How to Start Influencer Marketing on a Small Budget

You don't need an agency or a big budget to start with influencers. You need a few good creators, a small first test, and a way to know who you can trust.

Here is a simple way to begin.

1. Pick one goal

Choose one thing you want from the first round: more bookings, more orders, more visits to your shop, or more followers. One goal makes it easy to see later whether it worked.

2. Set a small budget

Decide how much you can spend in total, including product, meals, stays or payments to creators. Start with a handful of creators, not twenty. A small test teaches you more than a big bet.

3. Find a few creators

There are two ways:

• They find you. Creators write to your business asking for a free product, meal, stay or tour. Answer the ones who fit your business.
• You find them. Search hashtags and locations related to your business, look at who posts about similar places or products, and look at who your customers follow.

Smaller creators are often a good place to start. Their audiences are smaller, but they tend to be closer to their followers, and they are easier to work with on a small budget.

4. Check each creator before you say yes

This is the step most small businesses skip, and the one that protects your budget. A creator can look great and still have an audience that is fake, in the wrong country, or not reacting to the content.

You can do a quick check by hand: read the comments, compare likes to followers, and ask for the audience location. But the deeper problems only show up in the data behind the account. That is where an influencer report helps.

You don't need a monthly tool to do this. You can buy one report when you have one creator to check, or a pack of 5, 10 or 20 when you have a few. If you only check creators now and then, say a first set today and another set in three months, you pay only for the reports you use. No subscription, no contract, no retainer.

5. Start with a small deal

If a creator gets a Worth it verdict, start with something small: a product, a meal, or one night instead of a full package. If the verdict is Maybe, offer an even smaller deal. If it's a Skip, say thank you and move on. You haven't lost anything.

6. Look at the results and repeat

After the first posts go live, check what happened. Did you get messages, bookings, orders or new followers? Keep the creators that worked, drop the ones that didn't, and add new ones. When you're ready for the next set, check them the same way.

Starting out? Check your first creators with us

Send us the handle of each creator you're thinking about. We'll check the audience quality, real reach and engagement, and tell you in 24 hours if it's worth it, maybe, or a skip.