At 伊人直播, we work with some of the top brands in influencer marketing. So we know, when it comes to best practices, why not ask the best? We sat down with Mitch Alpiner, Social Media Specialist at to learn how they’re using influencers to engage with their audiences.
伊人直播: How does DXRacer approach influencers?
惭础:听We see influencers as a good trusted source of information that people can take and then apply. I know that鈥檚 saying a lot without saying anything.
We are a very experiential product. Just like a pair of glasses or like鈥� a Logitech keyboard, you don鈥檛 know what you鈥檙e getting until you actually try it.
You can look at one of our chairs online and say, 鈥渨ell, why does this chair cost $400? This is crap, I can go to Staples and get a chair for $50 and be just as comfortable.鈥� But then you try that $50 chair and you try our DXRacers and you immediately notice the difference.
So we use influencers as a trusted source for people to understand that hey there really is a difference between DXRacer and a normal office chair; DXRacer and our competitors.
伊人直播: How long have you been working with influencers?
惭础:听We have been working with influencers since 2015. We recently took the next step and launched a more fleshed out affiliate and influencer program in Q4 of 2017.
Previously it was a lot of one-off like 鈥渉ey we鈥檇 love to send you a chair, can you make a couple posts about it?鈥� And now we鈥檝e moved more into, 鈥渨e would love to send you a chair and give you a discount code so you can share it with your community.鈥�
Also, we鈥檝e really moved away from unboxing videos. Because unboxing videos were huge in like 2015 to 2016, where everyone was like 鈥渙h my god I got a new chair I have to unbox it.鈥� The problem is unboxing has now become so saturated we really moved away from it and into 鈥� we really want our influencers to create unique content that really utilizes both of our brands.
伊人直播: You had a really successful influencer moment earlier this month. Could you talk about that?
惭础:听Yeah! So there is an influencer, his name is , you might have heard of him, he currently holds the record for highest individual concurrent users per stream. The all-time record I believe is ELeague, from their tournament finals in January at 1.2 million concurrent. Ninja got 640,000 on [March 14] because 鈥� and this was not a paid thing between like Fortnite and Drake 鈥� but and then Lil Yachty popped in. Travis Scott popped, it was fun watching the entirety of Twitter freak out. The top trending topics on Wednesday (March 14) were Twitch, Ninja, Drake, Fortnite and I think Lil Yachty.
One of the things that really cool is that Ninja sits in a DXRacer because our previous dealings with a team that he鈥檚 on which is Luminosity Gaming. So the other cool thing is that Luminosity and Ninja have a discount code on Ninja鈥檚 stream that cycles every 30 seconds or a minute which then helps drive more people to our website and then whenever Ninja is asked about it he says oh yeah go check out DXRacer. His camera is angled in such a way that you can clearly see our chair and our logo behind him.
So just running the stream itself through 伊人直播 I had noticed that it generated over $2 million in earned media value. So that鈥檚 massive. And then running Ninja through he was something to the tune of $50 million in the last six months.
So we love Ninja.
[Eds. Note: DXRacer no longer directly sponsors Luminosity Gaming or Ninja. However, DXRacer branding was visible during Ninja鈥檚 stream with Drake.]
伊人直播: How do you pick influencers, that鈥檚 some really impressive value you鈥檙e getting out of just one partnership, how do you decide who to work with?
惭础:听It鈥檚 a mix of vetting them through 伊人直播 and talking to them in person. We鈥檝e got some influencer forms set up within 伊人直播 that we use to vet but we also are very in tune with our community in the sense that like, if they鈥檙e at PAX we鈥檙e at PAX, if they鈥檙e at E3, we go to E3, and then we鈥檒l have people come up to us and say “hey I鈥檓 an influencer I have this many followers, this many engagements, this many concurrent, how do I get involved with DXRacer?”
So we also like to have a good judge of their character because not only are they essentially being sponsored by DXRacer, but they are a representation and extension of our brand. And you don鈥檛 know how many people have interacted with our official brand before or if they鈥檙e interacting with a brand ambassador so we want to make sure that they have a very positive attitude they鈥檙e very welcoming because you never know what the first point of contact is.
伊人直播: What are some of the challenges that you face in your influencer marketing strategy?
So some of the challenges that we face would definitely be quantifying data. 伊人直播 has been a huge help in being able to see exactly how much an Instagram post is worth or exactly how much a Twitter post is worth. But then being able to take that next step and try to get a guess on the ROI on conversions versus like, hey if you鈥檙e an influencer and you have 4 million followers and you do a post for us, how many sales will that actually drive?
The thing that we have noticed for a while is that because we are more of a luxury item and also we fall in the furniture category, most people will not blindly buy a chair. They will be smart about it. They will do their research and go check out our website. They鈥檒l go look at competitors and then they鈥檒l go look at reviewers so definitely trying to reduce that process is one of the challenges that were facing and continue to face. I believe that having more trusted voices is better than having less trusted voices.
Other challenges, just scope. Trying to scale properly. We鈥檝e been growing our new influencer program at a conservative rate because we want to make sure that we get it right so one of the things we鈥檝e been working on right before you called me is we do feedback reports because like, we say it a lot, but it鈥檚 really true, this is as much their program as it is our program. So we want to be proactive and get their feedback and work with them and figure out how to make it better.
伊人直播: Your product is, well, a chair. Which I think of as a background item. How are influencers highlighting DXRacer the best? Do you work with influencers on how to frame your product?
惭础:听We do. I guess the way that we see it is having them talk about it and then having them answer questions. So being able to arm them with a depth of knowledge about our chair and our brand so that way they 鈥� again getting back to the first point of contact 鈥� they can answer those questions or if they don鈥檛 know it they can direct their audience to myself or someone on our customer service team. One of the things that we do is we have a DXRacer Twitch account, it is verified and partnered, and we will take it into our influencers channels and we will go hang out with them. So we use it to answer questions in the community. And we鈥檒l comment on things in the stream. And they really like this interaction. We鈥檒l also go with people who aren鈥檛 our influencers. We鈥檒l just go find people who are sitting in DXRacer chairs on Twitch and hop in their chat and say 鈥測o nice chair鈥� and then the chat will start asking them questions and that’s when the engagement level builds.
伊人直播: So would you say it鈥檚 a fairly collaborative process? You are working with influencers, pretty hands-on.
惭础:听It鈥檃 definitely hands-on. At DXRacer we don鈥檛 believe that a relationship starts and ends with a contract. The contract should be the bare minimum. We want to go above and beyond that bare minimum and try to make it as positive and successful for both parties.
伊人直播: DXRacer is very big in the gaming space. Are you looking to branch out in other directions?
惭础:听We are! We鈥檙e actually currently looking into makeup blogging because makeup bloggers normally have like 30-minute videos that are heavily edited. Which means they鈥檙e sitting on a chair for one to two hours trying to get one look down. And then they鈥檙e sitting in the chair for two to three hours editing a video. Why shouldn鈥檛 you be comfortable and have good posture while you鈥檙e doing that?
The other thing that we鈥檝e looked into is music in a sense of like, hey, if you take the armrests off our chairs can you use it as a piano bench? Can you use it as a drummer鈥檚 seat?
伊人直播: Especially in the gaming space, which is so crowded, where do you see influencer marketing going?
惭础:听I personally believe that influencer marketing is just going to keep expanding. It鈥檚 crazy to me seeing like advertising budgets for video games that came out maybe two or three years ago and what their marketing push was in traditional marketing versus how often I feel like I see a sponsored stream on Twitch or a sponsored post on Twitter or Instagram. It鈥檚 definitely become a lot more frequent. I don鈥檛 really think that there鈥檚 a limit. Because influencers have almost become on par with like news publications.
As an example, there is an I think its British guy on YouTube who鈥檚 name is TotalBiscuit, he does a lot of PC games, first looks, he鈥檒l look at the options menu and plays games and gives his take on it for a half hour to an hour and his videos get about as much coverage as like Kotaku or Wavelength or IGN. So like they鈥檙e definitely growing and I think as people are putting more and more trust inside of influencers to not steer them wrong or to give their opinion, rather than a news site such as like IGN. So I only think it鈥檚 going to keep going.
adm-tmp
