What is influencer marketing
Also known as: creator marketing, influencer partnerships, sponsored content
Influencer marketing is the strategy of partnering with content creators, known as influencers, so they introduce a brand, product or service to their own audience. It works because the recommendation comes from someone people already trust. For that very reason, the commercial relationship must be clear: consumer protection rules require advertising to be identifiable as advertising.
A specialty coffee brand had budget for a single post by a celebrity. Instead, it partnered with ten smaller recipe and coffee creators whose audiences actually brew coffee at home.
Each creator got a personal discount code, and the posts made clear it was a paid partnership. The codes showed which profiles really sold; the brand renewed with the top four and, with permission, reused the videos in its own ads.
Size is not everything
The industry usually sorts influencers by follower count, from nano to celebrity, but the tiers vary from one agency to another. More useful than size are three things: whether the creator's audience is the brand's audience, whether they have real affinity with the topic and whether people genuinely engage with what they post.
How to choose
- Ask for audience data: region, age, interests, not just follower counts.
- Look at past posts, including paid ones, and how the audience reacted.
- Check that the creator's values and tone fit the brand.
- Be wary of engagement that does not match the profile's size.
- Prefer creators who would use the product even without being paid.
Disclosure rules
In the United States, the FTC says endorsers should make it obvious when they have a material connection with a brand, which includes payment, free or discounted products and personal, family or employment ties. The disclosure should not be buried in a group of hashtags and, in a video, it should be in the video itself, not only in the description.
Brazil has similar principles: its Consumer Defense Code requires advertising to be easily and immediately identifiable as such, and CONAR, the advertising self regulation body, keeps a dedicated guide for influencer advertising, updated in 2026.
How to measure it
- A discount code or tagged link for each creator.
- Sales and leads attributed to each partnership.
- Cost per sale, compared with other channels.
- Actual reach of the posts, with data shared by the creator.
- Content that can be reused, with usage rights agreed.
What the contract needs
- Deliverables, formats and dates.
- Prior content approval, without taking away the creator's voice.
- Clear advertising disclosure on every piece.
- Rights to use the image and content, with duration and channels.
- Exclusivity, if any, and the data the creator will share.
Frequently asked questions
What is influencer marketing?
Partnering with content creators so they introduce a brand, product or service to their own audience, drawing on the trust they already have.
Do sponsored posts need to be disclosed?
Yes. The FTC requires any material connection with the brand to be made obvious, and Brazil's consumer code requires advertising to be identifiable as such.
Are micro influencers worth it?
Often, yes. Smaller profiles tend to have more specific, closer audiences, and the cost allows testing several creators and keeping the ones that sell.
How do I measure an influencer campaign?
With a code and link for each creator, tracking sales, leads and cost per sale, not only likes and reach.
Can I use an influencer's content in my ads?
Only if usage rights were agreed, ideally in writing, with a defined duration and channels.
Related terms
- UGCUGC, short for user-generated content, is content created by customers and users rather than by the brand...
- Engagement rateEngagement is the measure of how much people interact with content or a website: likes, comments, shares...
- Reach and impressionsReach is the number of different people who saw an ad or piece of content; impressions is the number of times...
- UTMUTM parameters are tags added to the end of a link, such as utm_source, utm_medium and utm_campaign, that...
- B2B and B2CB2B, short for business to business, is selling from one company to another; B2C, business to consumer, is...
Rodrigo Fávaro
Founder of ROO3, a marketing and technology agency in São José do Rio Preto, Brazil. Builds AI products running in production (Tobia, gerar.app, Pense Mercado) and maintains the AI Benchmark, a public ranking of AI models.
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