During my career in music and film, I have seen first-hand the power of pop culture and influencer marketing campaigns to have a social impact. My awareness of this began when I attended Live Aid and witnessed the profound impact of bringing artists together to end the Ethiopian famine. I now call what I experienced during that event the “Influencer Effect,” which is a proven practice of engaging audiences via public figures, especially celebrities and social media creators.
For the last three decades, I have used this phenomenon to create influencer marketing campaigns for nonprofit organizations, foundations, and purpose-driven businesses. However, throughout my social impact work, I’ve seen that many organizations lack the confidence and knowledge to engage influencers in their campaigns. In fact, most nonprofit leaders I worked with hadn’t even considered influencer marketing for their campaign strategy until our partnership.
I’m grateful to have helped these organizations use the power of influencer philanthropy to make an impact. Still, I often think about all the nonprofit marketers missing out on major opportunities to benefit their organizations, campaigns, people, and society. To address this, I wrote Good Influence: How to Engage Influencers for Purpose and Profit, a practical guide for social impact leaders seeking to create influencer marketing campaigns for nonprofits, available February 27, 2023.
Real Examples of Successful Influencer Engagement
As you read Good Influence, you’ll quickly see that it is different from other nonprofit marketing books and how-to guides. Because so many lessons I share within the chapters are tied to real experiences I’ve had while working in entertainment and philanthropy, Good Influence contains real stories and case studies that are both insightful and, in my humble opinion, entertaining.
In one case study, I reference Entertain Impact’s successful #DiabetesDanceDare campaign with the American Diabetes Association as a notable example of asking celebrities to support a nonprofit’s campaign. I share how we were able to engage many high-profile celebrities to amplify the campaign, including Shaquille O’Neil, Mark Cuban, Camilla Cabello, and Keke Palmer. As a result of our influencer marketing strategy, the campaign reached six countries, received over 1.5 billion impressions, gave pride to the employees, and was nominated for a Shorty Award.
Practical Steps to Creating an Influencer Marketing Strategy
At its core, Good Influence is a practical nonprofit marketing book that teaches purpose-driven leaders, whether in the business or nonprofit world, how to engage influencers for their social impact campaigns. That is why I organized Good Influence based on my D.R.E.A.M. method.
D.R.E.A.M. is a five-step influencer marketing strategy I created, evolved, and refined over 18 years. Each chapter of Good Influence walks readers through a focused step in the sequence, from designing the campaign to engaging influencers to measuring impact and everything in between. In teaching D.R.E.A.M., I reference more than 60 case studies in the book so that purpose-driven organizations and nonprofit leaders—irrespective of their size and resources—can learn to apply the method on behalf of their own social impact campaigns and, in turn, do more good.
Reach Your Influencer Philanthropy Goals with Good Influence
As I’ve learned from years of working in the entertainment industry and philanthropic space, the Influencer Effect is a force businesses and nonprofits can utilize to make a lasting impact. By publishing Good Influence, I look forward to teaching nonprofit marketers how to engage influencers to improve their organization’s performance and social impact.
This article was written by Paul M. Katz. Connect with Paul on LinkedIn and follow him on Twitter.
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