By Taylor Michelle Gerard, Head of Creative, Blue Hour Studios and Michele Esguerra, VP of Talent Partnerships at Blue Hour Studios, Horizon Media’s full service social agency
The creator economy has scaled at warp speed, fueled by cultural shifts, evolving consumption habits, smarter platforms, algorithmic roulette, and a tidal wave of capital and acquisitions. As a result, brands are rethinking not just what influencer marketing is, but what it should be.
Collectively, we’ve over-indexed on follower counts and likes. These shallow proxies for impact often lead to a sea of awkward, miss-able branded content, scroll bait that gets swiped past without a second thought.
It is time to rethink not just the content, but the structure of partnerships. That begins with how brands and agencies incentivize creators, not just for showing up, but for driving real engagement, cultural relevance, and measurable business outcomes. Flat fees don’t get us there. Smarter deal structures do.
The State of the Influencer Market
The Follower Count Fallacy
Marketers remain obsessed with follower counts, but platforms and audiences have moved on. According to Companian, content that sparks conversations or is frequently saved and shared is now more likely to be widely distributed. Yet brand deals still hinge on static audience size instead of real-time content impact. The result is that we are overpaying for reach and under-rewarding resonance.
Cringe Fatigue Is Real
The influencer space in 2025 is oversaturated, and audiences are feeling it. According to Find Your Influence, the number of self-identified influencers has surged, with user-generated content creators increasing by 93 percent year over year. That has led to a cluttered feed of templated scripts, forced enthusiasm, and jarring pivots from “story time” to “sponsored.” For audiences, it’s become a fog of sameness. For brands, it’s a rising cost of breakthrough.
The Performance of Authenticity
When everyone is trying not to make an ad, we end up with content that forgets what it is actually trying to say. Our obsession with “authenticity” has ironically made influencer content more formulaic, less thoughtful, and ultimately forgettable. It performs authenticity instead of earning it, leaning into vibe over value. The result is a digital tablescape of content that doesn’t persuade, doesn’t stick, and doesn’t deliver.
Creator Rates Are Climbing, Budgets Are Not
Brands are under pressure to do more with less. While AI and automation are driving efficiencies in content production, targeting, and media buying, creator compensation is trending up. Meltwater reports that sponsored Instagram feed posts have increased 26.7 percent in price, and sponsored Stories are up 33.5 percent year over year. Yet flat-fee contracts remain the norm. Marketers are left asking: what are we actually getting? Incentives must evolve toward impact, not just output.
Organic Performance Is the New Premium
Brands are no longer paying for presence alone. They are demanding proof, both on social and in business outcomes. That means partnering with creators who can drive meaningful results, such as views, saves, shares, link taps, sign-ups, and purchases. We are seeing more performance-based deals, from affiliate models to tiered bonuses and long-term partnerships that allow creators to optimize content over time. This is not about paying less. It’s about paying for value delivered.
The Future of Creator Deal Structures: Pay Smarter, Not Louder
Influencer marketing is not broken, but the incentives are misaligned. If we want content that works, creators need to be rewarded for more than just showing up.
The foundation of creator partnerships needs to be built with smarter incentives, clearer goals, and real accountability.
Shift Behavior by Structuring for Outcomes
Strong influencer campaigns are not a gamble. Build contracts that reward the behaviors you want, such as engagement, shares, link clicks, and conversions, not just deliverables. For organic campaigns, move away from rigid scripts and toward flexible briefs that give creators room to be themselves while still hitting the product’s point of difference. Make the expectations clear. We are paying for performance, not just presence.
Reward Real Influence, Not Vanity Metrics
Follower counts do not drive business. Engagement does. We are experimenting with compensation models that bonus creators for high-value actions, including saves, shares, comments, and conversions. This is not about undercutting creators. It is about aligning incentives with outcomes and rewarding the work that delivers.
Make Testing the Default, Not the Exception
No one gets it perfect on the first try. Build test-and-learn into your creator strategy. Run A/B creative pilots, one asset with brand guardrails and another with full creator freedom. Lean into niche communities and subcultures. The goal is not control. It is insight. Testing leads to better briefs, stronger partnerships, and more scalable success.
The bottom line: reach may open the door, but resonance is what closes the deal. In today’s creator economy, performance is the premium, and it’s time our contracts caught up.
