More and more brands and businesses are realizing the benefits of collaborating with social media influencers to expand their customer base and reach their target audience. One platform that promises to connect brands with the right influencers for safe and reliable collaborations is IZEA. But is it true?
If you are looking for the best influencer marketing platforms to find creators in your niche, we have your answer! In this article, we will review IZEA features together, take a look at its pros and cons, and introduce you to a better alternative with more features.
What Is IZEA
Back in 2006, IZEA started its work under a different name, ‘PayPerPost; which was one of the first attempts at influencer marketing. At that time, there were no social media platforms but blogs and bloggers were popular.
Today, IZEA is an influencer marketplace that connects brands with creators across almost all platforms. There are over 650,000 creators on IZEA publishing on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, Facebook, Twitter, Twitch, Snapchat, Pinterest, Blog, and LinkedIn.
With IZEA, you can launch an influencer marketing campaign in a few steps and analyze your performance to boost your best content. It provides social media analytics and reporting tools to assist you in determining what’s effective and what’s not. So, let’s dive into the IZEA influencer tool and check does it works the way it says.
How Does IZEA Work
The first step to using IZEA is signing up as a brand or influencer. If you are an influencer, you can create your profile and look for opportunities in your niche. Also, creators can view your profile and contact you if interested in collaborating with you.
As a brand, you have two options as well! You can create your campaign page and wait for influencers to pitch you or use the search engine and target influencers to invite them for sponsorships. Now, let’s dive into IZEA influencer marketing features and try them together.
IZEA Key Features
Want to use this platform for running brand and influencer collaborations and campaigns? Let’s see what it offers.
1. Influencer Marketing Marketplace
Business Side
If you want to use IZEA as a brand to find an influencer to work with, here is what it provides for you.
- First, you need to sign up on the platform as a brand.
- After the signup, you will be redirected to a page filled with different influencer suggestions across all social media platforms. At the top of each suggestion, you can check influencers’ followers/subscribers and under the suggestions, you can check the collaboration cost.
- But these suggestions might not be relevant to your niche, so tap on the ‘Filter’ option to target influencers.
- You can target by ‘Followers Count’, ‘Location’, ‘Tags’, ‘Gender’, ‘Age’, and ‘Engagement Metrics’.
- The ‘Tags’ option stands for the niche of influencers which are only available in six categories: Lifestyle, Fashion, Beauty, Entertainment, Family, and Travel.
- Once you are done, tap ‘Update Results’.
- Now, you will see new suggestions and the price of working with each creator. You can tap on their profile to view more details such as a short biography, conditions, etc,
- If that’s the creator you are looking for, you can tap on the ‘Buy Now’ option.
- If the seller doesn’t respond in 7 days, the order will be automatically canceled and your payment will be refunded.
- Also, you can talk about the deal by tapping the ‘Message Me’ option on the influencer’s profile and talking to them directly,
Creator Side
After signing up, you will be redirected to your dashboard. Here you can add your social media account and connect it to IZEA.
- For that, choose the platform from the right toolbar and enter your login details.
Note: You need at least 1k followers to join as a creator.
- It will take a few minutes for IZEA to authorize your profile from your connection app.
- Then your social media metrics will be added to your profile automatically. Brands can view your follower count, engagement rate, and other metrics.
- You can upload a piece of your work to your creator profile and show your content creation talent.
2. Campaign Management
Another feature that IZEA provides for brands is the ability to create and manage influencer marketing campaigns. As a brand, you can set your conditions, budget, maximum bid, etc. Social media influencers and creators can view your campaign requirements and submit a request to become your partner.
After setting the influencer criteria that you are looking for, IZEA campaign management software will find creators that match your needs and notify them of a new collaboration opportunity. Once you find your match, you can set your publishing time post details together and make the payments directly on IZEA. You can then schedule your posts for your publish date and IZEA will automatically attach any hashtags or mentions you want and alert you if the content is incomplete.
3. Managed Services
While the creator marketplace can provide you with targeted tools and features to find your collaboration match, its options are limited. This Managed service is designed for larger brands and companies and helps them with everything they need to grow their brand awareness.
In this plan, a dedicated expert team will start working on your business, content strategy, plan growth strategy, campaign management, and everything that can help your growth.
4. IZEA Flex
Having all the features of the creator marketplace, IZEA Flex provides more tools for professionals. Here is what it offers:
- Influencer Scoring: IZEA uses an algorithm to score influencers and suggest you best ones that match your target market.
- Influencer Segmentation: Segment influencers into groups based on their work on specific brand collaborations and campaigns.
- Audience Analysis: The system can automatically create a detailed brief and determine the target audience demographics programmatically.
- Campaign Analytics: Their service provides some automation tools to help you manage your social media campaigns. These tools include adding and managing contacts, integrating with Google Analytics and Shopify, tracking performance with a tracking link tool, and more.
- Data Importing and Exporting Tools: The tracking and monitoring tool allows you to export your performance data, share it with your team, and archive it.
IZEA Reviews: What Do Customers Say
One of the best ways to find out if a platform is legit or not is by reading what its customers say on review websites. Here is what we found out by checking IZEA ‘s reviews
- On G2, IZEA has gained a 4-star rating score among 30 reviews.
- Most of their customers are satisfied with the search service but their problem is many of the influencers are not active on the platform and don’t respond to messages.
- Other negative reviews complain about the in-app bugs while messaging and searching for creators.
- According to some reviews, the campaign feature doesn’t provide some basic tools and it’s not easy to work with it.
- According to customer reviews for the IZEA flex plan, the account managers are almost available in case of any issues which is a great pro.
- Also on Trust Radius, Izea has a 9 rating score showing almost all of their customers like what they use.
IZEA Pros & Cons
Now that you know everything about IZEA, let’s take a quick look at its pros and cons to help you decide better.
IZEA Pros
- Over 650,000 creators.
- Covering almost all major social media platforms.
- Personalized consultation with the help of their expert team.
- A professional FAQ page: Even though their support team is always available (They even provide a phone number on their FAQ page in case of emergency).
- Secure Payment method.
- Analytics and reporting tools: After running your campaigns, you can monitor and track the results inside the app.
IZEA Cons
- Limited targeting option! You can only find and contact influencers in 6 niches.
- You need to add your social media account’s passwords.
- According to customers’ reviews, there are some issues with the in-app messaging tool
- There are no free plans to test the features. Even for using the 10-day free trial, you have to add your card information.
- There are only influencers with up to 500,000 followers on the platform. This means larger brands can not find any mega influencers to work with.
IZEA Pricing
Based on the plan you choose, there are different prices for the IZEA influencer marketing tool. Let’s take a look at how much IZEA costs:
The Creator Market Place
Plans start from $6 per month. Also for the brand side, there is a free version that they can try but it has some limits. (You can only make three deals each month on the free version).
- Free: Gives creators, brands, and marketers the basics for transacting in the marketplace.
- Creator Pro: $9 month – Serious about getting paid for creating content? This is the plan for you.
- Creator AI: $23 per month – All the benefits of a Creator Pro account plus a lot more AI Credits to fuel your creativity.
- Creator AI+: $47 per month – All the benefits of a Creator Pro account plus TONS of AI Credits to fuel your creativity.
- Marketer Pro: $129 month – For brands or marketers looking to work with creators on custom projects.
IZEA Flex
- Starter: $ 165/ month: Only for one brand
- Power: $ 600/ month: Unlimited
The Best IZEA Alternative: Ainfluencer
Now that you know everything about IZEA features and pros and cons, let’s introduce you to a better tool that covers all niches. As we mentioned in the previous parts, the targeting options on IZEA are limited and also there are no free tools for new businesses on a budget. That is when a better alternative can help you.
Ainfluencer is a 100% free end-to-end influencer marketing platform focused on Instagram and TikTok. The marketplace is where brands can discover influencers by niche, country, gender, audience type, and more than 20 other criteria to invite for collaborations. Using Ainfluencer, in a few simple steps you quickly set up your campaign and get exposed to over 500,000 influencers on TikTok and Instagram across whatever niche you are.
As a brand, you can manage unlimited campaigns, get proposals from an unlimited number of influencers for as long as your campaign is still live in the marketplace, and get all the values and features of the platform literally for $0 fees.
Ainfluencer Features
It doesn’t matter what size brand or business you are and where you are located, you can always use Ainfluencer marketplace and its useful features for unlimited use for free forever. Here are some of its main features.
1. Influencers list
As we are writing this article, Ainfluencer has a list of over 500,000 influencers on TikTok and Instagram. Like any other marketplace, the list is growing day by day with 10,000 new influencers signing up monthly.
2. Campaigns
Brands can create a campaign in a few simple steps and launch their presence and quest for influencers and their criteria in the Ainfluencer marketplace.
3. Influencer Invites
Brands can send invitations to all influencers for free. You have no limit in terms of discovering and evaluating the influencers in your niche and sending invites. This is the first step to get them to notice you and your campaign.
4. Smart Filters
Brands can narrow down their search for influencers using a great set of filters such as the size of influencers, their platform, gender, country, and more than 20 different criteria.
5. Chat
Brands and Influencers use the built-in chat Inbox within the marketplace to receive offers, negotiate them, make payments, and discuss any matters around their collaborations. It is a very well-done Inbox that allows you to streamline the entire process from receiving offers to making payments and leaving reviews.
FAQs
Now that you know everything about IZEA, its features, and how to use it, let’s read some of the most frequently asked questions.
1. What Are The Key Features Of IZEA?
IZEA offers an influencer marketing marketplace, campaign management tools, managed services, and IZEA Flex, which provides more tools for professionals such as influencer scoring, influencer segmentation, audience analysis, campaign analytics, and data importing and exporting tools.
2. What Are The Pros And Cons Of Using IZEA?
Some pros of IZEA include over 650,000 creators, covering almost all major social media platforms, personalized consultation with the help of their expert team, and secure payment methods. However, some cons include limited targeting options, the need to add your social media account’s passwords, and some issues with the in-app messaging tool.
3. How Much Does IZEA Cost?
The cost of IZEA depends on the plan you choose, It starts from $6 per month for the Creator Marketplace and ranges up to $600 per month for IZEA Flex.
4. Is There A Better Alternative To IZEA?
Yes, Ainfluencer is a 100% free end-to-end influencer marketing platform focused on Instagram and TikTok, with over 500,000 influencers on its list and a variety of useful features for unlimited use.
Conclusion
IZEA is a legitimate influencer marketplace that connects brands with creators across almost all social media platforms. It provides a variety of features such as campaign management, analytics and reporting tools, and personalized consultation with the help of their expert team. However, there are some limitations to IZEA, such as limited targeting options and no free plans to test the features.
For those looking for a better alternative, Ainfluencer is a 100% free end-to-end influencer marketing platform focused on Instagram and TikTok, with over 500,000 influencers on its list and a variety of useful features for unlimited use.
