These days, everyone wants to be a social media influencer. This job allows you to earn a living by talking about the things you’re passionate about online and working with brands you love. It sounds like the dream! 

However, it’s not an easy industry to break into and truly make it big. It can take a lot of hard work, dedication and time to be truly noticed by the brands you’d like to work with. If you’re trying to work your way into the role of “influencer”, here are a few things you need.  

Aesthetically Pleasing Social Media

First of all, keep in mind that online, visuals are everything. Your accounts need to look good and stand out if you want to be noticed.  

This means professional-looking photography and a beautifully designed feed. You can make use of online design tools like a banner maker for posts or your website, Instagram story design templates, and even a logo maker if you want to create a logo for your personal brand.  

Photography or Videography Skills

Next, if you’re going to be creating content for a living, you need to be good at it and showcase those skills on your page, which functions as a creative portfolio of sorts.  

For example, if you’re an Instagram user, you’ll need to learn how to take good photos to post, as well as edit them properly. If you’re hoping to be promoting products, you need to have an eye for product photography too. TikTok and YouTube influencers of course need to make sure their video-creating skills are up to scratch.  

A Decent Follower Count

If you want to be noticed by brands and be able to enter into deals and sponsorships, you’ll need to work at increasing your follower count. Unfortunately, most brands aren’t going to be interested in working with accounts with little to no following, because influencer marketing is all about expanding reach. 

Spend time working on increasing your follower count by engaging with your audience, using the appropriate hashtags and posting content regularly.  

A Niche

If you want to make it as an influencer, you need a niche. Narrowing down the focus of your page can be quite a process, but finding a niche on Instagram will give purpose to your account and draw in the right audience. 

Simply think about your passions and interests, and the types of brands you’d like to work with. Your niche could be health and fitness, beauty and fashion, gaming and tech, books, or even academics. If you’re interested in a range of these, you could try out “lifestyle influencer” as a role.  

Spare Time and Commitment

The last thing you need is dedication and time. Real influencer marketing isn’t something that can be done effectively if you aren’t putting time and effort into it. 

Creating your content and engaging on social media on a constant basis is something that takes a lot of time and commitment, especially once you’ve signed contracts with brands, so make sure you have the time for it.