What Skills Do Marketers Need to Excel at Seeding?

How to Become a Marketer That Brands Actively Seek Out

Hello! I'm Luna, a marketer at Spray, bringing you various insights for growth.

In my previous article, I discussed the prospects for global influencer marketers.

We found that as the influencer marketing market grows, demand for professionals who can execute this work is also increasing, leading to higher growth potential for global influencer marketer roles.

So what skills do marketers need to build careers in this field?

In this article, I'll examine the competencies required for global influencer marketers, based on an analysis of over 120 actual influencer marketer job postings.

1. Campaign Planning That Aligns with Brand Messaging

The role of an influencer marketer doesn't stop at simply finding, recruiting, and managing influencers.

Rather, the more important competency lies in the ability to plan content and campaigns.

Our job posting analysis revealed that storytelling skills for conveying brand messages were mentioned over 420 times, making it the most frequently requested capability.

This shows that brands place greater importance on the ability to plan creative content that aligns with brand messaging.

The ability to turn creative concepts into concrete campaign ideas is equally important.

Marketers need the competency to develop appropriate content guidelines that ensure influencer content harmonizes with brand messages.

They must guide influencers so their content matches the campaign's planning intent.

How to ensure effective brand message delivery?

It's most effective to find people who naturally create content with visuals that match your brand's tone and atmosphere.

From the influencer's perspective, they're more likely to accept proposals from brands that are a good fit for them.

2. Understanding Social Media Exposure Logic

Since major social platforms like Instagram and TikTok are core channels for influencer marketing, social media management skills are crucial competencies.

Therefore, understanding each channel's algorithm and having hands-on experience managing them becomes a valuable asset for influencer marketers.

When this is combined with practical understanding of each channel's characteristics and consumer reactions, marketers can go beyond simply exposing content to effectively deliver appropriate messages to customers and maximize campaign performance.

Exposure Logic Characteristics of Short-Form Video Channels (TikTok/Reels):

As covered in previous content, creator feed exposure is determined not by followers but by content engagement.

You need to understand the recurring algorithm where content with high watch time, shares and saves, and comments gets exposed to more people.

3. Strategic Thinking Based on Market Research

While this might sound obvious, strategic thinking ability based on deep understanding of industry categories is also considered a core competency.

Influencer marketing builds trust relationships with consumers through influencers and contributes to brand awareness, customer loyalty, and community building.

It's not just a one-off campaign but directly connected to a brand's long-term growth.

Therefore, the ability to analyze markets and develop appropriate positioning strategies for those markets is crucial.

Strategic thinking that considers "which influencers should we collaborate with at this point to strengthen the brand's desired positioning" is essential.

What makes a truly effective influencer?

It's not someone who simply creates provocative content for views, but rather someone who serves as an 'object of aspiration,' 'creates belonging,' or 'removes fears'—these are the marketing-effective influencers.

Simply put, we can categorize them as people you want to emulate / people similar to you / people with more experience than you.

4. Data-Driven Performance Measurement

Fourth is data-based performance analysis capability.

Real job postings repeatedly emphasized the importance of measurement competencies like campaign performance analysis and KPI management.

As the saying goes, "what you can't measure, you can't improve"—the ability to understand how campaigns influenced purchase and sales conversions is essential.

While it's difficult to pinpoint exactly which content led to purchases due to the nature of influencer marketing, post-campaign measurement is needed to determine which messages resonated with consumers.

This requires the competency to collect and interpret data, derive insights, and optimize campaigns accordingly.

Views alone aren't enough for judgment.

Performance measurement is what makes influencer seeding marketing most challenging.

Sometimes high-view content doesn't translate to sales at all, and there are many opposite cases too.

You need the ability to reach comprehensive conclusions through both quantitative analysis and qualitative analysis of the messages and hook points in content.

5. Smooth Communication

Fifth is communication competency.

Influencer marketers must collaborate with various stakeholders simultaneously.

Internally, they work with brand teams, design teams, and sales teams, while externally they negotiate with influencers.

Therefore, smooth communication skills and negotiation abilities based on empathy and persuasion are essential.

Since relationships with influencers are trust-based partnerships rather than simple contractual relationships, there needs to be a collaborative process that allows influencers to naturally create content in their own style, rather than just unilaterally conveying brand requirements.

This is ultimately why marketers with excellent communication abilities get noticed.

What does fee negotiation ability mean?

Creators without alternative income sources inevitably have to demand higher content production rates.

Successfully communicating these requirements to appropriate levels is also a skill.

Successful global influencer marketers need the ability to gather as many people as possible, then create the most effective group in terms of brand message delivery and cost efficiency to run campaigns.

6. Global Language Competency

What makes these communication competencies even more valuable is global language ability.

Our job posting analysis revealed that companies targeting global markets mostly specify business English as a basic requirement.

Practical English skills sufficient for smooth negotiation and collaboration with overseas influencers are required.

Furthermore, some companies give preference to candidates who can speak Japanese or Chinese.

Does everyone need to speak foreign languages?

Most job postings require overseas living experience, Japanese N1 certification, etc., and having basic-level knowledge is certainly advantageous.

However, since translation services like ChatGPT and Claude have become so sophisticated, having AI create drafts and having capable team members edit them is more efficient for both hiring and operations.

What Kind of Global Influencer Marketer Do Brands Want?

In summary, global influencer marketers aren't simply people who find and manage influencers, but those who plan campaigns and see them through to completion alongside influencers.

In other words, content planning ability, platform management experience, strategic thinking, data-driven performance management, and communication skills are comprehensively required.

In the growing influencer marketing market, professionals with these competencies will face even higher demand and growth opportunities in the future.