We first tried using influencer marketing at ThirdLove back in 2014. And to be honest, we really didn’t get the results we were looking for.

Yet today, influencer marketing is one of the most promising emerging channels in our marketing portfolio.

What happened? The truth is, there are moments when influencer marketing works best. If you don’t see results initially, that doesn’t mean you should ditch influencers forever.

Maybe you weren’t using the right influencers. Maybe you weren’t crafting the content in the right way. Or maybe it just wasn’t the right moment for your brand to have that partnership. Whatever the case, influencer marketing is a useful way of reaching new audiences and educating them about your product.

Here’s what to keep in mind as you get started:

Understand paid doesn’t mean inauthentic.

I’ve heard people say, “Oh, I would never pay an influencer to work together.”

I understand what they’re trying to say—they see the relationship as inauthentic. But paid marketing is paid marketing. Is it inauthentic to buy Facebook ads or send out direct mail?

Regardless, we’ve worked with both paid and unpaid influencers at ThirdLove. And I can tell you that the claims of inauthenticity just don’t ring true.

That’s because the relationship is a two-way street. We only work with influencers who are passionate advocates for brand, and who truly like and wear our product.

You have to remember influencers represent their own brands as well. Influencers typically want to promote products and causes they genuinely believe in or use. Even if they’re getting paid for the partnership, it’s still important that the company and product is on-brand for them.

So, it’s normal to end up with a situation where the influencer actually has a genuine interest in your product and acts as a true advocate. And that’s about as authentic as it gets.

The audience has to align with the demographic you’re trying to reach.

When we launched our maternity bra line last year, we had a lot of success using influencers to help us get the word out.

We were going after a different sub-category of customers: pregnant women and new mothers. We wanted to make sure people that community knew about our launch. So, we relied heavily on influencers because pregnant women often follow bloggers, podcast hosts, and other influencers who are also pregnant.

There’s a real community there, and we were able to tap into that successfully through our partnerships.

If you want your influencer marketing efforts to be successful, you have to figure out who you’re trying to reach. Who’s your target demographic? What do they listen to? What do they watch? Who do they see as an authority they can rely on?

Find the answers to those questions, and you’ll find the right influencers for your product.

Judge success based on revenue and engagement.

Influencer marketing is about creating a relationship with someone who’s going to be an ongoing steward of the brand.

Judging the success of that relationship depends on several things. The first is the revenue you generate from the partnership. That revenue isn’t entirely trackable, but you can use special codes and links to get a good sense of how many people are purchasing because of your partnership.

Keep in mind, the largest overall audience doesn’t always equate to the largest number of sales.

That’s because you also have to look at the quality of engagement. And that isn’t just about how many likes an Instagram post gets. It’s about how many comments are made and the content of those comments. It’s about whether or not that post actually convinces anyone to try your product.

Ask yourself: Are we resonating with the influencer in an organic way? Are we able to reach a new audience and educate them about our mission? Are we able to have meaningful conversations with them?

It’s about creating an organic relationship.

Some of our influencers at ThirdLove have been paid, others have not. Sometimes an unpaid relationship creates strong engagement, and we ask them if they’d be interested in a paid partnership with more depth.

There’s no “secret sauce” for making an influencer relationship work. We’ve had success with everyone, from a reality star in her 20s to a blogger with two children.

Influencer marketing is like any other aspect of your business. It takes time to figure out what works best. You have to be open to evolving, trying new things, and even coming back to it if it doesn’t work the first time.