Influencer marketing is dead. Obviously I clicked.

This morning, coffee in hand, my YouTube FYP kept telling me:

Influencer marketing is dead.

Which obviously made me click.

But is it?

I’ve worked on creator campaigns across markets, researched influencers, watched campaigns go live and stared at the numbers afterwards. One campaign I worked on reached 18M+ people, and campaign content was reposted by the official When We All Vote Instagram account.

So this is one internet argument where I have receipts, not just caffeine and opinions.

What I’ve seen over and over:

Creator posts. Discount code goes up. Everyone waits for clicks.

And a lot of the time?

CTR was low.

Really low.

I can’t name names because NDAs are a thing.

But creator + product + BRAND20 does not automatically equal influence.

Last year, Empower Sports randomly emailed me asking if I wanted to create content for them.

They make cute gym clothes, I was becoming obsessed with the gym, and naturally I thought this was my moment to become the hot gym girlie influencer.

I tried. I posed. I had my own discount code.

NICOLE20, obviously.

One video got around 1.6K views.

Cute.

Did NICOLE20 cause a minor economic event at checkout?

Also no.

My content was basically: cute gym clothes, me wearing them, NICOLE20.

Not exactly Cannes Lions. First attempt, and it showed.

But maybe that’s the point.

The creator content that influences me most usually doesn’t feel like someone trying to close a sale.

I see someone naturally using a product or service and think:

Wait. What brand is that?

I don’t need BRAND20.

I need the name.

Because once the name is in my head, I can find you when I actually want the thing.

That’s exactly what happened when I needed a serious high-impact sports bra.

No discount code got me there.

Reddit did.

Women with the same problem kept mentioning Panache and explaining why it actually worked.

They had nothing to gain from convincing me.

I remembered the name.

Then I bought it.

That’s influence.

Maybe the problem isn’t influencer marketing.

Maybe it’s expecting every creator to be a walking checkout button.

So no, influencer marketing isn’t dead.

But creator + BRAND20 as the entire strategy?

Maybe that should be.