Transcripts
1. Introduction: Hi guys, welcome to
my course on how to be Instagram or
TikTok influencer. Over the last seven years, I've worked with a
variety of influences ranging from ten K to upwards
of 1 million followers. And I've learned so much and I'm here to share
it with you today. And we're gonna go
through what it takes to actually
be an influencer. The mindset that
you need to have, the steps that you need to take, and certain things
that you really, really must be concentrating. Make sure you have
a coffee ready. Make sure you've got
your checklist and notepad ready to take
some notes and to absorb the information and fundamentally reflect
on your own brand. But guys, by the
end of this course, I want you to be in
a position where you can go and really become the influencer that
you desire to be in 2023 is extremely competitive, but it's so lucrative
and you can easily make it your
full-time job by doing it. Well, let's get into it. My name is Alex. Let's go.
2. Approach: Hi guys, welcome to lesson one. Now, the first
thing I want us to discuss and think about
is your approach. And I think this is a
major stumbling block for so many of us or people that want to become influences to come
into influence. And nowadays it's an
extremely competitive market and we can't go into
it halfhearted. But fundamentally,
how we need to approach things is
like a business. Now, even if you're
working a nine to five, have a full-time job or kids, whatever it is that is taking
up a lot of your time. I still want you to approach your aspirations of
becoming an influencer, same way as if you were
starting any other business. So that key fundamental point there in terms of how you
approach things, ultimately, we are becoming
influences so that we can start generating income
and creates a business. So from the onset, even if you're zero followers, you need to have that mentality. Here are a few things that I want you to do straight away, just to put you into
that mindframe, first thing I want you to do is articulate your influence,
their goals, e.g. what is your passion and
what type of content or ideas do you have to translate your passion
into your influencing? How are you going to build that following around your passion? The next could be to put down some potential brands
that you want to work with that are
in your niche. And the final ones who put a number down
that you want to be making each month that is realistic from your influencing. It can be a safe plan, 12 months and 24 months. Those are just basic fundamentals
that you want to start thinking about and that you
want to put down on paper. The next thing I want you
to do is write a summary of the kind of influence a
brand you want to have, including the topics
that you want to post about aspects
of yourself and your life that you want to share some potential ideas and how you're going to
generate income. The next thing I want you to
do is just have some ideas. If someone approached you
right now for some promotion, some brand collaboration, how
much would you charge them? And do the same again, at certain amounts of
followers. So e.g. if you want thousand
followers, right now, how much you would
charge someone and do the same for
when you get to 5,000, 10,000, 20,000, 50,000, just
so that you have benchmarks. And so if something
does happen and someone approaches
you, you're ready. Guys, this is the next thing
that I want you to do, which is a very, very important step, is
find a payment solution. Something that is easy
for you to create invoices and also
receive payment. Again, this is a
business so you want to put yourself in
a position where you're ready to work with professionals and businesses
and make money from him. The next thing I want
you to do is just create a basic business plan. Again, articulate your goals, summarize exactly
what you're offering, what you're bringing
to the market and do some competitor analysis. The final thing that I want
you to do is to just gather some tools that are going to
make your journey easier. So e.g. you can have
a Canva account, you prepare some
graphics, logos, etc, and sets up a link straight
off the bat so that you can start adding URLs,
affiliate links, etc. Everything that is
required for you to turn this into
a proper business. So guys, building this approach from whatever stage you're at, especially at the beginning, is going to be fundamental
for your success. Because later down
the line when you're creating content
and you're posting, you don't want to think
about these things. You want to have these
things in place to make the whole journey
easier because it is going to be ups and downs. These fundamentals, they need
to be in place off the bat.
3. Who are you?: The next lesson is about who you are and identifying your niche. It's extremely important
at whatever stage you are, but especially at the beginning, to really understand
your markets. And I'm going to give
you some insight and now how we're going to categorize our market and
really understand our niche. Now, when someone says,
what's your niche? Yes, you can summarize
it and say fitness, etc. But from your perspective, as a business owner, as an influencer, you
need to know a lot more than just its fitness
or food or fashion. You need to know exactly
who you're targeting. So e.g. we need to know straight away who is our target audience? So e.g. are they
male or a female? On my appealing to
be unisex audience? How old are they? Are they teenagers?
Are they more mature? They professionals
working nine to five? Are they based in London? Is it worldwide? Is are they based in China? Is it the income
that matters to me? All of these variables are super-important because
you're going to be able to create content and attract that audience
to your page. You can't have influences who appeal to everyone that
just doesn't work. And ultimately brands
don't want that from you. They come to you
because they know that you attract a certain audience. And it's important that
you have that nailed. Of course, as you get
bigger and bigger, it can get broader. But ultimately, you're
always going to have a core audience that is
fundamental to your success. Now, this is really important, understanding these
variables and really understanding
your audience. But as an influencer and
as a business owner, I want you to take
it one step further. And we're going to do
that by thinking about the psychology
behind our audience. So we need to put ourselves
in their shoes and think, what are their interests? What are their beliefs? What are their values? This is how we're going
to really understand our audience and to be
really catered towards them. And some really good
things to do here are reflecting on
your own passions, on your own goals, which we've done in
an earlier class. And then also looking at
your target audience. Looking at what potential
pages they follow, an Instagram,
YouTube, TikTok, etc. It's important to understand what they're looking for online. Because ultimately,
if you're creating content that is
catered towards them, your content is going to
get a lot more engagement. You're going to get
a lot more growth, and you're going to get a lot more brands approaching you. A good way to really kind of a quick bonus tip on
this particular topic is build your
Instagram Explore page around your target audience. So e.g. act like that particular person or
consumer that's in your mind. Your Explore page on
Instagram should start recommending content which you, which it thinks you'll like. And then you can
start seeing what in what actually gets pushed
to the Explore page. You can start getting ideas
for your content and start understanding your target
audience a little better, guys. So make sure you
understand who you are and really
identify your niche to the point that you have no questions about
who you're targeting.
4. Research: Guys, so the next thing I
want to discuss is research. Now, this is going
to be ongoing, but it's ever so important
at the beginning. Now, in my previous class, we discussed how we're going to research and understand
our target audience, but we really need
to take that further and research the
market as a whole. We need to really focus on
our competitors as well. We need to see certain
aspects of their strategy, which are helping them grow
and understand from there, how are we going to implement
that into our own strategy? And on the flip side, is going to be very
important for us to look at potential competitors which are not doing well and understand the floors
that they are, that they have in
their strategy. Now, guys, as an influencer, you will most likely become
an Instagram expert in a year or two years if you
really commit to this and researching and analyzing is going to become
parts of your job, is going to be a
great tool for you to grow and a great tool for you
to find gaps in the market. By analyzing your
competitors content, you'll be able to
see which content of there's the audience
interacts with the most. And from there you
can really formulate a content plan that is centered around
attracting that audience. Another thing to analyze is
the type of comments that your audience makes
on your competitors. Posts. They might be asking
certain questions, they might be making
certain jokes. And it's important for you
to use that information, that data, and add it
to your own strategy. It's going to be critical for
your overall development. And I think at the beginning, it's especially important just so that you
understand, you know, we're all human beings, we're all extremely
intelligent beings. And it's very important for us to give ourselves the
right information. I think studying these
certain things of our competitors is going to
put you in a great position. And then finally, you want
to see the questions and the challenges that your potential competitors
might be facing. There may be competitors
which have been stuck at around 500,000
for over a year, or 1 million or 20,000, everyone reaches points of plateau and you want to or not, you want to analyze that and
see why has that occurred? Is it because they've changed
their contents style, the caption style, consistency. And you want to learn from
that and avoid that by guys, research is going to be a
great step for you to grow. And I think honestly, as an Instagram expert
and I've been doing this for a long time
without research. I would have never
achieved the numbers and the growth
that I have skies. Please make sure that you
spend time researching.
5. Content: Now, ultimately content is
at the core of everything. You know, as an
influence of your, one of your job requirements
is going to be to create content and post that content
on a consistent basis. Now, one of the biggest
stumbling blocks that I've come across
all my time on social media and
specifically on Instagram for influences is burning out. Now, this is going
to be something that you probably
will experience, but the way you want to, when it comes to content and the mindset
that I want you to have is really to
build a formula, a strategy which is
going to work in your favor and really help
you avoid burning out. In a burning out is when you've been doing it
so much, so much. And you start to get demotivated because the results aren't
there and you're just, you're just generally tired
from putting so much into it. Now, what I want you
to do is to yes, you need to be consistent. You don't need to be consistent. Every day. I know so many TikTok people are telling us we need to be
posting three times a day. You need to be doing this.
You need to be doing that. Yes. There, right? If it's possible to
post three times a day super high-quality content for six months to a year than do it. But for most of us,
and even for me, is extremely difficult,
we've got other commitments. And the reality of life is
that we are absolutely robots. So what you need to do is to
create a content calendar. I think if you are just
starting as an influencer, I would aim to post
around four times a week, three to four posts per week, just to kick things off. If you're struggling
to post that much, I would say you need to rearrange some things in
your life so that it will allow you to post that much because I haven't saved
That's the minimum and the benchmark in terms
of consistency because your competitors will be
posting at least that much. Now, creating a content
calendar is going to be fundamental
for your growth. Now, one of the consent
calendar works, e.g. when I used to work
with influencers back in the day on a Monday, we would say, let's post
a picture Tuesday, e.g. we'd post a video. And then on Thursday we'd post a graphic or a single
picture, or a swipe. And then on Saturday
we'd post a video. Then we will repeat the process. And that just gives you some
guidance to when you're creating your content on
what you need. So e.g. if you're creating content for
two weeks and under fonts, and I really recommend that you create content in advance, at least one week in advance, and upwards of three, I would say one
to three weeks in advance is what you
should be aiming for. And of course, leave gaps for dynamic content or trending
content when you jump on it. But creating content
in advance is going to help you a lot in
terms of burnout. And it will give you that window in that period where you
already have contents of research on next batch and just to take a break and live life. So create a content
calendar which will allow you to
do this in advance. And ultimately it will
allow you to be consistent. So you grow on these platforms, you need to be consistent. You need to feed the vending machine on
a consistent basis. Now, the reason is not just
please Instagram or to please TikTok is because you
need to teach your audience. You need to train
your audience to expect me to post on a Monday, on Tuesday, on a Thursday, and on a Saturday. And they will be ready for
your content on those days. And ultimately, you should have an increase in engagement because people are expecting it. I'm sure you guys have
seen on YouTube, e.g. so many YouTubers
will be like I post on a Thursday and Saturday
or just on Mondays. Because you want
your audience to expect content from
you, anticipate it. You can, you can do snippets
of your content, e.g. if you're doing
reels on your story, There's a lot of ways
you can maneuver. But ultimately what we want
to do is just be consistent. We want to avoid burn out, and we want to
train our audience. Now, when it comes to content, I want you to, obviously, if you can, and want to make reals,
then make rules. I have a separate
class on rules, but don't feel forced to just make rules if you
work in fashion. I know that pictures
and swipes are huge, so don't avoid doing them. There are so many influences out there who are
doing really well. Posting just swipes are just pictures and occasionally
posting a row. So you need to think about what ultimately works for you, okay? Yes, rules work, but sodas, all the other content guides. So please don't feel a need
to do what others are doing. Do what works for you. Content is all about
the consistency guys. And then finally
guys on content. Don't feel like you need to
have professional equipment or you need to have a videographer or you
need to have this. Anything can be done
with a new iPhone, a standard few iPhone. Everything nowadays is, makes it a lot easier for
us to make content. One of my older influences that I worked with
back in the day. We got up to 100,000
followers in a few months simply
using a phone. So guys, if you are blaming
content this and that, you're just making excuses, everything is achievable. What you have.
6. Relatability: Next up is related to ability. This is extremely important
as an influence or whatever niche urine
people need to be able to relate to you
in some capacity. As the most important aspect is you building the community. And I would say for you
to start off right now, there's two ways for you to
kind of categorize this. Let's say you have
related to ability. You want to categorize
this in two ways. You want to be able to inspire, but also relate to pupil in
terms of your struggles. So those are the two
ways that you want to encapsulate and communicate
with your audience. And you do that through
your actual content. You do that through your
captions, your stories, all of the methods that you
have of actually creating content have the mindset of inspiring or showing
the struggle. If people can relate to
you on a deep level, you're going to build
an audience and a community that are
going to like every post. They're going to
share every post. They're going to
save every post. So it's essential for you to do that if you really want to blow up as an influence how those two fundamentals at
the back of your mind. And you will be able
to build a community.
7. Online Presence: Guys, the next thing
I want to discuss is optimizing your
online presence. So this is essentially
your presence outside TikTok and Instagram. Now, this is going to
be fundamental for you as an influencer
because ultimately, you're trying to create
a brand and something that doesn't rely necessarily on all social media platforms. So one of the things
that I want you to write down as a goal or
to start working on. On the side is just having
a simple landing page. And you can use a platform
such as Wix to create this. What this will allow
you to do is to put some data gathering tools
on the website, e.g. you could put sign up here, put your email address and name, and you can sign up to
my weekly newsletter. Now, the reason you
should definitely do this is because you will
start collecting data, which is fundamental in the future when you want
to start monetizing more, and you want to start interacting with your audience outside of Instagram or TikTok. And data is so important
nowadays that I really recommend you start
thinking about this right now. And it's very easy to set up. And you don't necessarily
need to do a newsletter, but it's just a way for
you to add a URL onto your page straightaway for you to start creating
stories saying, sign up for my
newsletter or send me your e-mail address
for a reason. And from the onset
from zero followers, you want to train your
audience that you will be sending them elsewhere
away from Instagram. And I think when it comes to the point where you're
going to monetize more, you will have already
trained your audience. So guys, just optimize
your online presence. Started doing newsletters,
build a landing page, and think of ways
that you can grow things outside of these
platforms as well. I think that's going to be
really helpful for you just in where you think about
things and long term, you will thank me.
8. Community: Community. Community is basically the fundamental pillar
for every influence. So you have to be concentrating
on building a community. And a lot of the previous
lessons that I've spoken are centered around
building this community. You do this by providing value, by being consistent and just giving your followers
genuine content. And now let's put the
community into perspective. As an influencer, you will
be able to get brand deals. You'll be able to get
paid sponsorship. You will have different ways of monetizing one of
the beauties of influencer pages compared to a Instagram page
which has no persona, the purchase rate on products or anything will
be much higher on an influence because
people relate so much to them and they've
been with them on a journey. And if you've truly
built a good community, then you're going to be
able to really do well. Now with community, you need
to focus on being genuine. Spend less time
focusing on competitors and other people in your
industry and what they're doing. As you're looking
at other people, you will try and replicate that. Overthink your process. When your process could
be perfectly fine and you could be 12 steps
away from going viral. You need to focus on
your own process and the genuine passion and values that you
have will come out. But guys, when it
comes to community, use every Instagram or
TikTok feature available, reply to comments, post stories. I think at this
stage you should be able to do that because
we're all human. How would you like to relate
to one of your idols? What would you like to
see have that mindset and you will be able to do
exactly what you want, which is build a community.
9. Engagement: Guys, I really want you to be able to engage with
your audience. Because ultimately, if you're not able to engage your audience is going to be a big struggle for you to build a community. You don't want to
be standing so far away and so idolize that. People can never
connect with you. I think people often get
the celebrity influencer. Titles muddled up. A celebrity can be someone who's idolized
and is out of reach. But influencer really
should be in reach and ways to engage with your audience should be started right away. So one of the best
ways to engage with the audience
is through stories. And stories should be a fundamental part
of your strategy. And it also should be a really
fun part of your strategy. Doing things such as asked me anything or some behind
the scenes stuff, some polls, some general
stuff about your niche. It's a chance to try
out different content and really just ask your
audience questions. Should I make a
video about this? Should I buy this? You really want to just pretend they're
like your friends. Obviously, you're
building a brand, but to build that connection is going to require
those stories. And I really think that you should build a strategy
around stories. Now, a good way to build
things early on is two, and comments and engage
with other influencers in your industry and potentially
even some consumers that have liked their content. This is just going
to kick things off. You get your name out there, get your account out there, and people will go
onto your profile. And if you've set
everything else up, riots, they're likely
to follow you guys. If you start noticing
certain people that always like in your
content, commenting, etc. These are the
people that he also wants to engage
with sentiment DM, ask them, Is there any
specific content they want to see more from you, et cetera. This is going to be so helpful
for you moving forward and engaging with your audience might seem like a big task base, actually really fun guys. As your audience grows, it will become funner and fun. I know at the
beginning you might not have a big audience, but act like you do. Every person matters. I remember when I first
started my YouTube channel, I was getting like
two likes on a video. And you know, when I first went, I got my first ever comment, I was over the moon. But now obviously I get
a lot more comments. I still cherish
every single comment and I want you guys to
carry on with that mindset.
10. Consistency: Guys, next up is consistency. Consistency is a
massive one as it's a constant battle between
quality and quantity. And where do you fit in it
ultimately with quantity, it's about the frequency. How often can you post, I think with both platforms, TikTok and Instagram,
they're slightly different, but they both require
consistent content. I think the most important thing here is for you not to burn out. So you don't want to be
one of those people that post for a month and then the next month they're inactive. You really need to be able
to come up with a plan which allows you to do it for six months to a year,
but consistently. And if that means posting
to three times a week, then so be it, at least people, as I mentioned earlier, your audience will
be able to learn, understand what you're doing. You need to train your audience. So don't pose seven times in
one week and one the next as your audience is going to be confused by your approach, instead, post three
times every week. But really what you want
to do is have a balance. Now, of course, quality
is extremely important. You don't want to be
a perfectionist and comparing yourself to your
competitors too much. Essentially, when it
comes to quality, you want to concentrate on your self rather
than anyone else. As just y, you simply
creating content. We'll get a better look at the videos that you made
maybe two months ago, and compare them
with the videos that you make in three months time. And you will definitely
see a difference there, consistency and the frequency will provide results
in terms of quality, make sure that you are not over-complicate in
your content and comparing yourself
to competitors as you do not know the
situation they're in. But remember, your audience
needs to be trained.
11. Being Professional: I had to do a lesson on being
professional as I think, especially in the
influencer world. Being professional in what
you do is so important, even if you're part-time
and currently have what? Other commitments at
job, a full-time job. And you do the
influencing on the side, you need still come
across like it's your full-time job and that
you're fully dedicated. And your whole being an online needs to be professional unless obviously you're
a comedian, etc. But this still elements where you're going
to have to come across as a professional. So that word professional, analyze your content,
analyse your profile. Does it look professional? Compare yourself to some
of the best professionals. I know I'd mentioned earlier,
don't compare yourself, but for things like bio
and Avatar pictures, etc. It's very useful to just
do this side-by-side. Now, when it comes to your bio, people are going to look on your profile and get
information there. The information you want
to provide that is, what can they expect
from following you? So essentially you need to
put that information there. What can they expect on this
page from this influence? So use your story highlights to accumulate highlights
of stories. Whether you're traveling
or food you've eaten, or products you've worked with, or day-to-day stuff such as gym. You use that effectively but
make sure that you're using highlights that are
aesthetic and that will make your page
look professional. Finally, your avatar gets
a professional photo taken so that you stand out
when people search your name, that people feel that
you're a professional. Note, there's nothing worse than a very amateur or blurry photo. So please try to avoid that. But remember, ultimately here, you just really want to come
across professional and that will translate into
your content as well. I'm not expecting you to get a professional
videographer instantly, but just have the mindset
of professionalism. And you will see those
improvements over time.
12. Collaboration: Should you be doing
collaboration? Collaboration is something that has been introduced recently. And I would say it's a very, very good way for you
to get exposed to other audiences are the markets or potentially even
competitors, audience. And the feature is that. So why not use it? I think whatever
stage you're wrap, even if someone is lower
followers the new, it might be worth looking
into and actually doing it. Now, obviously you need to think about your brand, your strategy. It could be worth doing, and it's something I definitely
want you to consider. Now you don't necessarily need
to do an Instagram colab. Or you can generally
just get people onto your content or on stories. So there are ways you can
collaborate without doing the necessary
collaboration feature. E.g. if you're a
fitness influencer, you can bring someone
into your video, do a workout with them and they'll share
it on their story. So you need to be smart with the way you collaborate
with people, even if they're
content creators, etc. There's a lot of ways that you can build this to
your advantage. And at the end of the
day, the more eyeballs that come onto your page, better, the more
exposure and the more potential you
have to go viral. Now, when it comes to
collaboration, of course, one of the main things that we want is to collaborate
with brands. And brands will come to us. And we also are required
to reach out with brands. So if there's certain brands
that you want to work with and you feel like you've
got the right analytics, the right demographic, etc, because you will have
to provide this. Then reach out to them
via DMs, e-mails, etc. Keep the message short. Don't over-complicate things. Just say, I think
I'd be a great fit. Who do I speak to to take
this further? And e.g. if your food influence so you can reach out to
restaurants and ask for a free meal or free service for you to go there and to
get some concepts. So there's a lot of ways you can do this in
terms of collaboration. And nowadays, I
think you really, really need to find a way
that is going to work best for you and go from there.
13. BONUS TIP: Let's make your
life easier, guys. You need to be using scheduling software
if you want to be consistent on social media. So please use software
such as later, HootSuite, the metals sweet. Anything that will allow
you to plan your content, creates an aesthetic
grid and just schedule everything so you can accumulate content
and go from there. And on that note, learn about batch
content creation is very difficult to create content sporadically and
randomly and one-by-one. Something I recommend doing is setting aside a few hours a week or even a whole day so that you can create a
whole batch of content. This will allow you
to be consistent, which is going to be
a fundamental aspect when it comes to growth.
14. Project: Now what I want you to
do as your project, I want you to
optimize your buyer. I want you to, in your bio, be able to make it clear whether it's on
Instagram or TikTok. So in your name,
focus on a niche. So if you're a
TikTok specialists, you could put Jenny
TikTok specialists. And in the rest of your bio, I want you to be
able to present to potential followers what they're going to expect from you. So e.g. let's say Jenny,
the TikTok specialist, I make videos to help
you grow on TikTok. That can be the first line. The second line could be, I love going viral on TikTok. They're going to be
inclined to follow you. If that's what
they're looking for, then if you're able
to provide that, then they're going to
be a loyal followers. You so be aware of what
you put as if you put, I'm a gardener and
put football content, then they will
unfollow you as you've promised them
something different. So for the project guys, put it in the project
section so I can take a look and see that
we can grow together. But make sure you
put your values and your passions and what you
want to bring to the platform. And I'm sure that you will
be creating a great bio.
15. Outro: Guys, I hope this course has just given you some
insight on what it takes to be an influence so anyone can become
an influencer. It's just really about having the commitment and being able to translate your values and
passions into the online world. I really think that now is
the perfect time for you to do so both on
TikTok and Instagram, please let me know if
you have any questions. I do have other courses where I discuss Instagram marketing
or TikTok marketing. So you can learn
some more there, but definitely participate in the project as I'll be able to comment on how your bio is. If I feel like there's any adjustments you
need to make or just to congratulate you on creating an
extraordinary bio. But guys, make sure you take some time as you've
watched the course, just so that you can reflect
on certain points that I speak about and make
notes and go from there. But yes, best of luck, and I hope to see you online. Thank you.
Alexandre Pereira, Let's Grow.
