Insights
Influencer Marketing is maturing, moving beyond ad-hoc campaigns to sophisticated, scalable operations.
The Global Influencer Council’s webinar, "Lean vs. Layered: How Brands Are Structuring Influencer Marketing for the Next Wave," provided a deep dive into two distinct operational models: the centralized, in-house "lean" engine exemplified by Wix, and the extensive, agency-led "layered" model favored by a global CPG company like Unilever.
Thank you to Sarah Adam, Head of Partnerships & Influencer Marketing, Wix, and Saeyoung Cho, Influencer Marketing Strategic Advisor, Unilever, for hosting the session.
Here are the key takeaways for brands looking to structure or refine their Influencer Marketing organization.
The biggest roadblocks to scaling Influencer Marketing are operational. Success hinges on establishing clear roles, integrating influencer efforts with broader media strategies, and defining the right mix of internal talent and external partners.
Organizations must look at influencer operations across multiple critical dimensions: the role of creators, measurement, organizational design, process, media/tech enablement, and partnership models.
For enterprise companies with a vast portfolio of brands, a hybrid structure works best to manage Influencer Marketing operations. Influencer specialists at brands are responsible for custom activations tailored to their respective products and are paired with agency partners who are experts in influencer strategy and campaign execution. This can be supported by a centralized function to focus on overarching strategy, compliance, and agency management, all aligned with a global business goal.
For larger brands, the hybrid approach makes sense. This design suggests that while working towards a global business goal is essential for governance and consistency, granting high creative autonomy to in-house brand teams is vital to prevent scale from becoming a creative bottleneck.
Measurement should directly tie influencer spend to the primary business KPI (e.g., sales, earned media coverage, sign-ups) to demonstrate the channel's ROI, resisting the temptation to focus on vanity metrics.
Larger brands should standardize agency partnerships through thorough RFPs and MSAs, viewing agencies as a necessary operational layer for scale and risk mitigation.
The strategic implications are different for smaller or niche brands. Employment of agencies may be unnecessary. A single, senior marketing lead can set guidelines, keeping execution fully decentralized within product or marketing teams to maintain agility and speed.
Measurement should balance both immediate impact (conversion/sales) and long-term effect (brand awareness/community growth), starting with simple UTM tracking and graduating to brand lift studies as the brand scales.
Instead of an extensive roster, smaller brands should select a limited number of specialized agency partners or focus on direct creator relationships, prioritizing quality and deep strategic insight over sheer volume.
For smaller brands, a highly efficient, in-house influencer engine, treating creators as essential product consultants for direct feedback can work best. Sarah Adams runs a 5 person team who manages approximately 500 partnerships and 2,000 annual content pieces. For scale, the model is supported by a sophisticated tech stack that includes AI and LLMs for partner identification, content analysis, and performance tracking. Wix’s primary goal is brand awareness and product education.
Enterprise brands can take learnings from small, in-house influencer programs. This could mean integrating creators directly into your product development cycle, establishing formal "consultancy hours" or structured advisory panels that meet regularly. Enterprise brands’ scale offers more resources to leverage this continuous feedback loop for high-impact product refinement based on creators' lived experiences.
Smaller brands can take inspiration by prioritizing quality over quantity in partnerships. For example, focusing on deep, personal, and long-term relationships with a smaller, highly curated roster of creators who genuinely use and understand your product. Tech tools should be used to handle the manual, repetitive tasks to free up resources for relationship building.
A lean budget demands maximum efficiency, making trust-building and genuine, in-depth testimonials far more valuable than broad, high-volume reach. You should also rely on your core team's existing product knowledge and rapid iteration cycle instead of attempting to build a costly, new dedicated external feedback engine.
There is no single "right" way to structure Influencer Marketing.
The choice between a lean, relationship-driven in-house team and a layered, agency-led scale engine depends entirely on the organization's core business model, product-market fit, and spending volume. The key is to make a conscious choice and ensure your operational structure aligns with your strategic goals.
Follow the Global Influencer Council on LinkedIn for more insights.