The Miner: Issue 5
Hello beautiful people! It's time for your weekly dose of OMG, LOL, and WTF in influencer marketing.
As 2019 winds down I'm looking forward to meeting so many of you in 2020 at my brand building workshops. I'm headed to Los Angeles in January, Atlanta in February, Dallas in March, and Chicago in May. Every city has a different capacity and prices will increase in 2020 so if you plan on attending I suggest securing your seat with a deposit ASAP!
I hope you enjoy this week's edition and don't forget to tell your friends. Hit "reply" with any and all feedback and if you read a good link send it to info@carbonaugust.com. Here we go!
DIAMOND IN THE ROUGH
💎 WIRED may have just written the best answer to the question: What Is An Influencer? Just spam it to all the haters and doubters in your life.
💎 While we're over here struggling creating a post or video a few times each week, KOLs (key opinion leaders) in China are churning out live videos EVERY SINGLE DAY. They're pretty much infomercials with personal style and creators sold more than $4 billion of goods in 2018.
💎 The days of reading college brochures or websites are over. From dorm room tours to daily vlogs, high school students learn what they need to know on social media. So of course colleges started looking for ways to partner with these "big influencers on campus" but there are a lot questions. How much should creators be paid? How do they disclose? How much control should the college have over the content? It's one thing when you're being hired by a brand whose product you can take or leave but it's a totally different story when you're paying your school tons of tuition money and need a piece of paper from them to graduate.
💎 If you're a content creator the odds that a brand, imposter account, or shady e-commerce site has used your content without permission is high. But how are you supposed to find out who the culprits are? Trove Business thinks they have the answer.
💎 Classic Blue is Pantone's 2020 Color of the Year so prepare your feeds for the overkill.
[The clock is ticking to enroll in the Spring semester of my Influencer Business Plan. It's 100 days of gem dropping and you are going to have serious FOMO when you find out your friends took my course and you didn't.]
GOLD MINE
💰 Amazon Studios has a documentary on Chiara Ferragni aka The Blonde Salad. If you read the reviews it's either the best or the worst so I'll watch it and report back. Harvard Business Review did a case study on her a few years back and it's definitely worth the $8.95 to download it.
💰 Arlinda McIntosh is a designer and fashionista who is killing it on the gram. The "catch?" She's in her 60s. She has a great story and this is just further confirmation that you are not too old to join Tik Tok because you're in your 30s. But seriously, they are getting ready to dominate the US sponcon market and you want in on this.
💰 For all my fashion people, the application period for the 2020 LVMH prize is now open. There are prizes for all levels of designers including recent fashion school grads. You have to be in it to win it so give it a shot if you meet the requirements. The deadline is Sunday, February 2nd.
💰 There are 24 days left in 2019 and if you're thinking about one last thing to conquer, creating a Facebook group might be it. I have one, Lindsay Silberman has one, and so do many other creators of all sizes. They are a great way to stay in touch with your community and help them help each other.
[Those holiday contracts aren't going to negotiate themselves. Book a one-on-one coaching call and let's work on it together.]
BLACK LUNG
⚫ YouTube released the top videos from creators this year and pretty much admitted they know nothing about content... womp.
⚫ We all know keyboard warriors on the internet are they worst and it's really hard to stop them. All of the major platforms have "tried" and failed. But TikTok is trying something different - it's suppressing content from "disabled," "ueer," and "fat" creators.
⚫ Authenticity is key might as well be the motto of the influencer industry and it's 100% true... until it's not. But influencers are people too and are allowed to grow and change their minds right? Maybe. From Emily Schuman of Cupcakes and Cashmere promoting fitness equipment when her audience thinks she doesn't exercise, to a vegan influencer who is now on a carnivore diet, you have to wonder, how much freedom do you REALLY have when you serve your audience?
[You don't have to live this influencer life alone. Come join the Carbon August facebook group and get your community on.]
That's it for this week's edition of The Miner. Don't forget to tell me your thoughts and share this issue on social!