What's Missing in Creator Media Measurement?
Plus the dumbest thing at CES
One thing that was very noticeable at CES this week - creators, and creator media companies, are still too often stuck on the sidelines.
I get it, it’s a tech show, so you should expect a heavy dose of CTV players and ad tech vendors. Still, it speaks to the state of affairs when creators are still finding their place at the media mix table, even in 2025.
Case in point - I had Reza Izad, co-founder and partner at Underscore talent on my Next in Creator Media podcast this week.
When it comes to the world of influencer marketing and YouTube’s evolution as a major content platform, Reza is an OG. Prior to co-founding Underscore Talent a few years ago, he ran an early MCN, Collective Digital Studios, which morphed into Studio 71. I remember seeing eventual NBC talk show host Lily Singh at one of Collective’s NewFronts, where other brands and I were introduced to YouTube giants Rhett and Link circa 2015.
So Reza is a good barometer of where brands and media agencies are in terms of investing in creators, and crafting media plans that recognize the centrality of this talent for certain generations.
Things are - still off.
“It's not all equal,” he said. “The major consumer brands are dabblers in the space. Not all of them, but a lot of them are still [on the] outside…There's less engagement than you would think, especially given the competition they face.”
Reza said that certain categories, including beauty and culinary/cooking, are all in on YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, etc., given both their audience and the ability to drive transactions directly. But packaged goods brands are behind in his view.
For instance, how does Hershey or Mars just let a Mr. Beast run away with his own candy bar business, instead of partnering and/or emulating such a deal? Where are the Old Spices and Axes of the world, given the power of the manosphere?
“They've sort of just let it run [without them],” Izad said. “They just kind of dabble.”
One reason, per Izad, is that categories like beauty have fully bought into particular metrics vendors, such as Tribal Dynamic, a media intelligence/analytics company that was acquired by CreatorIQ in 2021.
Maximize your YouTube advertising with VuePlanner. As a member of the YouTube Measurement Program for Brand Suitability and Contextual Targeting, VuePlanner enables you to buy with confidence, clarity, and precision. Using advanced technology and AI-powered optimization, VuePlanner offers custom-curated contextual collections, exclusive content strategies, and transparent reporting for measurable, impactful results. Take control of your campaign performance—partner with VuePlanner now.
“The beauty industry has bought into Tribal as sort of, I don't know that it's the complete North Star, but it's a significant part of a lot of marketing discussions that happen,” said Izad.
My question is, what’s so great about Tribal, and why aren’t the consumer packaged goods brands finding an equivalent metrics platform that helps them better justify their investments in creators. As Izad mentioned, has this category, and YouTube in particular, gone too hard on emulating TV metrics versus focusing on something that better serves the needs of these brands that are used to leaning on old school marketing mix models and the like? Answer - I don’t know, but plan on doing more investigation into this issue.
In the meantime, a few more highlights from my pod chat with Reza (which you should check out on your CES flight home):
Is YouTube missing out on social video/social shopping by focusing so much on CTV? Is there an opening right now with Meta capitulating to Trump? “What [YouTube] has missed is Facebook has created their own market,” said Izad. “It's called social and they own it basically outright. There's TikTok and there's Snap and Pinterest maybe, but really they own a defined market and it comes with some other features, right? It's shoppable. It's got all these things that make it real...The next story [for YouTube] needs to be social shopping, all these things that they have, but they just need to figure out how it all works together and is sold together. Advertisers have to like almost think of it as two different businesses.”
Who might be a surprise winner if TikTok goes away? “Ironically, Pinterest is like the most aggressive on becoming like an affiliate place. I don't know if they have enough scale to do what [TikTok does], but they're pretty well adopted. So that's one interesting bet.”
Where.M.I?
While I can’t say I saw everything at CES this year, from the ground I did cover, it was quite easy to figure out the dumbest idea in Vegas. I stopped by the Creator Space at the actual convention center, which was a mess (instead of in a ballroom or something, it was stuck in a non-enclosed makeshift space in the middle of the main hallway. Not great.
There, former Black Eyed Pea will.i.am was demonstrating RAiDiO.FYI, which allows people to talk to a variety of AI personas about various topics. Will. decided to ask what I would describe as a young, Valley Girl meets bad Gen Z stereotype AI about…the state of the LA Fires and whether he’d hit a lot of traffic on the way home. Perhaps not a great choice of topics.
The AI rattled off an update on the devastation and the loss of the high school featured in Carrie, assuring us that the scene was “truly heartbreaking.” Will insisted that in the future we’ll all be talking frequently to such agents to get updates on the world. You know, instead of asking a trusted news source, or, I don’t know, reading. God fucking help us if this is our future.