Before this past year, the only people I had ever heard of who were referred to as âinfluencersâ were national and worldwide celebrities.
But, as the months went by in 2025, it seemed that half the people I met whenever Jannah, Charmaine and I would visit a new restaurant for the first time were either calling themselves or, more often, being referred to by the owners of those restaurants as âinfluencers.â Several were actually invited to be there to help the restaurants announce their respective openings, while yours truly had to drive by the places months before they were set to open, write about them multiple times and follow up still more times in order to attend their soft openings, âFriends & familyâ pre-openings or the actual openings of the places.
When Iâve asked some of these restaurant owners why they invited some of these influencers â many of whom Iâve had really nice chats with at these events; some of whom have even told me theyâre âfansâ of mine, the Neighborhood News or both â at least three or four restaurant owners have told me, âWe always try to invite local influencers to help get the word out for us.â O.K.
Hey, I know Iâm old school, but I can see now why so many young people are iPhone-recording every moment of their lives in an effort to become influencers. But, since I didnât have any idea how many of them actually qualify for the title â or what criteria actually makes them able to qualify for it â I decided to do a little Google/ AI searching to try to find out what those criteria are and whether or not I and the Neighborhood News already meet those qualifications.
Hereâs what I found:
Key Characteristics of an Influencer:
Authority/Expertise: They are seen as knowledgeable or an expert in a specific field. â
Audience & Reach: They have a dedicated following on platforms like Instagram, TikTok, YouTube, etc. (OK, not so much, at least not yet)
Trust & Authenticity: Followers trust their recommendations & value their perspective. â
Niche Focus: They typically focus on a particular interest area (e.g.,New Tampa?) â
Content Creation: They consistently produce engaging, entertaining/informative content. â
Engagement: They actively interact with their community, building relationships. â
Impact: Their endorsements or opinions can sway followersâ behaviors and buying choices, making them valuable partners for brands. â
Types of Influencers by Follower Count:
Nano Influencers â 1k-10k followers. Nano influencers have a following ranging from 1,000-10,000 followers and are considered to be mid-tier influencers. Influencers in this category can earn anywhere from $50 to $250 per sponsored post. (Ummm, no!)
Micro Influencers â 10k-100k followers. Micro influencers are defined as having between 10k-100k followers. Despite having a larger following than nano influencers, they still manage to maintain a similar ârelatabilityâ or âauthenticityâ factor. Which, in turn, means they still have high engagement rates. Often, micro influencers fall into a particular niche or influencer category that can be specific to a particular location, job, or hobby. â
Most of the local influencers Iâve looked up fall into one of these first two categories. The difference between them and us is that they have more followers on TikTok or Instagram (IG) than we do, although our Facebook numbers (17,000+ followers) would put us in the âMicroâ category â if Facebook even âcounts.â We only started attempting to increase our Instagram following about four months ago, and weâve increased our number of IG followers from about 100 at that time to more than 700 today
At any rate, Iâm proud that we had nearly 3 million views of our 350 Facebook posts in 2025, led by our top-10 posts of the year in this chart.
And that doesnât include the number of you who still read â and dare I say, are âinfluencedâ by us the old-fashioned way â by holding our publications in your hands and reading them.
Youâre still the main reason so many advertisers are willing to spend money with us in a supposedly dead medium â so, thank you!