M&A
Influencer Agencies aren’t what they used to be
Over the last 18 months, we have spoken with more than 40 social, influencer, and creator-led agencies across the UK, Europe, the US, and Asia, spanning founder-led independents through to scaled, multi-market platforms.
These conversations reflect both client-mandated work in the sector and our own efforts to stay close to how agencies are evolving in a market that remains active and fast-moving. While models and market positions vary, a consistent shift is emerging — not in how these businesses describe themselves, but in what clients now expect them to deliver.
There was a time when influencer agencies were relatively easy to define. They sat at the intersection of talent, content, and brand, delivering campaigns, managing relationships, and producing creative that travelled effectively across platforms. That model has not disappeared, but it is no longer where the pressure lies.
What is changing is not just the work itself, but the role these agencies are expected to play. Historically, they were brought in to deliver campaigns, focusing on reach, engagement, and creative execution. Increasingly, however, they are being asked to drive outcomes — not just engagement, but measurable commercial impact. This shift moves them from being one component of the marketing mix to operating much closer to its centre.
Across the agencies we have engaged with, the ones making the most progress do not necessarily appear dramatically different from the outside. The difference is more structural than visible. Internally, these businesses are operating in a more integrated and dynamic way.
Creative and performance are no longer treated as separate disciplines. Work evolves continuously, shaped and refined in real time rather than delivered and evaluated retrospectively. Content is no
longer created in isolation; it is designed from the outset with distribution, amplification, and commercial impact in mind.
Artificial intelligence is playing a role in this transition, but not as a headline feature. In the stronger organisations, it is embedded within workflows, enabling faster insight cycles, more efficient iteration, and better-informed decision-making. These changes are rarely obvious in a pitch deck, but they become clear when you spend time inside the business.
At the same time, the structure of agencies is shifting. Disciplines that once operated independently — influencer, social, PR, and paid media — are increasingly being brought together. This is not simply a strategic choice by agencies, but a response to changing client expectations. From a client’s perspective, these functions are part of a single system, and they expect their agency partners to reflect that reality.
However, this evolution introduces an important nuance. Not every agency is designed to become an integrated platform, and attempting to do so can often dilute what made the business effective in the first place.
A founder’s perspective
To sense-check these observations, we spoke to someone operating at the centre of this shift.
Liam Corrigan, founder of RedPill — one of the original influencer marketing agencies, with a track record dating back to 2009, and someone we have known for over a decade — takes a deliberately focused view.
While RedPill’s capabilities today extend across content, production, strategy, paid and performance, these have been built to deliver more effective influencer marketing — with the business remaining clearly anchored in its core positioning:
“There’s a tendency right now for agencies to try and expand into everything — to drive revenue — but that often just dilutes what they’re actually good at.
We’ve stayed very focused on influencer marketing. Not social channel management, not exclusive talent management — just doing one thing exceptionally well.
Clients don’t need another generalist. They need partners who can genuinely move the needle in a specific area.
The agencies that excel are the ones that understand exactly where they sit in the ecosystem and build depth there.”
His perspective highlights an important counterpoint. While the market is becoming more interconnected, the businesses that create the most value within it are often those that are most deliberate about their positioning.
Rather than attempting to cover every capability, successful agencies tend to make a clear strategic choice.
Some are evolving into broader social-first communications agencies, combining influencer, content, paid, PR, strategy, and performance into more integrated client offerings. Others remain more firmly anchored in influencer marketing itself, building broader capability specifically to deliver that more effectively.
Both models can work. What consistently proves challenging is occupying the space between the two without clarity on what the business actually is.
This distinction rarely appears in external messaging. Instead, it becomes evident in how the business actually operates — how decisions are made, how reliant the organisation is on its founder, how predictable its revenue base is, and how clearly clients can understand the value it delivers.
Looking ahead, several trends appear increasingly likely. Campaign-led work is gradually giving way to more repeatable, always-on content systems. Clients are consolidating their agency relationships, favouring fewer partners with broader responsibility. At the same time, the distinction between creative and performance continues to diminish, largely because, from a client perspective, it has already disappeared.
At the centre of these changes, social is no longer simply a channel. It is becoming the primary engine of brand and consumer growth.
For founders, the implication is not necessarily to do more, but to be clearer. Clarity around what the business is, where it creates value, and how it is structured to deliver that value consistently is becoming increasingly important.
This clarity matters in different ways depending on the stage of the business. For some, it is about building a more resilient and scalable organisation. For others, it becomes more relevant when considering external investment, partnerships, or an eventual exit. At that point, the perspective shifts. It is no longer about what the business claims to do, but about how it actually functions.
Final thought
The agencies that are pulling ahead are not necessarily those doing the most.
They are the ones that are clearest on what they are — and then build capability around that to deliver it more effectively.
For some, that means evolving into broader social-first communications businesses. For others, it means remaining deeply anchored in influencer marketing while building the surrounding capabilities required to deliver it at a higher level.
In other words, the distinction between what you do and what you are is no longer academic.
It is becoming the defining factor in how agencies grow, compete, and ultimately create value.
