B2B Influencer Marketing Statistics 2026: 46 Numbers With Sources

The strongest recent numbers say B2B marketers now treat influencers as a credibility channel: 82% of B2B marketers in LinkedIn's 2026 outlook say creators increase credibility with decision-makers, while 93% of marketers in TopRank's latest survey rate their programmes effective but only 46% rate them very effective. This page lists 46 numbers. We opened the publisher's own page or PDF for each one, and each row gives the source and year.

Almost all of this is self-reported opinion, and much of it comes from companies with something to sell. LinkedIn sells creator tools, TopRank and Ogilvy sell influencer services, and so do we. Use these figures to frame a decision, not to forecast your own results. For that, read our guides to measuring B2B influencer marketing ROI and what B2B influencer marketing costs.

Trust and credibility

LinkedIn's figures come from a YouGov online survey of 1,299 B2B marketers at middle management level or above in the USA, UK, France, Germany and India, with fieldwork from 14 January to 5 February 2026. The link goes to LinkedIn's announcement, which reports the outlook's figures and methodology.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
82%	B2B marketers who say creators increase credibility with decision-makers	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026
83%	B2B marketers who say credibility matters more than traditional brand messaging	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026
77%	B2B marketers who say buyers need to trust and know a brand before they will engage	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026
70%	Marketers who say buyers rely more on peer voices and experts than on brand-produced content	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026
56%	B2B buyers said to depend on creator input in the last stage of buying. LinkedIn words this as a buyer figure, but the survey it footnotes sampled marketers, so read it as a reported view	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026
81%	B2B CMOs who agree their organisation needs to deliver in new ways	LinkedIn, Global B2B Marketing Outlook, 2026

Adoption and effectiveness in 2026

TopRank surveyed 424 manager-level and above B2B marketers at US companies with 100 or more employees, from mid-May to mid-June 2026. The publisher labels this its 2027 report, which is why it can look newer than its fieldwork. The sample is US only, so treat it with care if you sell mainly elsewhere.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
93%	Marketers who rate their influencer programmes effective	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
46%	Marketers who rate their programmes very effective	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
46% vs 30%	Marketers citing trustworthiness versus audience size when selecting partners	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
44%	Brands partnering with content creators who have large professional audiences	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
42%	Brands partnering with customer advocates	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
72% vs 27%	Always-on engagement: very effective programmes versus the rest	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
73% vs 22%	Fully documented strategy: very effective programmes versus the rest	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
86%	Marketers who say improving generative AI visibility will be at least moderately important this year	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
21%	Marketers who have made AI visibility a primary goal of their influencer programme	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
37%	Marketers who have connected influencer work to AI search optimisation	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
48% vs 26%	Brand cited in AI answers: marketers who connect influence to AI search versus those who do not	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026
68% vs 43%	Very confident justifying influencer budget to a CFO: the same two groups	TopRank Marketing and Ascend2, fifth edition, published October 2026

Budgets, challenges and operations

These come from TopRank's previous edition. Respondents could give several answers to most questions, so the percentages do not add up to 100. Finding partners and measuring results were the two biggest challenges, which is why we wrote separate guides on how to find B2B influencers on LinkedIn and how to brief a LinkedIn creator.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
43%	Marketers reporting outstanding results from their influencer programmes	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
58%	B2B marketing teams using an always-on approach	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
53%	Marketers whose dedicated influencer budget is growing	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
48%	Marketers naming identifying, qualifying and connecting with influencers as a top challenge	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
47%	Marketers naming measuring and reporting results as a top challenge	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
56%	Marketers naming social media posts as the most effective influencer content type	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
52%	Marketers who find influencers through social media searches	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
50%	Marketers who find influencers through recommendations from trusted sources	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
53%	Marketers using performance-based compensation	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report
6%	Marketers not compensating influencers at all	TopRank Marketing, 2025 report

The global picture

Ogilvy's research surveyed 550+ senior marketing leaders through Opinium and was published in September 2023, with LinkedIn and Onalytica as partners. It is older than the rest of this page but remains one of the few surveys with a multi-country sample. The 1% figure deserves particular scepticism, as marketers tend to be generous about programmes they run themselves.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
75%	B2B businesses already using influencer marketing	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
93%	Of those users, the share planning to increase their use	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
67%	Respondents saying influencer campaigns had more impact than brand-only marketing	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
77%	Respondents expecting influencer campaigns to outperform brand-only marketing in the near future	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
1%	Businesses saying influencer campaigns performed worse than their brand content	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
40%	Marketers citing warmer leads, more leads or more sales as success factors they experienced	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
49%	C-suite marketers who say influencers give the brand a more credible opinion than it can achieve alone	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023
92%	Participants who agree influencers are effective for hyper-targeted marketing or personalised messaging	Ogilvy and Opinium, Influencing Business, 2023

Creative performance on LinkedIn

The Credibility Code is the most useful source here because it goes beyond opinion, although samples are small in places. It draws on AI-powered creative testing of 113 creator-led ads, LinkedIn campaign data from 36 creator-led ads, and an analysis of about 11,000 creator Thought Leader Ads from September to December 2025. Ipsos dated its page 31 July 2026. The first three rows are survey figures that LinkedIn cites from its earlier research.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
82%	B2B buyers who say creator content influences purchasing decisions (footnoted to LinkedIn and GWI, 2024)	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
94%	B2B marketers who say trust is key to success (footnoted to the LinkedIn and Ipsos 2025 benchmark)	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
45%	Share who actually trust the vendors they engage with (same footnote)	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
8.6x	Click-through rate of 36 tested creator-led ads against the LinkedIn video ad benchmark	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
4.2x	Engagement rate of the same ads against the benchmark	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
+30%	Predicted brand impact of the same ads against the Ipsos short-form video average. This is a model prediction, not a measured outcome	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
+52%	Median engagement uplift for creator Thought Leader Ads that feel user-generated versus highly polished ones	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026
+43%	Median engagement uplift for creator Thought Leader Ads with a clear point of view versus simple announcements	LinkedIn B2B Institute and Ipsos, The Credibility Code, 2026

Note what the 8.6x does and does not show. It compares a selected set of creator-led ads with a general video benchmark, so it does not prove that a new campaign would match it.

Thought Leader Ads

LinkedIn says these figures come from a select group of early pilot testers between 8 February and 25 April 2023, may be affected by early adopter bias, and are directional. For how the format works, see our LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads guide.

Number	What it measures	Source and year
1.7x	Click-through rate of Thought Leader Ads versus other single-image campaigns	LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads product sheet, pilot data from 2023
1.6x	Engagement rate on the same comparison	LinkedIn Thought Leader Ads product sheet, pilot data from 2023

What the numbers mean for your plan

• Adoption is no longer the question. The useful gap is between effective and very effective programmes, and it lines up with documented strategy and always-on work.
• Choosing partners on trust beats choosing on reach, according to what marketers report. Follower counts alone will not get you there.
• Measurement remains a weak spot, so agree your reporting before you spend. Named engagers and cost per thousand impressions are easier to defend than likes.
• Be careful with comparisons between groups. Very effective programmes doing something more often does not prove that the activity caused the success.

Fame has not published its own campaign benchmarks yet, so none appear here. To see how we run sponsored posts on vetted LinkedIn creators' profiles, see Fame Influencer pricing, or look up unfamiliar terms in the influencer marketing glossary. For the wider method, start with our complete guide to B2B influencer marketing and LinkedIn influencer marketing playbook. To see campaigns in practice, read our B2B influencer marketing examples.

If you are ready to choose a route, compare LinkedIn Creator Marketplace and agencies, or browse the best B2B influencer marketing agencies and best LinkedIn influencer marketing agencies. Fame's own options include our LinkedIn influencer marketing agency service, influencer marketing for SaaS companies and our vetted creators. Our published sponsored post examples are founder Tom Hunt's own posts, not roster results.