You are a brand.  You use social media to connect with your consumers, business partners, general fans, and other random people that clicked that button to link themselves to your social presence.  You put content out there for these people to see, to say something from your brand.  It might be a story.  It could be a really entertaining short-format video, or maybe a longer one.  You could’ve put a clever graphically-designed post out there.

Whatever it may be, it’s your content for your fans and followers.

This is all very basic stuff.  You’re probably super annoyed that you spent a minute reading the previous paragraph.

I do have a point though….

On a typical day you are reaching your typical users, whether that be due to EdgeRank, or followers on Twitter actually paying attention, someone actually using Google+, etc, etc.  And there a ton of factors that lead to your reach, but that’s not what this article is about.

Within your base of fans, followers, consumers, users, or even just floating around within the same subject matter circle – you have influencers.  You have tastemakers.  They are there, but you might not always see them.  They are able to sway trends, to create buzz, to spread the word, and heavily influence.  Your brand should be utilizing these influencers.  If you aren’t – you’re doing it wrong.

It’s 2013 and social media users have been seeing brands throwing around content for a couple years now.  Some of it is top notch, others – not so much.  That all aside, my point is that the brands have been doing a lot of the pushing of the messages and content.  Not everywhere, not always – some brands have this down already.  But a lot don’t.  Again, it’s 2013, people follow brands on social media to be entertained, inspired, to learn something, to discover something, to connect with others of a like-mind, so on and so forth.   The tastemakers and influencers within your area of expertise of subject matter could be a huge missing link to find others that might in fact be loyalists for your brand – they just don’t know it yet.

Partner with these influencers on content, on specific messages, and come up with a plan that fits within your overall strategy, makes sense for both your brand and your fans, and stays within said influencer’s voice (keeps it real).

One very important thing to consider: just because someone has a ton of followers doesn’t necessarily mean they’re a great influencer for your brand.  They need to be the RIGHT influencer within the subject matter at hand.   And it has to be the right medium.  Are they a blogger?  Do they make amazing vines?  Are they a big-time twitter personality?   Make sure the influencer fits within the audience you are trying to penetrate.

So, how do you find these people?  Well, this blog right here does a nice job of outlining some methods.  I’ll let them handle that part as opposed to me interpreting much of the same steps in my own words.

So the point of all this?  Find your influencers.  Use them.