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Industry surveyIPA, Oct 2025

Paid social campaigns deliver more volume but have a lower ROI index than influencer campaigns in the short term, according to matched UK results

Channel mix & planning


Reader Note:
ROI index benchmark is 100, the all-channel average. UK-only, and the two channels come from two different databanks matched together rather than from one study.
Evidence:
Observed behaviour
Vendor interest:
Moderate — This comes from a company with a commercial interest in this market, so it is not a neutral source.
Sample:
220 paid influencer campaigns from 144 brands across 36 sectors and 28 markets, covering £133m in spend; sample generally consists of larger brands using marketing mix modelling, and all campaigns had at least some positive influencer result — campaigns where influencer spend produced no result at all are excluded from the databank, so IPA itself says the bottom of its ROI range is significantly under-reported and every ROI index in the report is therefore read as an upper estimate.

Good for

Comparing yourself against a similar segment, and choosing what to test next.

Not for

  • Saying that one thing caused another, or predicting what you would get.
  • This was measured in one market. It may not hold where you are.
  • This is an aggregated or average number that covers very different cases. Real results in a particular segment may differ.
  • The source never says when this data was collected. It could be considerably older than the publication date suggests.
  • This comes from a company with a commercial interest in this market, so it is not a neutral source.

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