Changing from blogger to influencer - What's the difference?

I have been blogging for a fair few years now. In that time I’ve seen the world of blogging change, with that my ideas on what blogging is for me have also changed. If I look back at my first few posts, they were written for me as a hobby. I had no idea about photography or that this hobby could in time make me money. Now I run my blog as a second income source and hope to soon quit my teaching job altogether. I have always thought of myself as a blogger, but recently have been approached to do regular ‘influencer’ work. So, should I be changing from blogger to an influencer?

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Marketing

The first key difference could be seen in marketing, for many bloggers like myself we look at ways to monetize our work. Through passive income streams, like affiliate marketing and occasional sponsored posts. Being an influencer is different, it’s all about sales and influencing people to buy the products you are recommending. To do this you really have to have built a loyal fan base, that like, know and trust what you are telling them. Read this to find out more about what is influencer marketing.

Day to day

You may ask what do influencers really do? From my perspective the difference in the daily work is that there is a much higher focus on social media platforms. I use them as a blogger too, but the main aim of them is to drive people to come and read my blog. Influencing is normally focused on gaining followers and paid work on one platform, instagram being the biggest and potentially highest paying platform.

Changing from blogger to influencer?

So should I be changing my title and my focus in my work? At the moment I can see myself working on both aspects. There are many overlaps that make this possible. I have much improved my photography skills, I have growing numbers of followers on all my social media platforms. Plus I still have a loyal readership for my blog, which allows me to bring in ad revenue and earn from my affiliate links.

So what will be the trends in influencer marketing in 2020?

Many companies are now looking to work with micro influencers, like myself at just short of 3000 followers on instagram. As long have they have engagement, when people are keen to click like and comment on your posts. This means potentially more people are seeing your posts and these are converting into sales. Rather than having 100,000 bought bot followers and no click throughs.

As I worked in blogging for a number of years, I have built up a client base of brands and pr’s that I have worked with previously. They know I can produce high quality content and this has led to loyal collaborative partnerships. This can now been seen, translating through to influencing. Working with brands over a longer time period, helps build that relationship between the influencer – brand – follower.