Paul Gillen draws a surprising line between direct marketing and influencer marketing in a guest post at Deliver.

Connecting those two dots in particular — DM and influencer marketing — is heresy in many marketing circles. Common wisdom dictates that the influencer contact list and the direct marketing database should never meet.

We’re seeing the beginning of the end of conventional marketing wisdom as we know it. Sure, we’ve all heard the horror stories of influencers being spammed. The problem with this line of thinking is that it implies that it’s alright to spam anyone at all in the first place. Spam shouldn’t be part of the marketing strategy to begin with.

The direct marketing team can be a tremendous asset in supporting influencer relationships. Success depends on preparation and follow-through. Get started by:

• Defining the DM roles in relationship support
• Mapping DM team members to specific types of influencers or to specific relationship managers
• Train the DM team on influencer relations – the who, why and how
• Goal and compensate the DM team based on realistic influencer marketing objectives
• Put a flexible, “light” problem escalation and resolution plan in place
• Use common sense in caring for the influencer contact list. Consider maintaining an entirely separate database of influencer contacts, with access restrictions.