popularity by being authentic and relatable. Will virtual influencers be able to amass the same kind of loyal following without that personal connection?

Will Robots Take My Job show a 93% risk of modelling being replaced by automation, the same can likely be said for the influencer industry. However virtual humans describe virtual influencers as the influencers of tomorrow and as we move into Web3, I’m inclined to agree.

Are virtual influencers the future or is it a fad? Let me know in the comments below or join me on Instagram to find out more about content creation.

Social Media Listening Report for The SaGG Foundation

Elaine Malone — Wed, 30 Mar 2022 21:07:00 +0000

The SaGG Foundation is a charity dedicated to empowering girls in The Gambia through sponsored education. This report will include a social media audit of the charity, along with goals and recommendations for their future strategy.

Social Media Audit

Looking at the overall activity on social media, there are some discrepancies in terms of branding. The content published on active platforms is repetitive, while other channels seem to have been abandoned with no content being posted in recent years. Engagement is quite low across all platforms, likely due to a lack of strategy. However, one Tweet recently did very well, earning 42 retweets and 45 likes, which has increased the average engagement rate.

Looking at the audience report for Facebook and Instagram (Appendix 1), we can see that The SaGG Foundation’s audience are mostly male on Facebook and female on Instagram, predominantly in the 25-44 age bracket. It’s important to note that the audience is in the UK, parts of Europe, the US and The Gambia. We can use this information when it comes to planning the type of content created and posting schedule.

For the purposes of this audit, we will look at the two main channels with the most followers.

Overall social media audit

Instagram

The SaGG Foundation is doing a lot of things right on Instagram. There are keywords in the name and description, highlights for new audience members to learn about the charity and frequent visual posts on the grid.

A better call-to-action in the profile bio could encourage more people to visit the website and donate. Reels are also heavily weighted and encouraged by Instagram, who are keen to push them on the platform so including them in the content strategy would benefit the charity and help to increase the reach of their content overall (Shedding More Light on How Instagram Works, 2021). Instagram Stories are encouraged to build a relationship with the audience and increase trust. A hashtag strategy would also work well here (see Appendix 2).

According to Later, engagement rate can be found by dividing total number of likes and comments by follower count and multiplying by 100. Looking at the engagement over the last 10 posts, we can see that the engagement rate is quite low on average at 0.41%, with an average of 1 comment and 5.8 likes per post. In comparison, according to Phlanx, the engagement rate on Instagram based on all posts is 0.35%, which is well below average for the size of this account (Appendix 3).

Facebook

Again content is very similar to other channels and not customised for the audience specifically on Facebook. This is reflected in the engagement, which is 0.15% on average based on the previous 10 posts with an average of 0.5 comments and 3.9 likes. Although Facebook is known for lower engagement rates, there are some things that could be improved.

For one, the logo is set as the profile photo and banner. Changing the banner to a personable photo of some of the girls would connect more with the audience. Another issue is that the profile is not easily searchable. To fix this issue, some work could be done with optimising the profile using keywords. The copy is currently being cut off in the description and the about section doesn’t seem to be completed.

Competitor Analysis

When conducting a social media audit, an important aspect is to review similar competitors that can act as a benchmark. For this audit, we looked at Street Child, CAMFED and Educating The Children who have a similar mission and content.

Street Child UK shares a lot of content on Instagram about the girls they help, with a handful of Reels. They have a larger following, but a similar engagement rate. It’s expected that a larger following will result in a lower rate. While on Facebook, they share recent news that is relevant to their audience. CAMFED collaborate quite a lot on Twitter and are involved in a lot of educational events. This is likely why they have managed to grow a large following, though their engagement is quite low in comparison. Educating the Children share a mix of images, videos and documents on LinkedIn, covering a range of topics suited to the business-led platform. This includes educational pieces, engaging content such as polls and questions as well as behind-the-scenes posts promoting the bootcamps that they host. The SAGG Foundation would benefit from adopting some of these tactics for their own strategy.

Recommendations

The main goal is to increase reach on social media. This could be achieved by posting informative and educational content that explains the importance of girls education in Africa. This would also help to position The SaGG Foundation as an authority on this topic.

1. Content planning and repurposing

Creating a content plan and scheduling content in advance would allow the charity to stay consistent and measure success of each piece of content in order to figure out what works best on what platform. Content repurposing is a must for small businesses on social media, however it would be better to customise the content slightly for each platform. This would ensure the content is ideal for the audience who will consume it.

2. Experimenting with content

According to Charity Digital, one of the main aspects charities should be focused on when it comes to social media is storytelling. SaGG Foundation could benefit from sharing more real stories – this could be from the girls that need sponsorship, from the founders about how and why they got started, and from other sponsors about why how and why they got involved.

In order to again position the charity as a leader and improve engagement, they could collaborate with other organisations or authority figures within this space through Facebook or Instagram lives, using the collaboration feature on Instagram to promote or educate audiences across two accounts, or get passionate influencers involved as brand ambassadors.

While it is not recommended to be active on so many platforms that you cannot keep up, TikTok may be a good one to add as it can be a great place to engage with a younger audience and raise awareness (Not Just for Dancing Teens: Some Charities See Potential in TikTok Fundraising, 2021). This content could be repurposed to go on Instagram Stories, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts.

3. Content strategy

Researching topics and frequently asked questions would give us a list of potential content ideas to start with when it comes to developing content (see Appendix 4). These could be answered and elaborated on in multiple blog posts. They could then be broken down into different pieces of content (through snippets, quotes, soundbites or videos for example) and posted to the social media platforms with the goal of driving traffic to the site to increase donations. Facebook and LinkedIn are suited to longer-form readable content whereas graphics, infographics and videos with bite-sized captions work well on Twitter and Instagram.

Finally, having a well defined tone-of-voice, a clear and concise message and consistent branding in terms of graphics, fonts and colours, would go a long way to ensure that the brand is cohesive across all platforms (Iseli, 2021).

References

About.instagram.com. 2021. Shedding More Light on How Instagram Works. [online] Available at: [Accessed 30 March 2022].
charitydigital.org.uk. 2021. Social media trends for charities to watch in 2022. [online] Available at: [Accessed 28 March 2022].
Flick.tech. n.d. Flick: Instagram Hashtag Tool. [online] Available at: [Accessed 29 March 2022].
Iseli, F., 2021. Social Media for Small Business : Marketing Strategies for Business Owners. Wiley & Sons Canada, Limited, John.
Later.com. 2018. How to Calculate Your Instagram Engagement Rate. [online] Available at: [Accessed 28 March 2022].
Philanthropy.com. 2021. Not Just for Dancing Teens: Some Charities See Potential in TikTok Fundraising. [online] Available at: [Accessed 29 March 2022].
Phlanx.com. n.d. Instagram Engagement Calculator | Phlanx. [online] Available at: [Accessed 28 March 2022].
SPONSOR A GAMBIAN GIRL | GIVE A LIFE | SAGG FOUNDATION. n.d. Sponsor a Girl Charity – Give a Life | SaGG Foundation. [online] Available at: [Accessed 28 March 2022].

Appendix

Appendix 1: SAGG Foundation Audience Report

Appendix 2: Instagram Hashtag Suggestions

Appendix 3: Screenshot of Phlanx Instagram Engagement Calculator

Appendix 4: Content Suggestions from Answer The Public

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