HOUSTON, Dec. 5, 2019 /PRNewswire/ -- HireInfluence, a Houston-based white-glove creative influencer marketing agency, has been awarded "Best Influencer Marketing Agency" at the 2019 INFLOW Global Summit for its collective work on behalf of Southwest Airlines, SOUR PATCH KIDS, and GOLDTOE^® brands.

Earlier this year HireInfluence set new industry standards, challenging brands to think more about designing "influencer experiences" to better engage audiences as a response to growing tune-out from audiences on influencer product promotion. Within its approach to influencer marketing strategy, HireInfluence puts emphasis on how the audience sees and feels influencer content, in an effort to improve the value and engagement of branded campaigns while still aligning completely with FTC regulations that require complete disclosure of brand and influencer relationship.

HireInfluence highlighted a total of three top campaigns from 2018 and early 2019 that excelled for immersive storylines and creative experiences. All campaigns recorded above average engagement which helped further drive campaign impressions.

"This award bears so much meaning for us in support of our very outspoken efforts to lead the industry in the way we design influencer campaigns. These three campaigns all contained the tenants of being experience driven and focused on the consumer, infusing the campaign with fun and creativity and netting above average results for their investment levels," says Stephanie Stabulis, VP and Strategy Director at HireInfluence.

The campaign #SouthwestSaysAloha was hailed for its creative and unique strategy which helped innovate new ways to use influencers – via peer-to-peer channel takeovers.

"Southwest came to us with a unique challenge – they wanted to create buzz in advanced of their first public flights to Hawaii and drive pre-sale tickets. Since it was difficult to fly influencers ahead of the public flight, we recommended utilizing influencer takeovers. We paired Hawaii influencers with US counterparts with similar interests and let the Hawaii locals do their things showing real-time 'lustful' content channeled to audiences in the continental states. Influencer-to-Influencer guided takeovers were a brand new method for us, but we were blown away by how well they were executed and received by audiences," states Stabulis.

"When Southwest Airlines launched service to Hawaii, we wanted influencers to generate buzz, create inspirational destination content, and extend our brand values to this new market. The concept HireInfluence partnered with us on to activate influencers in California, as well as Hawaii, in virtual tours and takeovers was innovative and achieved our go-to-market goals. We were successfully able to speak to our brand and inspire travel to the islands – talk about a win-win," said Brie Strickland, Associate Manager, Southwest Airlines Marketing.

SOUR PATCH KIDS and GOLDTOE^® brands followed more immersive "experiences" which challenged influencers to create fun contexts in which the brand distributed campaign messaging.

"SOUR PATCH KIDS [Zombie Heads] is a playful brand, so we wanted to extend this to our influencer campaign by asking influencers what they would grab from their local convenience store in the event of a Zombie Apocalypse. It was crazy, but both audiences and influencers loved the context and answering with their content," shares Stabulis. "#Socktox for GOLDTOE^® was created to pose a challenge to clean out and replace old socks with newer and higher-quality socks. We wanted to create something that influencers could have fun with, felt natural, and also was a 'duplicatable experience' that would inspire audiences to do the same, share, and purchase the products they needed to complete it."

Since 2018, The INFLOW Summit has been the largest annual, global conference of influencers and marketers who represent some of the world's top brands. This year's event was attended by top thought leaders, including representatives from emerging media platforms like Facebook and Twitch.

HireInfluence is a full service influencer marketing agency for top creative agencies and the world's most prominent brands. As the first influencer marketing agency in the world, our team provides the experience and knowledge necessary to align brands with respected voices and digital audiences across the globe. We provide full-service solutions, including development of content strategies, hand curation and casting of right-fit talent, and execution of comprehensive, interactive, cross-channel influencer campaigns. 

CONTACT:
HIREINFLUENCE
800-535-4732
press@hireinfluence.com / info@hireinfluence.com

SOURCE HireInfluence

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