It is known that a well-managed Twitter influencer marketing strategy can help brands gain an outstanding return on investment. However, it is not without risk, because when it's gone wrong, it can waste millions of valuable marketing budgets. 

A well-managed marketing strategy prioritizes authenticity, engages a reputable influencer—and follows these guides.

Aim Beyond Reach

Brand's obsession with reach has indirectly encouraged the practice of buying fake followers. It was the more followers an influencer had, the higher fees they could demand. These days, brands should seek authentic engagement. It is much more beneficial than reach. The huge numbers of passive followers were causing their Twitter profile engagement rates to drop. At the end of the day, fake followers can’t mimic the same engagement as a loyal and genuine following and they can’t increase your ROI.

To uplift sales, you need to try to change your focus on relevancy rather than broader reach. Once you begin to change your focus, it’s no longer about how many people see the posts, but rather how many of the right people see the posts. That’s when you’ll see solid ROI and sales increase.

Quality Content Over Quantity of Followers

Twitter as one of the most used social media is becoming more crowded and competitive, therefore, average content won't catch people's attention. To stand out and engage your customers on Twitter, you need branded Twitter content that generates real impact.

To optimize your Twitter profile engagement, you need to choose the quality of content over the number of followers to save your brand from influencer fraud and failure. High-quality content doesn't only protect against fraud, it also boosts your Twitter campaign performance.

Twitter replies, retweets, likes, and followers can easily be bought. However, there is no easy way when it comes to quality content creation. The real professional Twitter influencers have proven their skills within their niche whether in storytelling, photography, videography, styling, illustration, and makeup artistry over years of practice. These kinds of influencers that have real skills are the ones that you need to collaborate with.

Ensure the Authenticity of the Twitter Influencers

There are three easy ways to distinguish real influencers from fraud.

• A very distinctive Twitter profile engagement to follower ratio. Utilize Twitter analytics tools to get a full report on the Twitter influencers' engagement rate. Fake influencers can have millions of followers but a very low Twitter engagement rate.
• Real influencers love sharing content with the addition of personal touch that truly engages their audiences, they tend to talk about real feelings, activities, and experiences. They have real interaction with their audiences.
• The quality of fake influencers' Twitter profile engagement is mostly vague and filled with generic comments. You need to analyze the quality of their interaction with their followers. Having lots of replies, retweets, and likes don't necessarily mean they are engaged with their audiences. Therefore you need to pay close attention to their Twitter profile. See if their interaction on Twitter is real or fake or filled with comments, replies, or retweets from bots.

To succeed on your Twitter marketing campaign and generate good ROI, you need to collaborate with real influencers who have audiences that have a genuine interest and often ask questions or advice to the Twitter influencers.

Beware of These Red Flags

• A notable increase in followers numbers in less than 24 hours usually signifies the influencer has purchased fake/bot followers.

• Analyze if the interaction and replies from their followers are unrelated to the post, it usually indicates it was all coming from paid audiences.

• If you are noticing the same users replying over and over on the influencer's Twitter profile with unrelated comments to the posts, chances are those users are paid to interact with. This will result in fake Twitter engagement rates.

• Check their Twitter profile picture, if they use random photos that they got from the internet or photos that appear elsewhere, chances are they may be fake.

• The Twitter influencer's account has only a few contents which show they are posting content inconsistently, yet they get many followers. An unusual number of retweets and likes for each post is also a red flag for you to stay away from those Twitter influencers.

Keep Your Brand Safe from Influencer Fraud

You need to do your due diligence before hiring an influencer. Start by using Twitter analytics and looking at the guidance that was mentioned earlier. After that, you can do these few tips:

• Make sure the influencers and their followers are the right audiences for your product or services.
• Check and analyze their Twitter profile using the Twitter analytics tool to get a full report on their Twitter activities.

• Review the influencer’s background and history of prior collaboration with another brand (if any).
• Check if their Twitter contents are aligned with your brand values.

Final Thoughts

Twitter is a great social media platform for expanding your reach to build brand awareness, establish your brand image, and foster better relationships with your customers. Nevertheless, do not let the excitement over potential growth opportunities take over your judgment. If you want to avoid Twitter influencers' fraud and protect your brand, you should be very selective with your partnerships.