The Follower Count Is Out. Loyalty Is In.

It’s official. Brands are no longer impressed by follower counts alone. According to a new eMarketer report, influencer marketing is shifting toward long-term loyalty and sustained engagement.

Here’s what the data says:

Virality is losing ground.
Brands want creators who show up consistently, not just once.
76 percent of creators who worked with a brand in 2022 were still working with them in 2024.

Smaller influencers are delivering bigger impact.
While 68 percent of marketers still work with macro-influencers (100K–500K followers), performance data favors smaller voices:

• Micro-influencers deliver the highest conversion rates, averaging 1.3 percent
• Nano-influencers saw a 74 percent year-over-year increase in revenue per click

Creators are becoming brand content engines.
Influencer content is no longer limited to social feeds. It’s being repurposed across:

• Retail media networks
• Email campaigns
• Connected TV
• Out-of-home formats

Why? Because influencers create content that feels human. And that works across channels.

Measurement remains a pain point.
The most tracked KPIs are:

• Reach (50 percent)
• Engagement rate (48 percent)
• Conversions (46 percent)

But only 11 percent of marketers say measuring ROI is easy. Tracking across platforms is still messy, and many campaigns lack a clear attribution model.

So what’s next?
Influencer marketing is starting to look less like a one-off and more like a proper brand strategy. Brands are:

• Building long-term partnerships
• Prioritizing loyalty over visibility
• Extending influencer content into other media channels

The mindset is shifting.
From chasing reach to building relevance.
From hiring influencers to keeping them close.
From single posts to shared goals.