In my last blog post, I discussed Ethics as it relates to content creators and influencers. If you haven’t read it, you can here.

Having influencers affiliated with your company or brand can be awesome. For businesses looking to reach a wider audience, influencer marketing has become a popular tactic.

It can help businesses build a positive brand image and even increase sales. If done right, influencer marketing campaigns can deliver incredible ROI. However, it can easily turn into a nightmare for companies.

Who remembers the Fyre Festival scandal?

Fyre Festival

I was living under a rock as I’m sure many of you were but I caught the Netflix documentary on it. In a nutshell, Fyre Festival was advertised as a luxury music festival to take place on a Bahamian island two years ago.

The promoters, Billy McFarland and Ja Rule recruited 400 of the biggest, best and most expensive social media stars on the planet such as supermodel Bella Hadid, Kendall Jenner, Hailey Baldwin, Anastasia Ashley and others. Tickets sold out immediately. Unfortunately, patrons did not get the experience they were promised and paid for and a massive scandal erupted.

 What went wrong

The influencers had little details as it related to the event and refused to disclose to their followers that they were compensated to promote the festival. People lost faith in the influencers ability to be honest with them and the scandal shook confidence in influencer marketing as a strategy.

The unfolding of the festival was a reminder of the responsibilities of influencers.

With this is mind and the Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) and Federal Trade Commission (FTC) keeping influencers honest, influencer marketing can be successful.

For example, on World Kindness Day in 2018, Coca-Cola partnered with four street artists, Greg Mike (Atlanta, Ga.) Stefan Kunz (Zurich, Switzerland), Ricardo Gonzalez (Brooklyn, N.Y.) and Timothy Goodman (New York, N.Y.), who embraced the brand’s core values, to create content for social media. The company also encouraged its 8 million followers to share the content. Coke used authentic influencers, kept the message and artwork simple and eye catching which allowed them to achieve their goals.

The mantra to keep in mind is less can be more with influencer and social media marketing. Once influencers and company remember their obligations to their consumers, they can experience excellent ROIs.