Original AI-generated illustration for Flonci. Conceptual artwork, not a product screenshot.
ROI data from Israel and campaign examples from Samsung, L'Oreal and Virgin Voyages point to a new pattern: less betting on one big name, more building a portfolio of creators, measuring, and reinforcing what proves itself.
For years, one of the simplest ways to choose an influencer was to look at the biggest number on the profile: how many followers he has.
More followers seemingly meant more exposure. More exposure justified a higher price. And so, the more important the campaign, the stronger the tendency to choose the bigger name.
The data is starting to tell a more complicated story.
The Israeli benchmark that frames the question
In Humanz's Israeli benchmark for 2026, based according to the company on hundreds of organic campaigns measured in its system, the average ROI of Micro influencers stood at about x5.16. For A-list influencers it stood at about x5.2. Nearly the same number.
But moving from the average to the median opens a gap: the median among Micro influencers stood at x4.8, compared with x4.1 among A-list.
That does not say a small influencer is better than a big star. It does place a question mark over one of the market's basic assumptions: audience size alone does not predict the return on the investment.
And the conduct of some of the world's largest brands shows they are already working accordingly.
Samsung: instead of choosing one tier, test them all
Samsung did something especially interesting in a TikTok campaign in Germany for the launch of Galaxy products.
Instead of building the move around a few big names, the company worked with 100 creators, from Micro to Top-tier, and produced 106 content assets. Over four weeks it rotated the ads at a high frequency, every three to four days.
The results illustrated how much a tier is only a starting point. One Micro creator reached 26% engagement, while another creator in the same layer reached only 1.19% (the low-end figure as cited in the original Hebrew article; it does not appear in the archived case-study summary). Average engagement in the Mid-tier was 6.2%, and in Macro about 8.1%. The Top-tier showed less variance and therefore more predictable results, but demanded a higher investment.
Samsung did not discover that Micro creators "win". It discovered something more useful: within the same group of influencers, the gaps in performance can be enormous.
So the way to benefit from the advantage of smaller creators is not to pick one Micro and hope for the best. You work with a sufficient number of creators, measure, and identify the ones who truly deliver.
According to TikTok for Business, the campaign led to a 125% increase in average watch time, a 141% increase in CTR and a 53% decrease in CPC on creator-based consideration assets. These are the platform's case-study figures, so they are best read as a business example and not as independent market research.
L'Oreal: the creator is only the first stage
L'Oreal also chose not to pit Micro against Macro.
In the #BeautyTok campaign it used both groups together. The creators received products and produced content in their natural style. Then came the important stage: L'Oreal took the creative and ran different media layers on it, including TopView, In-Feed and Spark Ads.
In other words, choosing the influencer was not the end of the decision. It was the beginning of a system: creator, content, measurement, amplification.
According to TikTok for Business, the campaign was also measured against business results, including a 43% increase in e-commerce sales in Peru and 92% in Ecuador.
Here too, the question is not "which tier won?". What is interesting is that the brand built a mix of creators, formats and media, rather than assuming the influencer's size alone would determine the campaign's success.
Virgin Voyages: 1,103 creators instead of a bet on a few stars
Virgin Voyages took the idea one step further.
In a move published in 2026, 1,103 creators took part, combining Micro creators, larger talent and community activity. The move produced more than 22.7 million video views and more than 3,200 posts around the campaign.
But the most interesting detail is not the number of creators. Virgin received 180 days of content usage rights, so it could identify which videos performed better and then keep promoting and distributing exactly those, through paid media.
The same structure returns: do not pick a winner in advance. Create variety, measure, identify winners, and then invest more in them.
Three campaigns, one pattern
Samsung, L'Oreal and Virgin Voyages are very different from one another. Technology, cosmetics and travel. The campaign goals and the markets differ as well. But the same logic appears in all three.
Do not rely on a single tier. Micro, Mid, Macro and A-list fill different roles. Do not assume the follower count predicts performance. Even within the same layer of creators, the gaps can be extreme. Do not treat the creator's post as the finish line. The content becomes an asset that can be measured, compared and amplified. Move budget to what proves itself. The budget turns from something allocated in advance into something managed throughout the campaign.
And this connects directly to the Israeli figure we started with. When the average ROI of Micro and of A-list is nearly identical, x5.16 versus x5.2, it is hard to justify a choice based on audience size alone.
The marketing manager's question changes
Less: who is the biggest influencer we can buy? More: which creator is expected to produce the best value for our price, our goal and our audience?
And perhaps even more important: how do we build a campaign that lets us discover that before we allocate most of the budget?
This is no longer just influencer selection. It is investment management in influencers.
Research notes and sources
This article is an English edition of "יותר עוקבים לא בהכרח מייצרים יותר החזר השקעה" by Amit Magen, first published in Hebrew on October 7, 2026 and preserved in the FLONCI archive at flonci.co.il. The original archive notice applies: the content reflects its original publication date; data, prices, examples and tool descriptions may have changed, and nothing in it is a verified FLONCI client result or a commitment to an outcome.
Source framing for the figures. The Israeli benchmark figures were checked on October 21, 2026 against Humanz's published 2026 benchmark at benchmark26.humanz.co.il, which describes the report as based on hundreds of organic campaigns measured in Humanz's system, without paid promotion; the tier averages (Micro x5.16, A-List x5.2) and medians (Micro x4.8, A-List x4.1) match that page. They remain Humanz's own measurements, not an independent audit. The Samsung, L'Oreal and Virgin Voyages figures are platform and press case-study numbers, not independent market research. The L'Oreal #BeautyTok figures, including the sales increases of 43% in Peru and 92% in Ecuador, match TikTok for Business's case study at ads.tiktok.com. The Virgin Voyages figures (1,103 creators, 22.7 million video views, over 3,200 posts, 180 days of content usage rights) match TikTok for Business's Creator Voyage case study at ads.tiktok.com; press coverage of the same cruise by Skift and Ad Age confirms the event with its own counts. The Samsung Germany campaign figures (100 creators, 106 content assets, the four-week run, the tier engagement bands, and the 125% watch-time, 141% CTR and 53% CPC changes) follow TikTok for Business's case study, corroborated by a LinkedIn post from TikTok's DACH general manager and an archived reading of the case study; the case study's live page is no longer available, and the single low-end Micro engagement figure of 1.19% is cited from the original Hebrew article, as noted in the text. The cover image is an original AI-generated illustration, not a product screenshot.
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