To anyone who's still wondering what Influencer Marketing is, we've got you.

"Influencers", "Feed", "Swipe Up", "Plandid", "Shadowban"? Find out what it all means! We'll be sharing top industry keywords every week for the next month. Our first group of words provides a basic understanding of the industry, starting with the obvious, "Who are influencers?"

1. Influencer: A creative professional, person, or figure, who is motivated primarily by their craft or passion, and who possesses an ability to affect culture through the unique creativity they share with their digital audience. Synonyms include: a. Collaborator: Collectively’s term for an influencer in our community and b. Content Creator: An individual who creates content on social media.

2. Influencer Marketing: The practice of connecting with influential people on social media to help communicate brand messaging.

3. Collaboration: A relationship between a brand and a collaborator with the goal being that the collaborator produces social media content for the brand. Synonym: Partnership

4. Wild Wild West: A term that’s used to illustrate the lack of clear universal standards within the Influencer Marketing industry.

5. Influencer Endorsement: Support or approval for a brand’s product or service, integrated into Influencer content in a creative way, that generates awareness and consideration for a brand.

6. FTC, or Federal Trade Commission: A government agency whose job is to protect America’s consumers—recently in the spotlight for regulations they’ve implemented for influencer endorsements. Read more on the FTC and their regulations for influencers here.

7. Platform: A social media or web application where influencers post content and build their audiences. Platforms include: Instagram, Twitter, Blogs, YouTube, Snapchat, Music.ly, and Facebook. Sometimes, the term is used interchangeably with the word “channel.”

8. Platform Algorithms: Computer code that determines what content users see in their feed, and the frequency at which they see it. Platform algorithms are designed based on various parameters, including user patterns and historical behavior.

9. Feed: The platform interface where a user views social content posted by people and influencers they follow. Or, if you’re looking at your own feed, you will see your own post.

10. Verified: Social media accounts that are identified with a blue checkmark on Twitter, Facebook, and Instagram, which signifies credibility to the particular account. With the advent of trolls and obsessive fandoms, many copycat and/or fake accounts mask for the real thing—the verified symbol presents proof of legitimacy. It’s unclear exactly how one can become verified; traditionally, it’s been granted by the social platforms themselves to celebrities and influencers of a certain status.

Because Instagram is at the center of every brand's influencer marketing strategy today, you should know these platform specific words:

11. Finstagram: A finstagram account is a secondary Instagram account that some Instagram users and/or influencers create to share content with a more controlled audience. It can be an account followed exclusively by friends and family, or a stealth account where they can post things anonymously.

12. Instagram Bots: Bots (short for robots) are designed to help you perform actions such as liking, commenting, and following other accounts through automation. Any sort of automation on Instagram strictly violates the platform’s terms of use.

13. Shadowban: When a platform, inadvertently or directly, blocks a user's posts from being seen by other users; most recently, it was believed by some that Instagram’s algorithm was “shadow banning” influencer content. The shadow ban was thought to be in response to hashtag overuse, or the perceived use of automated engagement services, bots, or buying fake followers. Eva Chen, Instagram’s Director of Fashion Partnerships, recently said “shadow banning” is just myth.

14. Comment Pods: Used primarily on Instagram, these are private, invite-only group chats where members share their latest posts, and every pod member is expected to leave a relevant comment (i.e. more than 3 words, no emojis, etc.). It’s hard to tell when Instagram comment pods first came on the scene, but it’s safe to say they’re a direct result of Instagram’s infamous algorithm change.

15. Instagram Business Account: A type of Instagram account that allows businesses to access deeper insights about their Instagram content and audience, and take advantage of exclusive business features that allow customers to connect with them more easily. In order to set up a business account, you must connect your Instagram account to a Facebook page. Today, Influencers with business accounts have deeper insight into their audiences, and get access to features other non-business accounts don’t have.

Want our full list of influencer marketing vocabulary? Download it here.