Let’s paint a scenario for you, shall we?
You’ve been tasked with promoting a brand-new product to get it off the ground and make it successful. You want to see this campaign through for obvious reasons, but there’s just one problem: you don’t know where to start. How can you reach your target audience and get them interested enough to purchase the product?
Against the odds, you decide to create a blog. You then write a few articles on this subject, hoping it will get enough views and generate the much-needed traffic to your website. Unfortunately, these visits don’t turn into anything much because there isn’t an active community present on your site.
Now let’s say that you’re determined. So, you decide to put a lot of effort into your blog. You cover it with all the bells and whistles, inviting people to join in on the discussion. They’re active, leaving comments on your articles, but still, they don’t generate any substantial growth.
What’s wrong with everything?
You need more exposure; you need more traffic. It would be best to have an active community to make this work, but it’s nowhere in sight.
The good news is that there are far more effective ways to achieve your campaign goals – you need to build an active community around your site! The key lies in the art of influencer marketing: locating and cultivating social media influencers who can help you spread the word about your brand or product.
Let’s take a look at the 12 best tools to find influencers on social media and learn how they can aid you in this quest:
#1 Buzz Stream
Buzz Stream is a powerful discovery tool.
It’s a simple tool that makes it easy for you to identify content creators who may be interested in sharing your posts with their readership. The Buzz Stream Chrome Extension lets you uncover influencers who are mentioning specific keywords in their content. The information is then saved so you can sort through the potential names and accounts to discover who’s worth pursuing.
How It Works
You need to create a Buzz Stream profile if you want to use this tool. Buzz Stream allows you to track down the influencers by performing searches for people who have said or written something along the lines of what you’re looking for and afterward select the ones that best appeal to your interests.
Bonus Tip: Compose a list of words that best describe the influencers you want. Next, you want to go through the generated Buzz Stream list and select at least three names.
How to Use It?
Sign up for a free BuzzStream account and add your email address to get started. Once you’ve done this, go ahead and click on “Find Influencers” and then select the search options that best resonates with you (keywords, content type, domain).
Note that, when choosing keywords, the influencers who use the most relevant keywords are most likely to be interested in your posts.
For this, you want to stick with relevant keywords as much as you possibly can.
How to Use BuzzStream to Find Influencers?
Step 1: Enter a Topic or Keyword into the Discovery Search Bar
Assuming you have already signed up for an account, go to the discovery homepage and enter relevant keywords to search for the influencers in your niche.
After entering your topic or keyword, hit enter or click on the white magnifying glass enclosed in a green background.
You’ll be directed to the discovery search results page.
The number of results shown will vary depending on the keyword you entered. In this case, we managed to find a total of 164 results. Note that these results are refreshed every 10 seconds. Meaning, if there’s an update to any one of these influencers, they will show up on your page automatically.
Now, what’s left for you to do is to go ahead and analyze the results shown.
Step 2: Analyse the Results Shown
BuzzStream allows you to filter the influencers based on their number of Twitter Followers, Domain Authority, last activity, and even location.
You’re free to play around with the filter options provided and narrow down to your preferred list of influencers.
Note that each filter serves a different goal:
- Number of Twitter Followers: serves to filter out influencers with more social media sway.
- Domain Authority: – serves to filter out influencers with more SEO value.
- Last activity: – serves to filter out influencers who are more prolific and consistent.
- Location: – serves to filter out influencers based on their physical location, be it country or city.
Step 3: View the Influencers’ Profile
Discovery allows you to view the details of any individual influencer.
Click on their name to be taken to their profile page or by clicking on “View Full Profile.”
The profile shows you the influencer’s contact information, website, number of followers, and whether or not they engage with their followers. The Buzz Stream Profile also shows you related posts an influencer has done. You can check out the posts they wrote or when last did they post?
We suggest you go through the profiles of each of the influencers you’ve selected and read a few of the articles they have written to determine if they’re a good fit for you.
There’s much you can learn about the influencer in question.
To break everything into easy to digest chunks, Discovery has three tabs that you can choose from at the top:
- Content
- Footprint
- Network
Let’s start with the “content” tab. Here, you’ll find the most recent posts published by the influencer. Included will be the links to the articles, the date published, social share count, and a short snippet of the post.
The “outlet” filter allows you only to view content from a specific site.
Filter by category allows you to choose content that’s relevant to your niche or topic.
You’re even allowed to filter content based on keywords.
All of these filters help you narrow down your options and come up with a list of influencers that are most relevant to the topic at hand. If there’s specific content or keyword you’re searching for, Discovery will show it to you!
The second tab, “footprint,” will display a list of sites the influencer appears on, be it guest post, contributor page, or author page. You can even filter for specific websites!
This tab comes in handy if you’re looking to do a large-scale outreach campaign and want to create portfolios with your competitors’ links.
Lastly, we have the “network” tab, which shows you a list of influencers that the I influencer you’re interested in happens to know.
This tab comes in handy if you want to grow your network, leverage the influence of others, and create strong relationships with other people in your niche.
It’s never too early this day to start networking!
Price: You can opt for a 14-day free trial or sign up for one of their paid plans.
#2 BuzzSumo Content Discovery
You’re probably familiar with BuzzSumo and its content marketing tools, be it the social media monitoring tool or the influencer finder.
Well, BuzzSumo also has a content discovery tool that allows you to find influencers based on their most shared content.
You can quickly find influencers by checking out their SEO and the social media shares for their posts.
If you need a specific topic or niche, you can also filter by these topics.
With BuzzSumo, finding influencers is a cinch. All you have to do is pop in a keyword, and the tool will churn out a list of people that have written or write about that particular topic.
How to Use Buzz Sumo to Find Influencers
Head over to Buzz Sumo, and in the text box provided, pop in your keyword.
The best part is that you don’t even have to sign in to use this feature. Plus, it’s all free.
In our case, we will be using “Tours and Travel” as our keyword.
Hit enter after you’ve entered your keyword. Alternatively, click on “Find Content.”
And that’s not all.
You can even filter the influencers based on when they last posted, their country, language, only journalists, and a long list of other filter options.
You’re even allowed to sort them out based on the number of followers they have or their level of engagement.
Pricing
Buzz Sumo has a free plan, where you’re limited to only ten searches per month. Their paid plans start at $99/month, with their highest plan going for $299/month.
#3 Traackr Influencer Marketing Software
Traackr is another excellent choice of an influencer marketing software solution that lets your social media influencers.
You can also use it to track the results generated by that particular influencer marketing campaign.
If you’re looking for a tool that can help you manage your influencer marketing campaign from start to finish, then look no further than Traackr.
So, What Makes Traackr Special?
Faster, Traackr features an in-build database to help you discover relevant influencers.
You can even filter the results shown based on the social network, topic, gender, age, brand affinities, and language, among others.
Pricing: Traackr doesn’t display pricing options. So, the only way to find out how much they charge is to contact them directly.
They, however, offer a demo.
#4 Followerwonk
If you’re the type of person who loves to sort things out and organize them in a well-ordered, neat manner, Followerwonk will come in handy.
It lets you find Twitter influencers based on their activity, curation, engagement, influence/authority scores, location, number of followers they have, and much more.
You can even filter out the content they shared based on keywords, language, and sentiment analysis.
How to Find Influencers on Followerwonk
First off, head over to Followerwonk, enter your keyword, and hit enter.
Followerwonk will show you a list of the top influencers based on the number of followers they have.
You can filter out the results based on Location, Topics, and Sources.
Not only that, you can even compare followers, analyse results, and even track them.
Pricing: Followerwonk has a free plan, where you get access to all their features except for keyword tracking and list management.
Their paid plans start at $29/month for a single user, with their highest plan going for $79/month.
#5 Klear Influencer Marketing Tool
Like BuzzSumo, Klear is a content marketing tool that allows you to find the influencers in your niche.
The platform seeks to connect content creators with brands.
It can even connect individual bloggers to brands too.
Klear also keeps track of the content creators who have already been in touch with brands so that you don’t get stuck contacting someone who has already said “Yes” to your competitors.
Here is a step-by-step process for finding influencers on Klear.
How to Use Klear to Find Influencers
First off, head over to Klear and click on “Find Influencers” (found at the footer section of the page). If this is your first time using the tool, you’ll need to sign up for an account.
Enter your keyword in the box provided, along with a minimum of five keywords related to your niche. Check the box marked “Influencer” on the right-hand side of the page.
Once done, hit “Submit” and wait for Klear to do its job. It might take a while, so feel free to grab a coffee as you wait.
After a few minutes, Klear will display the list of influencers who have shared your keyword or related keywords. You can also view their social influence by checking out the charts provided on the right-hand side of the page.
Pricing: Klear hasn’t provided any information regarding its pricing plans. The only option to find out is to contact them directly.
#6 Keyhole
Keyhole Social Share is a simple tool that lets you find influencers based on the keywords you enter. It’s an excellent choice of software solution for tracking the social media activities of specific influencers and their audience.
The best thing about Keyhole is that it gives you a list of influencers to reach out to, based on your budget.
For example, if you have $700/month reserved for influencer marketing, the platform will display at least ten influencers who can help you meet your requirements within that budget. So, you don’t have to try your luck with influencers who will ask for more than what you can afford.
How to Use Keyhole to Find Influencers?
You first have to sign up for an account. Fill in all the requested details, and hit Let’s Go.
On the next page, click on the third option (“Find Influencers Talking About a Topic or Brand”).
Next, enter your keyword or hashtag relating to the influencers you want.
On the right-hand sidebar, go ahead and click on “Influencers.”
A page will appear displaying a list of influencers that meet your criteria. Go ahead and sort the results based on any relevancy ranking, engagement ratio, reach score (how many people have seen their social media posts), and much more.
Pricing: Keyhole has a free plan where anyone can use the platform’s basic features. Their paid plans start at $49/month, depending on the number of keywords and influencers you want to monitor.
#7 Heepsy
Heepsy is an advanced tool that leverages the power of AI to match your brand or product with the right influencers.
You can use the platform to engage and collaborate with bloggers, journalists, vloggers, and other social media influencers in your niche. You can also use Heepsy to run contests for the best content created by your fans on Twitter, Facebook, or Instagram.
How to Use Heepsy to Find Influencers?
You can start by signing up for an account on Heepsy. Fill in all the requested sign-up details. You can then choose to connect with influencers, bloggers, fans or run a contest.
Once you have selected a campaign type, enter the keywords that best describe the content you want to collaborate on with the influencers. You should also specify whether you are looking to collaborate with an individual or a group of bloggers.
You can then sort the search results provided based on various factors, including engagement, follower count, and much more.
Pricing: There are quite a few pricing plans available to you at Heepsy. The first plan is free and lets you try their services for 14 days without the obligation to purchase anything. After 14 days, they charge you $49/month or $169year for their second plan. Their Gold Plan is a paid monthly subscription that costs you $269/month.
#8 HypeAuditor
HypeAuditor operates as an Instagram and YouTube database. At the time of writing this, they have more than 10 million content creators on their platform. Their database includes influencers from different verticals like fashion, beauty & lifestyle, entertainment, sports, and much more.
What’s more?
You can filter the influencers based on their niche, type of content they post, engagement ratio, average audience size, and much more.
How to Find Influencers on HypeAuditor?
Login with your Facebook or Twitter account, and you will see a list of influencers with the highest number of fans in each category. Go ahead and select the type of influencers you want. The platform will then display a list of Influencers who fit your criteria based on the kind of content they create, their viewership, and much more.
Price: HypeAuditor is a free platform for both professionals and brands interested in Influencer marketing. You can run unlimited searches without any restrictions.
#9 BestMark
BestMark is a community of more than 200,000 businesses and over 2 million consumers who patronize the following leading brands: Pizza Hut, Mars Inc., Royal Caribbean Cruises Ltd., Coca-Cola, and much more. The company uses its database to help you pick the best influencer for your brand or product.
What’s more?
You can filter the Influencers based on their follower count, engagement rate, cognitive trust score, and more. The tool also allows you to select the influencers you want to work with based on their location, industry experience, and much more. You can also use the platform to schedule a meeting with the influencers you’ve selected.
#10 NinjaOutreach
The software helps you to find Influencers using the power of their community. You can search for bloggers based on different metrics, including word count, post frequency, followers, and more.
What’s more?
You can also select Influencers based on location, the language used in their posts, engagement rate, and more. The platform allows you to filter your search and send a personalized outreach email to selected bloggers.
The main advantage of using NinjaOutreach is that you can try it for free, unlike most other platforms on the list. If you are a blogger or influencer looking to monetize your blog, this tool will prove to be extremely helpful.
#11 Upfluence
Upfluence is an Influencer marketing tool that lets you find new bloggers and Influencers. You can search the database for specific influencers based on their engagement rate, geographical location, content niche, etc.
The platform allows you to create relationships with influencers and grow together. The main USP of Upfluence is its focus on building long-term relationships with Influencers.
#12 Chinfluencer
Chinifluence allows you to search for over a million influencers based on their name, follower count, and location. It also allows you to select the right influencers by filtering through the following criteria: the language they speak, their occupations, number of followers, Spending limit, and much more.
The platform’s dashboard allows you to view the most influential people in different countries in a given month. That way, you can focus on influencers with the most considerable amount of clout at that particular point in time.
Price: There is a free trial available for first-time users. But once the trial expires, you’ll have to $30 per month to continue using the service.
#13 Influence.co
Influence helps you find influencers by searching their database or blog search engine. The software allows you to search based on the following criteria: Followers, engagement rate, industry experience, and much more.
What’s more?
If you are looking for specific bloggers or Influencers, the site allows you to search by name. The platform helps you filter your results by selecting a category that best suits your needs.
Price: Influence is free for bloggers and small-scale businesses.
#14 FameBit
FameBit is an influencer marketing tool that focuses on connecting brands with the right YouTube content creators. The platform currently hosts over 40,000 channels and over 15 million followers on YouTube. It allows you to select Influencers based on their geographical location, niche interest, etc.
What’s more?
The tool brings you closer to writers, bloggers, and content creators in different countries.
And the best part:
Brands can draft their campaign with content guidelines, the social media channels they want to target, and, most importantly, their budget.
Content creators (across channels, but primarily YouTube) will get to see your requirements and choose if they’re interested. If the brand’s campaign is something they want to be a part of, then both parties must agree on the right price for the campaign.
Note that everything will be held in escrow and paid by FameBit once the job is complete.
#15 Bloggerlink Upcall
BloggerLink allows you to search and find different bloggers or influencers based on their niche, location, social media following, and more. It also provides information about the estimated Reach of specific influencers.
What’s more? You can filter your search by selecting a particular category from the list, such as Bloggers, Vloggers, DIY, or Fashion Influencers.
Price: You will need to contact Bloggerlink Upcall for pricing details. It is free for small businesses. If you are a larger company with annual revenue of more than $1 million, this tool can cost up to $10,000 per month. Note: Bloggerlink Upcall is a paid service. However, if you are a blogger interested in connecting with brands and businesses, the site is free.
#16 GetListed
GetListed helps bloggers increase their exposure by connecting them with brands & businesses that can help get more website traffic. The software allows you to search for Influencers based on their niche, social media following, category, and more.
Price: It’s a free platform.
Don’t have a sizeable budget? No problem. Here are a few strategies that can help you find Influencers without spending any money:
- Find out the bloggers whose content is popular and resonates with your target audience. For example, if you are related to the fashion niche, check out Vogue, Harper’s Bazaar, and Marie Claire.
- Once you find influencers sharing content similar to yours, check out their social media channels and see how many followers they have on Twitter/Facebook/Pinterest.
- Add relevant Influencers to your network. But don’t blast them with promotional messages.
- Check out the profiles of bloggers you’re connected with, and look at their previous posts. If you can find value in their content, write a comment on their blog and share it on your social media channels.
- Reach out to these Influencers via email and let them know that you enjoyed what they were sharing online and would like to connect with them on social media.
- If you can’t find the right blogger or influencer, reach out to bloggers in your network who have a large following on Twitter and see if they can recommend you to someone.
- If you want to stand out from the crowd, don’t contact Influencers via Twitter or email only. Instead, send them a handwritten note or a card with your message and connect with them on LinkedIn as well. Once they get connected with you on LinkedIn, they will be more likely to respond to your message.
Should You Pay Influencers for Campaigns?
Yes, you should.
Why?
A content creator generally has two goals:
- Share their content with the world and gain recognition for themselves or the brands/products they work with.
- Earn a decent income from their online activity.
But you can’t expect influencers to share your posts with no return on investment (ROI). This is because bloggers and influencers are business people too. They need to make their content popular, and they depend on brands and businesses to support them financially. If you want bloggers and influencers to work with you, then it’s a good idea to pay them for their time, at least.
But how do you decide what to pay Influencers?
You can use the following formula:
Cost of Campaign / (Number of Followers/1000) = Per Post Fee (in USD)
For example, if the campaign costs you $500 and the blogger has 20K followers on Twitter, you will have to pay $25 per post.
$500/ (20000/1000)
$500/20 = $25
This is a fair rate for both parties. The influencer gains exposure – one of their goals – and earns money from your campaign in exchange for posting your content on their blog/.
In most cases, companies pay between $50 and $150 per post.
Even if you don’t have a large budget, there are plenty of other ways you can still connect with Influencers. For instance, partnering with smaller bloggers passionate about your brand and sharing the same values as yours is always better than just reaching out to big celebrities.
How Do You Select the Best Bloggers for Your Campaign?
Now that you know how to find bloggers and influencers, it’s time to put your plan into action. Here are some pointers to help you out:
- Are they passionate about what they’re sharing? If the influencer is just posting articles with no specific strategy, then that could mean they don’t value what they do, at least not that much.
- Check out their social media profiles and learn more about them. Are they consistent in sharing content? If not, then take it as a red flag.
- What types of engagement are they getting on different platforms? Does the influencer have a blog or website where they consistently share their thoughts?
- Are they active and regularly responding to comments on their blogs/social media channels?
- Make sure the content you’re promoting fits well with your brand image. Also, make sure it aligns well with your target audience.
- Do they have a well-written “About Us” page? If they are representing you via social media, then you should know more about them.
- How active are they on different social media channels? If you want to run an Influencer campaign, especially your first one, you need to be sure the team is reliable and consistent.
How Do You Make Influencers Agree to Work with You?
Here are some tips on how to make your Influencers agree to work with you:
- Don’t contact them only when you need something. Instead, approach them and let them know that you’re a fan of their work. Show interest in their activities, and then ask if they would be willing to feature your product/service on their blog. It will be easier for you to get them to buy in if they know that you’re interested in getting to know them better.
- Invite them to an event related to the content they share online. For example, if the influencer shares many articles related to photography, you can invite them to an exclusive photography event. This way, they will see you as an authority in your industry and are more likely to warm up to your campaign.
