sales-skills/sales-trendhero

trendHERO Platform Help

Helps the user with trendHERO platform questions — from influencer discovery and fake follower detection through audience analysis, tracking, ads database research, and API integration.

Step 1 — Gather context

If references/learnings.md exists, read it first for accumulated knowledge.

Ask the user:

1. What do you need help with?

   • A) Finding influencers — Discovery search, filters, keyword search
   • B) Analyzing a creator — AQS score, fake follower detection, audience quality
   • C) Tracking — daily monitoring of influencer accounts
   • D) Ads database — researching influencer ad posts and mentions
   • E) Audience overlap — comparing audiences across influencers
   • F) Outreach — contacting influencers through trendHERO
   • G) Lists — organizing and comparing influencers
   • H) API integration — generating reports programmatically
   • I) Pricing and plan selection
   • J) Something else — describe it

2. What's your current setup?

   • A) New to trendHERO — evaluating or just signed up
   • B) Using trendHERO for discovery/analytics
   • C) Using trendHERO for tracking and monitoring
   • D) Integrating via API
   • E) Comparing trendHERO to other platforms

3. What plan are you on?

   • A) Free ($0/mo)
   • B) Lite ($16/mo)
   • C) Pro ($40/mo)
   • D) Advanced ($120/mo)
   • E) Not sure / evaluating

If the user's request already provides most of this context, skip directly to the relevant step. Lead with your best-effort answer using reasonable assumptions (stated explicitly), then ask only the most critical 1-2 clarifying questions at the end.

Step 2 — Route or answer directly

If the request maps to a strategy skill, route:

• Influencer marketing strategy across platforms → /sales-influencer-marketing
• TikTok marketing strategy → /sales-tiktok-marketing
• Gaming influencer marketing → /sales-gaming-marketing
• Ad campaign strategy → /sales-retargeting or /sales-b2b-advertising
• Email marketing to subscribers → /sales-email-marketing
• Affiliate program design → /sales-affiliate-program

Otherwise, answer directly from the platform reference below.

Step 3 — trendHERO platform reference

Platform overview

trendHERO is an Instagram-focused influencer analytics platform specializing in fake follower detection and audience quality analysis. It provides a database of 95M+ Instagram profiles with 90+ metrics per creator, making it a focused, affordable tool for brands and agencies vetting influencers before partnerships.

Core modules

• Influencer Discovery — 95M+ Instagram profiles (TikTok recently added), 20+ filters (audience location/geo/age/gender, category/niche, engagement rate, follower range). Keyword search in names/bios with required and negative keywords; results ranked by keyword-match density and saved to lists.
• Account Quality Score (AQS) — 1-100 (higher = better), a rapid 2-second health check that consolidates red flags into one number. 5 dimensions: audience quality & engagement (follower authenticity/activity), follower type (real/suspicious/mass), comment quality (generic vs authentic), giveaway activity (temporarily inflates metrics), growth patterns (organic vs purchased).
• Analytics Reports (90+ metrics) — engagement: median likes/comments per post (median removes viral outliers), unique views per reel, weekly post frequency; audience: demographics (age/gender/location/language), audience-type breakdown, reachability (% of followers following <1,500 accounts); growth tracking; benchmarks (comments-to-likes 0.5–5 per 100 likes, views-to-likes 2–10 per like); PDF/Excel export.
• Daily Tracking — monitor accounts daily for follower growth, engagement changes, and activity; track competitors' partnerships; alerts on spikes/drops. Plan-gated: Lite 3, Pro 20, Advanced 50 accounts.
• Ads Database — 10M+ ad posts of influencer-brand mentions/sponsored content; find which influencers work with which brands (including competitors); filter by brand, influencer, date range, engagement.
• Audience Overlap — compare audiences across influencers, separate unique vs shared reach, minimize overlap for maximum reach; essential for multi-influencer campaigns.
• Lists & Comparison — organize candidates into lists, side-by-side metric comparison, export for team review, favorites/shortlisting.
• Outreach — built-in tools to contact influencers directly and track outreach status/responses.

Pricing

Best-effort — verify with trendHERO for current pricing.

| Plan | Price | Reports/mo | Tracking | Lists | Key features | |---|---|---|---|---|---| | Free | $0/mo | — | — | Favorites only | Engagement rate, follower growth, basic metrics | | Lite | $16/mo | 10 | 3 accounts | 10 lists | Full reports, PDF export | | Pro | $40/mo | 50 | 20 accounts | Unlimited | Excel export, full search across 95M+ profiles | | Advanced | $120/mo | 200 | 50 accounts | Unlimited | Priority support, all features |

• Additional reports can be purchased as add-ons
• All paid plans include AQS scoring and audience analysis
• Free plan provides basic engagement data — useful for quick checks

Plan-gated features to watch

• Full influencer search (95M+ database) — Pro+ only (Lite has limited search)
• Excel export — Pro+ only (Lite only has PDF)
• Tracking limits — Lite: 3 accounts, Pro: 20, Advanced: 50
• Report limits — credits consumed per report, varies by plan
• Priority support — Advanced only

Metrics reference

| Metric | What it measures | Calculation method | |---|---|---| | Likes/post | Typical like volume | Median of last 18 posts (excludes most recent if <1 day old) | | Comments/post | Comment engagement | Same median methodology | | Views/reel | Unique video views | Unique views (not Instagram play count — ratio up to 5:1) | | Weekly posts | Content consistency | Average posts per week over analyzed period | | Engagement rate | Audience interaction % | (Likes + comments) / followers × 100 | | Reachability | Addressable audience % | % of followers following <1,500 accounts | | AQS | Overall account quality | Composite of 5 dimensions (1-100 scale) |

Step 4 — Actionable guidance

Based on the user's specific question, provide:

1. Discovery playbook — how to set up searches, keyword strategies, filter combinations for their niche
2. Vetting workflow — how to read AQS scores, what score ranges mean, red flags to watch
3. Tracking setup — which accounts to monitor, how to interpret growth alerts
4. Ads database research — how to find competitor influencer partnerships
5. Audience overlap analysis — how to optimize multi-influencer campaigns for reach
6. API integration — authentication, endpoints, webhook setup, processing times
7. Plan recommendation — which tier fits their needs and budget

For API integration questions, refer to the detailed trendHERO API Reference.

Gotchas

Best-effort from research — review these, especially items about plan-gated features and integration gotchas that may be outdated.

• Reports consume credits, not just time. Each analytics report uses one credit from your monthly allocation. Running reports on influencers you end up rejecting still costs credits. Vet with free metrics (engagement rate, follower growth) before spending a report credit on a full AQS analysis.

• Report generation can be slow for large accounts. Accounts with 1M+ followers can take 2-4 hours to generate. Smaller accounts (<10K) take 30-60 minutes. Already-cached accounts return instantly. Plan ahead for time-sensitive vetting.

• Instagram-focused with limited multi-platform coverage. trendHERO's 95M+ database is primarily Instagram. TikTok analytics were recently added but with less depth. If you need YouTube, X, or Twitch coverage, consider HypeAuditor or Modash.

• Free plan is very limited. Only basic engagement rate and follower growth — no AQS, no full reports, no search. Useful for a quick check but not for serious vetting. Lite ($16/mo) is the minimum for actionable analytics.

• Median-based metrics can surprise you. trendHERO uses median (not average) for likes and comments to eliminate viral post outliers. This gives a more realistic picture of typical performance but may show lower numbers than you expect if you're used to average-based tools.

• Reachability metric is unique and important. The "% of followers following <1,500 accounts" metric indicates how likely your content is to actually appear in followers' feeds. Low reachability means the influencer's followers follow so many accounts that your sponsored post may not be seen.

• API has no documented rate limits. The API docs don't specify rate limits, but report generation is inherently throttled by processing time. For batch operations, implement reasonable delays between requests.

• Webhook requires setup in the Access Tokens page. The API supports webhook callbacks when reports finish processing, but you must configure the webhook URL in your account settings — it's not set per-request.

• Self-improving: If you discover something not covered here, append it to references/learnings.md with today's date.

Related skills

• /sales-influencer-marketing — Influencer marketing strategy across all platforms — discovery, vetting, campaigns, ROI
• /sales-hypeauditor — HypeAuditor platform help — AI-powered influencer analytics, 223.6M+ profiles, fraud detection, Campaign Management, API
• /sales-heepsy — Heepsy platform help — budget-friendly influencer discovery, 11M+ profiles, Shopify integration
• /sales-modash — Modash platform help — Shopify-focused discovery, gifting, payments, API
• /sales-infludata — influData platform help — AI creator search, audience analysis, social listening
• /sales-tiktok-marketing — TikTok marketing strategy — organic growth, paid ads, content creation, influencer strategy
• /sales-gaming-marketing — Gaming influencer marketing strategy — streamers, game launches
• /sales-do — Not sure which skill to use? The router matches any sales objective to the right skill. Install: npx skills add sales-skills/sales --skill sales-do

Examples

Example 1: Vet an influencer before a paid partnership

User says: "A fitness influencer with 80K followers wants $1,200 for a post — how do I check if they're legit?" Skill does: Searches the creator by username, reads the AQS score (>60 good, <40 concerning, <25 deal-breaker) across its 5 dimensions (audience type, comment quality, growth, giveaways), highlights the reachability metric (what % of followers actually see the post), and weighs the $1,200 ask against authentic reach and engagement. Result: Data-driven decision on whether the partnership is worth the investment

Example 2: Research competitor influencer partnerships

User says: "I want to see which influencers my competitors are working with" Skill does: Uses the Ads Database to search by brand/competitor name, filters by date range, engagement, and influencer size, identifies which creators drive the best engagement, saves interesting ones to a list, and runs AQS reports on the shortlist before outreach. Result: Competitive intelligence on influencer partnerships with actionable next steps

Example 3: Set up API integration for batch influencer reports

User says: "I want to pull influencer analytics into our internal tool via the trendHERO API" Skill does: Walks through Bearer-token auth (Access Tokens page), the create endpoint (POST /reports?username={username}), async processing (poll the status field for ready vs collecting), webhook setup for completion, and retrieval (GET /reports/{username}); points to the API reference for full docs. Result: Working API integration plan with auth, endpoints, and async handling

Troubleshooting

Report takes hours to generate

Symptom: Requested a report but it's still in "collecting" status after 30+ minutes Cause: Large accounts (1M+ followers) require more data processing. First-time reports for uncached accounts take longer. Solution: Check if the account has been analyzed before — previously cached accounts return instantly. For large accounts, allow up to 2-4 hours. Use the API webhook to get notified when the report is ready instead of polling manually. If a report is stuck beyond 4 hours, the account may be private or have restricted data access — check for impossible status.

AQS score seems too low for a legitimate creator

Symptom: A creator you know is legitimate has an AQS below 40 Cause: AQS factors in giveaway history and growth patterns. Creators who run frequent giveaways or had rapid growth spurts (even organic ones from viral content) may get penalized. Solution: Don't rely on AQS alone — check individual dimensions. If audience type and comment quality are high but giveaway activity is dragging the score down, the creator may still be a good partner. Cross-reference with engagement rate and reachability metrics for a complete picture.

Running out of report credits too fast

Symptom: Monthly report allocation exhausted before finding enough qualified influencers Cause: Running full reports on every potential influencer without pre-screening wastes credits. Solution: Use free metrics first — check engagement rate and follower growth on the free plan or in search results before spending a credit on a full report. Create a pre-screening checklist: engagement rate >2%, steady growth pattern, relevant content. Only run full AQS reports on influencers that pass the free-metric screen. Consider upgrading to Pro (50 reports) or Advanced (200 reports) if you regularly need more.