Getting Ghosted? How to Get Influencers to Respond to You

It can be disheartening when an influencer you really want to work with doesn’t respond to your collaboration proposals. But why exactly are your emails not working — and what can you do to get more responses going forward? 

Below, we’ve combined some insider tips from our blog, “Ask an Influencer: Why Aren't Influencers Responding to My Emails?” with some fresh insights to give you the best advice for your email outreach strategy.

5 Reasons You Aren’t Getting Responses

If you’re not receiving any responses, you may be making some of these common mistakes — and not even realizing it. 

1. Lack of Personalization 

Put yourself in the influencer’s shoes. Would you rather receive a generic email that could have been sent to anyone, or a specific message that was clearly personalized for you? I’m willing to bet my money that you’d choose the latter.

Contrary to popular belief, many brands are still copying and pasting the same email to every influencer they want to work with — with no personalization at all. In fact, some don’t even address the influencers by their first name. If you do this, your email is almost guaranteed to be ignored. 

Here's an example of what not to write.

As you can see, this email doesn't have any personalization — no first name, nor anything specific about why the influencer stood out.

2. Signs of Automation

As a marketer, you’re probably used to utilizing email automation programs. This is a great way to save time. But as we mentioned above, you want to focus on personalizing each outreach email — even if that just means including their name and one specific thing you like about their content. This shows that you’ve done your research and that you’re familiar with the influencer’s personal brand.

If you’re planning to use an automation tool to send out mass invites, make sure that all of your email tokens work properly and that your content looks professional. The worst case is if you accidentally address a potential brand partner as “{{First Name}}.” 

On Aspire, you can easily automate some of the personalization using tags, as shown below. With the magic tool, you can turn a personalized token like {{First Name}} into each influencer’s name with ease. 

3. Lack of Collaboration Details

Would you ever sign a contract without knowing what you’re getting yourself into? Probably not.

Similarly, prior to agreeing to a partnership, influencers want to know more about your brand and what the collaboration entails. Don’t start the conversation simply by offering a lot of money in hopes that influencers will respond — this will seem more like a business transaction than the start of a genuine, long-term relationship. Instead, offer up some details about the collaboration, such as:

• A quick background on your brand and your products
• Why you think this specific influencer would be a good fit for the campaign
• A general timeline of the campaign
• The deliverables you’re looking for
• The benefits and incentives they’ll get

While you should keep the email brief and to-the-point, providing important information and selling points about your brand will be received well by the influencer.

4. Bad Incentives

Piggybacking onto our previous point, the incentives you include — or don’t include — may be detering influencers from working with you. Perhaps you’re asking for too much, while not compensating them well enough. Just take a look at this satirical TikTok by content creator Aly Silverio.

Remember — creators are working hard to help your brand reach your goals. Always compensate them fairly.

5. Wrong Influencers

If you’re not conducting your research beforehand, you may very well be reaching out to the wrong influencers — partners who are unfit for your brand. 

Let’s say you’re a gaming brand. If you’re reaching out to a health and wellness influencer you found on your Instagram Explore page, there’s a good chance that they won’t be interested in the partnership. In cases like this, it’s clear that you haven’t spent much time looking at their profile because they typically talk about living a balanced lifestyle or their favorite supplements — not about video games. 

If you’re struggling to find well-aligned influencers, it may be time to invest in an influencer marketing platform. With a tool like Aspire, you have multiple ways to find potential brand partners and existing brand fans. This will streamline your influencer discovery process, ensuring that you’ll connect with influencers who have a higher chance of being interested in your brand. 

How To Increase Your Response Rates

Now that you’re aware of some of the mistakes you may be making, here’s an example of an email that would compel an influencer to respond. 

But what exactly makes this email response-worthy? 

1. Reach Out to Well-Aligned Influencers 

While it may seem tedious to track down dozens of high-quality influencers (who could still potentially leave you on “read”), doing your research and being meticulous about who you’re reaching out to will save you time in the long run. Think about it — the better aligned the influencers are, the more interest they’ll have in collaborating with you. 

If you’re sourcing potential brand partners manually, you can start by:

• Looking through your social media mentions and tagged photos to find who already loves your brand
• Finding a couple of influencers you love and looking for similar creators via the “Suggested” function on each social channel
• Searching very specific and relevant hashtags 

But if you’re looking to speed up your influencer discovery process, invest in an influencer marketing platform like Aspire. That way, you’ll have multiple ways to find influencers, such as:

• Influencer search engine
• Creator marketplace
• Social listening
• Ecommerce customer integration
• Branded application pages

2. Make Your Outreach Personal

Remember — personalization is key. When crafting your next outreach email, make sure to check off all of these boxes:

• Address each influencer by their first name. While it is simple, you’d be surprised by the number of brands that don’t take the time to do this. This is the very first step to capturing the influencer’s attention.
• Briefly introduce yourself and your company. Not everyone will be familiar with your brand, so give them a one-sentence rundown of what your company does. Plus, provide your name to give them an idea of who’s behind the brand — especially if your email is coming from an alias like social@[brand].com.
• Mention why you think they’re a good match for the company. For instance, comment on how a message from their recent post aligns with your brand’s mission or how their colorful content could be a fun addition to your next campaign idea. This shows that you’ve done your research.

3. Provide Campaign Details

Give influencers some more information about what they’re signing up for. Provide more details about the campaign overview, a brief campaign timeline, and the specific deliverables you’re looking for. Additionally, add in some fair incentives so that influencers know how they’ll benefit from the partnership. 

With all the details laid out, the influencer won’t have too many unanswered questions, allowing you to cut back on the back-and-forth and jump straight into signing the contract. 

4. Include a Call-to-Action

Make sure there’s a CTA at the end of your email. What do you want the influencer to send you? Ask for some more insights into their audience data, a media kit, their rates, or more ideas on what their ideal collaboration would be. This will compel the influencer to respond with exactly what you’re looking for.

Additionally, remind the influencer that you’re always open to jump on a call to discuss the collaboration in further detail. Influencers are less likely to ghost you if they’ve talked to you on the phone rather than just via email. 

5. Follow Up When Necessary

Influencers are busy people and there are many reasons they may miss your email. Perhaps they’ve got hundreds of collaboration requests hitting their inbox each week, or maybe their social media career is a side hustle in addition to their full-time job. Regardless of the reason, it’s worth following up after about 48 hours if you don’t get a response. This will ensure that your email gets sent to the top of their mailbox and the influencer will respond right away if they’re interested in collaborating. 

Refresh Your Influencer Outreach Strategy

If you’re struggling to get influencers to respond, rework your outreach strategy by implementing our tips above. Start by doing your research and finding the right influencers to reach out to, then sprinkle a touch of personalization into each email. Better yet, use our influencer outreach template to craft your next email. Paired with some collaboration details and a clear call-to-action, you’re sure to receive some responses in no time. 

Want to see how we can help? Book an Aspire demo.