Becoming a successful influencer is a dream for many, offering the chance to turn a lifelong passion into a business. Instead of a typical 9-5, influencers enjoy creative freedom, with some earning big money from home or jet-setting to exotic locations.
But it takes more than a few stylish Instagram posts to get there. Building an audience and gaining trust takes time, effort, and authenticity. However, with the influencer marketing industry projected to hit $24 billion by 2024, now is the perfect time to dive in.
So, you might be wondering how to get started. What does it really take to break into this world and carve out a successful niche?
That’s where Whop comes in. We’re here to guide you on everything you need to know to become a successful influencer. From understanding your audience to building a lucrative personal brand, we’ll help you turn your influencer dreams into reality.
So, if you're ready to break into this competitive, rewarding field, read on to get started.
What Is an Influencer?
In a nutshell, an influencer is an individual who makes money from building up followers on social media and influencing those followers to buy products or services. The most popular platforms influencers use include TikTok, Instagram, YouTube, and Facebook.
You don’t have to be a nepo baby or a reality TV star to be an influencer (although it helps!), but you do need a solid strategy. Choosing a niche market you are passionate about is a good starting place and you also need to identify the best revenue streams.
Successful influencers apply their specialized knowledge to educate and inform followers about industries such as:
🏖️ Travel
👗 Fashion
🏋️♂️ Fitness
💄 Beauty
💻 Tech
While the most followed social media accounts include sports stars and A-list celebrities such as Cristiano Ronaldo and Selena Gomez, non-celebrities have broken into the market too.
These include:
MrBeast
James Donaldson, more commonly known as MrBeast, is a popular YouTuber who has amassed over 300m YouTube followers for his channel based on dangerous and crazy challenges.
Murad Osman
Osman’s travel adventure content, including the “Follow me to” series, has helped him to generate an estimated $15 million in earned media value. Top collaborations include campaigns for Airbnb and Bochic jewelry.
Huda Kattan
One of the top beauty influencers, Huda Kattan has built her Huda Beauty brand by sharing makeup tutorials on social media. She now collaborates with some of the biggest high-end beauty companies in the industry.
Kayla Itsines
Australian fitness influencer Kayla Itsines rose to social media fame with her health and fitness advice and tips. She created the Bikini Body Training Company, has a clothing line, and is a successful ebook author.
Overview of the Influencer Marketing Market in 2024
The influencer marketing market has seen significant growth in recent years, rising from $1.7 billion in 2016 to $24 billion in 2024, according to Influencer Marketing Hub. So, there are plenty of opportunities for people to make money with this career path.
Another interesting insight from the Influencer Marketing Hub report is the shift away from brands using celebrities and mega influencers to nano and micro influencers. Just 12.9% of brands are using celebrity/mega influencers in 2024, compared to 44% using nano influencers.
Types of influencers
Nano influencers
Influencers with 1,000 to 10,000 followers fall into the nano influencer category. For example, bookwormmama14 has developed a dedicated following on Instagram by discussing and reviewing books across different genres.
Although nano influencers do not have the same audience reach as celebrities with over 1 million followers, they generally have more engaged audiences who are more likely to buy products.
Nano influencers are also a more cost-effective option for brands to work with, so brands with smaller marketing budgets can use them. So, the good news if you want to become an influencer is that you don’t necessarily need huge volumes of followers to start monetizing.
Micro influencers
Social media accounts with 10,000 to 100,000 followers are micro influencers. Think of Ryan King of makingmoneysimple, who shares practical money-saving tips with over 60,000 followers on Instagram.
Micro influencers typically have a very engaged community following sharing information and advice on niche topics. Due to micro influencers' expertise, they command a high level of authenticity and have developed strong trust from their followers. Brands can leverage this trust to increase their customer base and sales.
Macro influencers
These are people with 100,000 to 1 million subscribers or followers. Jimmy Broadbent falls into this category on YouTube. He has amassed over 900,000 subscribers through his racing game and real-life racing content.
Macro influencers are ideal to use for awareness campaigns, as they have larger volumes of followers compared to nano and micro influencers. This enables brands to reach a wider audience.
Mega/celebrity influencer
Mega influencers tend to be very well-known celebrities and internet personalities with over 1 million followers or subscribers. These include the likes of Charli d’Amelio, a dancer and social media personality on TikTok.
While brands will generally have to pay more to use these types of influencers, the huge reach and consumer influencing ability can generate larger volumes of sales.
Measures of influencer marketing success
When you are developing your influencer marketing strategy, you should consider the most common measures of success. These include:
- Views/reach/impressions
- Engagement
- Conversions/sales
12 Steps to Influencer Marketing Success
If you are ready to follow in the footsteps of the world’s most successful influencers, here’s what you need to do:
1. Define your niche
Before you get started, you need to identify a specific niche to focus on. Ideally, your niche will be an area of specialism you have a strong knowledge of that aligns with your passions and values.
When identifying your niche, consider how competitive the current influencer market is. For example, it will be more difficult to monetize a generic travel account compared to sharing travel content for campervan adventures in Yosemite.
Even within the same niche, you’ll find influencers who are poles apart. Once you have a niche in mind, think about what you can bring to the genre. For example, consider the difference between YouTube tech influencers Austin Evans and iJustine.
With 5.58 million subscribers, Austin creates fun, entertaining tech content, with a focus on gaming consoles, scams, weird and wonderful tech, and more. For example, in his recent “I bought EVERY GameStop Console,” he buys and reviews the quality of all consoles on sale at GameStop, and even attempts to sell them back to the company.
Meanwhile, with 7.1 million subscribers, iJustine’s content is focused on specific product reviews, with a more sleek, pastel aesthetic.
While she covers lots of different tech in her reviews, they mostly center on Apple products. She’s even held an interview on her channel with current Apple CEO Tim Cook! It’s clear that Apple products are a particular passion for iJustine, and that’s really paid off for her content.
When narrowing down your niche, think about what excites you the most within the genre. That might be a particular clothing brand, interior design aesthetic, gaming platform, or productivity strategy. Do your research before you set on a niche to ensure there’s enough interest from the community.
Ultimately, your goal is to find a unique angle of content that’s not already saturated in the influencer market. You can find out more about identifying profitable niches.
2. Select your revenue streams
Decide which revenue streams are most likely to help you make money as an influencer. There are several ways that influencers can monetize their social media channels, including:
💲 Affiliate marketing
Influencers earn money through commissions for marketing a brand’s services or products. Read our Affiliate Marketing 101 guide to learn how to get started with affiliate marketing.
💲 Ads
Influencers make money through targeted ads displayed to their followers. One example is ad revenue. Upload videos onto YouTube and once your video reaches a certain number of views, brands will pay for ads to be displayed in your videos.
💲 Paid subscriptions
Influencers and content creators can monetize their following by setting up paid subscriptions to access various content, such as online courses or video tutorials. Using a subscription-based platform such as Whop, influencers can generate recurring income in exchange for expert insights and exclusive content.
💲 Selling merchandise
Some influencers sell their own merchandise or co-create with brands to sell products to their followers. Lots of podcasters sell merchandise such as t-shirts and water bottles to listeners.
💲 Sponsored content
Similar to affiliate marketing, sponsored content makes money by promoting a brand through high-quality sponsored posts and videos. In this example of sponsored content on Instagram, Alexa Chung models Max Mara:
It’s a good idea to diversify your revenue strategies, as this provides more monetization opportunities. Choose whether your goals are to generate income from affiliate marketing, ads, content sponsorship, or a combination.
How do influencers get paid?
The main ways that influencers get paid are:
- Monetary compensation
- Free products
- Product discounts
- Giveaways
While free products won’t pay your mortgage, many influencers accept free products such as holidays, clothing, jewelry, and beauty products. If you want to generate a good income from influencer marketing, diversifying your monetization strategies and revenue streams is important.
3. Research your audience
Do some thorough research about your target audience. Ask yourself:
- Which social platforms do they use the most?
- Which types of content do they search for?
- What questions or problems do they need answers and solutions for?
An effective marketing technique for gaining a deeper understanding of your target audience is to build a target persona. This involves creating a fictitious person typical of your expected audience and then building a profile of their preferences, interests, and problems.
Doing some competitor analysis will also help you find more about the most popular content your target audience views and searches for. Research the social media accounts of your main competitors to see which platforms are the most popular—and which content followers interact with the most.
4. Choose your social media platforms
Once you have built a strong understanding of your target audience, choose the social media platforms to focus on. TikTok, Instagram, and Facebook are the most popular platforms used by influencers, but you should use your research to select the ones that will help you reach your target audience.
Let’s look at the demographics and usage details of the different social media platforms. This information was provided by statista.com:
Active users: 2.96 billion monthly users.
Audience age range: Largest age group of users is 25-34 (29.9%).
Demographics: 43.7% female, 56.3% male, with the largest market share of older age groups (50+).
Usage: Excellent for community building and reaching an older target audience. Facebook is also ideal for promoting local services.
Active users: 2 billion monthly users.
Audience age range: Largest age group of users is 18-24 (32%).
Demographics: 48.2% female, 51.8% male, with Gen Z and millennials making up around 66% of Instagram users.
Usage: Instagram usage increased by 25% in the year leading up to early 2024. Visual content such as Reels receive high audience engagement.
TikTok
Active users: 1.05 billion monthly users.
Audience age range: Largest age group of users is 18-24 (35%).
Demographics: 49.2% female, 50.8% male, with the largest usage group being males aged 25-34 (19.1%).
Usage: TikTok performs highest in terms of the longest time spent on a social media platform (average 53.8 minutes). It is popular for short-form video content and viral marketing campaigns.
X (formerly Twitter)
Active users: 556 million monthly users.
Audience age range: Largest age group of users is 25-34 (38.5%).
Demographics: 37% female, 63% male, with the largest usage group being males aged 25-34 (19.1%). The majority of X users are aged under 35 (58%).
Usage: Although X usage has been declining, it is a good platform if your target audience is males aged under 35. X is often used for building brand presence, using videos, images, GIFs, and threads.
YouTube
Active users: 2.5 billion monthly users.
Audience age range: Largest age group of users is 25-34 (21.2%).
Demographics: 45.6% female, 54.4% male, with the largest usage group being males aged 25-34 (12.1%).
Usage: YouTube is predominantly used for long-form video content, such as tutorials and entertainment, with creators typically being paid for ads based on the view volumes.
Top tip: It’s more efficient to use scheduling tools that allow you to publish content across multiple social media platforms. Tools such as Buffer and Hootsuite can help you publish content across Facebook, Instagram, X, and LinkedIn.
5. Create your influencer brand
Consider what you want your personal brand to convey. This should include what values, interests, and expertise you want to build your brand around. What do you want audiences to associate with your brand? You might want to share the humorous side of your personality, in a similar way to influencers such as PewDiePie. His 111 million subscribers are treated to comedic content, including his Bad YouTube Advice videos.
However, if you are looking to work with brands that sell financial products or services, your brand should be professional and adopt a more serious tone. Think about the style of language that will resonate most with your target audience.
Influencers are an extension of the brands they promote, so your personal brand and values should align with those of the brands you want to work with.
Your brand also includes your visual presence, such as your logo, colors, and even fonts. A cohesive, consistent approach to implementing your branding helps to increase your brand awareness.
If you look at finance guru Humphrey Yang’s Instagram bio and grid, he uses a professional yet friendly profile photo. He has pinned an image of him hiking to include his personal interests, and also a post showing him in his professional setting.
6. Plan your content strategy
While a lot of influencers focus on live content, having a content strategy with a topic calendar can help you to identify events and dates where your content will receive the most engagement.
A content calendar will also help you to plan your time, focusing on relevant events or timings for your content. For example, you can plan a series of posts leading up to a product launch or create seasonal posts in the weeks before holidays and events such as Black Friday.
You may want to post specific types of content on scheduled days of the week. Mondays could be motivational and productivity-related content, while Fridays could be dedicated to video tutorials.
You should time your posts to align with periods when engagement levels are highest. Research the best times for engagement on specific platforms—the best time to post on YouTube is typically between 3 pm and 4 pm on Fridays, for example.
The best timeslots will vary depending on your audience, so spend some time to discover your audience’s social media usage habits.
Task: Research influencers that you would like to model, to discover the type of content they post and when they post it. Are they posting long-form or short-form videos? Which content receives the highest levels of engagement?
7. Identify content creation tools and equipment
To create high-quality content, you should make sure you have the right equipment. There’s no need to have the most expensive camera or microphone to be successful. But you should still ensure your video and audio are of a high quality.
For platforms like TikTok, you’ll typically be able to do that with an up-to-date smartphone camera—at least until you’re a big name. If you’re making YouTube videos or podcasts, though, it's a good idea to invest in professional equipment from the start.
Once you’ve recorded your content, you can use software like DaVinci Resolve and Audacity to edit your video and audio. Then create social media infographics, thumbnails, and more using Canva or Adobe Creative.
8. Create and publish your content
The next step is to start creating your content, using your content calendar and creation tools. Before you reach out to affiliates or ad companies, you will need to demonstrate the quality of your content and build up an engaged group of followers.
One of the most important aspects of content creation is to be consistent. If you post sporadically, you’ll struggle to increase engagement. Content should also be timely, as followers don’t want to see a video about an event that happened weeks ago. Their interest has moved on to the next event by then.
Again, don’t be afraid to stand out. While you should aim to keep your content relevant to your niche, a unique opinion or perspective can help you to go viral. For example, the educational YouTube channel Answer in Progress went viral with their video “why you stopped reading.”
From the arresting lowercase title to the relatable question about books and attention, this video immediately makes the viewer want to watch. It’s an unconventional perspective within the online reading niche, as most bookish creators will naturally be reading hundreds of different books each year. Instead, this video focuses on people who once loved reading but stopped and can’t get back into the hobby.
9. Boost follower engagement
One of the biggest challenges that influencers must overcome is growing their followers. It takes time and hard work to build up a large, engaged audience.
Even influencers with large follower numbers need to focus on increasing engagement. To calculate engagement levels, you divide the engagement measures (such as likes, shares, and comments) by the number of followers.
There are numerous techniques you can use to boost engagement, including:
✉️ Answering questions promptly
📊 Creating polls
💬 Starting discussion topics
🔖 Using relevant hashtags
🎁 Sharing contests
📅 Consistently posting content
When you are creating content, make sure that you are first thinking about what followers want and need, rather than what you want to sell to them. Creating content that makes a follower feel some type of emotion drives better engagement results.
Don’t neglect your own emotions either. According to data from Best SEO Companies, YouTube thumbnails that conveyed sadness brought in the highest view count on average, reaching 2.3 million views. Joy and humor also brought in an impressive 1.5 million on average, with fear and anger drawing in 818,000 views.
10. Create an online community
Once you’ve started to engage with your following, don’t let the momentum slow down. The key to becoming an influencer is creating a loyal, long-term fanbase that’s built on trust. That has to grow over time—and an online community is the best place for trust in your brand to flourish.
Here’s how it works. There are a variety of platforms you can use to create an online community. Some popular choices include Whop, Discord, and Slack. Although features vary depending on the platform, you’ll typically have tools including a group chat, video or voice calls, forums, and more.
You can create public communities to openly promote your brand or private communities to foster an exclusive space. Here you can share insider content, tips, and tricks from your niche, and even offer giveaways and affiliate schemes to boost your profile.
Plus, if you’d like another revenue stream, you can even monetize your community. For example, Discord’s native monetization features can be limited, but you can use platforms like Whop to sell access to your Discord server.
On the other hand, Whop makes it incredibly easy to create and monetize your online community.
With Whop, you create your own whop, which is your online hub. Your whop starts as a blank canvas then you add the apps you need to offer the features you want. As you're building a community, you'll likely use the Chat App for community conversation, Forums App for Q and A, Video Calls App to host livestreams and webinars, and Files App to share any digital downloads. You can even give back to your community members with the Giveaways App. Then, you simply paywall part or all of your whop by creating free and paid sections of your whop.
For example, trading influencer Tori Trades has 416,000 Instagram followers and over 96,000 followers on TikTok. As part of her “Learn to Trade” course on Whop, she also provides access to forums, a chatroom, and more.
11. Collaborate with brands and other influencers
Influencers don’t exist in a vacuum. It’s essential to connect with other creators and businesses in your niche and beyond. Do some market research into your niche to discover popular influencers with a similar style and outlook to you. Connect with their content first to build rapport, then you can send them a pitch for your collaboration.
Take a look at their social profiles to see if they have a preferred method of communication. Some may prefer to be contacted via a work email only, while others won’t mind a DM. Make sure your pitch is tailored to the influencer, rather than sending out a bulk email.
Refer to the influencer by name, mention some of their content you’ve enjoyed in the past, and let them know why you think you’re a good fit for a collaboration. Also, be clear on why they’d benefit from collabing with you. Be friendly and professional, and thank them for taking the time to read your message. Keeping it humble goes a long way to creating a solid reputation online.
If you’d like to reach out to brands for collabs, make sure you’ve created an influencer media kit. This will contain everything businesses need to know about you—and why you’re their ideal influencer to work with.
You’ll need to include details like:
- Social media metrics (including follower counts, engagement rates, and more)
- Social profiles and contact details
- Audience demographics (including age, gender, and more)
- Brand testimonials
- Case studies
You can use graphic design apps like Canva to find free templates for your media kit. However, you should ensure yours is fully personalized. This helps you to stand out and shows brands that you take yourself seriously.
12. Set up monetization streams
Once you have followed the eleven previous steps, you will be ready to reach out to brands and set up monetization streams. Take your time—it’s unlikely that you’ll be able to get to this stage overnight. It will take time to build up your social media content and get the required levels of engagement.
Affiliate programs can help you to find brands that will want to work with you. The Amazon Affiliate Program lets influencers earn money from promoting products from Amazon.com. There is also an Amazon Influencer Program you can join.
Whop also has an affiliate program where creators get paid for referring new customers to products on Whop Marketplace. It is easy to sign up as a Whop Affiliate to start earning a cash reward.
You can also refer creators to sell with Whop - simply click 'refer creators' to explore this option. This is a high-ticket affiliate marketing option, as you get 30% of Whop's revenue for life. Whatever Whop earns in commissions from the creator, you as the affiliate get 30% of this - for as long as the creator continues to make money with Whop.
Another option is to reach out directly to brands that you think will be interested in marketing to your followers.
You can also tag brands in your posts to demonstrate to them that your followers are interested in their products. For example, if followers are asking questions about a brand you have mentioned, tag the business and this could lead to a partnership.
You are likely to get more success tagging smaller businesses, as the big brands will already have established partners.
Monetize Your Following With Whop
There are plenty of options for making money as an influencer with Whop.
For one, you can become a Whop Affiliate. But to really maximize your income as an influencer, you should create your own whop and set up paid subscriptions for your content. Content creators and influencers using Whop make money by creating exclusive videos, private communities, online courses, newsletters, podcasts, and more.
Start making money as an influencer with Whop—from affiliate marketing to digital products and paid communities, Whop does it all.
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