AcademicJournal of Marketing & Social Research, 7 Jul 2025

Micro influencers scored best on cost effectiveness at 7 out of 10

Shortlisting creators

Micro influencers: performance scores

Micro influencers: performance scores
Metric	Score (0–10)
Engagement Rate	6
Conversion Rate	5
Cost Effectiveness	7
ROI Score	6

Reader Note:: This is the paper's own 0 to 10 score, not a directly observed market metric.
Evidence:: Observed behaviour
Vendor interest:: None
Sample:: 63 influencer marketing campaigns in niche markets, using secondary campaign data from influencer marketing platforms, brand reports, social media analytics tools, and industry reports, plus 3 purposefully selected case studies.

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.
The source never says when this data was collected. It could be considerably older than the publication date suggests.
The source never says how this number was measured.
Nobody counted this directly — it's a calculation. The publisher worked it out itself, or took the ad platform's word for what its ads achieved.

Influencer selection is mainly based on engagement rate and audience demographics (94% and 88%), with only 25% using social listening on what consumers discuss

Share of marketers using each data input to select influencers, and what it measures
Data input	Usage (%)
Engagement rate (Influencer output)	94%
Audience demographics (age, gender, location) — Influencer audience	88%
Past campaign performance data (Influencer track record)	81%
Audience interest / affinity data (Influencer audience)	78%
Follower count and reach metrics (Influencer scale)	72%

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Sponsored posts got more engagement when influencers had either very low or very high ad loads, and did worst in the middle

In creator selection, brand fit mattered most and follower count mattered least

Most Important Factor Brands Use When Selecting New Creators to Work With
Selection factor	Brands (%)
Creator suitability or fit for brand	22%
Content performance	17%
Working with a diverse group of creators	14%
Brand affinity, or a history of posting about your client	12%
Follower audience demographics	10%

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Our Substack turns the data behind these cards into full breakdowns: what changed, why, and what to do about it.

Fixing your influencer marketing campaign: How to get into the top 10% of advertisers

1.95x

higher conversion odds came with stronger creator audience-brand fit in influencer marketing campaigns

People were about twice as likely to share the sponsored Instagram post when the influencer had low or high ad load instead of a middle one

89%

of marketers do not plan to work with virtual influencers AI avatars or digital clones of creators in 2026

Micro influencers scored best on cost effectiveness at 7 out of 10

Good for

Not for

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