Influencer Marketing Hub sets itself apart from conventional review platforms through the involvement of Influencer Marketing experts such as Werner Geyser, Djanan Kasumovic, Camille Kennedy, Dave Eagle, and other notable industry figures. This expert team brings a profound understanding of the Influencer Marketing landscape, assessing tools and platforms with an insider’s perspective on capabilities, experience, and industry acumen. Unlike user-generated review platforms, Influencer Marketing Hub’s evaluations are rooted in extensive firsthand experience and direct interactions with the tools and platforms in question. This ensures that the reviews are not only trustworthy but also deeply informed. High-caliber brands like Viral Nation, inBeat Agency, and LEADERS undergo rigorous monthly evaluations, highlighting the platform’s commitment to identifying and showcasing top-tier solutions in Influencer Marketing and beyond.
Influencer Marketing Hub has consistently been recognized by leading media outlets for our authoritative data, findings, and insights within the Influencer Marketing landscape. Our platform is frequently cited as a trusted source of information, demonstrating the value and impact of our work in shaping industry standards and practices.
Influencer Marketing Hub employs an expert-driven methodology to evaluate Influencer Marketing agencies, ensuring that our recommendations are both reliable and comprehensive. This approach is designed to help businesses and individuals find the best agencies to meet their specific Influencer Marketing needs. Here’s how we assess the various agencies like Viral Nation, inBeat Agency, and LEADERS:
Influencers continue to gain loyal followers worldwide. Canada, in particular, sees younger creators connecting on a deeper level with highly engaged social media users. With consumers spending more time on social platforms, brands can potentially widen their customer base by partnering with influencers who already have an established follower base.
However, choosing the right influencers and monitoring performance isn’t always easy. The impact of influencer partnerships on brand reputation is so strong that one collaboration with the wrong influencer can destroy it overnight. Thus, brands must carefully choose the influencers they work with to ensure that they are aligned with their brand values and goals.
This is where influencer marketing agencies come in. In this article, we list the top influencer marketing agencies in Canada and share valuable tips on how to choose the right one for your brand.
Top Influencer Marketing Agencies in Canada
Location: Toronto Year Founded: 2014 Using a social-first approach to marketing, Viral Nation’s strategy veers away from traditional media-led marketing strategies. For a decade now, the agency has been connecting brands with content creators and crafting dynamic social media campaigns that captivate consumers, positioning itself as a global leader in social-first transformation. Viral Nation leverages the latest technologies to streamline influencer marketing campaigns. Its proprietary solutions include Viral Nation_Secure™ and CreatorOS™. These solutions are powered by AI and other tools that simplify complex workflows and enable brands to scale their marketing initiatives. Aside from its robust suite of tools, Viral Nation provides brands access to a huge database of verified creators. One of its notable successes is its influencer marketing campaign for Bud Light. Viral Nation helped the iconic beer brand connect with the Latin community through the #HechoEnCalifornia campaign. It partnered with eleven Hispanic influencers who created and shared engaging content that highlighted the Californian roots of Bud Light. Oscar Miranda, Solace Rose, and a handful of California’s most prominent Latinx influencers used the #HechoEnCalifornia hashtag on their social media posts showing them having fun while enjoying Bud Light with family and friends. Although there were barely a dozen influencers in the campaign, the campaign gained 7.9 million interactions, exceeding the initial goal of five million interactions. Not only did the campaign successfully drive awareness but it also built brand loyalty. With Viral Nation, you can find global influencers who have affinities with your target audience. The centralized platform has everything you need to manage campaigns, from influencer review and content approval to campaign monitoring and report generation. Powerful analytics tools also allow you to view campaign performance in real time. Viral Nation works with some of the biggest brands in the world including Walmart, ViewSonic, and Smartwater. It has run a holiday campaign for Energizer, a VR game launch for Meta Quest, and a global challenge for PUBG. Aside from influencer marketing services, Viral Nation also offers services for paid media, performance media, ad creatives, and content. Location: Toronto and Montreal Year Founded: 2019 InBeat Influencer Marketing Agency focuses on connecting brands with micro-influencers who can help them organically reach their audience. It emphasizes authenticity in every connection to make interactions more meaningful. Its most recent successes are influencer marketing campaigns for Greenpark and Nordstrom. InBeat helped media and information services company Greenpark raise brand awareness and acquire new users for its new app. The agency brainstormed with the client to develop creative concepts and strategies that would make the brand stand out. With the help of InBeat’s creative director and strategist, influencers were onboarded and given detailed content briefs. The influencers were allowed creative freedom to help ensure the messaging resonated with their specific audiences. The collaboration resulted in well-performing user-generated content that led to numerous app downloads. For Nordstrom, InBeat promoted a new line of non-binary clothing designed in partnership with Wildfang. They cast seven active influencers from different cities and worked with them to create video and photo content featuring the new clothing line. This campaign had influencers feature pieces of clothing from Wildfang in their social media content. This enabled Nordstrom to reach over 750K people. When you work with InBeat, you get an expert marketing manager and a team of researchers, strategists, and content creators. The manager supervises the full-scale implementation of your strategy, while the rest of the team shares their individual expertise to ensure you meet your marketing goals. They craft implementation strategies, content guidelines, and other key elements tailored to your brand messaging. They also use a proprietary evaluation system to curate the right set of influencers for a specific campaign. Over the years, InBeat has gained the trust of over 250 online brands including global giants like Disney, Nestle, 7-Eleven, and New Balance. InBeat offers influencer marketing services for various industries including consumer packaged goods, direct-to-customer, healthcare, eCommerce, and mobile apps. Its core services include: Locations: Montreal Year Founded: 2009 The tagline, “powered by people,” reflects the human-centric approach of the LEADERS group. It encapsulates the agency’s core belief that authentic and relatable experiences create brand growth. They empower brands by connecting them with influencers who resonate with their target audience. Instead of aggressive hard-selling tactics, LEADERS focuses on developing real connections with real people. With LEADERS, you can leverage the power of trusted influencers who impact the purchasing decisions of their loyal followers. Topshop and Estee Lauder harnessed this power when they struggled with sales during the pandemic. To renew consumer interest, LEADERS created bespoke campaigns for each brand. For Topshop, they asked influencers to pick outfits from the newest collections and share trendy looks with their followers. The mantra for the campaign was “simplicity, efficiency, and authenticity.” For Estee Lauder, LEADERS ran “always-on campaigns.” This included a Black Friday campaign where mega celebs and brand ambassadors were asked to share promo codes, gift cards, and affiliate links. Both campaigns for Topshop and Estee Lauder were successful in amplifying reach and engagement. The influencers were able to connect with their audience on a more personal level and foster authentic interactions. This approach not only re-engaged existing customers but also attracted new ones by highlighting the influencers’ genuine endorsement. These successes are founded on LEADERS advanced tools and agile strategies. Their proprietary influencer analysis tool backed by AI and big data enables you to find the right influencers for your campaigns. Aside from establishing brand-influencer partnerships, LEADERS ensures marketing success by developing and executing creative and performance-based strategies. A personal dashboard gives you full control of your influencer marketing campaigns, granting you access to other tools that allow you to select influencers, monitor campaigns, and track KPIs. For the past 15 years, LEADERS has worked on thousands of campaigns, many of which are for household names such as P&G, Samsung, BMW, Nespresso, Cheerios, Budweiser, Topshop, and Estee Lauder. Location: Los Angeles Year Founded: 2018 The Influencer Hunter is a dynamic team of growth marketers who believe that working with influencers is the best way to build a brand that people love. Although headquartered in Los Angeles, the agency also has numerous Canada-based businesses on its client roster. The hunt for the right influencers becomes easier and more efficient with the help of Influence Hunter. The agency helps send free products to influencers who agree to post about their experiences. They can also arrange sponsored posts with influencers who have large followings. They also enable the use of influencer-generated content in paid ads. One of its best campaigns is for furniture brand Transformer Table. The brand wanted to raise awareness for its innovative product—a multifunctional table that can transform into six different sizes. Influencer Hunter matched the brand with mid-tier and macro influencers in the home decor and lifestyle niche. One of the influencers chosen, @Mynameisrasha, posted an Instagram reel that went viral with over 116 million views. Aside from Instagram, the influencers also shared content on TikTok. The focus on these two platforms amplified the potential for virality—a strategy that proved very effective. Overall, the campaign was an astounding success that generated more than five million dollars in sales. With Influence Hunter’s extensive network, you can run campaigns ranging from just a few influencers to over 500. Through its powerful search engine, you can sift through millions of influencers and find the ones that meet your required demographics, follower size, and platform. Once campaigns are implemented, the Influencer Hunter team uses analytics to optimize the campaigns and generate progress reports. They are also able to determine the top-performing influencers who would make great ambassadors for your brand. Influencer Hunter makes influencer marketing cost-efficient by enabling businesses to run campaigns at scale. This means it can serve both small startups with limited ad budgets and large enterprises with funds to spare. Some of its most well-known clients are Honda, Quevos, Dermalogica, Blaze Pizza, Semaine, and Best Self. Location: Toronto Year Founded: 2008 Established in London by two passionate visionaries, We Are Social has since become a global agency with offices across the United States, Canada, Europe, Asia, and Australia. It offers end-to-end marketing services including brand strategy, creatives, media production and distribution, and influencer marketing. We Are Social matches businesses with the influencers that best fit their brand, budget, and campaign type. Its roster of influencers includes nano, micro, macro, and celebrity influencers from various niches. Big on collaboration, the agency cultivates the sharing of ideas, especially socially-led ones. The agency was at the helm of the #ToTheMakers campaign of Samsung. For this campaign, We Are Social was asked to differentiate the Samsung brand from competitors that are well-loved by millennials. The agency analyzed the market and found that 60% of millennials are willing to try a product recommended by an influencer. Based on this insight, the branded community #ToTheMakers was created. At its heart are influencers who use and love Samsung products. We Are Social has photographers, filmmakers, fashion bloggers, and other creators who are popular with the younger generation. Elliot Numskull, Carmen Hamilton, May Leong, Sam Evans, and many others showed their ingenuity in using Samsung devices to create engaging content. As they shared this content on their social media platforms, they tagged the brand and used the hashtag #ToTheMakers. Wooooo now part of the #maker community in a bigger way. Thanks #Samsung! #makecreate #innovate #tech @SamsungAU #Note8 #GearVR #TotheMakers #creative #innovative #hack #build #Melbourne pic.twitter.com/o6SnZs5u0b — ✨ Michelle “MishManners” Duke ? (@MishManners) November 9, 2017 Going beyond product features, influencers like Brooklyn Whelan and Ben Claremont ran workshops and masterclasses that included the use of different Samsung devices. These provided viewers more value and helped position the Samsung brand as a partner for growth. How To Shoot 360 Like A Pro – today’s workshop was a big success! Huge thanks to Samsung for inviting me to host ?? #tothemakers pic.twitter.com/yulRoCc4vF — Ben Claremont (@benclaremont) August 6, 2017 By creating a community focused on inspiring people to develop and hone new skills, the #ToTheMakers campaign spread the Samsung philosophy of “Do What You Can’t” and increased awareness of Samsung products. Over the years, We Are Social has worked with global brands including Adidas, TikTok, Telus, Sephora, Kellogg’s, Fossil, and Samsung. We Are Social offers end-to-end influencer marketing services that include: Beyond influencer marketing, the agency also offers paid media management, social commerce, performance media, media production, and many more. Location: Calgary Year Founded: 2018 Created specifically for the Canadian market, Embold empowers businesses to launch targeted campaigns with the help of local and micro-influencers. Its 9,000-strong influencer roster makes it possible for brands to find influencers that best fit their marketing needs. With Embold, you can opt for either self-serve solutions or fully managed services. It offers a free influencer marketing platform with robust features for managing smart campaigns and user-generated content. The free platform allows you to work with a maximum of five influencers per month. For large campaigns, end-to-end management by Embold eases the burden of having to build and monitor the campaigns yourself. A dedicated team will build and execute strategies, curate influencers, and manage campaign execution. Embold works mostly with small and mid-market businesses but it also has enterprise clients like Anytime Fitness. Embold runs different types of influencer campaigns. It tailors its services to the specific needs of a client, which may include the following: Location: Toronto, Montreal, Vancouver Year Founded: 2017 The Influence Agency is a boutique influencer and digital marketing agency that specializes in custom solutions for brands. Its team of digital media professionals crafts performance-based marketing campaigns that create meaningful engagement with their target audience. For influencer marketing, it evaluates the brand requirements for a campaign and chooses the best fit from over 100,000 influencers on its roster. It then guides collaboration between the client and the influencers to ensure that the project’s marketing goals are reached. The Influence Agency has worked with numerous brands including Lowe’s, Jamieson, and Spirit of York. Some of the amazing results they have delivered to their clients are 10K+ engagements for MTV’s Hard Seltzer launch, 16M+ reach for Napoleon, 29K+ app downloads for Delta, and a 33% organic engagement rate for redtag.ca. Location: Ontario Year Founded: 2021 InfluGlue is known for its extensive network of influencers across diverse sectors such as fashion, health and fitness, travel, and food. To drive impactful marketing, it emphasizes the importance of understanding customer motivations, rather than just follower counts. InfluGlue provides brands with measurable engagement opportunities by connecting them with influencers who create authentic and relatable content. Its platform ensures secure and seamless interactions between brands and influencers. Its efficiency is demonstrated by its capability to create campaigns in just 10 minutes. 1. Viral Nation
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2. inBeat Agency
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3. LEADERS
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4. Influence Hunter
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5. We Are Social
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How to Choose the Ideal Influencer Agency for Your Brand in Canada
Choosing the ideal influencer agency for your brand is not as simple as picking one out from a list. It takes a bit of vetting for you to ensure that your brand will benefit from the partnership. A study revealed that 68% of internet users in Canada find influencer content credible on social media. For your brand to gain traction, you need to partner with an agency that truly understands your brand and can make your brand stories resonate with your target market.
In choosing the ideal marketing agency for your brand, consider the following key factors:
1. Your Brand Goals
Know exactly what you want to achieve with your influencer marketing campaign. It could be to spread brand awareness, drum up online engagement, attract online or in-store consumer traffic, or drive sales revenues among others. The agency that you choose should be capable of delivering results towards your specific goals.
2. Research and Compare
Check out which agencies are likely candidates. Look beyond their corporate credentials stating their background and expertise. Most of these agencies will have a portfolio of past campaigns with brands in and out of your industry. Read client reviews and feedback. Compare your options based on their expertise, services, and pricing. Determine which agency can deliver the best value for your needs.
3. Consider Their Network
Identify an influencer agency that has an extensive and well-connected network of influencers who can effectively reach your target audience. More importantly, these influencers should align with your brand’s values and core qualities. Remember that these influencers will be carrying your brand and their image and actions will be associated with your brand too.
4. Evaluate Their Strategy
Do take time to ask questions. They should be able to tell you all about their approach to influencer marketing and what strategies they use to help their partner brands achieve their marketing goals. It’s a good sign if they can share with you right off the bat what their strategies are specifically in the areas of content creation, campaign management, and performance tracking among others.
5. Transparency and Communication
You need to choose an influencer marketing agency that you can trust and communicate with. They should be able to exercise transparency in all aspects of your campaign and should be able to communicate with you as necessary to keep you abreast of your campaign’s progress and performance metrics.
How Do These Agencies Measure Success?
Influencer marketing agencies measure success using several key performance indicators (KPIs) that are usually monitored regularly. Periodic reviews of these measures serve not only to track but also to improve campaign performance. Take a look at these metrics typically used by these top agencies to gauge success:
1. Reach and Impressions
You want to reach as many of your target audience as possible and have your content displayed frequently. Reach and impressions are among the most crucial metrics that are tracked when it comes to influencer marketing.
2. Engagement Rates
You want your brand stories to resonate with your target audience. You do not want your audience to merely read or watch your content. You want them to react and interact with you. This is measured by tracking likes, comments, shares, and overall engagement.
3. Conversion Rates
Those who see your content and interact with you should move forward with the engagement and respond positively to your call to action. If the goal of your campaign is to drive your sales revenues, you want your audience to actually “Buy Now” after seeing your content. Boosting your conversion rates should be your goal.
4. Brand Sentiment
This particular metric ‘quantifies the qualitative’. It could also linger even after your campaign. This is measured by analyzing the sentiment of the audience through their comments and social media mentions. This helps you understand how the audience perceives the brand and what positive (and negative) associations are attached to its image.
5. ROI
All businesses would of course look at Return on Investment (ROI) as a key metric for anything that entails spending precious dollars. This compares how much was spent on the campaign versus the revenue that was generated. A positive ROI is desirable and is one of the indicators of campaign success.
Spreading Your Brand Stories Through Influencer Marketing
Influencer marketing has quickly evolved into a truly powerful tool to spread your brand story to your target audience faster and more effectively. Having influencers tell your story for you gives it authenticity and helps it resonate with your audience more. You can drive your company’s success with enhanced brand equity and increased sales revenues through influencer marketing.
The best influencer marketing agencies in Canada are more than capable of helping you exponentially expand your reach and put you right in the hearts and minds of your target audience. You can do this without spending a huge chunk of your budget on mainstream advertising and promotions. Find an agency that understands what you need and can provide you with a cost-effective strategy to achieve your marketing goals. With the ideal influencer marketing agency in Canada, you can elevate your brand and achieve your marketing goals.
Frequently Asked Questions
Who can benefit from influencer marketing?
Any business or brand that has an online presence and is looking to expand its audience reach can benefit from influencer marketing. Influencer marketing is a powerful tool for businesses who want to reach out and get personal with their audiences. For a lot of marketing experts, influencer marketing is believed to generate more meaningful audience engagements and higher-quality customers.
What kind of influencers do I need to look for?
Influencers are categorized based on the number of followers that they have. Nano-influencers, for instance, are those with 10,000 followers or less. Mega-influencers, on the other hand, have follower counts of over a million. An influencer marketing agency can help you determine what level of influencers you need and can help you choose the right influencers that match your brand.
What services do influencer marketing agencies offer?
The most basic service offered by influencer marketing agencies is influencer outreach and collaboration. Most of these agencies also offer campaign planning and execution, content creation, analytics and reporting, and talent management. Usually, these agencies can put together a service package to fit your campaign needs and budget.
Is influencer marketing better than getting a celebrity endorser?
Influencer marketing is the preferred strategy for most businesses these days, although celebrity endorsers are still popular for big brands. While celebrities lend their star power to promote products, influencers make brands and products relevant to their followers through authentic and relatable content.