Social used to be the top of the funnel. Now it's the whole thing: a shopper finds you on TikTok, watches a real person use the product, trusts that face more than any ad, and buys. But most brands still treat creators like a media buy instead of the front door to the brand. This panel gets past the hype into the mechanics: when creator content is brand-direct, when it's retail media, when it's just a fancy affiliate deal, and how to keep it authentic enough that Gen Z trusts it while still trying it to a sale. Real brands, real numbers, real talk on what's working and what's just expensive noise.
Takeaways:
• How to tell when creator content should run as brand-direct spend, retail media, or an affiliate deal, and what changes in each case
• A way to pressure-test whether "authentic" content can still carry a hard call to action without losing Gen Z's trust
• What real brands are actually measuring on creator programs today, and which numbers are vanity