Children’s Toys Series Part 1 on consumer insights to help target parents here.
Today’s toy companies are trying to stand out in a sea of competition and many are turning to creative and unconventional means. For example, LegoLand Malaysia recently announced a new augmented reality app where visitors can become ghost hunters and interact in an AR world. On a day-to-day level, however, another factor that toy companies should be paying attention to is leveraging their social media presence with kid-influencers (dubbed kidfluencers). With the growing digital age, influencer marketing services are driving new waves in the children’s toy industry. How? Let’s find out.
Toy Talks on Which Social Media Platforms?
Our social listening platform found that toys are talked about most frequently on Youtube, with Twitter following close behind.
Although Youtube may be the most relevant platform for the toy industry, it may not be the best place to partner up with influencers. That’s because most of the users watching toy videos on Youtube are children and therefore lack the purchasing power that adults have. It may be more effective to target Twitter, where the majority of users have purchasing power. Ultimately, although children express what they want, it’s up to the adults to make the purchase. Therefore, companies should target both platforms for the most effective results.
Youtube Influencers or Kidfluencers?
Nevertheless, Youtube kidfluencers are a major deciding factor in the next best children’s toy, especially if they have a cult following.
Since our social media intelligence platform found that consumers use YouTube most often to share thoughts about children’s toys, we went over to Youtube ourselves. We noticed immediately that there is a large presence of toy reviewers. Channels like Ryan’s World are often consumer favorites for finding the best children’s toys to gift to young ones.
Due to the popularity of these toy channels, some kidfluencers have even created their own line of toys. For example, Ryan (from Ryan’s World) created a line of mystery eggs.
Today, this product has over 106 customer reviews and is an Amazon’s Choice product, demonstrating the reach and influence of YouTubers in the toy industry. Influencer marketing services are sure reaching into every nook and cranny of social media.
So, how do we leverage influencer marketing services to boost visibility?
Consumers are attracted to channels and brands that host giveaways, meaning that winners will receive a prize. For example, Youtube channel Toy Caboodle hosted a giveaway after reaching 500,000 subscribers.
Oftentimes, influencers ask for their followers’ participation in order to enter the giveaway. For example, @louiseluppg asked her followers to recreate their favorite “hairdorable” style for a chance to enter and win the giveaway. This undoubtedly drove up engagement, interactions, and positive conversations.
Since YouTube is such a major player in the toy industry, we decided to use our platform to find the highest-performing Youtube influencers this past month.
Surprisingly, although Ryan’s World has over 22 million subscribers, he didn’t show up on our top list of influencers. Ryan’s absence indicates that more subscribers do not necessarily mean a wider reach or higher engagement. In turn, it tells us that influencer marketing services are much more complex than having lots of subscribers. So, our influencer list identified influencers by calculating reach, interactions, and impressions. Kidfluencers with fewer subscribers might actually have more active and engaged fan bases. When it comes to influencers, it’s not always a numbers game. That’s why companies need social listening platforms to find influencers that work for their brands.
Applying These Use-Cases To Your Brand
In short, one of the best ways for toy brands to boost visibility is to partner with existing kidfluencers that have better engagement metrics rather than followers. Toy companies should specifically focus on giveaways since many consumers are naturally drawn to the promise of winning a prize. Furthermore, most giveaways require participants to share or retweet content related to your brand, which boosts engagement and visibility. The interactive nature of these channels makes them popular with not only children but also parents and caretakers who use them to gift the best children’s toys. It’s an effective way to reach today’s tech-savvy kids and parents.
Influencer marketing services have become an industry of its own! And finding the right kidfluencer partner is crucial to a brand’s success. But, our social listening dashboard can give you real-time data on consumer behavior and metrics to drive your products. While also alerting you of which markets you’re missing out on. Watch our short webinar to see how you apply social listening to your brand.
