Why influencers should be part of every brand’s marketing strategy — with India Sehmi from The India Edit

In the latest edition of The Growth Journals I speak to India Sehmi, an influencer and founder of The India Edit, a lifestyle blog, brand and social media presence.

Here’s a quick summary of my takeaways from the chat with India:

• Define your brand values and image and stay true to them across all activities
• Build trust with your audience through genuine, honest interactions
• Growth often requires sacrificing short-term gains for longer-term investments
• Be realistic with what you can achieve with your time — it’s better to do fewer things really well then lots of things poorly

“The India Edit felt like a brand that I could evolve and potentially grow beyond me”

Tell me a bit about The India Edit

The India Edit is my lifestyle blog and brand, I started it in 2019 after blogging on and off for about six years. It now spans various categories and corresponding Instagram handles. I describe it as a curated edit, featuring everything from fashion and travel to wellness and interiors. My blogs in the past were very age or location-focused and The India Edit felt more timeless, like a brand that could evolve and potentially grow beyond me.

I love how I can use The [space] Edit to create extensions of my brand as my life and interests change. In the last year I have created The Mirror Edit, where I share daily outfits, and The Interiors Edit to share my home and inspiring places, in addition to The India Edit. I think that’s as many as I can manage for now!

How has it evolved since it began?

For years I was creating content as a hobby on the side for little or no monetary reward, with the hope that it would one day evolve. This year it has grown a lot as a brand and a business — my following alone has increased from around 5K across my handles to over 50K in total now. In April I created a Limited Company as I was starting to get paid by brands to create content either to share with my followers on my channels, or just for their own channels.

“I think when people follow you they want to know what they are signing up for and with The Mirror Edit you know exactly what you are getting”

You mentioned that you began with The India Edit, and then expanded to include The Mirror Edit and The Interiors Edit. Why did you decide to split out these accounts rather than have everything under one brand?

It’s a good question and one I get asked a lot. With The Mirror Edit, I started sharing my outfits and mirror selfies on The India Edit stories and people were engaging with them a lot so I knew there was a place for it. I like to keep The India Edit more curated and editorial and the mirror selfies felt a bit scrappy and slapdash in comparison. So that’s how The Mirror Edit came about, and actually that account has grown quicker than The India Edit. I think when people follow you they want to know what they are signing up for and The Mirror Edit you know exactly what you are getting so it’s an easy decision to make.

The Interiors Edit came about earlier this year because I had the time and opportunity to spruce up my home and I was sharing snippets of it on The India Edit. Again, people seem engaged with that content and I knew I wanted to share more interior content long term so I created a standalone account, which has been really fun. I like that by having these standalone accounts a single follower could follow just one or all of these accounts depending on their own interests, yet I can also build up new audiences across those extensions of my brand. Ultimately I am speaking to more people by appealing to different interests.

And how does The India Edit blog fit in around these accounts. What sorts of people are you trying to target or engage via that channel?

My blog is a space where I can create longer form content, so if someone wants to delve into a topic or they are really in the mood to shop, then they can take that next step in terms of engagement by visiting my blog. Most of my followers are on Instagram and then a subsection — the more highly engaged followers — go to my blog. One thing that influencers often talk about is owning their own channel. Instagram and other social networks could be gone tomorrow and don’t necessarily have your interests or growth at heart, whereas my blog is the one channel I truly own so it’s important to establish it amongst my followers.

“I need to be realistic about what I can take on and mindful of the trust I have built with my audience”

You’ve got some really cool partnerships with big brands which I am so jealous of! How do these partnerships come to fruition?

As this is something I do in addition to a full-time job I don’t have as much time as I’d like to be proactive with my outreach. I have been lucky that through the hard work I put in to make my content consistent and of a high quality I have mostly had brands approaching me. With a brand we might start out with gifting, then one months worth of content and then move to longer three-month contracts. Working in this way means we lock in obligations for me to post across my channels for a set fee over a set period. I get approached by about three to five brands per day and I am super selective about what I say yes to. I need to be realistic about what I can take on and be mindful of the trust I have built with my audience. I want to make sure that I am promoting things that truly align with my brand and those that I really like and am excited about.

You mention these commercial arrangements you have with brands. Could you tell me a bit more about the different commercial models that sit behind influencer-brand partnerships?

There are three different ways that I typically work with brands — these can work together in tandem creating various opportunities and income streams. First is the commission side of things, which is the first way that I made money from my content. Through rewardStyle, which is a monetisation platform, I can earn commission from products that I drive sales to. This is almost like a personal shopping service for my followers as they are getting style advice and product curations and the brand gives me a small cut for driving that sale, but the price the follower pays is not affected.

I can create commissionable links to any of rewardStyle’s 5,000+ brands regardless of if I have an existing relationship with them, however it can be a great way to approach a brand if I can prove I already drive sales for them. For example with a brand I could see that my followers already buy from them when I share product recommendations so I can then approach them with that knowledge to build the relationship. That may lead to one of the below ways of working together.

When you start speaking to a brand, the entry level way you’d work together would be a brand providing something in the hope that you’d share it with your followers. This could be a product like skincare or clothing, a service like a consultation or membership or something experiential like a meal out or stay in a hotel.

The final way I work with brands is through them paying me flat fees. This can either be to post on my own channels or creating content for them to use on their channels. The latter hadn’t really occurred to me before, but it’s becoming quite a large proportion of my earnings. For example, one brand might pay me to post on both The India Edit and The Mirror Edit plus a blog post, whereas another brand might pay me to shoot 10 images that they can use on their own social channels with no obligation for me to share the images myself.

“Learning to price my time and the value of selling my image for brands to use on their own channels has been a really important lesson”

How have you navigated these conversations to agree on the ‘right’ price?

Learning to price my time, as well as the value of content solely for brands to use has been a really important lesson, and one I am still learning! Ultimately what I’ve learnt is that for the most part my time is best spent focusing on creating content for my own channels to help my brand and audience grow long term, rather than taking short term monetary gains from creating brand content. There’s always going to be a trade off, but I have to focus on long term goals.

Retail brands and beyond are starting to tap into influencers as a way to grow. What’s your take on how this is changing?

With influencers in general they can be really powerful with hitting different marketing objectives. They help with brand awareness and they can also be very powerful in driving sales. Influencers can offer a direct route to buy a product, sign up to a newsletter or discover more about a brand. They have typically built up trust with their audiences so there is often a higher conversion rate. I was actually talking to my dad about “fin-fluencers” — finance influencers — American Express already do it well, but I think we’ll increasingly see more traditional industries turning to influencers as they have seen the value they drive for other industries.

“By nature influencers can speak to their audiences and get a response immediately, which is very valuable”

Influencer marketing has been one of the few industries that has been positively impacted by Covid. Do you think this positive level of performance will sustain when we move back to ‘new normal’?

Whilst globally you’d assume consumer spending has gone down, online spending has gone up and that’s where influencers sit. Influencers are typically a one-man-band that can create content and pivot really quickly. They can also offer inspiration and escapism in a time where the world feels very negative. By nature influencers can speak to their audiences and get a response immediately, which is very valuable.

It was so interesting at the beginning of Covid because all of a sudden brands weren’t able to shoot products for their sites. Influencers are basically set up to do this themselves so lots of brands were using them to create imagery for their websites. It’s a very agile way of spending marketing budget — there’s no need to pay a photographer, videographer, studio space, models etc. You can literally send your product to one influencer and they can shoot all of your ecomm shots in one go. I think Covid has meant brands appreciate the value of influencers more and I have no doubt that will continue, particularly as we move away from physical shopping even further.

And do you think there are particular brands that work well using influencer marketing?

I think influencer marketing can work for almost all brands and industries so long as the choice of influencer and channel is right. Different social channels perform differently so it’s important for a brand to be considered in their approach based on their offering and goals. Looking at the price point is a good place to start — a low-priced product that is more of an impulse purchase would work well on Instagram and Instagram Stories to drive sales for example. Whereas a luxury product that costs £1–2k is unlikely to sell well through an Instagram swipe up as few people will spend that on impulse.

Influencers know their audiences best so it’s important to be collaborative and listen to what they think will work well given your goals. In addition, the data side of things is also incredibly important — looking at historical sales data for an influencer or going to a platform like rewardStyle who have years of historical data to analyse and use for casting.

And lastly, what are your priorities for The India Edit over the next year?

In terms of my goals I would love to move to a place where I work with more brands in a long-term capacity. I’ve heard the term “marrying a brand” which I think is a nice concept and really builds audience trust. From a business perspective it’s of course great to know you have that consistent income coming in too. I would also like to commercialise my brand content offering more. I’m essentially a mini content agency / photographer so I think turning that into a more formal proposition would work quite well. Finally, I really want to focus on growing my audience and maintaining my consistency. Outside of my full-time job at rewardStyle it’s the only other job I can see myself doing long-term so I need to think about that transition one day, which is exciting, but scary!

Now a final round of ‘quick fire’ questions! I’m going to ask you a series of questions and I want you to reply with the first thing that comes to mind. Ready?

What’s the best advice you have been given personally or professionally?

Don’t ask, don’t get (in the nicest way possible!)

If you could take one item with you on a desert island what would it be?

Definitely my camera.

What does success look like to you?

For me it’s about living in alignment with your true self.

If you want to see more from India, follow her on Instagram (The India Edit, The Mirror Edit, The Interiors Edit) or read her blog!

And check out my other interviews and articles for The Growth Journals here!