Mark Simpson (video creator/uploader) explains a practical, tried-and-tested checklist for filtering genuine influencers from 'blaggers' who seek free stays. Using Beth Sandland as an example, he emphasizes that follower count alone is insufficient — check follow-to-following ratios (rule of thumb: following under ~1,000), per-post engagement (likes and comments), whether the influencer replies to comments, presence of active Instagram Stories viewers (red ring), and the quality/activity of their blog. He also recommends always requesting an influencer/media kit containing analytics, insights, offerings, past work, strategy, bio and contact details.
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This is a video just to show you what to look out for when you start to get influencers approach you to work with you. This is a tried and tested model that I use, and it's a great way of just filtering out the people that actually are decent and the one that are blaggers that are just trying to get a free stay. So let's take Beth Sandland as an example. Now, Beth has got good numbers. Nearly 50,000 followers. A big thing to look out for is how many people they're following. Now, if they've got automatic follow bots and if they're cheating the system, what you'll notice is they may have a lot of followers, but they'll also be following a lot of people. So a big thing that I always look out for is that how many people are they following compared to how many followers do they have? A general rule of thumb is under a thousand. You can have people that follow more, but general rule of thumb that I have is a thousand. If there's anything that you're looking at and thinking, I don't know, just send me a message and ask for me to have a quick look at then what we're looking for. Because it's not all about follower numbers. Because like I said, people can buy followers. That's not what we want to do. We want to look at the actual post that they put out. How much interaction do they have with it? So this post here, 2120 likes 118 comments 1549 likes 50 comments 1448 likes 55 comments 1626 likes 44 comments so it's not all about numbers. Again, let's go and have a quick look in. What we're looking for is when people comment that the Instagrammer actually goes back and comments on the comments, because that means that she cares and that means that she's got an engaged audience. So perfect. That's great. Have fun. So you can see here that she's replying to people. So that's a plus for me, is that when you get influencers that come in and comment back on comments, I absolutely adore this. And that is what she's doing. It shows that she cares, which is the key here. What you'll normally find on blaggers is that when people comment, they just don't comment back, which is not what we want. Another thing is just to go and see and just look at who is commenting back. So, for example, the people and have a look at. So, yeah, she's a real person. We're trying to see, just to make sure that there's no bots in here. So click on this section, have a little look down and make sure you find people that are doing stories. So when they've got the red circle around, it means that they're doing stories. So it means that she's got an engaged audience. Normally what you'll find if these are just bots where people are buying likes, then it means that they won't have any red here. It'll just be all be down like this. And what you'll notice would be just loads of random names, no profile pictures. Now this to me is a plus because she's got an engaged audience. People that like a community. Other key point is that they actually do use Instagram stories. Okay. Which is, which is key. Again, another key for me, make sure that they are actually using Instagram stories. If they're not watching Instagram stories, if they're not utilizing Instagram stories, they then they shouldn't really be somebody that you should be looking with. Next thing, we want to go look at the blog. Okay, so let's come out here. Let's look at the actual blog. So to me, it looks good. Active, very active. As in putting posts of regular travel, lifestyle, book reviews, blogging tips. She's got a shop, so it looks to me like she's very good at this. You know, it's got a follower count in here. She's active on Twitter, on Facebook, she's got on an award. And again, these are things to look for. The final thing that I would be doing if I were you, if somebody approaches you, all you gotta ask for is an influencer marketing pack. Okay, Media kit. Sorry. And an influencer media kit is something that they should have if they're approaching you. This is something that I would definitely be asking for. Ask for an influencer media kit or a media kit. So we're looking for analytics, insights, offerings, past work, strategy, bio and contact information. It'll look something like this. This is one of the best ways to. To separate the blaggers to the actual proper influences. And those are the things that I should be looking for. Let me know how you get on. I'll put a comment below again, just to highlight those key things. But this is what I would be doing when somebody approaches you asking for a free stay in exchange for working together.
