Glossary
The ratio of attributable revenue to total campaign cost, expressed as a percentage. The number that determines whether influencer marketing survives in the next budget.
Return on investment (ROI) is the ratio of attributable revenue to total campaign cost, expressed as a percentage. It is the number that determines whether influencer marketing survives in the next budget cycle, which is why reporting it credibly matters more than reporting it high.
A defensible ROI is what lets a marketing team walk into a budget meeting and keep the channel funded. The teams that report ROI in impressions and engagement lose the budget, because finance does not accept impressions as a result. The teams that report attributable revenue against full cost, with a window that matches the buying cycle, keep the budget. The discipline is in the details: instrument attribution before you spend, separate paid from earned, align the attribution window to the buying cycle (long for YouTube), and normalize cost (fee plus seeding plus coordination plus rights). Read the ultimate guide to influencer marketing ROI for the full framework with a worked example.
Infmap records the full cost side per deal (creator fee, platform fees, seeding) and the full conversion side per deal (attributable revenue over the window you set), so ROI is computed from both sides consistently rather than estimated. The dashboard surfaces per-creator ROI, so the ranking that drives the rebook decision is data-driven. The metric is tied to the deal, not the creator profile, so the ROI of the same creator can be compared across campaigns. See how brands use Infmap and the measure ROI use case.
A $120 SaaS app launches with a 15-creator YouTube campaign. Total cost: $54,000 (fees, seeding, coordination). Over 90 days, the campaign attributes 1,820 conversions at $120 average order value, for $218,400 in revenue. ROI = ($218,400 minus $54,000) divided by $54,000 = 304%, or 3.04x. The top three creators drive 61% of conversions, the bottom four drive under 2%, and the rebook list is obvious. That is the report a brand can defend to finance.