Nielsen has launched a measurement solution to help advertisers evaluate the effectiveness of influencer marketing.
There is still a huge lack of transparent, independent and comparable metrics to determine the success of influencer campaigns, despite it being such an enormous and well-publicised advertising channel.
Brands are set to spend up to $15 billion on influencer marketing by 2022, yet there remains a lack of transparent, independent and comparable metrics for brands and agencies to measure the true ROI of their influencer investment.
With most marketers citing engagement metrics as the primary means to evaluate influencer campaign success, the need for greater understanding of the true impact of influencer activity is especially important at a time when social media platforms are testing the removal of traditional engagement metrics such as likes, views and shares.
The Nielsen Influencer Brand Effect solution is a measurement tool designed to help brands and agencies objectively measure the effectiveness of their influencer marketing activity against key brand metrics such as brand awareness, ad recall, favourability and purchase intent. The solution also provides content metrics to assess the perceived ‘fit’ between a brand and the influencer, the right influencers to drive specific brand goals and whether content is effective at shifting audience perceptions.
Barney Farmer, UK Media Commercial Director, Nielsen, said: “Influencer campaigns can be a very effective way to engage audiences around products and brand messaging. However, measurement of the effectiveness of these campaigns is currently inadequate. The Nielsen Influencer Brand Effect solution looks to solve this challenge by giving brands and agencies a greater understanding of the impact of their influencer campaigns. By analysing KPIs such as familiarity, likeability and branding, research can provide actionable insights for brands to ensure that they are always improving their communications and relationships with their consumers.”
Methodology for Neilsen’s Influencer Marketing measurement:
- Nielsen’s analysis is measured by obtaining the responses of real people who follow influencers to determine how effective the influencer has been at driving key brand metrics.
- Respondents are screened to ensure they fall within the target audience before being presented with a list comprising of all influencers on a media plan, along with other influencers operating within the same area. Respondents that follow the specific influencers on the media plan will fall into the ‘Test’ group and those that do not will fall into the ‘Control’ group.
- Throughout the campaign period, a brand KPI survey is administered to both Test & Control groups and brand uplift is determined by comparing the performance of the Test group against the Control group. Test and control groups are balanced on a number of variables, and campaign impact is determined by comparing to the responses of those who follow the influencers on the plan vs. those who do not follow the campaign influencers but influencers of a similar category.
- For the test group, an additional recall-based question is administered to ascertain exposure to influencer content
- Up to 3 pieces of influencer content are tested via forced exposure to assess creative performance against a set of standard KPIs
