Influencer Discovery: The Best Tools in 2024 to Elevate Your Influencer Search

You need an influencer discovery tool to find and connect with relevant influencers on Instagram and other platforms for your brand's marketing campaigns. While the terms "search" and "discovery" are used interchangeably, they refer to the same process of finding influencers.

Discovery tools use advanced search capabilities and data-driven insights to identify influencers aligned with your niche, audience demographics, and campaign goals.

Keep in mind that all pricing mentioned is current as of the publishing date but may be subject to change.

What’s the difference between the dozens of free search tools versus a paid tool?

Features to look for in an influencer discovery tool

1. Influencer search capabilities

Look for features like filters based on niche, location, engagement rates, and follower counts. This empowers you to connect with influencers who cater to your target audience, ensuring effective collaborations.

2. Profile insights

Look for tools that offer easy-to-understand analytics, such as graphs and charts, to quickly digest the information and compare influencers side by side.

3. Authenticity verification

You want to ensure that the influencers you partner with have genuine, engaged followers who will engage with your brand’s message.

Look for features that quickly show engagement rate and how much of an influencer's audience may be fake. This may include algorithms that detect fake followers, suspicious activity, or sudden spikes in followers or engagement.

4. Collaboration history

Choose an influencer discovery tool that offers insight into an influencer's collaboration history. View past brand partnerships to determine their relevance and effectiveness, ensuring a strong fit for your campaigns.

5. Ease of use

A user-friendly UI can save you time and frustration, allowing you to focus on developing your influencer marketing strategy.

6. Integrations

To streamline your influencer marketing efforts, look for tools that integrate with your existing marketing stack and your e-commerce platform, if applicable.

7. Customer support

Look for tools that offer quick responses when you need them--during your work hours. Find out how you will interact with support and the response time promised. Check reviews and look for a reputation of responsive, helpful customer service. If the platform offers onboarding or training services, that can be a valuable bonus to help you get up and running quickly.

8. Pricing

Finally, carefully review the pricing models of the influencer discovery tools you're considering. Some platforms offer tiered pricing based on the number of users or features, while others may charge based on the number of influencers you search for or collaborate with.

MightyScout

MightyScout is your go-to platform for streamlining your influencer campaigns, with a special focus on influencer post tracking and analytics. It offers a range of features to help you discover and engage with Instagram influencers effectively.

MightyScout's lookalike search is a game-changer for finding the ideal influencers for your brand. Simply input a few Instagram usernames that reflect what you're looking for, and let the MightyScout algorithm work its magic.

It considers multiple characteristics simultaneously, such as category, aesthetic, location, and follower count, saving you time and effort in your search.

Use lookalike search to:

• Create a roster of influencers who closely resemble your target influencer
• Quickly narrow down influencers within a specific category
• Discover up-and-coming influencers with ease

Keep in mind that a lookalike search requires you to provide at least one influencer (and ideally five) so it may not be ideal if you're looking to find influencers from scratch.

Before selecting an influencer for your campaign, use MightyScout's influencer vetting process to evaluate their performance and audience fit. Access Influencer Lookup and Audience Insights reports to dig deeper into historical performance metrics and make better decisions.

In addition to its powerful search and vetting features, MightyScout offers a suite of tools to support your entire influencer marketing workflow, including:

• Influencer tracking
• Reporting and analytics
• Content collection
• Affiliate marketing capabilities

With MightyScout, you have everything you need to effectively leverage influencer marketing on Instagram and other social media platforms. Discover, engage, and analyze your influencer campaigns like never before.

Who MightyScout is best for?

MightyScout is best for brands and agencies that prioritize making data-driven decisions. It stands out from competitors in its unique ability to reliably track Stories, product gifting, product seeding, and influencer events content.

It offers features such as influencer tracking, search/discovery, and vetting, which are specifically tailored for Instagram influencer marketing.

The platform helps streamline the process of monitoring campaigns, compiling end-of-campaign reports, and analyzing them, making it easier for brands and agencies to manage their paid and unpaid influencer marketing efforts.

MightyScout’s features

• Lookalike search: Allows users to input a few Instagram profiles to find more profiles with similar characteristics like category, aesthetic, location, follower count, etc.
• Influencer vetting: Provides Influencer Lookup and Audience Insights reports to help users evaluate an influencer's performance and audience fit before selecting them for a campaign.
• Influencer tracking: Enables users to monitor their influencer campaigns, including paid and unpaid collaborations.
• Content performance analysis: Allows users to assess the quality and relevance of an influencer's content to their brand.
• ROI estimation: Includes a built-in ROI calculator to help users estimate the potential return on their influencer marketing investments.

Pros of MightyScout

• MightyScout provides detailed analytics, allowing you to make informed decisions based on deep insights into influencer performance, audience engagement, and campaign performance.
• Thanks to its intuitive design, MightyScout's is easy to navigate and use.
• Maximize your marketing budget with MightyScout's competitive pricing compared to other influencer platforms.

Cons of MightyScout

• No automated payments for influencers: You can log payments in MightyScout but you pay influencers manually (e.g., via Venmo or Paypal).
• No whitelisting or Spark integrations: If you do whitelisting or spark ads, you’ll need to do it directly through the social media platform, not through MightyScout.

How much does MightyScout cost?

MightyScout offers a 30-day money-back guarantee with no contract requirements, making it a low-risk option for brands to try out. They also provide an enterprise plan for larger, customized needs.

• Starter: $249/month
• Growth: $399/month
• Professional: $749/month
• Enterprise: custom pricing

HypeAuditor

HypeAuditor is an AI-powered influencer marketing platform designed to streamline the process of discovering and vetting influencers across various social media platforms, including Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and more.

It offers advanced tools to search for influencers based on a wide range of metrics such as audience demographics, engagement rates, and authentic influence, which ensures the influencers they connect with are well-matched for their campaigns.

Who HypeAuditor is best for?

HypeAuditor is best for brands and agencies that require detailed, data-driven insights to guide their influencer discovery and selection across multiple social media platforms.

What are HypeAuditor’s search and discovery features?

• Uses AI to match brands with influencers that align with their audience and campaign goals
• Filters influencers by location, audience demographics, engagement rates, and more
• Evaluates the authenticity of an influencer's followers to prevent fraud
• Predicts campaign performance based on historical data of influencers
• Provides insights into competitors' influencer strategies and campaign effectiveness
• Tracks and analyzes trends within the influencer market to identify emerging opportunities
• Searches and discovers influencers across Instagram, YouTube, TikTok, and more

HypeAuditor pros

HypeAuditor's strength lies in its AI analytics which not only helps in identifying the right influencers but also predicts the potential success of campaigns.

The platform's focus on combating influencer fraud through its audience quality scoring system ensures that brands connect with genuine influencers, improving campaign results and effectiveness.

HypeAuditor cons

While HypeAuditor offers extensive features, its comprehensive data and multiple functionalities might present a steep learning curve for some users, especially those new to influencer marketing tools.

Additionally, the cost associated with accessing full capabilities may be higher compared to simpler platforms, potentially making it less attractive for smaller businesses or those with limited budgets.

HypeAuditor capabilities are strong on the influencer discovery and evaluation front. Not as strong on campaign management, tracking, and reporting.

How much does HypeAuditor cost?

Pricing available upon request.

GRIN

GRIN's platform supports your entire influencer marketing workflow, from fielding applicants to communicating with influencers, and provides tools to nurture authentic brand relationships at every campaign stage.

With GRIN's influencer discovery features, including a best-in-class web extension, creator-focused landing pages, and simple tools to import your roster, you can find the right influencers faster.

Who GRIN is best for?

GRIN is an influencer marketing platform that aims to help brands manage all aspects of their influencer campaigns. No one feature is powerful. But for e-commerce brands that work with many paid influencers, GRIN is an effective all-in-one tool.

What are GRIN’s search and discovery features?

• Tailor searches by engagement rate, follower count, location, and more
• Track and manage communications and relationships with influencers
• Assess influencer audience characteristics to ensure brand alignment
• Find new influencers similar to those who have proven successful in past campaigns
• Gain insights into influencer performance and audience engagement in real-time
• Integrated tools to streamline the setup, execution, and tracking of campaigns
• Organize and track content created by influencers for campaigns

GRIN pros

GRIN offers a range of features that streamline your influencer marketing efforts. For its discovery offerings, GRIN has been going through some changes since late 2022. They offer curated lists of influencers created by their in-house team and landing pages to easily recruit freelancers and the integrated Gmail inbox for seamless communication within the platform.

GRIN cons

Occasionally, you might encounter software glitches, such as product fulfillment showing incorrect status. GRIN also lacks a calendar view for paid partnerships, making it difficult for you to track monthly creator activities, spending, and earnings. Additionally, the creator search functionality is limited, and PayPal is the only payment option for creators, which can be challenging for some countries.

How much does GRIN cost?

You need to contact their team to get more details on pricing.

Upfluence

Upfluence excels in helping brands identify and collaborate with influencers across various social media channels, including Instagram, YouTube, Facebook, and more.

Upfluence's advanced search capabilities help marketers filter potential influencers by detailed criteria such as engagement rate, geographic location, audience demographics, and content style, making it easier to find the perfect match for their campaign's objectives.

The core strength of Upfluence lies in its powerful discovery tools that not only simplify the search for influencers but also provide in-depth analytics to gauge the potential impact of influencers on specific campaigns.

Who Upfluence is best for?

Upfluence is ideal for brands and agencies that require a scalable solution for managing multiple influencer relationships across various social media platforms, but that do not need a large number of influencers from the database.

What are Upfluence’s search and discovery features?

• Search influencers by keywords, demographics, interests, and social media metrics
• Find influencers based on their geographic location to target specific markets
• Access detailed analytics on an influencer's audience to ensure alignment with target demographics
• Evaluate potential influencers based on their engagement rates and audience interactions
• Filter influencers by the relevance of their content to your brand's niche or industry
• Review past campaigns and performance metrics of influencers for informed decision-making
• Use up-to-date information for the latest insights into influencer activity and trends

Upfluence pros

Upfluence has a database of influencers, making it easier for you to find the right partners for your outreach campaigns. The platform's user-friendly interface simplifies the process of inviting influencers to your campaigns, saving you time and effort.

Upfluence cons

While Upfluence offers some attractive features, it comes at a steep price compared to other CRM and influencer marketing tools available in the market. The platform also requires a 12-month contract commitment, which can be a significant financial burden, especially for startups, even with discounts.

How much does Upfluence cost?

You need to contact their team for more information on pricing.

Influencity

Influencity is a newer influencer marketing platform. It has some strong features and some that are yet to be built out.

The platform's advanced search and discovery tools are a key strength, allowing you to quickly identify relevant influencers for your campaigns. Influencity's AI-powered algorithms analyze audience demographics, content performance, and engagement metrics to surface the most suitable influencers for your specific needs.

Who Influencity is best for?

Influencity is ideal for global brands and agencies that value deep insights in the discovery phase such as influencer effectiveness and audience alignment, particularly those in sectors like beauty, tech, gaming, and DIY.

What are Influencity's search and discovery features?

• Uses advanced algorithms to match brands with the most suitable influencers based on detailed criteria
• Allows for precise targeting based on specific industry sectors and influencer expertise
• Provides in-depth analytics on the audiences of potential influencers to ensure brand alignment
• Predicts the potential impact of influencer collaborations on campaign goals
• Offers up-to-date information on influencer activity and audience interactions
• Enables brands to refine searches with filters like location, engagement rate, and more

Influencity pros

Influencity offers a vast discovery pool of around 70 million influencers worldwide. It also provides valuable information on unique followers in a campaign or group of influencers, giving you insights into the potential reach and impact of your partnerships.

Influencity cons

One of the limitations of Influencity is that it might be overwhelming for smaller brands or newcomers to influencer marketing due to its sophisticated interface. Additionally, while the platform offers extensive data-driven insights, the cost associated with accessing the full range of tools and analytics can be a barrier for smaller entities or those with limited budgets.

How much does Influencity cost?

• Basic- $120/month
• Professional- $299/month
• Business- $899/month
• Enterprise- You need to contact their team for the enterprise pricing

Promoty

Promoty provides an advanced toolset that allows brands to effortlessly identify influencers who align with their brand values and campaign goals. This platform is particularly adept at handling large-scale searches, with a global database of over 250 million creators.

Marketers can perform unlimited searches and filter results based on detailed criteria such as location, engagement rates, audience demographics, and more. This ensures that brands can find the most relevant influencers for their campaigns quickly and efficiently.

Who Promoty is best for?

Brands and agencies looking for a comprehensive influencer discovery tool. Promoty is ideal for those who need to navigate large databases of influencers and prefer a platform with robust search functionalities and detailed analytics.

What are Promoty’s search and discovery features?

• Unlimited searches to find ideal influencers
• Access a global database with over 250 million profiles
• Filter influencers by location, niche, engagement, and more
• Add up to 1000 influencers to a personal CRM
• Download influencer profiles in PDF or CSV format
• Streamline communication with direct email integration
• Integrate Promoty with other marketing tools using API access

Promoty pros

Promoty helps you connect with influencers who genuinely love your brand, fostering authentic partnerships. With features like flexible packages, in-app chats, and social media integration, managing influencers becomes a breeze. You can also create multiple boards to efficiently track and organize various campaigns, optimizing your marketing and branding initiatives.

Promoty cons

Setting up campaign details might take some time initially, but this thorough process ensures successful collaborations. Although Promoty offers numerous benefits, a more comprehensive comparison with alternative platforms could better showcase its advantages, helping you make informed decisions.

How much does Promoty cost?

• Basic- $95/month
• Professional- $198/month
• Expert- $297/month
• Enterprise- $907.50/month

Traackr

Traackr helps you identify the most impactful influencers aligned with your goals and target audience. The platform offers sophisticated tools and insights that enable you to make informed decisions when selecting influencers, ensuring that you invest your resources confidently and effectively.

Who Traackr is best for?

Traackr is best suited for medium to large enterprises that are looking for a comprehensive influencer marketing solution with strong capabilities in influencer discovery and analytics across multiple social media platforms.

What are Traackr's search and discovery features?

• Search influencers by keywords, hashtags, location, or demographics
• Analyze influencers' audience demographics and interests for target market alignment
• Track influencers’ performance metrics like engagement rates and historical data
• Compare potential influencers with competitive benchmarks
• Customize search criteria for campaign-specific influencer characteristics
• Access real-time data on influencer activity and trends
• Leverage AI-powered recommendations based on past campaign success and brand affinity

Traackr pros

Marketers can access prompt, autonomous insights, allowing you to monitor business KPIs with comprehensive cost and performance metrics. The discovery function helps you evaluate the best influencer fit, while account sharing with external agencies streamlines campaign creation.

Traackr cons

You may encounter slow loading times due to third-party data sourcing, sometimes taking a day or two to gather all necessary information. The "brand safety" feature could be more accurate, as flagged posts often lack nuance. Additionally, making changes within the platform can be challenging and time-consuming, potentially affecting overall efficiency.

How much does Traackr cost?

You need to contact their team for pricing details.

Meltwater

Meltwater's influencer discovery and vetting capabilities are centered around its Klear platform, which is now integrated into the Meltwater suite. With Klear, you can use advanced search filters and AI-powered suggestions to find the perfect influencers for your campaigns, based on criteria like audience demographics, content performance, and past brand collaborations.

Who Meltwater is best for?

Meltwater is ideally suited for marketing teams and public relations professionals who need to monitor media coverage, understand market trends, and track the effectiveness of their campaigns across various channels.

What are Meltwater's search and discovery features?

• Monitor diverse media sources, such as social media, news, and blogs. Refine searches using advanced filters like keywords, topics, geography, language, and media type
• Receive real-time alerts for new content matching predefined search criteria
• Identify and engage with key industry influencers
• Analyze and predict industry trends based on media data
• Gauge public perception through sentiment analysis of media mentions
• Use visual analytics for easier data interpretation and decision-making

Meltwater pros

You'll love how Meltwater provides insightful data that helps you create content tailored to your audiences. The dashboard and every mentioned tool ensure you never miss anything in real time. The every-mention tool is invaluable for daily use, and the dashboard keeps you informed weekly.

Meltwater cons

New users may find the interface daunting and reconnecting pages inconvenient. While getting used to the platform requires effort, doing so will help you to leverage its full potential for enhanced media monitoring and analysis.

How much does Meltwater cost?

You need to contact their team for more details on pricing.

Heepsy

Heepsy helps you to easily discover influencers on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, and Twitch.

The platform offers a wide range of advanced filters, enabling you to search for influencers based on location, follower count, engagement rates, and audience demographics. This granular control helps you find influencers who closely align with your target audience and campaign objectives, ensuring more impactful and effective collaborations.

Who Heepsy is best for?

Heepsy is best suited for e-commerce businesses, startups, established brands, and marketing agencies seeking to leverage influencer marketing to enhance their brand presence and drive sales across diverse social media platforms.

What are Heepsy search and discovery features?

• Filter influencers by relevant brand categories
• Target influencers based on their location with geographic filters
• Select influencers with top engagement rates through engagement analysis
• Ensure optimal brand fit by understanding audience demographics
• Verify influencer authenticity for genuine influence
• Gain valuable insights from past posts and audience interactions
• Reach multiple influencers efficiently through bulk messaging tools

Heepsy pros

Heepsy has an extensive database of influencers across multiple social media platforms, providing a diverse pool of potential partners for your campaigns. With advanced search filters, you can identify influencers who align with your campaign objectives and target audience, ensuring optimal engagement.

Heepsy cons

The platform may not cover influencers on emerging or niche social media platforms, potentially limiting your options. Furthermore, the cost of Heepsy's services might be a barrier for smaller businesses or individual marketers with limited budgets. Lastly, you won't be able to add influencers with less than 3,000 followers to the Boards feature, restricting your ability to track and monitor smaller influencers effectively.

How much does Heepsy cost?

• Starter- $59/month
• Plus- $169/month
• Advanced- $269/month

What other tools or features can augment a discovery tool or augment the search and discovery process?

1. IRM / influencer relationship management and CRM

An influencer relationship management (IRM) system or customer relationship management (CRM) tool can be a valuable addition to your influencer discovery process. It allows you to manage and track your interactions with influencers, ensuring that you maintain strong, long-term relationships.

2. Analytics

By analyzing metrics such as reach, engagement rate, and audience demographics, you can better assess an influencer's fit for your brand and predict the potential success of a partnership. Advanced analytics tools can also help you track the performance of your influencer campaigns, allowing you to optimize your strategy and allocate your budget more effectively.

3. Tracking

Influencer tracking tools can help you monitor an influencer's content and performance across multiple social media platforms. By tracking metrics such as post frequency, engagement, and brand mentions, you can gain a more comprehensive understanding of an influencer's impact and identify opportunities for collaboration. Tracking tools can also help you ensure that influencers are fulfilling their contractual obligations and protecting your brand's reputation.

MightyScout offers all three of these features—IRM, analytics, and tracking, making it a complete solution for brands looking to optimize their influencer discovery and management processes.

How to evaluate and choose the best influencer discovery tool for your brand or agency?

Evaluate the user interface, onboarding resources, and compatibility with your tools. Additionally, consider pricing, budget, and potential ROI when choosing the ideal influencer discovery solution for your brand or agency.

If you're struggling to find relevant influencers for your campaigns or spending too much time manually searching for potential partners, it may be time to invest in an influencer discovery tool. These tools can help you quickly identify influencers who align with your brand values, target audience, and campaign objectives, saving you valuable time and resources.

An influencer discovery tool can address several pain points, such as the difficulty in finding relevant influencers, time-consuming manual searches, and lack of data-driven insights. These tools can help you identify influencers that are a perfect fit based on criteria like niche, location, audience demographics, and engagement rates.

Questions to ask when evaluating influencer discovery tools

For Brands:

• Does the tool offer advanced search capabilities that align with your brand's influencer marketing goals?
• Can you search for influencers based on criteria that matter to your brand, such as niche, location, audience demographics, and engagement rates?
• Does the platform provide in-depth analytics and performance metrics to help you make data-driven decisions about influencer partnerships?
• Is the user interface intuitive and easy for your team to navigate, with comprehensive onboarding and training resources?
• Does the tool integrate seamlessly with your brand's existing marketing stack, such as social media management platforms, analytics tools, and CRM systems?
• Are the pricing models and plans transparent, and do they fit within your brand's allocated budget for influencer marketing?

For Agencies:

• Does the tool offer advanced search capabilities that align with your clients' diverse influencer marketing goals?
• Can you search for influencers based on a wide range of criteria to meet the unique needs of each client, such as niche, location, audience demographics, and engagement rates?
• Does the platform provide in-depth analytics and performance metrics to help you make data-driven recommendations to your clients?
• Does the tool integrate seamlessly with your agency's existing marketing stack and your clients' systems, such as social media management platforms, analytics tools, and CRM software?
• Are the pricing models and plans transparent, and do they offer the flexibility to support your agency's diverse client base and budgets?
• Does the tool offer features that can save your agency time and streamline the influencer discovery process across multiple client campaigns?
• Can the platform help your agency identify influencers who are a perfect fit for each client's unique target audience and brand values?
• Does the tool provide a clear return on investment (ROI) and support your clients' specific influencer marketing objectives?
• Is customer support responsive and helpful, with resources available to answer your agency's questions and help you deliver the best results for your clients?

Wrapping up

The market offers a wide array of influencer discovery solutions, but not every tool will align with your specific needs, criteria, and budget. If you're interested in learning more about how MightyScout can revolutionize your influencer discovery efforts, don't hesitate to contact us at [email protected] or request a personalized demo. Our team is ready to walk you through our cutting-edge features and help you experience the full potential of influencer marketing for your brand.