Here’s why brands must treat it as a performance channel
For years, influencer marketing was often viewed as the “extra” line item in a marketing budget. If there was a room after television, digital ads, and media buying, brands would experiment with creators. Today, that thinking is outdated.
The conversation has shifted from “Should we invest in influencers?” to “How do we make influencer marketing accountable for business outcomes?”
Consumers’ paths to discovering brands have changed drastically. They don’t need ads to tell them what to buy; they trust the recommendations of the people they follow every day. Creators have become today’s discovery engine, from a skincare review to a finance creator explaining an app to a food vlogger discovering a local restaurant.
This shift is apparent in the growth of the industry. India’s influencer marketing industry is expected to exceed ₹3,375 crore in 2026, growing at a fast clip as brands are increasingly weaving creator collaborations into their core marketing strategy. But the broader creator economy is growing even faster, and influencer-led commerce is one of the strongest forces in digital advertising today.
The reason why influencer marketing is so important, however, is not just the scale.
What has changed is, really, the accountability. Marketing leaders today aren’t impressed by views or likes alone. Every campaign is expected to answer tougher questions:
Did it improve consideration?
Did it generate quality traffic?
Did it influence purchase decisions?
Did customer acquisition become more efficient?
Influencer marketing is increasingly capable of answering all four. With affiliate links, creator-specific coupon codes, platform analytics, pixel tracking, social commerce integrations, and first-party data, brands can now measure creator performance with far greater precision than they could a few years ago. Influencer campaigns are no longer isolated awareness exercises; they sit alongside paid media, performance marketing, and CRM as measurable growth channels.
This also changes how brands should select creators. The biggest follower count is not always the biggest business opportunity.
We have consistently seen nano and micro creators outperform celebrity influencers when the objective is engagement, trust, and conversion. Their communities are smaller, but far more invested. Audiences recognise authentic recommendations, and authenticity continues to outperform reach in today’s content ecosystem.
Another important shift is moving away from one-off collaborations. Creators are treated as campaign vendors, limiting their influence.
Long-term relationships are what brands with the best recall are building. When a creator has a real sense of a brand over the course of weeks, not days, that content feels more authentic, the storytelling is better, and audiences connect the creator with the brand, versus another sponsored post.
This consistency builds credibility that no media budget can buy overnight. Technology is speeding this evolution even more.
AI is helping agencies identify the right creator fit, predict campaign performance, detect audience fraud, and optimise content strategy before campaigns even go live. But AI should never replace human creativity.
The most successful campaigns still begin with a simple understanding of people—what they watch, why they share content, and what earns their trust. Technology makes campaigns smarter; creators make them believable.
At Defodio Digital, we have observed another interesting shift. Clients are no longer asking only for influencer campaigns. They are asking how influencer marketing can support product launches, improve customer acquisition, strengthen community building, and even generate long-term brand equity.
That’s a significant difference. Influencer marketing is no longer operating in isolation. It is becoming an integrated business function.
Of course, performance doesn’t mean every campaign must deliver immediate sales. Different objectives require different metrics. A brand launch may be measured by awareness and visibility, while an e-commerce campaign is more likely to be judged by conversions and revenue. The key is defining success before execution, not after the campaign ends.
The brands that continue to evaluate creators only through follower counts or engagement percentages risk missing the larger opportunity.
Creators today are storytellers, researchers, community builders, and trusted voices. In many cases, they understand digital audiences better than brands themselves.
As digital behaviour continues to evolve, brands that treat influencer marketing as an experimental channel will gradually lose relevance to those treating it as a measurable growth engine.
The future belongs to brands that stop asking, “Should we work with creators?”
Instead, they will ask a far more valuable question:
“How do we build creator ecosystems that consistently drive business performance?”
That shift in mindset will define the next decade of marketing.
Vibhor Gulati is the Founder of Defodio Digital
