Creators have turned the marketing world on its head, allowing brands to connect with audiences through authentic content. And as consumers increasingly rely on influencers for inspiration, brands like yours need to know how to feasibly incorporate these voices into their marketing. Discover how to plan for adding content Creator marketing into your 2025 budget and elevate your brand.
The Growing Role of Influencer Marketing
Influencers offer new ways for brands to reach consumers and grow overall awareness. According to the LTK x Northwestern University Retail Analytics study, 36 percent of surveyed brands spend at least half of their marketing budget on Creators. Businesses achieve an average return of $5.20 for every $1.00 spent on influencer marketing, so it’s no surprise that Gartner found that 49 percent of companies increased their content Creator marketing investment in 2023.
Consumers don’t want to be “sold to”
Today’s shoppers want authenticity, not a sales pitch. Old school commercials and in-your-face tactics fall flat as they gravitate toward genuine and relatable content. Influencers effectively illustrate why shoppers should try specific products because they’re advocating for something they’ve tried. And once their seal of approval reaches the masses, shoppers can buy directly from Creators through specialized platforms like LTK.
Preparing Your 2025 Budget to Include Influencer Marketing
The next calendar year is ripe for potential, so take the time to assess your overall marketing goals and objectives for 2025. Influencers can add value across the marketing calendar, from seasonal moments like back-to-school and Black Friday Cyber Monday to promotions and product launches. A few simple steps can help.
Compare overall goals to your financial constraints for the year
Analyze your overall marketing strategy and goals—from brand awareness to engagement to sales—and where influencers can add value across the customer lifecycle. What channels do you wish to be more active on, and is it feasible in 2025?
Influencer marketing spans across marketing channels, so you can leverage Creators to power up everything from social media to email marketing. Just be mindful of your campaign goals and if you have strict deadlines.
Determine optimal performance and audience engagement goals
Who’s your audience and what do you want them to do? Different generations and genders use the web differently and have unique needs. Fine-tune your ideal audience to help refine the platforms to use and type of influencers to look for.
Understand your desired campaign scale
The scope of your influencer collaborations is largely dependent on your budget. The number of influencers you can partner with and their notoriety is tied to your resources. Plus the costs of marketing assets slide on a scale depending on whether you need editing, video production, music, or other extras.
Allocating a Portion of the Marketing Budget for Influencer Marketing
A budget for content Creator marketing is more than a set dollar amount. Factor in everything, from the cost of each partnership to the metrics that help you refine your influencer spend over time.
Research average costs for influencer partnerships
Influencers vary across industry, audience size, and platforms. So consider the potential reach of influencers your brand could work with. Micro influencers have smaller followings, while macro influencers have thousands or millions of followers. And by no surprise, their price tags differ, too.
Costs per influencer are based on engagement, reach, industry niche, and seasonal demand—and also includes management fees and commission. Spread your funds across different types of content, including sponsored posts, product reviews, giveaways, and long-term partnerships to get the most from your content creator marketing.
Look for potential partners
Choosing Creator partners is more nuanced than Googling and contacting names on page one. After all, Creators act as ambassadors to your brand. So consider your values and seek Creators who align with them to advocate for you. Once you do this, you can:
- Examine how they’ve driven engagement and results
- Evaluate their content, engagement rates, and authenticity
- Determine which audience demographics match your target market
Of course, you don’t have to go it alone. Platforms such as LTK can help match you with Creators based on your needs and budget. LTK Match is an AI-enriched tool that finds Creators aligned to your brand. Select the best partners and put in the work to set the stage for success by establishing clear expectations.
Establish metrics to continuously measure ROI
Move forward with clear goals in mind so you can keep an eye on performance. Define targets and KPIs, across the customer lifecycle, including those for:
- Awareness, such as impressions, reach, and brand mentions
- Engagement, such as likes, comments, shares, and interaction rates
- Conversion, such as click-through rates, conversion rates, and sales
Implementation and Monitoring
Partnering with influencers not only promotes your products in new ways, but reaches a much broader audience—who turns around to multiply your efforts. LTK early adopters amplify influencer campaigns to achieve 3.5 times more conversions, but they’re not the only ones. General consumers extend Creator reach 2x by sharing and getting others to the purchasing tipping point faster.
Set the stage for this kind of success by establishing clear agreements with influencer partners. Outline expectations, deliverables, and compensation, as well as what content creation and approval will look like. Knowing all of this informs your marketing strategies to drive engagement.
Tracking and analyzing the performance of influencer campaigns
Use your budget to track spending against KPIs, helping to improve budget efficiency and pinpointing high-performing strategies. With these metrics, you can optimize campaigns by allocating resources and adjusting strategies based on campaign results.
Inegrate Influencers Into Your 2025 Marketing Budget
Adding content Creator marketing to your 2025 budget keeps brands on the cutting edge. By leveraging the growing influence of Creators on consumer behavior and aligning campaign goals with influencer partnerships, you can authentically engage with target audiences.
Integrate influencer marketing into your 2025 budget. Get in touch with LTK to see how our proprietary platform can connect you to trusted influencers and power your campaigns.
