I’ve been keeping an eye on the tour of Australia by Logan Paul and KSI and their super popular brand, Prime Hydration. A tour of Australia that highlighted how Prime has leveraged the core aspects of influencer marketing to showcase influencer marketing benefits.
Introduction to Prime Hydration
Prime is a brand partially owned and fully fronted by Logan Paul and popular UK influencer KSI (JJ Olatunji). Does the Prime name ring a bell, but you’re not sure why? If you don’t know it via the two popular part owners; Wakey Wines, the sponsorship of Arsenal and the UFC, the Superbowl commercial, the inability to buy any in the UK and the fact that in just a year the brand is legitimately rivalling billion-dollar conglomerates; Red Bull, Monster, Gatorade, and the like.
Prime Hydration is where it is today because of Logan Paul and KSI. Simple and why it’s there is because of their success cultivating influencer marketing.
Prime Hydration’s Tour Down Under
Prime recently embarked on a tour of Australia to show off their products and to engage with new customers.
I expect this was planned but meet and greets at smaller locations were quickly called off due to police concerns with new venues (much larger locations) announced.
KSI and Logan Paul spoke with all the largest news outlets and pictures and videos of their meet and greets went viral, with this video from The Today Show picking up the most traction:
I’m somebody who is involved heavily in influencer marketing, and I’ve seen tens of thousands of people turn up to watch events featuring their favourite influencers, but this surprised even me.
Thousands upon thousands of people turning up to a location to get a glimpse of their favourite creators for a few minutes. No performance, no bells or whistles, just to get a glimpse.
You might think I’m crazy for even thinking this, but the comparison has been made by a lot of reputable people, and to deny it is non sensical, but elements of this tour for me echo the infamous Beatlemania tour of America in 1964. I’m not claiming for a second that KSI and Logan Paul have the talent of The Beatles, but the pandemonium around their visit draws comparison.
If you need a reference point:
How Prime Hydration Leveraged Influencer Marketing Benefits to Become a Market Leader
Prime leveraged the power of influencer marketing to engage with customers, just like KSI and Logan Paul have done.
Prime has managed to be so in-demand in the UK is because of KSI. However, his secondary gifting campaigns have helped maintain hype. These campaigns garner tens of millions of impressions for next to no outlay.
His recent Prime Mango flavour was delivered to a couple of hundred of the top creators in the UK. They have no obligation to post on social media about it, but most inevitably will. So, an initial spend of a few thousand dollars (labour, boxes, materials, drinks and postage) returned several hundred thousand dollars of ad space.
The Results of Prime Hydration’s Tour Down Under
The results of Prime’s tour of Australia were extremely positive. It generated a lot of mainstream media buzz, which is imperative for growth beyond social.
The tour would have also helped to build brand awareness and loyalty to the Australian market. There is no doubt it sometimes gets overlooked by Western influencers, yet it’s often is their third biggest demographic.
Why the Prime Hydration Superbowl Advert told us EVERYTHING about influencer marketing benefits
This isn’t related to the trip, but one of the things that happened while they were there was The Superbowl. It had been announced that Prime would be purchasing a thirty second ad spot for an estimated $7m. Instantly, for me, alarm bells started ringing.
It might surprise you to learn that experts say that $7m for a 30 second ad, when you scale it based on viewership is decent value when compared to other traditional media advertising. However, even a novice to influencer marketing could tell you that those numbers don’t come close to what the field can deliver.
Working out the difference between influencer marketing and Superbowl Ads
Remember the campaign I mentioned earlier that KSI was involved in for the launch of Prime Mango? Let’s break the figures down now.
Let’s assume I own a rival company that does not have the connections, so we have to pay for ads. Initially I’d have to work on influencer identification and contact, which would require a lot of expertise and time. Then there’s campaign strategy etc… If my hypothetical brand wanted to gift 200 creators a similar package and ensure they all posted. I’d have to commit to a large ad spend.
Say the average creator I contacted had an IG audience of half a million, my potential ‘maximum’ reach is 100m.
Note, these numbers. People and examples used are hypothetical but we’re using our experience to formulate a calculated number.
Let’s take an example of a creator they might use; https://www.instagram.com/theburntchip
Now I know roughly what Chip charges, but it’s not my business to say, so I’ll use https://inzpire.me/instagram-pricing-calculator.
We can formulate that a story post from Josh (Chip) might cost $1,500. With a story as highly engaged as this one, we’d expect a view count of about 100,000. That’s a $15 CPM. That’s $15 for every 1,000 people who see it.
Now, times that by 200 (the number of influencers) and you’re potentially getting 20m Instagram story views for an estimated spend of $300k (200 x $1,500). Yes, this will inevitably include people seeing the ad more than once, but there’s a whole separate set of benefits with repeat advertising.
First, we have to note, that unlike the Superbowl, every influencer has tangible results they can send you to prove how many people were reached. How long they watched for, how many times the @ was clicked etc…
Okay, so what about the Superbowl?
If a Superbowl ad costs $7m and the total potential reach is 100m you do not need to be a mathematician to see the difference.
Even if every single person stayed in front of their television for the Superbowl adverts the absolute best value a brand would get solely for the television ad would be $70 CPM. 100m viewership divided by 7m spend. That’s $70 for every 1,000 people. That’s the absolute best-case scenario.
In fact, to make it comparable we shouldn’t use the more realistic 20m figure, we should use the ‘maximum reach’ 100m figure. It’s the same we’re doing with the Superbowl. That’d make the influencer marketing CPM $3 rather than $15- or 23-times higher reach than the Superbowl Ad.
Check out this tweet, which explains it in more detail:
In conclusion, Prime Hydration’s Tour Down Under highlighted the true influencer marketing benefits both directly and indirectly.
If you want to take advantage of influencer marketing, contact us today to find out more.
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