Building an Audience that Sticks & Working with Micro-Influencers with Erin Abernathy & Steph Pulido of Out of Office Media
Episode 303: Show Notes
Today we welcome Erin Abernathy & Steph Pulido from Out of Office Media. We are so excited to have them here on the Strategy Hour Podcast to talk about working with micro-influencers and how brands can create strong content and build a really engaged audience. Our guests are best friends, the co-founders of their company, and they have recently been recognized by Forbes! Their goal is to serve and interact with female millennials and they are now based in New York City. In their business they work with micro-influencers, or those that have less than about 10k followers on social media, to grow their following and in turn aid a brand’s goals. This is really about building a small yet strong tribe whether you are a solopreneur, budding influencer or big brand.
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So if you are what may be called a micro-influencer and would like to dabble in working with brands and companies, creating another revenue stream, this episode might be just the thing you have been looking for. Erin and Steph offer a bunch of great strategies to get started, boost engagement, and niche down your market. So no matter what business or field you are in this can help you get to where you need to be. So without further ado, let’s dive in!
Some Background on Out of Office Media and What They Do
Out of Office Media is a new media company that focuses on a young female audience and lifestyle brands come to them to get in front of this group! They run campaigns across their website as well as in conjunction with small scale influencers from their database. This type of work is very content driven and its highest aim is to build a very engaged audience. They want the consumers to stick and come back for more! It is all about how you position your product and service and showing an audience how they can use it. For our guests the game is making sure it all fits is their job because you want your audience well suited and ready for what you pitch next. Erin and Steph have seen the rise of influencer culture in the years since they started Out of Office Media. The same sort of role used to be called a blogger and emerging bloggers. From the brand perspective, working with people in this context is the most affordable way to create compelling content and using a micro-influencer to help you create content can work out in everyone’s favor. Influencers and especially those still in the earlier stages of building their audience are highly engaged with their followers and are often sharing messages and so on. For this reason, Erin and Steph believe that engagement statistics are actually the most relevant to a possible business relationship, rather than just the number of followers. The more reach a person has the better the results!
How to Go About Starting Relationships with Brands
Our guests believe that it should always be an option to walk away from business that is not the right fit. You need to have some shared values and above all maintain brand integrity. Both Erin and Steph were micro-influencers when they started the company a few years ago. Their goal was start a group of friends in New York City with shared interests and who could work on projects together. This meant getting together and networking in person. One of the biggest things for their company is the fact that a lot of their audience really likes talking in real life rather than online, it is more intimate and it just feels right! They remind us that building an offline community can help your online presence! Both of them were quite shocked to find there was no other service in NYC like theirs when they started. In the end it is about accountability, friendship and support and their image is that of the approachable and friendly female entrepreneur.
Separate Accounts and Revenue Stream
Some of the people Out of Office Media works with have created separate businesses and accounts to deal with other types of content. If, for instance you are a fashion influencer and would like to start talking about literature, it may be worth considering separating the two. These things can sometimes be woven in but just keep your audience in mind and remember what they usually come to you for. Some of the influencers on their roster work full time in their field and others have jobs completely outside of the range of influence. All this to say there are a vast number of ways you can go about the game of influencing. You can be an expert in a number of fields if that is what suits you. Our guests have their own lifestyle brand and then their media company and the stories for each of those are different. They admit they are constantly tweaking and re-looking what they set out to do with each and these kinds of updates are what can set you apart in your pursuit for great content, an audience and increased revenue!
Quote This
It’s one thing to take a product or service and just push it in front of your audience. It’s another thing to kind of position that product or service in a way that speaks to your audience.
—Out of Office Media
Highlights
Some Background on Out of Office Media and What They Do. [0:04:42.7]
Working with Micro-Influencers and Brands. [0:08:39.2]
The Responsibility of The Influencer with Regards to Brands. [0:13:44.5]
How to Go About Starting Relationships with Brands. [0:17:15.1]
The Niche Differences Between Influencer Content. [0:19:56.6]
Balancing Influencer with a Business. [0:23:45.2]
Separate Accounts and Revenue Stream. [0:27:18.7]
How to Juggle A Media Company and A Lifestyle Brand. [0:30:48.9]
#TalkStrategyToMe [0:32:49.2]
Figure out your content.
Engage with your audience.
Find like minds.
Ask for feedback.
ON TODAY’S SHOW
Erin Abernathy and Stephanie Pulido
Out of Office Media
Erin Abernathy and Stephanie Pulido are best friends and co-founders of Out Of Office Media and were recently recognized on the Forbes 30 Under 30 2019 list. Out Of Office Media is a buzzy media brand among female millennials! Through its owned media property, My Life OOO, and its expansive network of micro-influencers, the brand reaches over 65M female millennials. Out Of Office Media helps lifestyle brands develop and execute advertising campaigns that speak directly to this coveted consumer group in fun and creative ways.
