The document discusses how influence marketing can be used to leverage trusted third-party endorsements and increase a brand's customer touchpoints. It outlines how the consumer purchase journey is no longer linear but circular, with customers gathering information from many sources. Influence marketing can impact search engine results by providing third-party content from influencers across blogs, reviews, social media and more to gain customer trust. This will require brands to shift marketing budgets from traditional advertising to relationship-building and influence marketing programs.

1. Copyright © 2013 Appinions. All rights reserved.
Marketing Through Trust:
Leveraging Influence in the
Buyer’s Purchase Journey

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Understanding the New
Purchasing Process
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This is the old way that customers made
purchasing decisions – a linear process
Awareness
Opinion
Consideration
Intention
Sales
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The new purchase journey is no longer linear,
it’s circular
McKinsey’s Consumer Decision Journey
Source: https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_consumer_decision_journey_2373#
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Active Evaluation
Informal gathering, shopping
Post-purchase Experience
Ongoing exposure
Initial-
consideration
set
Moment
of
purchase
Loyalty Loop
Trigger
The consumer considers an
initial set of brands, based
on brand perceptions and
exposure to recent
touchpoints.
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Consumers add or subtract
brands as they evaluate
what they want
2
Ultimately, the consumer
selects a brand at the
moment of purchase.
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Consumers have significantly more touchpoints in
the decision making process – and growing rapidly
20122011
Source: http://www.zeromomentoftruth.com/
0
2
4
6
8
10
12
2010 2011
Decision Sources
The average shopper uses 10.4 sources of
information to make a decision in 2011
5
Up from
5.3 sources
in 2010

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Influential touchpoints for consumers are shifting
away from company-driven marketing to
consumer-driven marketing
Source: https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_consumer_decision_journey_2373#
Word-of-mouth, online research, and offline or print reviews are of key
importance to the buying process
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Most-influential touchpoints by stage of consumer decision journey, for competitors and new customers,
% of effectiveness
-5%
Initial
consideration
set
Active
evaluation
Closure
Consumer-driven marketing
Word-of-mouth
Online research
Online and/or print reviews
Company-driven marketing
Traditional advertising
Direct marketing
Sponsorship
In-store product experience
Salesperson contact
Store/agent/dealer interaction
Past experience
12%
39%
28%
21%
26%
26%
37%
10%
43%
22%
31%

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The most trusted touchpoints for consumers
are socially-driven
Recommendations and other consumers’ opinions are more highly trusted
than any brand, or even, editorial content
Source: http://blog.nielsen.com/nielsenwire/nielsen-news/trust-in-advertising-%E2%80%93-paid-owned-and-earned/
TITLE
= Trust %
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Recommendations from
people I know
Consumer opinions
posted online
92% 70%
Editorial content such as
newspaper articles
Emails I signed up for
58%
50%58% 46-47%
Branded websites Ads on TV/Brand
sponsorships/Billboards/
Ads in magazines/Ads in
newspapers

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Social media is particularly important in the
decision process, and in ongoing customer
relationships
Social media is expanding the circle of people consumers trust: from
only friends and family to new people they connect with in forums,
blogs, and other social media sources
Source: http://www.thearf.org/news.php?newsid=309
22%of consumers say that social media is important in
their final purchase decision
33% of shoppers say social media introduced them to a
brand/product they were unfamiliar with or helped change
their opinion of a brand/product
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Influence Marketing to Increase
Customer Touchpoints
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Given the increase in customer information sources,
it’s imperative that brands increase the information
available about their product or service
• One of the primary ways for brands to find their way on to the
list of consumer-trusted touchpoints is through third-party
endorsements
• Generating third-party endorsements will provide more
opportunities for consumers to get information about your
brand, product or service from a source they trust more than
the company itself
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There is a vast array of potential third-party
(non-company) sources for customer information
• Search engine results
• Company social media – brand engagement
on owned channels such as Facebook,
company blog, Twitter and YouTube
• Reviews and comparison shopping sites
• Retailer/store website
• Blog post or video where the product was
discussed
• Blog post or article comment which
mentions the brand
• Discussion forum or group
• Comments on an online post or article
• Likes, plusses or tweets from friends or
those following
• Conversations with friends or family
• Experience with product at event
• Store display or experience with product
at a retailer
Online Offline
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Brand influencers could have an impact on, and/or
provide credible content to, the majority of third-party
sources for customer information
• Search engine results
• Company social media – brand engagement
on owned channels such as Facebook,
company blog, Twitter and YouTube
• Reviews and comparison shopping sites
• Retailer/store website
• Blog post or video where the product was
discussed
• Blog post or article comment which
mentions the brand
• Discussion forum or group
• Comments on an online post or article
• Likes, plusses or tweets from friends or
those following
• Conversations with friends or family
• Experience with product at event
• Store display or experience with product
at a retailer
Turquoise indicates potential
opportunity for influencer content
Online Offline
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The Intersection of Search and
Influence Marketing
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92% come from organic results
vs.
8% from paid search advertising (brand advertising)
Third-party endorsements can significantly affect
search marketing, which is one of the primary
drivers in the consumer decision making process
Source: http://www.scribd.com/doc/68628887/From-Intent-to-In-store-Search-s-Role-In-The-New-Retail-Shopper-Profile)
93% of consumers say they use search in the
shopping process
Of all the clicks happening on a search engine results page,
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Search provides a big opportunity to get
third-party endorsements to customers
• Digital influencers with established online platforms, including
their own sites/blogs as well as their social media presences,
can provide top search engine results for you
• Forums and groups are often at the top of search engine results
listings; influencer activity in these venues can also impact
consumer behavior
• Video also ranks well in search engines and consumers often
turn to YouTube for their product and brand searches
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Influencers can help a company dominate
organic search results, particularly for
non-branded “research” searches
• Given the variety of potential influencer content touchpoints,
non-branded searches could be enhanced by influence
marketing campaigns
• A few examples of influencer content in non-branded
searches follow
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Every one of the top 10 listings
for “best baby carrier for dad”
could potentially
be influencer-driven.
• Journalists
• Bloggers (individuals
and retailers)
• Forum/group posters
Red boxes around search results indicate
potential or actual influencer content
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18 months later, this blog post is still the #9
organic listing for “top non stick skillet” – the
product was provided to this influencer for
review purposes.
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Even for a high-consideration purchase
such as a car, influencer properties could
have a big impact on search.
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Every brand relationship with an influencer
can provide multiple customer touchpoints
• Influencer platforms
– Their own blog or videos
– Forums/groups
– Events and offline groups
– Their social media
– Publications they write for
• Each of these platforms and outlets provides a potential search
engine result for a brand, product, service or category
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Leveraging Influence to Gain
Customer Trust

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Product Influencers
Traditional marketing goes direct to customers;
influence marketing goes through influencers
to customers
One-to-Many Marketing One-to-Few Marketingvs.
Customers
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Influence marketing will change the nature of
how we budget and resource marketing efforts
• Relationship building
• Communications professionals
• Listening and research to
understand who influencers are
• Corporate use of platforms to
connect to influencers such as
Twitter, LinkedIn, Pinterest
• Non-company brand content
developed
• Advertising spend
• “Super Bowl” style high-impact
advertising
• Creative director as the holy grail
of the marketing team
MoreLess
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Given the shift in customer trust, and the nature of the
way they are now searching for information, we are
already seeing a change in brand and agency marketing
towards effective influence marketing
• Brands, agencies and people will need to adapt to this new one-to-few
influencer-driven approach
• New skillsets, or skillsets with increasingly greater demand,
will include:
– Data analysis
– Customer relationship management
– Relationship-driven communications
– Brand social media
• Budgets will move from traditional advertising to communications and
influence marketing programs development
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25. Copyright © 2013 Appinions. All rights reserved.
Key Takeaways: Marketing Through Trust
• Purchasing decisions are no longer linear
• The number of customer touchpoints for purchasing decisions are
growing year-over-year
• Customers don’t trust brand advertising or properties
• It’s imperative for brands to provide more touchpoints for customers,
particularly third-party touchpoints
• Search is also extremely important for customer decision making
• Influence marketing can have a major impact on search and the
creation of customer touchpoints
• There will be a major shift in brand and agency marketing to
accomplish effective influence marketing
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Appendix: Further Reading

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Further Reading
• McKinsey’s Consumer Decision Journey
– https://www.mckinseyquarterly.com/The_consumer_decision_journey_2373#
• Basics of Influence Marketing
– http://appinions.com/whitepapers/basics-of-influence-marketing/
• The Influencer Continuum™: From Influencer to Super Advocate™
– http://appinions.com/whitepapers/influencer-continuum/
• How to Create Successful Influence Marketing Programs
– http://appinions.com/whitepapers/create-successful-influence-marketing-programs/
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