#SMWiAccra 2017 and my keynote about influence.
(First things first: s/o to Beryl at EchoHouse for putting together this event. Everything is perfectible but as a first edition, I’ve seen great things done. And it has to be given to her. )
I was invited to talk about content, and how influencers are monetizing their influence. So I had to show examples of people making a serious amount of money out of Ghana because as it stands in Ghana nor brand or bloggers or celebrity seems to be doing the right thing to monetize influence.
This will be a long post, but as I’ve been asked by several different people to get the “slides” of my keynote, I decided to summarise my speech in a text. I think that there’s no point to having my slides if you can’t get the references and the thought process behind them so hopefully, this post might help more.
Before I start: we will do the same exercise made at SMW: for the duration of this post, we will not consider the word “bullshit” profanity because no other word in the world can work the same way in this context.
The title of my keynote was “The Bullshit Industrial Complex.” As explained the title was borrowed and inspired by an extremely compelling article I read on 99U about the creative industry being self-referential. It was the perfect headline for the message I wanted to send about the wrong perception of influence in this country ( and not only ).
At the beginning of this year, I wrote a couple of posts on LinkedIn after a company called Clique Africa published the ranking of the most influential social media personalities and brands in Ghana with title “THE INFLUENCE ISSUE: GHANA, THE DIFFERENCE BETWEEN QUALITY AND QUANTITY AND ME ROLLING MY EYES SO BAD.”
The point I was making is that influence cannot solely be considered from a quantitative perspective, but it has to be defined from a qualitative one as well.
In the context of what I was asked to talk about at #SMW was important to make people understand the impact of quality if you want to have a chance to monetize your “influence” and your social media presence as an “influencer” through partnerships with brands.
I like the definition of influence that I found in an old article in Forbes, which says:
“Influence = Audience Reach (# of followers) x Brand Affinity (expertise and credibility) x Strength of Relationship with Followers.”
These are parameters which should be considered by brands when they decide to invest in influencers. Most of the times they look only for the fan base, and that’s how we get the wrong ranking of the most influential people/brands in Ghana.
“Influential ” for a brand cannot be equal to “famous”: if “famous” is for the wrong reasons, the damage to your brand will be much bigger than the “impressions” you got. And if you as an influencer lose credibility, you will lose your money: no need to mention Tiger Woods, and many others after him, who lost sponsorships because of their loss of credibility.
To define who is an influencer I love to use a clip from a 2010 short documentary which I think is still absolutely legit: “INFLUENCERS: how trends and creativity become contagious.”
What I think is important to understand is that an influencer doesn’t hop on a trend, s/he creates the trend. And to do so, s/he has to create an impact on the culture. Whatever culture … unfortunately even trash culture if you want, but you still have to be impactful.
When brands have the luck to meet this kind of human beings able to take something that is not in mainstream consciousness and make it mainstream, they have to create the longest possible partnership with them, because they have the chance to become iconic together. See whoever works with Pharrell Williams, or think about Michael Jordan.
Henceforth INFLUENCERS ≠ BULLSHITTERS. Now when I say this, I don’t mean to say that influential people are only severe people with conscious thoughts. But the more they are consistent in their truth, the more they are influential. Read: I don’t think the Kardashians will help us to save the world, but I can’t deny their influence in the modern society.
However, giving a Ghanaian context to the evolution of the digital world, it’s sad to say, I see a circus where everyone is trying to gain likes in the worst ways. If I were a brand, I would look more for micro influencers who can add value with content and who can become very significant in the upcoming years considering how music/fashion/art are growing fast and gaining international attention.
What makes these Ghanaian micro influencers more impactful than big mainstream artists/bloggers, is the power of their content and their storytelling.
I have to talk about two examples of people defined “most influential” in Ghana: John Dumelo and Ameyaw Debrah. Because being the “most influential” celebrity and the “most influential” blogger, right now they should be making money after their influence ( real money ), but they are not making what Rihanna makes from Puma, aren’t they?
Thanks for the wonderful service @telefonikaghana 😇😇
My question in the room was: how many of you feel the urgency to run to Telefonika and buy something after seeing this post? No one raised his hand. We got the same reaction after using an Ameyaw Debrah picture, except that he was in the room and he didn’t like it.
When you arrive at a certain level of notoriety, and you start being tapped by corporations, you have to be careful not to lose the ability to connect with the culture and to influence people for real and don’t become self-referential. If your selfies are a constant masturbation about what you are doing without any story to tell, you will keep getting paid peanuts, and you will never be able to start a real partnership with meaningful brands.
The kind of influencers big brands want to work with don’t conform, don’t follow the rules, they challenge the culture saying “what if," they have the power to become role models. Unfortunately, at this moment, brands in Ghana don’t seem to be ready to engage real partnerships with influencers who are telling different stories, but they will, and that’s why I always love to show Kanye West speech at the 2016 MTV VMA about the power of role models “aka” influencers.
After working for years with different brands in Ghana I recognize the mistake of “counting the impressions, not the impressed” and that makes them go where the big numbers are without evaluating the real influence.
If I think as a brand about who I would invest in, there are so many better ideas than a blogger with a lot of followers but no credible image, posting offensive content, revenge porn and showing off a lifestyle that doesn’t exist.
I presented some examples which are not an exhaustive list of the amazing people I could have mentioned, I keep thinking about people I left out, but I wanted to focus on influencers who can take some brands on a different level if they decide to run together in the long term. Partnership with the right influencer is the future. Frankly, when a blogger comes with a “price list” for a blog post, I want to kill myself. Give me a story to tell, that’s priceless.
What these people I mentioned have, is content. Their image is content; their life is content, their behavior is content, their art is content. And what brands desperately need is content, because people don’t want to deal with your product they want to deal with people’s stories interacting with your product story naturally and organically. That’s branded content.
Serge Attukwei Clottey, Bright Ackwerh, Dj Steloo, Poetra Asantewa, Darko Vibes, Worlasi, Kobby Graham, the Black Girls Glow collective, Crazinist, Efua Sutherland, Papa Oppong and Mukase Chic. I could have added many more… from Accra We Dey to the Serrallio crew (yes they are influencers ), from Official Kwame to Francis Kokoroko, from Stefania Manfreda to Wanlov, from M.anifest to Ria Boss to Adomaa… I was just giving examples of beautiful stories to tell, I wasn’t saying they are the only ones. However, those I mentioned make me want to tell their stories and they have an image so powerful that stands out and were good examples. And the reason why they stand out it’s because there’s nothing fake about what they are doing. There’s authenticity in their message.
Authenticity is what counts when you have to work with a brand/agency as an influencer. As Shelly Lazarus said once: “Here’s the thing: I hate it when people talk about personal brand. Those words imply that people need to adopt identities that are artificial and plastic and packaged, when what actually works is authenticity. One of the fabulous things I’ve enjoyed about my career is collaborating with so many leaders across different industries and countries, and without exception the successful ones have been comfortable in their own skin.”
When brands and influencers partner up compellingly, you can get content like what recently Quincy Jones has done for JBL: I don’t see him inviting anyone to buy the headphones in the entire series of documentaries… but it’s more effective than an advert.
My suggestion to blogger and influencers is, if brands and agencies are not ready yet to come up with good ideas for you, go and present a project, go and show your content and how they can use it to improve their brand. If you keep going and begging for small money, they will never consider you when big money will come.
And to conclude, all of us have a responsibility when is about not to give to bullshitters the power they think they have “We all bear responsibility in the war against bullshit. We should discourage bullshitters by resisting the temptation to cave to the clickbait and contribute to page views.”
Quick notes: I never said anything against Shatta Wale; I said if you want to deal with someone mainstream you have to be sure he is representing your brand in the right way to the right target audience. But if the mainstream artist is taking a lot of money to represent a brand and then decides to open his mouth and bite the hand which is paying him, the brand should sue his ass even if the person is Shatta Wale.
I have nothing against John Dumelo, we are actually friendly, and I usually tell him the same things I presented when I meet him or talk to him. He never gets offended. Au contraire Ameyaw Debrah seems to feel like bringing examples of people doing a better job than he does, means to insult Ghana. But all I am actually trying to say is that Ghana artists are as excellent as the foreign ones, deserve the same money and recognition, and they have to start to get what they deserve stepping up the game regarding content. Whoever keeps asking for few cedis to post whatever bullshit a brand asks for, is not doing any favor to his country and the industry.
I have said nothing against Worlasi; I actually compared him to Kanye so the person in the room who had the great idea to tell him I was dissing him on stage, should find the way to open his mind when I speak.
I guess I will see you at the next Social Media Week, in the meantime if anyone is interested in continuing this conversation somewhere else, I think you know where to find me.
Cheers!
