When a message comes directly from a brand, it is born under suspicion—and I’m not the one who says it. The words that symbolize a change of mentality in the advertising logic were said by Fernando Fernandez in his first interview as CEO of Unilever. In the conversation with the journalist the times, the executive announced a new strategy that has been the subject of debate between brands, agencies and market professionals: under the command of Fernandez, the consumer goods multinational will reduce investment in advertising created by the brand and increase the budget for influencers by 20 times.
The subject generated immediate repercussion in the global market because it not only represents a gigantic transformation in the way of giving visibility to a brand, but is a response to the change in consumer behavior. If they are skeptical about traditional advertising, what good is it to continue investing lots of money in campaigns that the public has already learned to ignore?
I understand that if people don’t trust brands so much to make their purchase decisions, it is evident the need to establish this bond in another way. Not for nothing, the Unilever CEO named the new “social-first” strategy, prioritizing social channels and human voices as the main interface with the public.
This does not mean, of course, that Unilever size brands are now only discovering the power of influencer marketing. It would be completely naive and wrong to analyze the news through this prism. The question, in fact, concerns the scale. Instead of concentrating funds on a few vehicles of great notoriety or a dozen famous spokesmen, there is a movement of wanting to be present in different spaces, dialoguing with various consumers.
In my opinion, such a change has to do with the awareness that that mega celebrity with an exorbitant cache is not really a “universal voice”. That is, it does not build genuine connections with different niches, nor does it represent the average consumer. An influencer, on the other hand, manages to dialogue with specific audiences because he cultivates a close relationship with his followers, knows his audience and speaks with legitimacy, context and empathy. It is exactly this type of connection that Unilever is looking for by stating that it wants to have at least one influencer in each municipality — and up to 100 in some. It is about activating local voices, micro community leaders, who speak the language of each regional audience. A strategy impossible to execute with global stars, but totally viable and scalable with creators. And this is an even greater truth when it comes to micro and nano creators.
Anyone who knows me knows that I always insist on this point: the strategy of brands needs to value this profile. And that’s for the simple fact that Micro and Nano Creators have proven to form much more engaged communities with a close trust relationship. Yes, the trust that the CEO of Unilever wants to rescue.
A proof of this lies in the results of a recent BrandLovers survey: a R$1 million campaign distributed in Micro Creators obtained an average cost per view of R$0.11 (9.1 million views), while the same amount with Macro Creators resulted in R$0.31 per view (3.2 million views). That is, the reach per real invested was 65% higher using micros.
Ignoring this data that shows the maximization of the reach of a campaign without the budget increase can only be explained by an attachment to the old model — an attachment that also reveals itself in a certain resistance to using the technology.
I know that there are several successful cases of brands that have incorporated artificial intelligence and data intelligence into your marketing strategy. However, I dare say that the vast majority still suffer from operational amateurism disguised as tradition, which is a problem considering that the marketing of influence well done is the one that goes beyond the multiplication of influencers. He seeks, above all, to multiply intelligence. The old methods of manual selection and of betting on isolated celebrities already show clear signs of exhaustion, with enormous inefficiencies, so that the future belongs to those who combine data, technology and human creativity to transform creators into a highly effective media.
Unilever is signaling to the market that the game has changed. However, the big question is: how many brands will you know how to make this movement strategically? The expansion of investments in creators only makes sense if it is accompanied by operational efficiency, predictability and measurement in real time. Without it, we are just inflating a market with poorly distributed money.
Scaling influence marketing without technology is like trying to buy programmatic media over the phone: impossible to sustain. Only with platforms that automate selection, activation and measurement — as we have done for years in digital advertising — can we transform influence into a scalable, efficient and measurable ROI channel.
We need to understand once and for all that the big difference is not in those who spend more on their marketing strategy. Instead, the outstanding result comes from a brand’s ability to use technology to ensure that each real invested in influence translates into true impact. This requires a new mindset: one that prioritizes data, authenticity and intelligent strategies.
