Ignite Search Tool Identifies Average-Joe Influencers For Brands


Ignite Search Tool Identifies Average-Joe Influencers For Brands


by Laurie Sullivan @lauriesullivan, February 20, 2017



A tool that will become available this week from Insightpool allows marketers to search through a database of more than 600 million social profiles from across Twitter, Facebook and other sites to find the best individuals to become influencers for its brands.


The tool — Ignite, an identification portal-like search engine — aims squarely at small businesses that want to “dip their toe” in influencer marketing or larger brands that lack the line item in their budget, said Devon Wijesinghe, CEO of Insightpool, an influencer-marketing platform that collects real-time data and audience sentiment.


About 80% of the struggle for brand marketers is just trying to identify the influencers, he said.


Insightpool is not the only company offering this type of service. Google acquired Famebit in October 2016, which is largely focused on paid influencers on YouTube. Insightpool searches through more than 600 million people across 100 social networks and focuses on individuals that are not being paid, but love certain brands.


For every individual that someone engages with, at least six others who follow that person engage with their content, Wijesinghe said, and many times it’s many more than that.


Although brands want to find the perfect individual to influence the sale of their products to other consumers, vetting influencers should always remain an important part of the process.


The danger arises when brands link with unknown individuals, and sometimes those very well known in certain crowds, without really knowing their character.


When asked about the vetting process and how brands can protect themselves against YouTube stars like PewDiePie, which Disney’s Maker Studios dropped after The Wall Street Journal revealed that he posted videos with anti-Semitic messages, Wijesinghe said the vetting process is strict.


Ignite links to Insightpool’s platform that searches through more than 100 social platforms and other sites such as WordPress blogs or reviews on Yelp and LinkedIn. The information on any one individual is aggregated into a profile card to assist brands in understand what the person discusses and shares, and how influential they are in relation to specific topics.


The data is pulled from public information. Facebook allows vendors to pull specific information from individuals tagging their content as either “super public posts” or pull only aggregated insights and views such as topics such as politics or cars in locations such as Florida from posts that are marked private, Wijesinghe said.


The brand determines who the best individual to become their influencer is through filters that Insightpool builds into the technology, such as their network following and rank in the pecking order of influence on specific topics.


Inventors in Insightpool run the spectrum, including Peter Knight, founder of Checkfree, as well as TDF Ventures.


MediaPost.com: Search Marketing Daily

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