Measuring an influencer campaign
Every campaign report contains numbers that sound like results and numbers that are results. Telling them apart is the single most useful skill a brand-side buyer can have, because the first kind is always larger and always arrives first.
How much each number is worth
Ranked by how strongly the metric supports a claim that the campaign worked. The bars are an editorial judgement, not a measurement — but the ordering is not controversial, and the metrics at the top of a typical agency report are usually at the bottom of this list.
On earned media value
EMV converts attention into a dollar figure by estimating what buying the same reach would have cost. It is not a fabrication and it is not a measurement — it is a model, and the multiplier that drives it is chosen by whoever is reporting.
Two agencies can report EMV for identical campaigns and differ by a factor of three, both honestly. Ask what multiplier was used and what it was benchmarked against. If nobody can answer, the number is decoration. This site quotes EMV once, on the Fenty Beauty page, and labels it as modelled.
Set up attribution before the brief
Almost all unprovable influencer ROI is an attribution failure rather than a campaign failure. Four things, all cheap, all much harder to add afterwards:
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Give every creator their own code or link
Not one campaign code. One per creator, so the report is a ranked list rather than a total.
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Agree the attribution window in writing
Influencer purchases lag. A 24-hour window will show you a failure; 30 days is more honest for considered purchases.
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Capture a baseline
Two weeks of normal traffic and sales before launch. Without it, every subsequent number is uninterpretable.
If the agency does not ask for a baseline, ask why they expect to prove anything.
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Ask new customers where they heard about you
A single post-purchase question catches the demand that never touched a tracked link — which on a working campaign is most of it.
What good looks like
There is no universal benchmark, and any agency offering one is selling. What is portable is the comparison: measure influencer against your existing paid social on cost per result, using the same window and the same definition of a result. That question — "cheaper or dearer than the channel I already run?" — is answerable, and it is the one your finance team is going to ask anyway.
A quick test
Ask for these
- Cost per acquisition, next to your other channels
- Revenue by individual creator
- Results against the pre-campaign baseline
- Which creators underdelivered, and what happened next
Treat these as context only
- Total impressions
- Combined follower reach across the roster
- Earned media value with no stated multiplier
- Engagement rate quoted after the campaign rather than before
Keep reading
Creator tiers
Nano to mega, what each tier costs, and why engagement falls as audience grows.
Campaign types
Gifting, paid posts, affiliate, whitelisting, ambassadors and takeovers — and when each one fits.
Pricing
Creator rates by tier, how agencies charge on top, and where budgets actually go.
Disclosure
What the FTC requires, what each platform requires, and who is liable when it goes wrong.
Choosing an agency
What to ask, what the answers should sound like, and the terms that matter in the contract.