- Influencer marketing strategies for play-to-earn applications
- Published 08/07/2023
- 7 min Read
- Written by Anastasia Zaichko
Table of contents
Play-to-earn applications have emerged as a groundbreaking innovation, fundamentally altering how consumers interact with gaming platforms. By monetizing gameplay and allowing players to earn real-world value from their in-game achievements, play-to-earn games have carved out a lucrative niche in the gaming industry. As this sector continues to expand, so too does the need for effective marketing strategies to help these platforms stand out and attract a dedicated player base.
This is where influencer marketing comes into play. In an era where traditional advertising techniques often fall on deaf ears, influencer marketing serves as a dynamic and engaging way to capture the attention of potential players. Harnessing the credibility and audience of a popular influencer, businesses can organically promote their play-to-earn applications to a receptive and engaged audience.
Influencer marketing involves partnering with influential personalities who have a strong online following and a significant sway over their audience’s purchasing decisions. These influencers often specialize in specific niches, which makes them ideal partners to promote play-to-earn applications to specific audiences. By collaborating with influencers, you can effectively communicate your unique value propositions, gameplay mechanics, and earning opportunities to an audience already interested in gaming.
However, influencer marketing for play-to-earn applications requires a comprehensive and tailored strategy, one that takes into account the specificities of your target audience, the platforms they frequent, and the types of content they engage with the most.
In this article, the Famesters influencer marketing agency will help delve into the nuances of influencer marketing for play-to-earn applications, providing valuable insights and strategies to optimize your marketing campaigns. Whether you’re a developer looking to promote your latest play-to-earn application, or a marketer aiming to fine-tune your strategy, this article offers a comprehensive guide to leveraging influencer marketing in the play-to-earn gaming sector.
SETTING CLEAR GOALS AND KPIS
Before diving into the world of influencer marketing, it’s crucial to outline your marketing objectives clearly. These objectives, often referred to as Key Performance Indicators (KPIs), provide a benchmark against which the success of your campaign can be measured. Without defined goals and KPIs, it’s easy to lose sight of what you’re hoping to achieve, making it challenging to assess whether your campaign was successful.
When it comes to play-to-earn applications, typical goals might include:
- Increasing brand awareness and visibility.
- Attracting new players.
- Boosting engagement levels.
- Increasing the number of transactions within the game.
- Growing your community on social media platforms.
Remember, your KPIs should align with your broader business goals and should be Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound (SMART).
For instance, instead of a vague goal like “increase brand visibility,” you might aim to “increase the number of unique visitors to our website by 25% over the next quarter.” This gives you a clear target to aim for and a definite timeline in which to achieve it.
Having clear goals and KPIs not only helps in tracking progress and measuring success but also assists in identifying the right influencer for your campaign. If your goal is to attract hardcore gamers who are likely to spend more time and money in-game, partnering with an influencer who specializes in casual or mobile games might not be the best fit. Conversely, if your aim is to reach a broader audience and attract more casual players or even people who are new to such apps, influencers with a more general or entertainment focus might be more appropriate.
In essence, your goals and KPIs should guide your influencer marketing strategy, helping you identify who to partner with, what kind of content to create, and where to distribute it for maximum impact.
Read more on the topic:
SELECTING THE IDEAL PLATFORMS AND INFLUENCERS
Once your goals and KPIs are clearly defined, the next crucial step is to identify the ideal platforms for your influencer campaign and, by extension, the right influencers to partner with.
Identifying the ideal platforms
When considering platforms, it’s vital to take into account where your target audience spends most of their time. As of 2023, Twitter and YouTube are the most prominent platforms for crypto, NFT, and blockchain gaming communities. Other platforms, such as Instagram, Facebook, and TikTok, while popular for influencer marketing in general, might not yet host a significant proportion of your intended audience. However, these platforms are evolving rapidly, and with Instagram integrating NFTs, the audience demographics could change in the near future.
Choosing the right influencer
With your ideal platform in mind, the next step is identifying the right influencers. There are various types of influencers, ranging from nano and micro-influencers with a small but highly engaged following, to macro and mega influencers with broad reach.
Your choice of influencers depends on multiple factors:
- Type of influencer. Mega-influencers can help you reach a large audience, but they come with higher collaboration costs. Nano- and micro-influencers may have a smaller reach, but they often have high engagement rates and come at a more affordable cost. And what engagement rate is good? It depends on the platform and the type of influencer. For example, here are YouTube engagement rate benchmarks.
- Influencer’s audience. The influencer’s audience should align with your target market. If your game caters to hardcore gamers interested in play-to-earn apps, partnering with influencers in this space would be ideal. However, if your goal is to introduce traditional gaming audiences to play-to-earn applications, influencers with a more general gaming audience may be a better fit.
- Influencer’s style and content. The way an influencer communicates with their audience should resonate with your brand’s voice and image. Some influencers might be more educational and serious, while others might be more casual and laid-back. Choose one that aligns best with your brand’s identity.
- Influencer’s content quality. Consider the quality of the influencer’s content, especially their sponsored content. Does it appear thoughtful and genuine, or does it feel forced and generic? The more authentic and engaging the content, the better it will resonate with their audience.
By meticulously considering these factors, you can ensure you choose an influencer whose style, content, and audience best fit your brand, helping maximize the impact of your campaign.
CRAFTING ENGAGING AND RELEVANT CONTENT
Once you’ve selected the right influencers and platforms, the next step is to collaborate with influencers to create content that will resonate with your target audience. Here’s how you can do this.
Collaborative approach
While it’s essential to provide influencers with some guidelines, remember they’re also content creators. Giving them the creative freedom to put their unique spin on your message can lead to more genuine and engaging content. Their audience follows them for their unique style, so it’s crucial to allow their creative expression to shine through while maintaining alignment with your brand message and objectives.
Types of content
Depending on the chosen platform and the influencer’s style, different types of content may be more effective. Here are a few recommendations:
- Influencer giveaways. These campaigns can boost engagement and visibility. The entry method might require people to like, share, comment, tag, or perform similar actions, resulting in more exposure for your brand. Rewards can be in the form of whitelist spots, free NFT mints, or other perks related to your play-to-earn application.
- Tweets and retweets. Given the popularity of Twitter among crypto, NFT, and blockchain communities, regular posts, tweets, and retweets about your application can be highly beneficial. Influencers can tweet about key announcements like token drops, new features, and updates.
- Video content. Video content works exceptionally well, especially for gaming applications. It’s visual, informative, and versatile. Influencers can create explainer videos outlining your game mechanics, tokenomics, play-to-earn model, and more. Live streams are also a great way to attract attention and encourage real-time engagement.
In essence, the content you create in collaboration with influencers or the influencers create for your brand should not only be engaging but also provide value to the audience. It should educate them about your application, highlight its unique features and benefits, and inspire them to become a part of your community.
ASSESSING AND OPTIMIZING YOUR INFLUENCER CAMPAIGNS
The final and critical stage in implementing influencer marketing strategies for play-to-earn applications is measuring the effectiveness of your campaigns and optimizing them for better results. This process can involve the following steps:
Set up tracking measures
Before launching a campaign, ensure you have tracking measures in place. Whether it’s tracking hashtags, using promo codes, or employing social media analytic tools, setting up tracking measures will allow you to capture data accurately. This data can be related to reach, impressions, engagement, conversions, and other KPIs you’ve defined at the beginning.
Analyze campaign results
After the campaign ends, gather all the data and start analyzing it. Did you reach your defined KPIs? Which parts of the campaign were most successful, and why? What type of content had the most engagement? Answers to these questions will provide valuable insights into the effectiveness of your campaign.
The insights from your analysis will enable you to understand what worked and what didn’t. If the campaign didn’t meet your objectives, it’s crucial to identify where it fell short. Was it the influencer, the content, or perhaps the timing? Conversely, if it was successful, what made it so? Identifying these factors will help inform your future strategies.
Detailed reports help a lot with this. When you can clearly see what exact post or influencers performed the best and the worst, you can use insights and easily adjust your influencer marketing strategy. Platforms like BuzzGuru that have the campaign management tool available create such reports in a click and give you all the valuable information about your campaign.
Also, agencies like Famesters always provide you with detailed and up-to-date data when managing your campaigns.
Optimize future campaigns
Influencer marketing, like any other marketing strategy, requires constant tweaking and optimizing. Apply the insights gained from previous campaigns to optimize your future efforts. This might mean choosing a different influencer, adjusting your content strategy, or even redefining your goals and KPIs.
Remember, influencer marketing is not a one-size-fits-all strategy. It often involves trial and error. If a campaign doesn’t yield the expected results, consider it a learning opportunity rather than a failure. By continuously learning and adapting, you’ll be able to leverage influencer marketing effectively to promote your play-to-earn application.
In the final analysis, influencer marketing for play-to-earn applications isn’t just about getting more users. It’s about creating a loyal community around your brand and providing value to them, which in turn, will help your application thrive in the long run.
IN CONCLUSION
To conclude, influencer marketing is a powerful tool for promoting play-to-earn applications. It’s about building relationships, crafting compelling content, and staying attuned to your audience’s interests. With careful planning, execution, and analysis, you can harness the potential of influencers to take your application to new heights.
Contact the Famesters influencer marketing agency to get experts work on your next successful influencer marketing campaign! We have 6+ years of experience, have worked for play-to-earn apps, and know how to build strategies to promote them in different countries, considering cultural peculiarities.
TAGS :
