Social media mavens earn cash, freebies
Style-conscious millennials using Instagram to create small businesses
The packages land on the suburban Milwaukee doorsteps of Pamela Kieck and Drew Westphal with great frequency.
Shirts, slacks, watches, belts, jewelry, hats — all new merchandise, all stylish, all free, and all theirs.
“My parents joke that when they come over that it’s like Christmas at my house every day,” Kieck said, “that the FedEx guy should just be parked in front.” Which is what happens when you’re an “influencer.” With fashion brands striving to reach millennials where they spend much of their time — looking at their smartphones — style-conscious young adults with large social media followings are much in demand.
Westphal, a sharp-dressing, 29-year-old Wauwatosan who posts on Instagram (52,000 followers) as “everyday-
drew,” receives so much free apparel that, he said, he wouldn’t have to buy clothes if he didn’t want to.
Arrayed in just one of his recent Instagram posts are more than $1,000 worth of clothing and accessories he got from companies eager to promote their brands. Among the swag: A $600 watch from Shinola, a $248 chore coat woven with Japanese cotton, and a pair of button-fly jeans (with left-hand twill) that go for $150.
Kieck, 28, a retail manager from South Milwaukee with 23,000 Instagram followers, is similarly showered.
“I mean, I’ve been getting stuff probably every day for the last six months now,” she said.
Plus, they get paid. Not always, and not enough to make a living, but significantly more than tip money.
Kieck typically receives $100 for an Instagram post, and about $550 for photos and a short article on her blog, “It’s Pamela Kieck – The Diary of a Curvy Fashionista.”
Westphal can get $500 for an Instagram post, sometimes more. Between Instagram and his blog, Everyday Drew, he estimates he received about $15,000 last year.
These little businesses grew naturally out of personal interest in fashion.
Kieck started blogging three years ago as a hobby after friends kept telling her how much they liked her outfits. Westphal was a fan of Red Wing boots and raw denim who found that if he used hashtags — #redwing, #rawdenim and such — Instagram could connect him with similar enthusiasts worldwide.
Freebies flow in
In late 2014 he started regularly posting photos of himself in clothes he liked, just for the fun of it. He had no idea that freebies might start flowing in until a few months later when out of nowhere a company offered him a free tie if he’d showcase it on his Instagram account.
Nor did Kieck grasp the potential for booty and cash till a social media professional clued her in.
“It took me a little bit to realize that that was a big thing,” she said.
Kieck works with a professional photographer, Liz Klein. Favorite locations for shooting are Grant Park and, of course, the Historic Third Ward with its urban atmosphere.
Westphal also uses the Third Ward. He works there, at Milworks men’s goods store, 143 N. Broadway, and maintains an “office” at Kickapoo Coffee, 232 E. Erie St.
He does most of his own photography using a tripod-mounted Nikon and an app on his phone to trip the shutter.
Westphal works with two New York-based agencies, Socialyte Collective and Endorsify, that connect him with brands. Kieck is part of the Vogue Infuencer Network.
“There are a lot of different ways that you can get brand partnerships,” Kieck said.
Going mainstream
Two-thirds of marketers now use influencers, according to a survey by Chute, a social media marketing firm in San Francisco, and Thuzio, a New York company that maintains an information bank on more than 50,000 influencers.
Formerly a niche tool, the approach has gone mainstream and is being tapped by brands both large and small, said Peter Adams, associate editor of online trade journal Marketing Dive.
One reason for the growing interest: increased use of ad-blocking software that lessens the value of banner ads.
Further, Adams said, influencers offer brands the possibility of reaching “an audience that will really connect with a product, assuming the influencer and the brand are a good fit.”
So-called “micro influencers” — people with thousands, not millions, of social media followers — let brands target their message to a narrow slice of consumers, Westphal said.
“If you’re following a men’s fashion blogger, you’re probably interested in what that person has to say, so you’re getting a prime audience of people who are 100% into what you’re showcasing,” he said. “It’s not like you’re just putting up a billboard.” Some influencers bolster their reach with automated services that, for a fee, attract followers by scattering thousands of “likes” and comments among similar accounts. Typically, some of those people reciprocate, and your following grows.
Westphal and Kieck said they don’t do that.
“It’s definitely cheating the system,” Westphal said by email. “… Many feel as if it’s a necessary evil, but it’s definitely not legitimate.”
Kieck said she initially considered using automated tools, but opted against them.
“I want to be authentic, and using that is the opposite,” she said in an email.
She won’t post photos or write about products she doesn’t truly like. At the same time, Kieck said, the brands she features typically specify the text they want used.
A messy issue
There’s also the messy little issue of disclosure. Under Federal Trade Commission rules, if someone gets paid to promote products, or gets them for free with the expectation that they will promote them, they’re supposed to say so.
Westphal said he marks Instagram posts with “#ad” or “#partnered with” when he is being paid. But he doesn’t include a disclosure when he just receives free goods — a no-no, according to FTC guidelines.
Kieck said she discloses when she receives something, typically with “#ad” or “#sponsored.”
Her posts often include that disclosure near the beginning, which the FTC likes. But sometimes they show up at the end of a long string of hashtags, a practice the agency questions.
It is widely perceived that the FTC is becoming more aggressive about enforcing the rules, but senior staff attorney Michael Ostheimer said the agency has been concerned for several years about pay for endorsements.
In any event, the FTC is highly unlikely to target influencers who count their followers by the thousands. The agency has said it usually will focus on the brands themselves, or their marketing agencies.
Meanwhile, the influencing will continue, and probably continue to grow. The appeal to marketers is significant, and the lure to would-be taste-makers is strong.
“This is such a great way to partner with brands,” Kieck said. “I mean, I’m going to Vegas in April and my car service is sponsored from the airport to the hotel, and a spray tan is sponsored for my trip, and my clothing is sponsored and all of this stuff.
“I was like, ‘This is awesome.’ Not to sound greedy, but who doesn’t love to get free stuff and then make money off of it?”