Unilever: solving influencer fraud easier said than done

Industry Contributor 6 May 2019 - 2 min read

Unilever: solving influencer fraud easier said than done

By Paul McIntyre - Executive Editor

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Tags: Influencers, social media, fraud, Unilever, marketing, metrics

Since announcing a transparency drive on influencer marketing last year, Unilever is finding there is no silver bullet to the issues of fake followers and influencer fraud (Digiday).

Key points:

• In June 2018 Unilever committed not to work with influencers that buy followers, nor would its own brands buy followers and that it would spend more with platforms that improve transparency and help eradicate bad practice

• "It's definitely a difficult space … we are reliant on the info coming from platforms." – Unilever director of PR and digital engagement, Casey DePalma

• Key issue is the way industry measures success, i.e. number of followers, effectively incentivising fraud.

• Unilever therefore moving to engagement metrics over reach

Synthetic reach still rules the socials. Any ecosystem that pays for unverifiable reach will be gamed. That is why bot farms and long tail ad networks exist. Social media is no different - some of the platform giants' own audience claims are as questionable as the reach claimed by many influencers (the New York Times' exposé is always worth revisiting). As Digiday's story suggests, the platforms hold the data but resist providing the means to properly analyse and benchmark (why, one has to ask). Ultimately, that has to change if brands are to trust them with marketing dollars. Unilever is not alone in taking action and marketers and their employers must realise that over representation leads to over investment without commensurate return. Yet in the main, ad revenues continue to grow across the major social media platforms, suggesting the industry still sees something in synthetic reach.