Helpful tips and customer cases
Spending large sums of money on marketing deals with movie stars, athletes, or fashion icons is still common, but another strategy is becoming increasingly popular: influencers act as authentic brand ambassadors, reaching a wide audience and building trust among the target group. We’ll show you how thepublic® uses influencers in PR with the example of Germany’s most popular apple brand: Pink Lady!
How do we conduct influencer relations at thepublic?
At thepublic®, we clearly define what the customer and we want to achieve together before starting a collaboration. Possible goals include increasing brand awareness, enhancing credibility, or promoting a new product. We then look for influencers who are a good fit for the brand and the goals.
One example is the influencer campaigns for our client Pink Lady® Europe. There are usually clear criteria: we are looking for influencers who primarily create content on the topics of cooking, health and fitness, or family.
What else do we pay attention to?
- Relevance: Does the influencer’s content fit the brand?
- Reach: How large is the influencer’s follower base or reach?
- Engagement rate: How interactive are followers with posts?
- Authenticity: Is the influencer credible and authentic?
The first contact with the influencer should ideally be made via a personal message or email. Alternatively, you can contact an influencer marketing agency that specializes in this area—such as our partners at LookFamed. In your cover letter, you should briefly introduce the brand, explain why a partnership would be beneficial for both sides, and what you hope to gain from the collaboration.
A willingness to negotiate is essential, as influencers often have their own ideas and needs. Important points of negotiation include the type of content, the time frame of the campaign, remuneration, and any exclusive rights.
At Pink Lady, we often have to take into account that content (reels, images, or recipe suggestions) may be published on multiple platforms—website, Instagram, TikTok—and in different countries.
A clear contract is important for defining the terms of the collaboration. The contract should include details on the service description, time frame, remuneration, copyrights, and possible penalties for non-compliance.
During the campaign, close contact should be maintained with the influencer to ensure that the content meets expectations and appears authentic. To this end, it is also important that the influencer receives all the necessary information and materials to successfully design the content.
Once the campaign is complete, we conduct a thorough evaluation. This includes taking into account feedback from influencers and customers. Then we move on to the analysis: Did we achieve our goals? What worked particularly well? What can we do better next time? Do we want to maintain contact with the influencer for future collaborations?
Cases
For the bees
For our client Pink Lady, the topics and collaborations are not limited to recipes with apples. Pink Lady is constantly launching great initiatives: one of them is Bee Pink – an initiative to protect bees. For this campaign, we worked with a bee influencer to create educational content and image and video material for Pink Lady’s channels.
Adopt a tree
Another great initiative was the “Become a Tree Sponsor” campaign, which allowed consumers from all over Germany to sponsor a Pink Lady tree at a South Tyrolean apple farm and harvest the apples in the fall. The campaign was aimed at families, so we worked with @AboutDina, whose content fits this message. She visited the orchard to pick her own apples, and we produced a series of Q&A videos with the apple farmer.
As part of influencer relations, we also frequently engage in content collaborations. This means we work with experts, artists, or other prominent figures in their field. Here are some notable examples that demonstrate how versatile our campaigns can be.
Pink Lady featuring star pastry chef Hannes Radeck: DIY desserts for at home
Hannes Radeck, Gault & Millau Pastry Chef of the Year 2021, works with the entire spectrum of flavors and textures offered by Pink Lady apples. He has developed three DIY recipes so you can recreate his dishes at home. Especially for all Instagram followers, we organized a live cooking workshop with Hannes, where he demonstrated how to prepare one of his Pink Lady creations.
Pink Lady as a fragrance and flower bouquet for your home
What do apples and flowers have in common? In collaboration with floral designer Valentina Teinitzer, aka Studio de Pasquale, Pink Lady has created a bouquet: The Fruitful. This bouquet for the home reflects the colors and aromas of Pink Lady apples.
