A few months ago, we gave the team at The Influencer Marketing Factory (IMF) access to the Modash API.

(If you're not clued in on all things Modash, the Modash API is where Modash, the platform, gets all its data from.)

IMF dug into the raw data and came back with the Brand Deals Report 2026.

Here are some findings that stood out to me at first glance.

68.5% of brand-creator collaborations on Instagram happen once. On TikTok, it's 71.8%. Over on YouTube, it's a slightly different story — 50.9% of collabs are repeats.

What's going on? Why so many one-off sponsored posts? Here’s what I see going on.

First, influencer marketing is booming. More brands are jumping in than ever before, which means more first-time collaborations. Brands test the waters with a creator or two, posts go live, and… crickets. Not enough sales to justify the spend.

But a one-off sponsored post isn’t the point of influencer marketing. One post not performing could be down to a dozen reasons. You need at least two or three before you get a real picture of what someone can do for your brand.

We consistently see that brands with strong influencer programs work with the same creators over time.

Generally, creators get better the more they work with your brand. Audiences trust a recommendation more when they've seen it before.

So, when you look at your own program, are you contributing to the high rate of one-off collabs the data shows? What would happen if you negotiated three posts with every creator instead of just one?

I see the same advice recommended everywhere. “If you want to win with influencer marketing, you've got to have long-term partnerships.”

No one ever says what “long-term” actually means.

Influencer Marketing Factory has finally defined this. They looked at how long repeat partnerships last on each platform.

Overall, YouTube partnerships last the longest, averaging 13.5 months. Instagram is at 7.7 months. TikTok: 4.9 months. That's the average time span between first and last collaboration — not necessarily consecutive months of posting.

While we can’t accurately gauge how many times creators posted over the course of the partnership, these findings show us what a “long-term partnership” looks like on each platform.

It doesn’t have to mean multiple years. It simply means you want to hire creators to post multiple times over a longer period.

You get to define how long your repeat collabs will be, depending on your products, your brand, and performance.

On Instagram, repeat-collaboration rates barely change across tiers. Nano creators (10K–25K): 32.1%. Mid-tier (100K–200K): 30.4%. Mega (1M–1.5M): 29.9%. It's essentially flat.

TikTok is similar — repeat rates hover between 22% and 27% regardless of creator size. Even on YouTube, the variation between tiers is modest.

It seems that there is no relationship between creator tier and repeat partnerships. There isn’t some secret cohort of creator sizes that brands work with more consistently.

When you’re choosing creators to work with, the size of their audience only tells two pieces of information: the size of the audience (duh!) and how much it’ll likely cost you. (Smaller = more affordable, bigger = more $$$).

You’ll still have to choose the creators you bring back on a case-by-case basis.

Do we have a lineup for you for the next installment of How brands do influencer marketing?

In this special edition of Modash LIVE, you’ll learn from marketers working with creators at brands like Moroccan Oil, Edelman, and L’Oreal.

I’ve peeked at their slide decks, and we’re going to have a great time hearing about what’s working now and what’s coming up.

More names to be announced soon.

Save the date and your seat here.

As a budding balcony gardener, my FYP served me @johns_plant_adventures. Suffice it to say, I now have an impossible standard.

Who they are: John, an Arizona-based container gardener with 271K followers on TikTok who calls himself a "luxury gardener."

Why they’re worth a follow: John gardens in Zone 9b, which Google told me means he's growing in what is essentially an oven. And he does it entirely in pots. His monthly garden tours are the main event — lisianthus, delphiniums, snapdragons, foxgloves, all thriving in containers. If you've ever looked at your balcony/patio and thought, "I wish I had an actual garden”, John is your inspiration.

Dream collab: Sure, garden tool and hose brands make sense here. But what I'd really love to see is a fragrance or skincare brand partner with him. Take Aesop, for example. He could build a new arrangement around a specific scent. Or plant the actual botanical notes — the rosemary, the lavender, the mandarin— and let this container garden become the fragrance.

If you've discovered a creator that you love and have a dream collab in mind, shoot me an email at [email protected] so I can share it with the group.

See you next time!
Eleni Zoe xx
Brand @ Modash. Say hi on LinkedIn