Creators now take up 26% of Americans’ daily video viewing, close behind linear TV (35%) and streaming (33%). US creator ad spend has followed, with a projected $37 billion in 2025, growing about four times faster than the media industry as a whole.
That growth raises some pressing questions: How much control should a brand keep? Does working with dozens, or even hundreds, of creators sharpen a brand or blur it? And how do you make sure people remember whose ad they just watched?
To find out, we surveyed 2,000 US adults about creator partnerships and drew on our analysis of 3,303 social video ads from our latest State of Creative Effectiveness report. We also tested three ads from Chipotle’s new campaign which handed the cameras to 100 creators.
The first job of any social ad is to avoid being scrolled past. From our research across nearly 4,000 scroll-format video ads only about 1 brand-made ad in 8 held viewers for at least three seconds. People come to the feed to be entertained, to learn something and to see what people like them are up to — and they’ve learned to spot an ad in an instant.
But creators are adept at stopping the scroll with something that grabs attention. Content made by creators in partnership with a brand scores +0.46 on Ad Distinctiveness (how much an ad stands out as different from other ads), while polished brand ads score −0.53. Creators know how to win the first few seconds and their content looks like it belongs in the feed.
That standout is valuable. An ad that isn’t watched for at least a couple of seconds can’t build a brand or bring it to mind in more buying moments. Getting noticed comes first and it’s where creators earn their place on the media plan.
Creator content can get people interested in the brand too. The most common response to watching branded creator content is looking the brand up: 42% of US adults have done it in the past year because a creator promoted it.
More than a quarter have bought something they hadn’t planned to buy (27%), meaning creators can generate demand as well as capture it, putting products on people’s radar before they’re even looking.
They are often seen as a way to reach younger audiences and under-35s do act most: 47% of 26–35 year-olds have looked up a brand because a creator promoted it. But creator influence reaches well beyond them: even among 56–75 year-olds, more than a quarter have looked up a brand (28%).
That makes creator content a tool for broad reach, as well as a way to connect with younger audiences.
It’s easy to see why so many marketers now treat them as a core channel. Nearly half of ad spenders consider creators a “must buy,” second only to social media and paid search.
Every piece of creator content has to serve two brands: the creator and the company paying for the post. When the creator’s own brand takes over, people remember the creator. When the paying brand takes over, the content turns back into an ad and loses what made it stand out in the first place.
Getting that balance right is the big opportunity in creator marketing. On average, creator content scores −0.67 on Brand Connection, compared to +0.60 for polished brand ads.
But it’s important to remember that this is the average. The spread of results within creator content is wide — and those that solve branding pull well ahead of the rest. We’ll show a good example of a creator campaign later in this post.
Many brands now run creator programs at scale. 41% of CMOs say they work with more than 100 creators. That raises the question of whether so many different voices dilute what a brand stands for.
Consumers say it doesn’t. If anything, working with lots of creators gives a brand a boost: people are much more likely to say it makes a brand seem more in touch with culture than less (38% vs. 23%). And the brand doesn’t get lost along the way. Three-quarters say it either makes no difference or makes a brand seem more consistent (74%) and clearer about what it stands for (75%).
That reaction is strongest among the people creator marketing reaches most. 45% of 26–35 year-olds say working with lots of creators makes a brand seem more in touch with culture. So do 49% of people who’ve bought something because a creator promoted it.
So scale and consistency can go together. What holds a large program together is a shared idea and recognizable brand assets running through every piece.
Distinctive brand assets are the biggest lift to Brand Connection in social video (+0.70) so they’re what lets 100 different voices still add up to one brand, as long as they belong in the creator’s world. A logo slapped on top breaks the spell, while a pack in the creator’s hand or a jingle they sing tells people whose ad it is without making it feel like an ad.
People expect a brand to stand behind the claims made about its products.
Nearly half of US adults think the brand should decide what a creator says (49%), a third lean toward the creator (33%), while the rest sit in the middle (19%). Among people who’ve bought because of a creator, 55% lean toward the brand.
How the information is delivered matters just as much. The things most likely to put people off creator content are claims that sound too good to be true (40%), lines that sound as if the brand wrote them (38%) and creators changing how they normally talk or act (35%).
In other words, people respond to realistic claims told in the creator’s own voice.
That gives brands a useful way to split the work. The brand owns the product truth, like what it does and where it shows up. The creator owns the delivery, including the format and the way they talk to their audience.
Many marketers already work this way. 62% of CMOs give creators general brand guidelines and leave the interpretation to them.
Advertising fundamentals pay off about twice as much for creator content as they do for other social video. Within creator content:
When it comes to branding, the strongest creator content brings the brand into the creator’s world:
So what does it look like when a brand hands over the camera at scale and keeps the credit? We tested three ads from Chipotle’s latest campaign and put that to the test.
“Behind the Foil” has been Chipotle’s platform for showing how its food is made since 2019. Earlier chapters used documentary-style footage and Chipotle’s own employees to show the real ingredients and fresh prep in its kitchens.
For the latest chapter, Chipotle handed the cameras to 100 creators. These creators joined the morning prep in more than 50 restaurants across the US, UK and Canada, grilling chicken and slicing vegetables alongside the crew. It all supports the launch of the new Pollo Asado and Chili Lime Chips, the first time Chipotle has introduced two limited-time items at once.
Each creator filmed in their own style, between them capturing 345 hours of footage, with a combined following of over 100 million.
Brazil-based agency KIDS, a new partner for Chipotle, shaped that footage into 30- and 15-second spots. Its aim was to keep what made each creator’s footage distinctive instead of conforming it to a traditional commercial.
The ads launched on August 31 on national TV, TikTok, Instagram Reels and YouTube Shorts, as well as on the creators’ own channels.
The campaign is Chief Brand Officer Fernando Machado’s debut national campaign and he calls it the first campaign of his career where he didn’t know exactly how it would turn out: “It takes a lot of trust to give up that control, but there’s power in leaving room for the unexpected.”
So did handing over the camera pay off? We tested three of the creator’s videos on TikTok to find out what worked and why.
One of the 100 creators Chipotle let into its kitchens is stop-motion animator Ben Treat. He shot the background shots in a real restaurant, then headed home to animate the rest. Frame by frame, he builds a burrito that looks like it’s making itself, in his signature style. The video takes us through the restaurant, his home studio and the animation itself.
It’s a strong all-round video (Creative Power: 6.2). Its best score is the one creator content usually struggles with most — making sure the brand gets the credit (Brand Connection: 6.7).
What makes the difference is that Ben Treat had complete freedom over the filming, but everything in front of the camera is Chipotle’s, including the restaurant and the food.
At the same time, the stop-motion technique makes the ad highly distinctive (Ad Distinctiveness: 6.6), and it only works if you pay attention to every single step, which is what Chipotle wants us to notice about how its food is made.
Ultimately this video persuades (5.9) — a great outcome for creator content! It’s found a big audience too, with 3 million views so far on Treat’s TikTok.
Next up is battle rapper Anderson Burrus, who went behind the counter to see how the food is prepped, then came back out to perform a rap about it for the crew.
It lands a 6.2 Creative Power score and the unexpected mix of battle rap and burrito prep makes it highly distinctive (Ad Distinctiveness: 6.9). It’s been viewed nearly 195,000 times on Burrus’s TikTok too.
The video taps into what Burrus does best, putting Chipotle’s food and how it’s made at the heart of the rap. He puns his way through scratch cooking, a spotless kitchen and the food’s little kick, so the brand is part of the performance itself.
This goes a long way toward making sure people make the connection to the brand (Brand Connection: 5.9). Effective creator content like this builds the entertainment around what the creator is already known for and puts the product at the center of it.
The final video we looked at comes from ceramic artist Emme Zhou, who’s back for her second collaboration with Chipotle. She opens by showing us an image of the final result of the chip-and-dip set, then takes us through the whole process of throwing the bowls, glazing them and painting them by hand.
Revealing the finished piece first is a classic creator hook and it puts Chipotle in the picture from the opening seconds (Brand Connection: 5.6). At the same time, the slow satisfying craft makes the ad highly distinctive (Ad Distinctiveness: 6.8). It racked up more than 200,000 views on Zhou’s TikTok.
Once it’s ready, she fills it with Chipotle’s dips and chips and tucks in, telling us how much she loves the food. Persuasion is where the ad really shines (Persuasion: 6.5). Watching her enjoy the food in bowls she made herself feels like a personal recommendation and that’s what makes creator content so persuasive.
It’s a perfect example of putting the product in the creator’s hands. Chipotle’s food fits so naturally into Zhou’s craft that it blends seamlessly into her usual content while the brand still gets the credit.
Chipotle handed the reins to 100 creators and these three videos show how well it can work. Creator content often struggles to make sure the brand gets the credit, but it can be done.
Stop-motion animation, battle rap and ceramics couldn’t be more different, yet every one of these ads stands out and still connects back to Chipotle. What they have in common is that each creator brings their own style, with Chipotle’s food at the center of the story.
Consumers are open to creator partnerships. They act on them, believe them and see brands that work with lots of creators as more consistent and in touch with culture. What they want is a brand that stands behind what’s said and a creator who sounds like themselves.
But attention only pays off when people remember whose ad they watched, so the branding has to be built in from the start. Chipotle shows it can be done: give creators the freedom to entertain their way and put your product in the spotlight of the entertainment.