Latest / Influencer Marketing with Fexingo: Creators, Sponsorships, and Modern Endorsement Deals / How Influencer Fraud Detection Is Changing Brand Deals
Transcript
- Lucas: So there's this number that keeps me up at night, and I think it should keep every marketer up at night too. According to a report from the University of Baltimore, brands lost about $1.3 billion to influencer fraud in 2024 alone. Luna: That's fake followers, bot engagement, view stuffing—all the stuff that makes a campaign look successful on paper but actually delivers zero real eyeballs. Lucas: Exactly. And the scale is bigger than most people realize. A study from Cheq, which is one of the fraud detection firms, estimated that about 15 percent of all influencer spending is wasted on fraudulent activity. That's not just a problem for the brands—it undermines trust in the whole creator economy. Lucas: If these marketing conversations have sparked something you've actually used, like a new way to vet a creator or a smarter approach to ROI, the reason these episodes stay ad-free is listener support. You can keep that going at buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. Luna: Yeah, and honestly, it's a small way to say this kind of deep-dive content matters. We dig into the messy details so you don't have to. Lucas: Anyway, back to fraud. One of the most telling cases I've seen happened last year with a luxury fashion brand—I can't name them because of NDA clauses, but the details are public enough. They were about to sign a $200,000 campaign with a creator who had 2.4 million followers on Instagram. Luna: I think I remember that one. The brand's agency ran an audit and found that over 60 percent of the creator's audience was either bots or inactive accounts. Lucas: Right. And the engagement rate, which looked like 3.8 percent on the surface, actually dropped to 0.4 percent when you filtered out the bot activity. The brand pulled the deal, and it became a sort of cautionary tale inside the influencer marketing world. Luna: So how are agencies and brands catching this stuff now? Is it just manual checks, or is there actual tech involved? Lucas: It's increasingly tech-driven. Tools like HypeAuditor, Cheq, and even some newer players use machine learning to analyze follower growth patterns, engagement velocity, and comment quality. For example, if a creator's follower count jumps by 20,000 in one day and then goes silent, that's a red flag. Lucas: They also look at the ratio of likes to comments. Real audiences tend to have a certain ratio—maybe 10 to 1 or 15 to 1. If a post has 50,000 likes and only 50 comments, that's suspicious because bots don't comment as much. Luna: It's like a digital forensics lab for social media. I've heard that some agencies now require a fraud audit as a standard part of the contract before any money changes hands. Lucas: That's becoming more common, especially for mid-tier and large campaigns. I spoke with a talent manager at one of the top influencer agencies—they said about 70 percent of their brand clients now request an audit before signing. Five years ago, that number was probably under 10 percent. Luna: What about the creators themselves? Are there legitimate creators who get falsely flagged? Lucas: That's the tricky part. False positives happen. For example, if a creator gets a surge of followers after a viral post, the algorithms might flag it as suspicious even though it's organic. So the best tools combine automated screening with human review. Lucas: One agency I talked to uses a three-tier system: first, an automated scan by HypeAuditor; second, a manual check by a human analyst who looks at the actual comments and follower bios; third, a sample DM outreach to see if the audience engages one-on-one. Luna: That sounds expensive. Is it only worth it for big-budget campaigns? Lucas: It can be, but the cost of fraud is even higher. A mid-tier campaign might spend $10,000 on influencer fees, and if 15 percent is wasted, that's $1,500 down the drain. An audit might cost $200–$500 per creator. So the ROI is pretty clear if you're doing multiple campaigns. Luna: I've also seen a shift where some creators are proactively buying verification from firms like Cheq to prove their audience is real. It's almost like a badge of trust. Lucas: Exactly. And that's a smart move because it differentiates them. I know of a beauty influencer who paid for a third-party audit and then used the results in her media kit. She said it helped her land a deal with a major cosmetics brand that had been burned by fraud before. Luna: Right. So the fraud problem might actually be pushing the industry toward more transparency. Lucas: I think so. There's also a regulatory angle. The Federal Trade Commission in the US has been paying more attention. In 2024, they sent warning letters to dozens of influencers and brands about deceptive endorsements, and some of those cases involved fake followers. Lucas: And in Europe, the Digital Services Act requires platforms to be more transparent about how they recommend content, which indirectly affects influencer visibility. Luna: Do you think platforms like Instagram and TikTok are doing enough to police fraud themselves? Lucas: They're trying, but it's a cat and mouse game. Instagram purges fake accounts regularly—they removed about 100 million in 2024 alone. But the fraudsters adapt. They create more sophisticated bots that mimic human behavior, like posting random comments or following real people in patterns. Lucas: Plus, the platforms have a financial incentive not to crack down too hard. More followers and engagement make the platform look more vibrant to advertisers. So there's a tension there. Luna: That's a good point. The platforms benefit from inflated metrics to some degree. Lucas: Right. But I think the pressure from brands and agencies is starting to shift the balance. When brands demand real ROI, platforms have to respond. We're already seeing TikTok introduce more granular analytics for business accounts that include engagement quality scores. Luna: Interesting. So what should a marketer listening to this take away? If they're planning an influencer campaign next month, what's one concrete step they can take? Lucas: First, before you even reach out to a creator, run their handle through a free tool like HypeAuditor's basic check or SocialBlade. Look at their follower growth chart. If it looks like a flat line with sudden spikes, that's suspicious. Lucas: Second, look at the engagement on recent posts—not just likes, but comments. Sort comments by 'most recent' instead of 'top' because bots often get filtered out of the top section. If you see a lot of generic comments like 'nice pic' or emoji strings, that's a red flag. Lucas: Third, don't rely on the creator's own screenshots of their analytics. Those can be faked or cherry-picked. Ask for a live screen share or use a third-party tool that pulls data directly from the platform's API. Luna: And if you're a creator listening, what's your advice? Lucas: Be proactive. If you've got a real, engaged audience, get verified by an independent auditor. Put that badge in your media kit. It signals to brands that you're trustworthy and saves them the hassle of doing their own deep dive. Luna: It's almost like the influencer version of a credit score. The more transparent you are, the more trust you earn, and that can translate into higher rates. Lucas: Exactly. And I think we're moving toward a world where fraud detection becomes as standard as background checks for employees. It's just part of doing business. Luna: So in a weird way, the fraud problem might actually be good for the industry—it's forcing everyone to get more professional. Lucas: That's one way to look at it. The flip side is that it raises the barrier to entry for small creators who can't afford audits. But overall, I'd rather have a system that prioritizes real connections over fake numbers. Luna: Agreed. Real connections win every time.