A Different Way to Think About Influencers

Outsourcing your campaign’s creative to college students you don’t know might sound like an idea that would lead to a contract termination. But flytedesk, the college media advertising network, has seen just that offering take off among campaigns and groups, including VoteAmerica which used the company during its 2020 turnout campaign.  

Flytedesk rolled out the offering early in the last presidential cycle as the Democratic primary season was getting underway.

“By the time the general election rolled around, we were doing it pretty regularly,” said CEO Alex Kronman. “Influencers are now a standard part of the offering with all of the candidates and causes that we work with.”

The way it works is clients develop a creative brief with flytedesk, which then uses its college media partners to identify the influencers for the effort. 

“The influencer has to get some context. What election is this and why its is important? What’s at stake, what’s the lay of the land here? What are voter registration laws?” said Kronman. Influencer campaigns “are one of our easiest things to stand up because it’s not about creating ads in a bunch of different formats, it’s one brief. We are very hands on to get the think right.”

Now, this type of advertising involves a certain amount of trust that the influencer will maintain the brand security of the political marketer. Still, Kronman said they’ve never had to take down a post yet for going off message. “There’s a list of dos and don’ts. A very common don’t is don’t speak negatively about anyone else,” he said. “It’s important to be positive.” 

Turning loose TikTok creators and Instagram influencers has actually yielded some excellent creative, he added. For instance, one student posted about her grandmother’s fight to exercise her right to vote for a GOTV effort. It was an Instagram post with a single black-and-white photograph and caption. But more often than not the best material features the students themselves: “If people can see their friends, that’s usually best,” he said. 

While this marketing tactic is a hot topic right now with political advertisers, Kronman said he would never suggest a client use it in a standalone effort. “We see far better results with multi-channel campaigns than single-channel campaigns,” he said. “Almost every campaign we’ve built is about 50/50 digital media and visible media. We see this as another great tool in the shed.”