Influencer budgets keep climbing, yet too many teams still can’t answer the CFO’s simplest question: What did it drive? The gap isn’t effort—it’s signal loss, tool sprawl, and manual steps that turn attribution into a guessing game.

The state of play

Privacy changes and platform-side signal loss have blurred last-click and view-through visibility. Meanwhile, fragmented workflows (spreadsheets, screenshots, DMs) slow validation and inflate error rates. The result: delayed decisions, wasted spend, and low confidence in what actually moves revenue—not just reach.

Recent findings underscore the gap and the path forward: 60% of enterprise marketers cite ROI measurement as their top influencer challenge [CITATION NEEDED]; many still struggle to connect creator costs to revenue with confidence [CITATION NEEDED]. On the solution side, AI can cut creator vetting time by up to 70% [CITATION NEEDED]. And 60.2% of teams already use AI for discovery/optimization, with 66.4% reporting improved outcomes [CITATION NEEDED]. Global creator spend continues to expand despite the measurement gap [CITATION NEEDED].

Executive summary

This article is a pragmatic blueprint for turning influencer discovery into a revenue engine. We’ll clarify what “influencer tracking” actually means across the funnel—beyond vanity metrics—and show how AI-powered discovery reduces noise, compresses time-to-value, and improves match quality. You’ll get a tool selection framework that aligns with your data constraints, a playbook to operationalize performance (from brief to payout), and a metrics stack that rolls from campaign-level signals to board-ready ROI. Expect concrete guidance on attribution options in a post-signal world, how to standardize creator data for decisioning, and where AI materially cuts cycle time and cost—without sacrificing brand safety or compliance.

What you’ll learn

• The true scope of influencer tracking—and what’s missing in most stacks

• How AI elevates discovery quality and measurability (not just speed)

• A vendor evaluation checklist aligned to ROI outcomes

• A step-by-step operating model to instrument performance

• The metrics leaders use to scale with confidence

Next: What “Influencer Tracking” Actually Entails.