Winfluence - The Influence Marketing Podcast

At the end of each show, I offer you up the opportunity to ask a question or throw out a topic you’d like my take on to inspire a show. You’re always welcome to do that by emailing me. The address is jason@jasonfalls.com. I love it when you do because it gives me a good topic to talk about and it probably helps your fellow listeners and Winfluence community folks learn, too. I also have people in...

Instagram is changing its algorithm and user experience. Kylie Jenner isn’t happy about it. She once critically wounded Snapchat by saying she never goes there anymore. Now she’s created a PR issue for the platform. But the changes to Instagram go far beyond pissing off a Kardashian. Instagram is now outwardly saying video is better. They’re prioritizing it over the their heritage approach of phot...

We’ve gotten into a little bit of a pattern here on the show. Seems like every other interview or so is with some founder or executive at an influencer marketing software company. There are lots of reasons for that. First, they’re anxious to mention their platform to you since they know the people who listen to WInfluence are interested in and often shopping for solutions to problems with influenc...

I just returned from a short vacation with my children, Grant and Katie. We choose a city the kids haven’t been to each summer and go explore for four or five days. This year, we chose Denver, or the Denver area. We stayed in an AirBnB between Denver and Boulder. We spent a day in Golden, Colorado as well. Plus we drove up into the Rockies one day … so it was far more than just Denver. Now, I have...

The influencer marketing space is overrun with agencies and marketplaces and software solutions and such. It’s hard for a brand to find the right partner to actually solve the specific problems they have that influence can address.  Case in point, I reached out to a talent agency last week – you know, one that manages talent, like celebrities and influencers. But I made the mistake of using the te...

Many of you are small business owners. Some of you might also work in marketing teams or even at agencies where influencer marketing budgets are thin. So when you hear people rattling on about the software platforms they use for their influencer marketing efforts, you probably think, “Yeah … wouldn’t that be nice.” The soup-to-nuts platforms are expensive. Or at least they are for small businesses...

The most overlooked facet of marketing execution across our industry is consumer research. The large brands and agencies swear by it. But the one-percent is just that: one percent. When you drop down to the lower end of the large brand spectrum, and then to medium brands and small businesses, consumer insights are seldom even talked about.  Not enough businesses invest in consumer research. Not en...

The word affinity has a wide range of meanings. The core one is, a relationship by marriage. That’s according to Merriam-Webster. But it can also mean a similarity based on a relationship or causal connection.  Which is to say the spectrum of the relationship can be strong. Or not so strong.  I have an affinity for bourbon. But I also have an affinity for Hanson’s 1997 album Middle of Nowhere. I c...

Let’s talk about building your influence. And I don’t mean growing your follower count on social networks. I mean really growing the number of people that you have some degree of influence over. Now, for some of you who want to build a following online or offline and have true influence. Perhaps you want to be content creator that does brand deals and gets paid to create on social media channels....

I share a lot of my own opinions about influence marketing here on the show. But of course the meat of what we do here is mine the brilliant minds of our guests. I make no claim to be the know-all and end all to influence marketing.  Sure, I have a perspective on the practice and industry I think is unique and expands your thinking about it. I believe that’s why you listen. And I thank you for tha...

If you’ve listened to Winfluence for any length of time, you know that for the influencers and content creators out there, I’m bullish on building and growing your owned content channels. Blogs, websites, email newsletters, podcasts … the properties where you own the content and the audience. As opposed to social networks where your content is on someone else’s website and the audience is not your...

What if we have the formula for influencer marketing all wrong? What if all this organic content creation and brand collaborations is like driving the wrong way down a one-way street? I’m not throwing this out there as hyperbole. I mean it. What if we have it all wrong? Let’s deconstruct the construct for a minute. What we’re trying to do is persuade an audience to take action. We want them to buy...

The first social media conference I ever attended was a Search Marketing Expo event back in 2007 or 2008. While it was being put on by a search-focused company, it was all about social media. I thought it would be a good place to learn and listen and see if my ideas on this emerging space could hold water to others thinking about it. But because it was run by search folks, the roster of speakers i...

At the end of this show each week, I invite you to ask me a question or present an influence marketing problem you might have and either email me about it, or even better, email me a voice recording so I can actually drop you asking it here on the show. So far, I haven’t had a lot of takers and that’s fine. Though, I will send you a signed copy of Winfluence the book if I use your question on the...

There's no question the pandemic had and is still having a tremendous impact on the restaurant industry. In fact, as today’s guest points out, when you look at the history of how and why people use restaurants, the experience has changed.  Rev Ciancio is a food and hospitality industry influencer. Yep … in the B2B space. He speaks at food and beverage industry conferences. He is a marketing and te...

According to The State of Influencer Equity report from IZEA, black creators on average make more than white influencers. But find a black creator that thinks that’s accurate and you might be the first. In fact, other studies and surveys show the influencer pay gap through the filter of race is still very far from equitable.  But the influencer pay gap isn’t as simple as creators should be paid th...

This is a special episode of Winfluence. I’m going to step aside and let you hear someone else guide a discussion about influence marketing. There’s another great show on the Marketing Podcast Network called The Endless Coffee Cup. Matt Bailey of Site Logic is the host of that show. He welcomes expert guests from all around the world on a variety of marketing and business topics. Matt and I have k...

We learned on a recent episode of Winfluence that we’re all gamers. If you play Wordle, or 2048 or Solitaire on your phone, you’re considered a gamer. When you think of the label that way, and filter that label through the lens of influence and influencers, a stereotype is shattered a bit, right? Gaming is a $250 billion industry. The demographic of a gamer isn’t what you think. The demographic of...

It could be the economy. Or opportunity. Or greed. But I’ve become fed up with the ever-increasing price tags influencers and content creators are putting on brand engagements. For you brands and agencies out there, I’m guessing you might be as well.  In the most recent edition of my monthly email newsletter, I shared some tinkering I’ve been doing with ideas that might help us know when we’re bei...

As you know here on Winfluence, we spend a good deal of time talking to influencers and content creators. We also have had the chance to dive into the talent management side of the industry and see the space from the angle of someone who is mindful of the creator’s business and the brand’s needs in interacting with them. On this episode, we have an interesting and rare treat. Molly Tracy is a tale...

Without question, the number one issue that brands and agencies have in the influencer marketing space is simply finding the right influencers to use for a campaign. While that might seem like a simple solution to solve for (there’s a whole industry of software companies with search algorithms meant to do so), typing a few characteristics into a search engine isn’t really a good solution, regardle...

My definition of an influencer is anyone who can motivate an audience to take action. Now, that’s a very broad definition. In fact, anyone can be an influencer (or more accurately, influential) under those criteria.  But when it comes to differentiating between influencers, we have to split hairs. And one category where my hair-splitting axe comes out is the category of celebrities. I think there...

Can you think of a brand that has done something in marketing in the last few years, not just with influencers, but marketing overall, and they’ve immediately had to put out the fires of a PR crisis because their campaign was culturally insensitive?  I mean, how can you not think of a few. From L’Oreal to Amazon to Disney … some of the biggest brands, and certainly even small businesses, have eith...

Too many content creators and influencers are building their homes on borrowed ground. And someday, the landlord may well swoop in and hand them an eviction notice.  That analogy is actually a toned down version of reality, though. When an influencer or content creator puts all their content on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube or Facebook, they’re building their house on borrowed ground. When they build...

When you have the opportunity to learn from a seasoned professional, you should always take it. When I found out I could get Chris Gibson on the line to pick his brain as it were about being an online content creator, an influencer who has created a career over the last 15-plus years doing that kind of thing, I knew I had to jump at the chance.  Chris is known as one of the world’s foremost skinca...