The complete visual guide to The influencer marketing universe
Fourth Floor have created a brand new comprehensive universe infographic of every key influencer marketing agency that's out there.
The 350+ agencies are grouped by type, giving you clear visibility of all the agencies that matter.
The full graphic (left) contains 12 systems full of the world’s influencer marketing agencies.
Foreword by Scott Guthrie
Welcome to the 2021 influencer marketing universe. Influencer marketing is an industry growing exponentially, professionalising at speed, and increasingly specialising. Fourth Floor has set about identifying the main players within this fast-moving category. For the first time, influencer marketing companies have been brought together in a single infographic representing the full breadth of offerings within the industry.
Advertising spend globally has hovered at around 0.7% GDP for the past decade. But teasing out digital spend from analogue spend tells a tale of two different fortunes. Analogue languishes, whilst digital shows dynamic growth. In 2020, digital overtook analogue ad spend for the first time. And Influencer marketing provided a main growth driver within that. The industry is now 20-times the size it was five years ago, enjoying a growth rate of around 40%, year on year.
A rising tide lifts all boats. Nowhere is this truer than within influencer marketing. There has been a seismic shift in scale, from a handful of companies operating within the industry five years ago, to hundreds within the ecosystem today.
As influencer marketing matures, so it specialises. This has been taken into account as I have worked with Fourth Floor to create a representation of the influencer marketing universe, a cosmos boasting 350-odd influencer marketing platforms, marketplaces and agencies.
The universe is clustered around 12 forms of organisation, grouped by their main service offerings:
Marketplace
Multi channel
Talent
Word of mouth
Specialist
Stand-alone full service
Stand-alone specialist
Full service
Tool
UGC
Content or media production
Platform
Each organisation is listed by name, by type of offering, by location of office headquarters, by URL, and by date of formation.
The infographic charts the growth of our industry, and demonstrates there is no one-size-fits-all approach to influencer marketing. Instead, success depends on communication and corporate objective, on vertical, location and budget.
Fourth Floor’s influencer marketing universe is a snapshot of our nascent industry. Future iterations will track its growth, consolidation, and increased specialisation.
This infographic is the first iteration of the influencer marketing universe. Please send us any questions, corrections, or media enquiries to contact@fourthfloor.co.
A close up of the full-service agency system
The full system
Looking for more influencer marketing wisdom and overall industry insight? We have a whole Fourth Floor blog dedicated to it. Maybe check out our guide to the four most important metrics in measuring influencer marketing campaigns, or our explainer on how food and drink brands can use Instagram marketing in 2020.
Or if you’re looking for a meatier long-read, there’s always our four-part audience insight and content data study into the highs and lows of the Xbox Series X/S vs. PlayStation 5 marketing campaign. Enjoy!
