If you’ve found the right influencers to collaborate with, it’s time to reach out. As with so many other things in business, influencer outreach can seem intimidating. After all, you’re asking a complete stranger to help you with a business opportunity. With influencers, you’re requesting a personal service that can impact their reputation. Fortunately, I’ve prepared this guide to help you know how to reach out to influencers with confidence.
Key Takeaways
✅ Warm up the relationship before you pitch. Follow the influencer and engage with their content for a while before you ask for anything. A cold pitch to someone who has never seen your name is the easiest kind to ignore.
✅ Personalize every message you send. Use their name, point to something specific in their recent content, and never open with “Dear influencer.” Generic outreach gets treated as spam because that is exactly what it looks like.
✅ Say what is in it for them up front. You are asking an influencer to put their own reputation behind your brand, so be direct about compensation rather than saving it for a later email.
✅ Match the channel to the platform. Instagram DMs suit Instagram collaborations, while bloggers and creators with their own sites usually prefer email. If the influencer publishes a media kit, it names the contact method they actually check.
✅ One follow-up is expected, not pushy. Influencers receive far more requests than they can accept, and some reply only after a second message.
✅ Treat the first collaboration as a beginning. The influencers who deliver are worth moving into an ongoing program rather than re-pitching from scratch on your next campaign.
What Is Influencer Outreach?
In a nutshell, influencer outreach is when you contact social media influencers with the intention of collaborating with them. Typically, this collaboration is focused on raising brand awareness or sales for a particular brand as part of an influencer marketing campaign.
Outreach can take a few different forms. Most direct is sending an email or social media message to the influencer and asking them to collaborate. Another method is used by Amazon and a few other large companies: having a page where influencers who are interested in collaborating can sign up. Many other businesses do a combination of these techniques.
Also, keep in mind that sometimes you will reach out to an influencer in order to add him or her to an overall influencer program. In this case, you might not intend to collaborate right away. Instead, you want someone who you can count on at a later date. Either way, it’s critical to know how to reach out to influencers. Here, we’ll focus on the direct outreach method.
Step 1: Identify Relevant Influencers to Reach Out to
Before learning how to reach out to influencers, it’s important to find the right people. In this case, you’re looking for a short list, because you aren’t quite sure who will respond favorably to your pitch. Fortunately, if you do this right then there’s sure to be someone who is willing to help. I’ve written extensively on influencer discovery, and my full guide walks through eleven ways to find influencers for your brand, but here are a few quick tips.
Determine relevance based on your target audience
For an influencer marketing campaign to work well, you need someone who is influential with your target audience. This isn’t always an example of the target demographic, just someone who appeals to them. As an example, you might choose a regional-level sports personality for your brand of athletic wear. This person might be older than your target audience, and likely makes more money than they do. But, your goal is typically to sell sports gear to an audience who plays that sport. By choosing a successful competitor, you’re going to appeal to that demographic.
However, there are other niches where the best influencer will closely match your target audience. In other words, it’s more than just a common interest. If you sell beauty products tailored to a certain subculture, then your influencers should be part of that community. Alternatively, if you’re trying to expand your reach, pick someone who fits your new buyer persona.
Compare levels of influence
Here, I’m talking about more than just follower numbers. Especially given that some influencers have a few fake followers, there’s a lot more to influence levels. No, here I mean the extent to which someone is influential in your industry. You wouldn’t pick an athletic influencer to pitch junk food, would you? Chances are, they encourage healthy eating. To pick a more subtle example, let’s go over to the travel industry. Some influencers pitch budget getaways, and you wouldn’t use them to hawk a five-star hotel.
How do you ascertain this level of influence? First, check out the hashtags they’re using. You want to ensure that their hashtag trail is relevant not just to your industry, but to the correct segment of the industry. In addition, you’ll want to analyze what they recommend to ensure that it’s suitable.
Put together priority list to pitch to
Finally, this information will help you narrow down the options. Pick the best handful of candidates and learn how to reach out to influencers. Then, have another couple of groups if not enough influencers respond favorably the first time.
Step 2: Preparing the Pitch
Next, you’ll want to prepare your pitch, because this will help you decide how to reach out to influencers. While some aspects of outreach are the same for everyone, others should be tailored to the individual influencer.
Confirm your marketing strategy
Pitching influencers requires that you understand your marketing strategy. This will allow you to ask for the right kind of help from a potential influencer. Nothing says “pass this up” like a marketer who is fuzzy on the details.
Know what to say when reaching out to influencers for collaboration
Writing that note to a potential influencer might feel like applying for a job, in that it can make you nervous. However, if you know how to reach out to influencers, this is less of a problem. Following these tips will help you succeed.
- Avoid starting the letter or message with “Dear influencer” or “To whom it may concern.” Crazy Egg estimates that an opener like that gets ignored by 99% of recipients. Instead, be more personal.
- Tell them what’s in it for them. In other words, what are the rewards? There may be some flexibility here, but make it clear they’ll be compensated.
- Mention something about them or their content. It shows that you are paying attention and helps build a rapport. Have something personally in common? You might use this if appropriate.
Step 3: Connect with Influencers on Social Media
Mastering the secrets of how to reach out to influencers is surprisingly easy. Ask yourself, what would you want someone else to do, if they were offering you an opportunity. Putting yourself in their shoes is a great way to boost your chances of success.
Before you begin, show interest in what they have to say. This can include following their social media accounts, liking or sharing their content, and more. By doing this, you’re building a connection before reaching out. This is a critical step: Backlinko and Pitchbox analyzed 12 million outreach emails and found that only 8.5% of them ever get a response. By connecting with an influencer on social media ahead of time, you’re showing interest in a relationship.
Step 4: Send Your Influencer Outreach Email
Now that you’ve built a relationship with your chosen influencers, it’s time to use my practical advice on how to reach out to influencers. There are several options for outreach, depending on your preferences and the intended platform for collaborations.
If you intend to use Instagram, the best way how to reach out to influencers is using Instagram DMs. These are easy to use, and let the influencer see your Instagram profile quickly. Also, feel free to link to the brand account if you aren’t using it to reach out.
Other social media networks
Many other social networks have the ability to directly message someone. In a few cases, like LinkedIn, you might have to pay for it. However, all of these are relatively high visibility ways to try and get your message read.
Outside of social media
With bloggers, or when in-network messaging is restricted, you can always send them an email. Of course, your first step is to find that email address. Sometimes, they’ll list it in social media profiles. If the influencer has a media kit, then they will list their preferred contact on that document. A link is often available on their profile.
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Another option is to use Google. Depending on their off-network internet presence, you might be able to find some form of contact information. Just be aware that if you’re a B2C brand you probably don’t want to use their workplace to send collaboration pitches. This could get them in trouble at the day job.
Use outreach tools
If you’re looking for a blogger, or if you haven’t found the contact information you need any other way, consider using tools. Apollo’s email finder looks up a business email from a name and company, and the free plan includes 50 credits a month. One caveat worth knowing before you sign up: Apollo indexes business addresses only, so it will not surface a consumer creator who has no company email. From there, you’d follow the other steps on how to reach out to influencers. Alternatively, try Respona’s blogger outreach tool, which finds the writers behind a piece of content, pulls their contact details automatically, and runs the follow-up sequence for you.
Compose your note
Once you have the right contact information, it’s time to compose your pitch. There are two basic approaches. The first one is to present a specific opportunity. For instance, you might ask them if they’d like to prepare a single Instagram post on behalf of your brand. The second approach is to be more open ended. In this case, you’d ask if they are interested in discussing collaborations. If your intended influencer does a variety of collabs, this might be the better option. Unless, of course, you have something specific in mind.
Step 5: Didn’t Get a Reply? How do you follow up with an influencer
If you’ve ever sent out a whole bunch of resumes or CVs and not gotten a response, you know what it feels like. Thing is, like that hiring manager who ignored your application influencers get more requests than they could ever grant. For some of them, the sheer volume of requests means that they don’t even respond to everyone.
For that reason, experts agree that it’s OK to send a follow-up email or message. In fact, it’s considered best practice to do so. In this way, you show the influencer that you’re really interested in working with him or her. Combined with your earlier interest in the content they’re already producing, you’ll distinguish yourself from the competition. Finally, keep in mind that some influencers make a practice of only answering after the second contact.
Step 6: Start Your Collab and Build a Long-Term Relationship
When you finally get a response, you will have learned how to reach out to influencers successfully. Now here comes the fun part: collaborating! Once you’ve carefully negotiated the terms of your collaboration and put them in writing with an influencer contract, you can enjoy the outcome of all that hard work. Hopefully, your influencer marketing campaign will be a success.
However, just because the campaign is over doesn’t mean you should end the relationship with your influencers. In fact, that’s not really a good idea. Consider adding successful influencers to a formal influencer marketing program. This may mean making them part of your network, and using them for future collaborations. Or, it could mean an immediate, longer-term engagement. Either way, you both win.
Bonus: Influencer Outreach Templates
Suffering from writers block? It happens to everyone. That’s why I’ve prepared these brief templates to help inspire your outreach efforts.
Sample Instagram DM
Hi [influencer name],
I’ve been watching your Instagram profile for a while and noticed that [mention something great about their content]. As a member of the [brand] marketing team, I was wondering if you’d be interested in a paid collaboration with us. I’ll be happy to talk about the creative possibilities and rewards with our brand if you are interested.
I look forward to hearing back from you.
[name, title, company]
Sample Email
Greetings [influencer name],
I’ve been following [blog name or profile] for a while now, and I thought it was time to introduce myself. My name is [name] and I work for [brand]. As a member of the marketing team, I’d like to offer you the opportunity to [describe opportunity]. In return, we offer the following: [describe what’s in it for them]. I think you are an ideal match because [give reason]. If you’re interested, drop me a line and we’ll talk about it further.
Sincerely,
[email signature]
Frequently Asked Questions About Reaching Out to Influencers
Engage with their content first so your name is at least faintly familiar, then send a short personalized message on the platform where they are most active. Say who you are, name something specific you liked about their work, and describe the collaboration and what they get in return. Keep it brief enough to read on a phone.
Use the channel that matches where the collaboration will run. Instagram DMs work well for Instagram partnerships, while bloggers and creators with their own sites usually prefer email. If the influencer publishes a media kit, follow whatever contact method is listed there, because that is the inbox they are watching.
Start with their social profiles, since many list a business email or link to a media kit that includes one. If nothing is public, a search engine or an email finding tool will often surface it. Avoid pitching a consumer brand collaboration to someone’s workplace address, which can create problems for them at the day job.
About a week is a reasonable gap, and one follow-up is plenty. Influencers get far more requests than they can grant, and some make a practice of replying only on the second contact, so a polite nudge reads as interest rather than pestering.
Skip generic openers like “Dear influencer” or “To whom it may concern,” which advertise a mass send before the reader finishes the first line. Avoid vague talk of exposure with no mention of payment, and do not ask for a detailed proposal before you have offered anything concrete yourself.
Start Your Influencer Outreach This Week
Outreach is a sequence, not a talent. Pick three or four influencers whose audience actually overlaps with yours, then spend a week or two engaging with their content before you ask for anything. When you do send the message, name something specific about their work and state plainly what they get in return. If you hear nothing back, send one follow-up and move on to the next name on your list.
The brands that do well here treat the first collaboration as the start of a relationship rather than a transaction. If you want the long version of that argument, grab the free preview of The Age of Influence, my book on building influencer marketing into a real business function. And if you would rather have someone help you build the program than read about it, that is the work I do as a Fractional CMO.
So what are you waiting for? Go out there and start collaborating!
