Do you need an in-house creator?

Companies like NERF and OLIPOP PBC are already hiring TikTok creators to run their accounts.

The benefits of in-house marketing vary from market to market and even from company to company, but the key values that companies return to are:

• Increase in transparency

• Reduced costs

• Control over brand messaging

In addition, taking your marketing in-house offers lower costs, higher ROI, better control and more.

What is In-House Marketing?

The definition is as simple as the name sounds, and the premise is: If you want to get something done, do it yourself. So, there is no outsourcing or delegating here. Instead of freelancers and outsourcing options, in-house marketing advocates for building up its original team that sticks to full-time content creators engaged only with your product and brand.

Let’s Dig Into the Subject

Since we live in a world where consumers demand compelling content they can relate to, we must produce new content really fast and be able to change course on a dime.

A readily available in-house team can cover the rush of large volumes of highly specific content. They also know the company inside and out and put more dedication into their work because the company’s fortunes are their fortunes too.

For example, Yellow Shoes is a big-time creative agency that you probably have never heard of. That’s because typical brands cannot hire it for creative work—it is an in-house advertising agency for the Walt Disney Company.

The Yello Shoes agency consists of artists, writers, designers, producers and project managers responsible for creating various advertising materials.

Could you imagine that? The whole ad agency serves one company. That’s amazing!

But you know, not everyone has a company as large as Mister Disney’s, so one creator would probably be enough, right? In this case, you don’t need to form a new department; just look for an influencer to work for your brand directly!

Olipop’s head of new business development, Steven Vigilante, says that it’s more efficient to have in-house creators. They can make more authentic content than relying on an outside agency or a traditional social media manager.

A big benefit of a brand hiring an employee with a following online is that usually these people know much more about social media, content creation, and connecting with users than certain corporate social media managers Alessandro Bogliari, CEO and co-founder of influencer agency “The Influencer Marketing Factory".

Besides, creators act as brand ambassadors, helping companies be more “human” online on their social networks. By showing the names behind your branded content, you can build clusters of influence behind your company’s personality.

When a brand is represented by a real person on their TikTok or Instagram account followed by thousands of people, a consumer’s brain agrees to “buy a thing” more willingly than in cases where some random person promotes it.

Plus, when a creator has a massive audience, influencers will not only help your brand to become more recognizable, but they will also help gain more customers. A follower might think John Smith loves this water so much; maybe it is really worth checking out. And if there are 50,000 followers, that would probably bring in some cash.

For influencers, joining brands full-time or part-time poses the question whether they will have any agreements on what other brands they are allowed to promote on their channel. If your company produces only cosmetics, then it would not cause any harm if “your” creator works with a clothing brand because you aren’t competitors.

Let’s have a look at some examples of successful campaigns, including those with the help of in-house creators.

Urban Outfitters + Own Employee

Urban Outfitters features its own design team on its Instagram profile, where they create homemade tutorials and styling videos.

That’s a win-win – employees can build their “personal brand” and advance their careers, and brands can get real content from real human beings.

Nerf + Sophie Lightning (2.1 million followers on TikTok)

Nerf’s TikTok account is under the control of Sophie. She is featured in most of the videos where she acts out characters, shows the backstage of the shootings, and reacts to TikTok trends — always featuring Nerf products.

Hypetrain + Natalia Fedorova (17.9 K followers on TikTok)