Consumers today have more choice and more control when it comes to shopping. Social media platforms like TikTok, YouTube and Meta have collapsed the shopping journey into a single destination for discovery, research, and purchase. Creators are the trusted guides in these environments, connecting with audiences through authenticity rather than algorithms.
Brands that embed themselves in creator-led communities are not only successfully navigating the modern consumer journey but also outperforming.
Through partnership marketing, brands like prebiotic soda Olipop have achieved an impressive close to 1,000% ROI through creator campaigns, with 12% of total sales driven by creators last year. The company built a community-led strategy from the ground up, driving success through partnerships with a range of creators, lifestyle advocates and registered dieticians – chosen for their shared values over follower count.
Systemic Priority Shift
Similarly, Unilever is reallocating 50% of its media spend to social and increasing influencer marketing investment twenty-fold. The company sees the direction of travel, and is moving quickly to embrace partnership marketing in its many forms – even if that means tearing up the rulebook to build partner-led marketing strategies.
These aren’t isolated moves— they signal a systemic shift in marketing priorities.
But what makes social media platforms successful in engaging audiences? Their nature inherently encourages community building. This means that in today’s digital advertising world, brands need to become part of these communities.
Whereas previously, brands did all the talking, telling consumers how great their products are, relevance now depends on others saying it for them. People now tune out brands that talk. They lean in to brands that listen. Therefore, it’s critical that partners, creators, and communities carry a brand’s message with them. Enter: partnership marketing.
The New Consumer Journey Demands a New Marketing Playbook
Authenticity and the trust it creates beats targeting every time, so brands need to figure out how to become a part of the communities where their audience spends time. They can do this by partnering with ambassadors, affiliates, publishers and creators of commerce content to engage with consumers as organically as possible.
The new consumer journey is multi-device and multichannel, flowing dynamically in all directions, both online and in the physical world. The traditional funnel is no longer fit for purpose, given the dramatic shift in how consumers discover, research, and buy products and services.
This poses a new challenge for the industry, but making matters worse for marketers is ad blindness. Reaching audiences via traditional methods is more costly than ever; acquisition has increased by over 200% in the last decade.
Partnership marketing— which is part of the larger “performance marketing” category and accounts for only about 2% of the $600 billion spent annually— offers a solution. Brands can engage with consumers through trusted partners to drive performance through communities where they are listening and watching. Meanwhile, brands that are pumping large amounts of cash into increasingly inefficient traditional performance marketing channels are missing out on the huge, untapped potential presented by partnerships.
Drive Growth with Creator, Influencer Marketing
Social media has become the primary focus for time and attention because interacting with creators on a daily basis has become entirely normal. The majority of consumers don’t turn to magazines, TV, or radio for trusted reviews and opinions; they open their smartphones and browse various platforms to find the information they need.
As a result, the new approach to partner marketing is happening on social media. Looking at the stats, it’s clear why. In 2025, there will be about 5.45 billion social media users across the globe— that’s just over 67% of the world’s population, and an increase from 4.72 billion users in 2023. The average user spends 19 hours a week on social media platforms, so it follows that social media creators will provide the best chance for brands to meet them there.
In fact, social media last year became the single largest ad channel (with 22.6% of global ad spend), overtaking paid search for the first time. Additionally, in 2024, brands increased their investment in influencer partnerships by 49%, and content creators now command 25% of social marketing budgets.
Five Proven Strategies to Maximize Influencer ROI
- Build for the long term. Partnerships that sustain and mature over time become increasingly successful, as both brand and creator/influencer craft and calibrate their relationship towards mutual success over the long term.
- Empower creative freedom. One of the biggest causes of strain between a brand and creator/influencer is creative freedom. Brands need to give their partners licence to present their products and services in their own voice, resonating with their audience and driving success. No algorithm, agency, or brand strategist understands an audience like the creator who built it. The smartest brands don’t dictate the message— they empower creators to deliver it their way.
- Activate customer advocates. Happy customers already love your product and recommend it. The question is: Have you made it easy and rewarding for them to do so? Referral marketing through partnership management platforms will help you do this, simultaneously driving growth and trust with your audience.
- Integrate, don’t isolate. Partners are a core part of a marketing mix, and should be integrated as such. Influencer marketing belongs within the broader partnerships function, aligned with performance marketing. When these teams are separated, it limits the impact of influencer marketing. What’s more, fully integrating partnerships will provide greater performance on a smaller budget, providing a measurable impact on ROI.
- Embrace hybrid models. Brands often put creators in boxes— focusing solely on awareness or strictly on delivering performance. Embrace hybrid models that incentivize creators to start a relationship with your brand and give that collaboration room to evolve. This might look like a flat fee on initial commission, with the addition of a performance-based element. And the better a brand treats and collaborates with its partners, the harder those partners work to amplify its message – creating lasting loyalty and long-term performance.
The next era of performance marketing belongs to partnerships. Consumers have already moved to community-led commerce. Consumers now buy through communities, not campaigns. Brands that cling to outdated, one-way advertising models will be left behind. Partnership marketing led by creators is now the most direct, scalable, and trusted path to growth. The only question is: How quickly will your brand move to meet your customers where they already are?
Dave Yovanno, CEO of impact.com, joined impact.com in February 2017 as a seasoned media and technology executive. With 20 years of leadership experience for premier SaaS companies in MarTech, Dave brings deep operational expertise and a proven track record in growing companies through key phases of fiscal development. Before joining impact.com, Dave was CEO of Marin Software, a San Francisco-based global leader in paid search SaaS technology. He was also the President of Technology Solutions at Conversant, and CEO of Gigya. Dave served on the board of the Interactive Advertising Bureau and as a lieutenant and CIO in the United States Navy. He currently serves as a board member of the Cloud Software Association, the largest network of more than 4,000 partnership leaders across SaaS. In 2022, Dave authored The Partnership Economy: How Modern Businesses Find New Customers, Grow Revenue, and Deliver Exceptional Experiences.
