Influencers During a PR Crisis When Should a Brand Use Influencers During a PR Crisis? When a Brand Is in Crisis, Should It Really Turn to Influencers? Not every PR crisis needs an influencer. In fact, using a creator too quickly or for the wrong reason, can make a difficult situation even worse . But when used strategically, influencers can help brands communicate with communities that may be skeptical of traditional corporate messaging. The key is knowing when influencers should speak, what they should say, and when they should stay silent. During a PR crisis, credibility matters more than reach. And that changes everything. What Is a PR Crisis? A PR crisis occurs when an event, allegation, mistake, or controversy threatens a brand's reputation and creates significant negative public attention. Examples include: · Product safety concerns · Poor customer experiences · Employee-related controversies · Misleading advertising claims · Data or cybersecurity incidents · Public statem...
The Biggest Mistake in Influencer Marketing Happens Before You Choose a Creator
A creator can have millions of followers and still be completely wrong for your brand. Recent research shows that only 17% of consumers check a creator's follower count before deciding to engage. Audience relevance, content style and subject matter increasingly matter more than raw follower numbers.
So before asking, "Which creator should we work with?", brands should ask a more important question:
"Who exactly are we trying to reach?" That is where effective influencer marketing begins.
Why Your Audience Should Come Before Your Creator:
Influencer marketing works best when three things are aligned: The brand. The creator. The audience.
Unfortunately, many brands start the process in reverse. They search for popular creators, check follower counts, look at engagement rates and negotiate fees before determining whether those creators actually influence their target customers.
The result can be a campaign that generates thousands or even millions of views without generating meaningful business results.
Identifying your ideal audience before choosing creators changes the process. Instead of asking which creator is popular, you ask which creator already has the attention and trust of the people you want to reach. That shift can lead to better creator partnerships, stronger content and more effective influencer campaigns.
Choosing Creators Before Understanding Your Audience:
Imagine a skincare brand launching a new product, and the marketing team finds a creator with 800,000 followers, strong engagement and attractive content. On paper, the creator looks like an obvious choice.
But there is a problem, most of the creator's audience consists of teenagers interested in entertainment and fashion, while the skincare brand is targeting working professionals aged 25–40 who are actively looking for solutions to specific skin concerns.
The creator may generate impressive views, but those views do not necessarily translate into customers. This however, is the difference between reach and relevance.
A successful creator partnership is not simply about putting your product in front of as many people as possible. It is about putting your product in front of the right people, in the right context, through someone they trust.
Statistics & Data: Why Audience Relevance Matters
The influencer marketing industry continues to grow, making strategic creator selection increasingly important, Collabstr's 2025 Influencer Marketing Report, based on data from 40,000 advertisers and 100,000 creators, reported that the influencer marketing industry was projected to reach $22.2 billion in 2025. The report also found that UGC creators increased by 93% year over year.
This invariably implies that more creators could mean more opportunities for brands, but also more choices to evaluate.
Google has highlighted the value of creator content, reporting that 89% of advertisers feel positive about advertising alongside creator content, while 92% agree that creator-produced content can be considered premium. Trust is another important factor. Nielsen has reported that 71% of consumers trust advertising, opinions and product placements from influencers, demonstrating why creators can be powerful bridges between brands and consumers.
The key takeaway is simple: The opportunity is enormous, but brands need to be intentional about which audiences they are entering.
How to Identify Your Ideal Audience Before Choosing Creators
1. Start With Your Existing Customers: Before searching for creators, study the people who already buy from you. Analyze the:
- Age
- Location
- Interests
- Occupation or lifestyle
- Purchasing power
- Shopping habits
- Preferred social platforms
- Common pain points
- Reasons for choosing your product
- Reasons potential customers hesitate to buy
Your existing customers can reveal patterns that are more valuable than assumptions. For example, a fashion brand may say: "Our target audience is women aged 18–35." But that is too broad.
A stronger audience definition might be: "Women aged 24–34 in major African cities who are interested in affordable premium fashion, follow style creators on Instagram and TikTok, and regularly purchase clothing online." Now you have an audience profile you can actually use to evaluate creators.
2. Identify the Problem Your Audience Wants to Solve: People rarely buy products simply because a product exists, they buy solutions.
Ask: What problem does my ideal customer want solved? For a fitness brand, the problem could be:
- Lack of time
- Difficulty staying consistent
- Finding convenient workouts
- Losing motivation
For a financial service, it could be:
- Difficulty saving
- Limited financial knowledge
- Managing personal finances
- Finding convenient payment solutions
For a beauty brand, it could be:
- A specific skin concern
- Finding affordable products
- Building a simple routine
- Understanding which products to use
Once you understand the problem, you can identify creators who consistently talk about that problem.
3. Find Out Where Your Audience Spends Time: Your audience may behave differently across social platforms. A young consumer discovering fashion trends on TikTok may have a completely different content journey from a professional researching business software on YouTube or LinkedIn. HypeAuditor's 2025 data found that approximately two-thirds of TikTok users are under 24, while 63% of YouTube users are between 18 and 34. However, demographics alone should not determine your platform strategy.
You should Ask:
- Where does my audience discover products?
- Where do they look for recommendations?
- Where do they engage with creators?
- Where do they research before purchasing?
- Which platform best fits my campaign objective.
The answers should influence your creator search.
4. Create a Detailed Audience Persona: Turn your research into a simple audience persona. For example:
Audience Persona: The Ambitious Young Professional
Age: 25–34
Location: Lagos, Abuja and other major urban centres
Interests: Career growth, fashion, wellness and personal finance
Platforms: Instagram, TikTok and YouTube
Pain Point: Wants quality products but has limited time to research them
Buying Behaviour: Searches social media for reviews and recommendations
Creator Preference: Relatable experts and lifestyle creators rather than celebrities
Now you have a reference point, and when evaluating a creator, ask: Does this creator's audience resemble this person?
If the answer is no, the creator may not be the right choice, regardless of their follower count.
Practical Example of Audience-First Creator Selection
A Nigerian Skincare Brand
Suppose a Lagos-based skincare company is launching a product for young professionals. Instead of automatically selecting the creator with the largest following, the brand could identify creators whose audiences are interested in:
- Skincare routines
- Beauty education
- Affordable premium products
- Lifestyle content
- Nigerian beauty
- Specific skin concerns
A micro-creator with 30,000 highly relevant followers could potentially be more valuable than a lifestyle celebrity with 2 million followers whose audience has little interest in skincare.
The smaller creator may have a stronger relationship with their community and greater relevance to the product.
Example 2: A Food Delivery Brand
A food delivery company targeting university students does not necessarily need the city's most popular lifestyle influencer. Instead, it could look for creators whose audiences are interested in:
- University life
- Student budgeting
- Food reviews
- Campus lifestyle
- Local entertainment
The creator's existing content provides a natural environment for demonstrating the service. The campaign becomes less like a traditional advertisement and more like a recommendation from someone who understands the audience.
Example 3: A B2B Technology Brand
A B2B technology company might initially assume it needs a creator with a huge professional following. But if its actual buyers are startup founders, HR leaders or marketing managers, the brand may get better results from niche experts whose audiences actively seek advice about those subjects. This is where authority can be more valuable than popularity.
7 Actionable Tips Before Choosing a Creator
1. Create a Target Audience Statement
Complete this sentence: "We want to reach [specific audience] who are interested in [topic] and need help with [problem]."
If you cannot complete this sentence clearly, you probably are not ready to select creators.
2. Separate Primary and Secondary Audiences
Your campaign may have more than one audience. For example: Primary audience: Women aged 25–34 interested in skincare. Secondary audience: Men purchasing skincare products as gifts. This distinction can help determine whether you need one creator or multiple creators with different audience profiles.
3. Look Beyond Follower Count the following should be Evaluated:
- Audience demographics
- Audience location
- Audience interests
- Engagement quality
- Content relevance
- Previous brand partnerships
- Comment quality
- Audience sentiment
- Platform performance
- Creator credibility
Follower count can be useful, but it should not be the only deciding factor.
4. Analyse the Comments, do not just look at likes the comments can reveal what an audience actually cares about.
Look for comments such as:
- "Where can I buy this?"
- "I've been looking for something like this."
- "Does this work for...?"
- "I've tried this before."
- "Can you review...?"
- "What's the price?"
These interactions can help reveal whether an audience is simply consuming entertainment or actively seeking recommendations.
5. Check Audience Location
This is particularly important for local and regional campaigns, If your product is available only in Nigeria, a creator with a huge international audience may not provide the value you expect. Look for creators whose audience overlaps with your actual serviceable market.
6. Match the Creator to the Buyer's Journey
Different creators can serve different stages of the customer journey.
Awareness: Lifestyle and entertainment creators can introduce your brand to new audiences.
Consideration: Niche creators and reviewers can educate audiences about your product.
Conversion: Trusted experts, reviewers and creators with strong community relationships can help overcome purchasing hesitation.
Think about what your audience needs before deciding which creator type you need.
7. Prioritise Audience-Creator Fit
Before approving a creator, ask:
1. Does their audience match our target customer?
2. Does their content naturally relate to our product?
3. Does their audience trust their recommendations?
4. Is their audience located where we can sell or deliver?
5. Can they communicate our message without making it feel forced?
If a creator fails several of these tests, a large following should not automatically save the partnership.
The Audience-First Creator Selection Framework
A simple framework to remember is: AUDIENCE → PLATFORM → PROBLEM → CREATOR → CONTENT → CAMPAIGN → RESULTS
Start with the audience, then identify where they spend time, understand what they need, find the creators they already trust, develop relevant content and measure the outcome.
This approach makes your influencer strategy more intentional and gives every creator selection a clear reason behind it.
In conclusion, Choosing the right creator starts long before you open Instagram, TikTok or YouTube. The strongest influencer campaigns begin with a clear understanding of who the brand wants to reach, what that audience cares about, where they spend their time and who they already trust. Follower count is only one piece of the puzzle.
Audience relevance, creator credibility, content fit and geographic alignment can be far more important when your goal is to generate meaningful business results.
So before asking: "Which creator should we choose?" Ask: "Whose attention do we need to earn?"
Once you know the answer, finding the right creators becomes significantly easier.
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Ready to Build a More Strategic Creator Campaign?
Deinfluential Limited helps brands develop influencer strategies, identify relevant creators, manage campaigns and build creator partnerships designed around the right audience not just the biggest following.
If you are ready to find creators who can genuinely influence your ideal customers, start building your influencer strategy with Deinfluential Limited today.
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