Unilever Reveals the Creator Marketing Growth Mistake Brands Keep Making

Creator marketing has entered a new phase.

The conversation is no longer about whether brands should invest in creators. It's about how they build creator programs that continue to perform as they grow.

That was one of the central themes during a discussion at the WWD Beauty CEO Summit, back in May, where Casey McCartney, Chief Growth Officer at Unilever US Personal Care, joined Pierre-Loïc Assayag, CEO and Founder of Traackr, to discuss what the next chapter of creator marketing looks like.

While Unilever's ambition to increase its creator network by 20 times grabbed headlines, the more interesting takeaway was the reasoning behind it.

According to the panel, brands often mistake creator volume for creator marketing maturity. The brands seeing the strongest results are building better systems, stronger relationships, and making smarter decisions before adding scale.

More Creators Doesn't Automatically Mean Better Creator Marketing

Creator marketing has become one of the fastest-growing areas of advertising.

As investment increases, many brands naturally assume the path to growth is straightforward: recruit more creators, launch more partnerships, and increase campaign output.

Unilever challenged that assumption.

During the discussion, McCartney explained that simply increasing creator numbers isn't the goal.

That distinction changes how brands should think about growth.

A creator program built around one-off partnerships often requires teams to start from scratch every campaign. New outreach, new negotiations, new approvals, and new onboarding quickly become bottlenecks.

A mature creator program looks different.

Relationships already exist. Processes are established. Teams know who to call when an opportunity appears.

In other words, scale comes from repeatability rather than transaction volume.

The Best Creator Programs Start Before the Campaign Does

One of the strongest examples shared during the session came from Dove.

Rather than waiting until a campaign brief is approved, Dove has spent years building relationships with creators who genuinely align with the brand.

When cultural moments emerge, those relationships allow the team to move quickly because the foundation is already in place.

McCartney described this as building creator communities before campaigns require them.

Vaseline offers another example.

Instead of inventing campaign ideas internally, the brand monitored conversations already happening across social media. Consumers were sharing countless creative ways to use Vaseline, from beauty routines to skincare tips.

@vaselinebrand

how long have YOU had your vaseline tub? that's an essential in our book. #Vaseline #ProVitaB3 #essentials

♬ original sound - Vaseline - Vaseline

Rather than simply observing the trend, the company launched Vaseline Verified, inviting its scientists to test popular community hacks before creators helped amplify the validated ideas.

@hmdfilm_

AD the new ‘it’ bit of kit @Vaseline #vaselineverified #itsavaselineworld #vaselineuk

♬ Sunny Day - Ted Fresco

The campaign transformed user-generated conversations into creator content grounded in consumer behavior.

It's also paying off.

According to McCartney, Vaseline is now the most organically talked-about skincare brand year to date, despite being more than 150 years old.

The lesson extends beyond Unilever.

Social listening is becoming one of the most valuable inputs into creator strategy. Instead of asking creators to manufacture conversations, brands can identify the conversations audiences are already having and help creators expand them.

AI Will Magnify Your Strategy, Good or Bad

Artificial intelligence naturally became part of the discussion.

But Traackr's perspective differed from many of today's AI conversations.

Rather than encouraging brands to automate creator workflows immediately, Assayag argued that companies should first improve how they make decisions.

His reasoning was simple.

If outreach, creator selection, or campaign planning are already ineffective, automation simply allows brands to repeat those mistakes faster.

Instead, AI should begin with insights.

Better creator intelligence produces better recommendations. Better recommendations lead to stronger partnerships. Only then does workflow automation become truly valuable.

Assayag summarized the idea succinctly:

He also encouraged brands to think carefully about the creator data they collect today.

As AI becomes more embedded in marketing operations, historical creator relationships, campaign performance, and partnership knowledge could become some of a company's most valuable assets.

As Assayag put it:

Creator Marketing Is Becoming a Long-Term Business Capability

Perhaps the biggest takeaway from the conversation had little to do with technology.

It was about organizational thinking.

The discussion suggested creator marketing is gradually moving beyond campaign execution into a permanent business capability.

Creators are increasingly influencing product innovation, commerce, customer experience, and brand strategy—not simply distributing marketing messages after they're created.

That shift requires different investments.

Success depends less on finding the next viral creator and more on building the infrastructure that supports hundreds or thousands of long-term relationships.

For brands chasing growth, that's an important distinction. Adding creators may increase activity.

Building repeatable systems, stronger relationships, and better creator intelligence is what allows creator marketing to scale sustainably.

About the Author

Kalin Anastasov

Writer

Kalin Anastasov plays a pivotal role as an content manager and editor at Influencer Marketing Hub. He expertly applies his SEO and content writing experience to enhance each piece, ensuring it aligns with our guidelines and delivers unmatched quality to our readers.