Brands to Spend $44 Billion on Creators This Year — and They're Changing How They Hire

Marketers are expected to spend $44 billion with creators this year, more than tripling in five years, per the Interactive Advertising Bureau. That money is buying a different kind of relationship: brands from Disney to Keurig Dr Pepper say they're done treating creators as rented ad space.

Business Insider asked some of the most innovative influencer marketers which platforms and tactics currently hold their attention. Their answers point to a shift in both where the money goes and who gets a seat at the campaign table.

"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."

A nice line — but note what it commits to. Nothing in the spending figures breaks out how much of the $44 billion is genuinely collaborative versus standard sponsored posts.

Which platforms are winning, and why?

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 rather than getting 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."

The NFL splits roles by platform strength. "YouTube is a home for creators. TikTok is a great way to get discovery," said Ian Trombetta, the NFL'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."

Substack has become the surprise pick for brands like Poppi and Rothy's. For some creators, the newsletter platform offers a way to get more personal with their biggest fans — and that intimacy helps Poppi plan collaborations, said Sophia Sesto, Poppi's vice president of culture.

Yahoo uses Meta's Threads as a low-stakes testing ground. When Taylor Swift released "Patient Zero," Yahoo riffed with a Thread tying 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."

How is Disney using TikTok Live?

Disney has found particular success with TikTok's Live feature as a customizable way to build premiere excitement. For "Zootopia 2," the viral squirrel character Nibs interviewed cast on the red carpet. Internet personality Carter Kench hosted 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.

What does this change for how brands actually hire?

Keurig Dr Pepper wouldn't typically hire a creator through a platform's marketplace, said Lindsay Burstein, senior director of integrated social and communications — TikTok being her 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," Burstein said.

Yahoo takes a similar hands-off approach. It looks for entertaining creators and figures out how to insert itself into their work — as it did with TV personality Kyle Cooke to promote the 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."

That loose-brief claim rests on creator feedback, not independent measurement — creators rarely criticize paying clients publicly.

Still, the direction is clear. Platforms remain necessary infrastructure, but brands are signing creators directly, involving them earlier in campaign planning, and demanding content they can slice across channels. Expect the platforms' marketplace businesses to feel that pressure next.