New IAB Australia research shows 61% of Australians now discover brands through creators, rising to 85% among under-40s, while Australian influencer spend nears A$1 billion. The budget lags the behaviour because the measurement infrastructure is still half-built.
The Take: Creators are not a nice-to-have channel anymore. For most Australians they are the front door, the first place your brand gets seen. The money has not caught up, because the measurement has not caught up either. Fresh numbers this week put the behaviour beyond argument, so the businesses still treating creators as garnish are underfunding the exact moment a buyer first hears their name.
On the ground: IAB Australia's Creator Connect research, released Thursday, found 61% of Australians now discover brands through creators. It climbs to 85% among those under 40 and drops to 21% among Australians aged 60 to 70. If your buyers skew younger, a creator is now more likely to introduce you than your own website.
The maths: Australian brands spent A$830 million on influencer marketing over the past twelve months, up 13.5% year on year, and are on track to pass A$1 billion during 2026. Real money, growing fast, still a fraction of what the same brands pour into search and social each year. The channel doing the discovery is not the channel getting the budget.
What Australian brands spent on influencer marketing in the past year, up 13.5%
What to watch: the reason finance holds the line is trust in the reporting. At IAB's first Creator Upfront, the sticking point was a half-built measurement layer that keeps CFOs from signing bigger cheques. It is the same gap we wrote about in today's piece on AI search. The influence is real. The instrument is not built yet, so the budget waits.
For Australian operators: stop scoring creators on last-click sales and start tracking what they actually move. Watch branded search volume and direct traffic in the fortnight after a creator posts. Brief creators on the outcome and let them keep their own voice, because the scripted read is the one that gets scrolled past. Pick for audience fit and Australian relevance over follower count. Do not wait for perfect attribution to fund the channel that is already introducing you to six in ten of the country. The measurement will mature. The behaviour is here now.