Creators are jumping among an ever-wider mix of platforms and formats — and brands are scrambling to follow them.
We asked the most innovative marketers working with influencers which platforms and tactics have their attention right now — and why.
Marketers from Disney, e.l.f. Beauty, and others told us they’re using platforms like TikTok to own the red carpet, Substack to align with tastemakers, and Threads to experiment.
“YouTube is a home for creators. TikTok is a great way to get discovery,” said Ian Trombetta, the National Football League’s senior vice president of global social, creator, and content marketing. “And then Instagram is another big one for us as it relates to discovery. Even platforms like X and Reddit have a really important role to play.”
Beyond platforms, brands like Keurig Dr Pepper are also exploring ways to work directly with creators, involving them earlier in the campaign process.
“A major shift has been pivoting away from rented reach to true collaboration,” said Samim Sadrzadeh, Disney’s director of creator content and partnerships. “For a long time, the industry treated creators as ad placements. We think that significantly undersells the value they actually bring.”
Substack, Threads, and more
YouTube and creators are taking over the living room, and marketers like e.l.f. Beauty and St. Jude’s fundraising organization ALSAC are leaning in, not wanting to be left behind.
“We have a lot of plans around long-form content, and that’s a great place to show up,” said Patrick O’Keefe, e.l.f. Beauty’s chief integrated marketing officer. “We’ve been on YouTube for years. We’re now looking at it from the lens of entertainment.”
Others, like Poppi and Rothy’s, are embracing the newsletter platform Substack to partner with creators. For some creators, Substack has become a way for them to get more personal with their biggest fans. That helps Poppi plan collaborations, said Sophia Sesto, Poppi’s vice president of culture.
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Yahoo
Yahoo has found value in Meta’s Threads as a way to try out ideas in a lower-key environment before putting them out on bigger platforms, especially if it’s jumping on a cultural moment and isn’t sure how the effort will go over. When Taylor Swift released “Patient Zero,” Yahoo riffed on it with a Thread that tied the “Os” in its name to the song.
“I think it’s a little less precious over there, and it feels like a fun place to kind of gut check certain things, see how they’ll perform,” said Kemma Kefalas, Yahoo’s senior director and head of Creative Lab. “It’s just been a nice kind of litmus test for us.”
Disney has especially found success with TikTok’s Live feature, finding it a customizable way to build excitement for premieres. For “Zootopia 2,” it had the viral squirrel character Nibs interview cast on the red carpet, while internet personality Carter Kench played host for the “Hannah Montana 20th Anniversary Special.”
“Those moments work because we treated the platform as a canvas for a new kind of storytelling that connects directly to audiences in real time,” Sadrzadeh said.
Brands are going direct
Platforms may always be a necessary part of doing business with creators. But going direct has become a bigger buzzword as many brands seek to bypass platforms entirely.
Keurig Dr Pepper, for one, wouldn’t typically hire a creator through a platform’s marketplace, said Lindsay Burstein, senior director of integrated social and communications, using TikTok as an example.
“We would hire the creator, have them post on TikTok. Then we have the ability to use that content and distribute it across multiple channels, but slice it up in different ways that make sense for that channel.”
Influencers spent a long time trying to convince marketers to take them seriously. This year, marketers are expected to spend $44 billion with creators, more than tripling in five years, per the Interactive Advertising Bureau.
As brands increasingly treat creators as long-term partners, they’re engaging with them earlier in the marketing process.
Yahoo’s approach is to find creators who are entertaining and figure out how to insert itself into their work, rather than vice versa, as it did with TV persona Kyle Cooke to promote its new Yahoo Weather app.
“We’re working with them for the entertainment that they bring to people, and we’ll Yahooify it,” Kefalas said. “Our briefs are often loose in those regards. We’re not doing a lot of ‘talk to camera, promote products’ kind of thing. We’ve gotten a lot of positive feedback from creators that they’ve loved that opportunity to just do what they do best.”