Influencer marketing experts across ASEAN and Australia are upbeat about the bright future of online platforms amid uncertainty, saying the more creativity and alternative options can penetrate audiences and brands to cash in on more benefits.
Henceforth, every creator is urged to rethink diversity and creativity and use proper platforms effectively in order to ignite themselves to stay in business and secure further growth.
Influencer marketing specialists from Thailand, the Philippines, Indonesia, Malaysia and Australia floated their fresh ideas and looked into a new regional aspect toward influencer’s empowerment. Though they feel a clinch of uncertainty after being disrupted by the pandemic and many other negative factors, the co-incidents do not much bother influencer marketing as it is proven that online marketing platforms remain in growth compared to the abatement of traditional media.
Suvita Charanwong, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Tellscore Thailand pledges that influencer marketing in Thailand and across ASEAN nations will continue to grow gradually because it distributes more authentic and clear content to audiences and brands.
She believes online content generating users will become an effective tool enabling and reaching a wider community and also leverage more change agents and brands to learn the uses of social media. Hence, every creator must spread content more carefully.
“Influencers and celebrities can only empower business and set price tags if they are able to prove strong personality, trust and honesty with their audience for a period of time,” Suvita shared in a panel discussion entitled “The Shaping of Asia Pacific Influencer Economy 2023” held in Bangkok recently.
Meanwhile, Rade Tampubolon, Chief Executive Officer and Co-Founder of Indonesia’s SociaBuzz cites influencer marketing becoming a new tool for brands to communicate with customers. It also helps online marketers source niche clients or obtain business partners looking for alternative options.
According to Detch Singh, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of HypeTap in Australia, audiences in the current era are turning to look at more specific needs based on their locations and their objectives. As such, he suggests that selection of a proper celebrity and number of followers along with cost and expense need to be considered before going to work online marketing.
Although Malaysia is facing a current situation like many other countries, influencer marketing still has room to grow there. However, Yuhwen Foong, Chief Executive Officer and Founder of SushiVid puts a new focus on so-called iconic matter or something really tangible, saying that being the one and only identity will make great impact. Yuhwen also spoke about taking the lead in a chosen segment. For instance, Lalisa (Blackpink) is created to be the first out there, others cannot be imitated. So an influencer needs to work something like that in their own way.
In the Philippines, the growth of influencer marketing is acclaimed as a magical moment thanks to the overwhelming number of creators and influencers. But Ace Gapuz, Chief Executive Officer of Blogapalooza reveals that it is hard to work with micro influencers and celebrities since each of them plays in different ways to bag their communities with either massive or tiny stories.
She points out that the key success of influencer marketing depends on true understanding of what influencers are doing and the brand or person they are working with.
Another expert, Ajeng Febrianti of Community Manager of Tellscore Indonesia, agrees with the coming of the influencer economy wave, stating that a lot of people are taking advantage of new platforms like Tiktok in particular. But one of the challenges lying ahead is how new influencers are able to maintain their reputation and awareness when they spread out content to receivers.
By and large, all of the influencers, creators, brands, products and communities are keeping eyes on benefit and worthy if they can gain from hours of social media consumption. Given a case from Meissie Kemala, Tiktoker from Indonesia with 5.3 million followers, she bares her mind that she aims at money and benefits from her platform. “Yes, I’m working for money and I will continue to work like many others do. But I have been improving myself throughout,” she avers.
This year, influencer marketing sagas left the panel with an important query urging all influencers, online marketers and social media users to produce creative content and messaging to gain trust from the public and to save the younger generation from being flooded by social media.
“We need to build a sense of trust for our community and influencer economy,” Suvita concluded.