Ali Payani, is chief executive at Burbank-based digital marketing company LookinLA. The agency uses a data-driven approach to provide B2B and B2C marketing solutions for sustainable growth. Analyzing the current landscape, Payani said the next marketing trend is not about online influencers convincing peers to love a product, but brands developing authority in their markets. Payani spoke with the Business Journal about “authority marketing” and how the consumer landscape is changing.
Question: What is authority marketing?Answer: Basically, authority marketing is the research-backed marketing activities that you already have the strategy or the research for, and then you use those to try to achieve that authority for your brand. There are seven pillars that marketers talk about, like your branding, your PR and media campaigns, your events, your content, marketing, lead generation and referrals. So these are the standard seven pillars of authority marketing – and to really get successful, you have to be a specialist in all of them.In which sectors of B2B has authority marketing made the greatest impact?LookinLA has seen authority marketing effective across sectors. We have clients spanning tech, education, beauty, athletics, thought leadership, energy, and so on. Authority marketing can be deployed in any industry and that’s what makes it so effective. It is hard to do influencer marketing for an energy company, versus a cosmetics brand. But authority marketing transcends the barriers created by social media and again, harnesses the power of an organization and its people to create the outcomes that expand a company’s reach, influence and power in the market.What are examples of authority marketing done well? One of the clients I can name is PeopleG2, now one of the leading background check software companies. They have a really great integration with the staffing companies with the HR tools. We had analyzed their website, their marketing activities in their industry. And after we implemented an authority marketing strategy, they achieved close to 86 percent growth in organic traffic, and their conversion rate tripled.
How does a brand become an authority? It’s all the pillars in unison. You cannot have the authority and then not deliver a really good service or product, because then you’re going to fail. You have to have the right tools and executions, you know, the details to make sure that you can also maintain the reputation and you’re delivering something really good. … You have to have that marketing strategy, and branding guidelines, you have to have the content marketing strategy, competitive analysis, you have to know exactly the marketing in the industry insights and your market trends. Then you have to also be active in PR as the owner of the company, speaking at events. Referrals are also part of authority marketing and you have to build that community for yourself.What are typical timelines for authority marketing campaigns?For campaigns, you can build them out for any amount of time that strategy sets as valuable. But we really need a few months to assess and map out that campaign timeline, and we start to see results in three to six months, but can begin to see them even more rapidly. The full benefits can be seen even in future campaigns we do for clients, that builds upon the previous campaigns. Highly effective data-driven marketing produces authority capital.When companies try an authority marketing strategy, what are the things they must get right?The first thing a company must get right is its product or service. You can’t use authority marketing to cover up flaws in what you are delivering to consumers. Additionally, authority marketing requires you to clearly assess your company’s marketing strategy and acknowledge strengths and weaknesses, align departments, bring harmony to the organization’s working model and deploy the human capital in a way that everyone reaches their potential for the good of the company.Would this type of marketing look different for a startup compared to an established brand?Yes, definitely. Because when we have the startups coming to us, they have no past data that we can analyze, so we have to build from the ground up. Established companies, it would be really analyzing their trends on the market and then we’ll target customers. They’d have some things in common, like branding and creating the communities and all that. But established companies already might have a community that we can analyze and then improve on.
So is it easier to establish authority marketing for a start-up or an established brand?On paper, the startups will be easier because sometimes the startups might have a really innovative new product on the market that they can accelerate, even in two years. They really grow faster than even the companies that are marketing for 20 years. So it really depends on the product, I would say the quality and the product or service if you’re B2B. But also, in the same level, if you want to compare them and it’s the same kind of product – like if it’s a software company, for example, and it’s the same software, definitely the one that is established is easier to change branding.
What are the most common mistakes?The most common mistake is thinking you can just throw money at marketing and everything will get solved. You can throw money – or even rake in money – that gives a false sense of stability or purpose. But being an authority is about being an authority, not loud on social media.How does authority marketing differ from influencer marketing?To compare them, the influencers are marketing to a specific audience, right? So if you’re working with Influencer A, Influencer A has exactly a specific audience and demographic that they are watching him or her. So they have their marketing and so you’re advertising to the influencer’s audience. In authority marketing, establishing yourself as an authority, then you have the influence. Basically, yourself, the company is an influence, and everything you do as a company other companies can follow, or even the influencers or your customers would follow, you know, because now you have the innovations and you have that authority, that you have actually influenced the others.Do you think audiences are shifting away from influencers?Influencers should be part of a marketing strategy, if needed. But, you know, if you’re an influencer, and every week you’re advertising five products, or 10 different brands with the same product line, people start to lose faith and then not follow. Think of the influencer as the brand and, if they establish authority for themselves, then their audiences are still going to follow them. Why? Because they promote a good product to their audience.
How is the shift from “influencers” to “authority” different from traditional marketing?The main reason B2B is changing in behavior is because of the millennials changing their buying process. So for example, one of the pillars of authority marketing is lead generation, which is traditional, but now it’s more in the on-demand generation because millennials are not as trusting. They research your brand and they want to see your content. It’s on YouTube, it’s on Instagram. How many blogs is your company is producing every month? So, because of the shift and changes in consumer behavior, the companies have followed. Traditionally, it was the events and exhibitions; now it’s more toward the online communities to build brand trust.Influencers can humanize a brand – giving it a personality rather than a “faceless corporation.” How should authority marketers handle that challenge?Authority marketers don’t need to negate the value that can be created by influencers, but there is higher, long-term, and even more short-term value that authority marketing gets that influencer marketing misses. If you are viewed as an authority in your industry—or even better, across sectors—influencer marketing will be more powerful than if you are depending on influencers on social channels.
Authority Marketer
