Brands and agencies have surely come across campaigns where companies teamed up with computer-generated characters. Since AI tools have become sophisticated enough that studios and graphic designers can create life-like individuals and algorithms can control their behaviors, virtual influencers have become a hot topic.
Just the fact that they are not real people will appeal to many people. They can be a game-changer for brands that want to differentiate themselves from their competitors. Still, virtual influencers have backstories, and personalities and are also bound to all the rules human creators are. Brands and agencies must understand how they can benefit from their advantages.
This article will provide 5 tips on how to successfully plan a marketing campaign with virtual influencers. We’ll touch upon their flexibility and availability, and what brands and agencies must consider before teaming up with them. Plus, as a bonus, you can download our whitepaper on virtual influencers’ popularity and how their performance compares to real influencers.
1. Select a Virtual Influencer that Aligns with Your Brand Values
Virtual influencers’ backstories, interests, expertise, and appearances are customized by their creators. This is good news because many brands struggle to find influencers who completely understand their industry, and align with their core ideas, mission, and aesthetics.
Many virtual creators have well-thought-out personalities with hobbies and topics they are concerned about. Because of this, brands still must study whether they are a good fit for their campaigns. For example, a digital influencer who is associated with a luxurious and materialistic lifestyle will not be a good choice for a company that champions sustainability and the concept of conscious economics.
A few brands with enough financial resources design their own virtual ambassadors. Companies make sure these characters are tailored to the brand’s image, share the same ethos the business does, and will be approved by their target audiences. Think of Magazine Luiza’s in-house designed influencer Lu do Magalu, or Renault’s computer-generated ambassador Liv.
2. Evaluate Your Core Audience’s Demographics
Virtual creators have become a novelty in the last few years. They attract almost as many people as they deter. There are several examples of how campaigns went wrong because companies failed to consider whether their target customers would resonate with digital influencers. Thus, brands must decipher how their audiences would perceive a digital model or ambassador in their promotions.
Our recent study of virtual influencers revealed the distribution of followers by age group. Most users between 18 and 34 follow these influencers. More precisely, 31.62% of their followers are from the 18-24, and 42.17% of their audience is from the 25-34 age group. This data reflects which generations are most receptive to virtual reality, spend a significant time on social media, and are disillusioned with traditional marketing: Gen Z and young Millennials. Companies that offer services and products for these age groups are more likely to succeed with virtual influencers.
However, businesses must assess their audiences' interests as well. Brands operating in tight niches are better off with human content creators. It makes the promotion more authentic and relatable when they add their own experiences to the narratives.
3. Bear in Mind the Legal and Ethical Considerations
In most countries, influencers must disclose sponsored partnerships in their content to avoid misleading consumers. Despite not being real people, virtual creators are bound to comply with regional and platform-specific advertising regulations just like their human counterparts. Brands can face huge penalties and legal actions if their influencer partners - whether real or artificial - fail to take these steps.
Computer-generated influencers are the intellectual properties of their creators and, therefore are subject to intellectual property laws. The studio, brand, agency, or designer who created them owns the rights to their character and actions. Businesses that want to work with virtual influencers must enter into a contract where the ownership and usage rights are outlined. This may cover the platforms, content ownership, location, timeframe, etc.
Many artificial influencers are realistic to such an extent that users can’t realize immediately that they are not real people. To keep the public’s trust, brands should indicate that their influencer partner is artificially created. Several virtual influencers acknowledge this in their bio to avoid confusion and erosion of trust.
4. Exploit Their Unique Advantages and Flexibility
Computer-generated influencers don’t get tired, don’t get sick, and don’t go on vacations - unless it’s part of their jobs. They don’t have to face the usual physical limitations their human counterparts do. You can plan a global campaign with them because they don't get fazed by time zones or jet lag. You don’t have to worry about logistics, catering, travel, and accommodation costs as well. They are available every day, every hour, and can engage with social media users in real time.
The fact that they are virtual entities and have no physical barriers, opens up a lot more opportunities for brands. They can be placed in virtual locations just as much as real events. I'm sure you've heard of promotions using augmented and virtual reality. A digital influencer can work just as well as a human or even better on this type of content.
Brands with ample financial resources can opt to create their own virtual ambassadors. In this case, they can shoes to design a realistic, human-like figure, or an animated character. Either way, whatever the brand finds suitable for itself can be done by software. Thanks to machine learning a company can train their virtual creator and have AI manage their behavior.
5. Cross-Platform Reach and Engagement
Each social media platform has its strengths in terms of content. Since its launch, Instagram has relied heavily on visuals and has become known for its photo posts. TikTok's stronghold is short videos, while YouTube dominates long videos. For this reason, they are favored by diverse audience demographics. Instagram is the favorite platform of the late 20, and early 30 age group, TikTok is used mostly by teens and people in their early 20s, while YouTube can cater to a wider range of generations and is preferred mostly by males.
Although they are present on multiple platforms, human creators are generally familiar with the peculiarities and features of one or at most two social media platforms. They are experts in these channels, but not so much in others. Virtual influencers however can easily adapt to any platform requirements taking advantage of all their ins and outs.
Why is this great? Because digital creators can reach distinct audiences and engage with them right away. Thanks to the virtual influencer's cohesive image, your brand message will be consistent across all platforms. By checking out our whitepaper, you’ll see how much higher engagement virtual influencers have compared to humans.
For example, Nobody Sausage is present on 5 social media platforms and has a total of 33.54 million followers. He has over 21M followers on TikTok and almost 8M on Instagram. By the way, our study found out that Nobody Sausage is the most popular virtual influencer in terms of follower numbers.
Create Effective Campaigns with Virtual Influencers
Armed with the tips and ideas we provided you in this article will give you the edge over your competitors and put your business at the customers’ top of mind.
