Advertising value equivalency (AVE): what it is and why not to judge creator campaigns by it

Advertising value equivalency (AVE) is the amount a brand would have had to pay for paid advertising of similar space, airtime or reach to what it got from an unpaid publication or one obtained other than by buying media. In creator campaigns, AVE answers the question “what would these views have cost if we had bought them as ads”. It does not answer the question a brand actually cares about: did the campaign change anything — in awareness, website traffic or sales.

That is why you can show AVE as a curiosity, but it should not be the main measure of an influencer marketing campaign’s success. Instead, judge the campaign by what can be measured and tied to its goal: reach within the target audience, engagement, clicks, discount code uses, sales and cost per acquisition. This is easiest when, from the very start, you have a clear brief, agreed formats and creator stats in one place — for example by running the campaign through Blogger Bank.

Where advertising value equivalency came from

AVE grew out of public relations. For years PR teams needed a way to show management the value of press articles and TV coverage the company had not paid for. The simplest explanation was: “this article took up half a page, and a half-page ad in this title costs this much”. Over time the same logic moved online, then to social media and influencer marketing.

In the creator world, AVE shows up most often in agency reports and monitoring tools. The client sees one big number that is easy to paste into a presentation. That simplicity is exactly why the metric is still popular, even though the measurement industry has advised against it for years.

How AVE is calculated — in words, without formulas

The idea is always the same: take what the campaign “received” (space, time, views) and price it using a paid advertising rate card. In practice there are several variants:

• The space variant — typical of print. You measure how much space the piece took and multiply it by the price of an ad of the same size in the same outlet.
• The reach variant — typical of online and social media. The number of views of a creator’s post is converted using the average price per thousand ad impressions (CPM) on that platform.
• The multiplier variant — an extra factor is added on top, justified by the idea that a creator’s recommendation is more credible than a banner. This multiplier usually has no source other than an agreement between the agency and the client.

Each variant requires assumptions: which rate card to use, whether to count views or unique reach, whether to include stories that disappear after a day, and whether to add a multiplier. Two agencies can calculate the AVE of the same campaign and get completely different numbers. That is the first sign the metric says more about the method than about the campaign.

Why the industry criticises AVE

The strongest voice belongs to AMEC, the international association for the measurement and evaluation of communication. AMEC runs the “Say No to AVEs” campaign, which calls on PR and communications organisations to fully abandon AVE and all of its derivatives as a metric. The association also developed the Barcelona Principles — a set of communication measurement principles evolving since 2010 that focuses on measuring outcomes and impact rather than mere media presence.

The main objections to AVE, applied to creator campaigns:

• It measures cost, not effect. AVE tells you what something would have cost, not what it delivered. A high equivalent does not mean a single new customer.
• It ignores the quality of the contact. A creator video criticising the product can have the same AVE as an enthusiastic review, because the views are the same.
• It ignores audience fit. A million views among people outside the target group produce a high equivalent and very little value for the brand.
• It compares the incomparable. A creator post is content the audience chose themselves, often with clearly labelled collaboration. A paid ad is a different contact and a different kind of attention. Converting one into the other by rate card is arbitrary.
• It is easy to inflate. Choosing a pricier rate card or adding a multiplier instantly improves the result, even though nothing changed in the campaign.
• It does not support decisions. AVE makes it hard to tell which creator to invite again, which format worked and what to change next time.

When AVE is still used and how to present it

Sometimes a client or the board explicitly asks for advertising value equivalency, because that is how the company has reported for years. You do not have to refuse, but present it honestly:

• show AVE in a separate, clearly labelled section, never as the headline result;
• state plainly which rate card and method were used, and that no multipliers were applied;
• next to AVE, show effect metrics: clicks, codes, sales, cost per acquisition;
• add one sentence explaining that AVE describes a hypothetical media cost, not the business value of the campaign.

Over time you can move the conversation towards metrics that really show results. Usually one campaign with both approaches side by side is enough.

What to use instead of AVE: better metrics for creator campaigns

The rule is simple: goal first, metric second. A campaign building awareness is judged differently from one meant to sell. Below are the metrics worth collecting, from the top of the funnel to the bottom.

Reach and views within the target audience

Reach tells you how many unique people saw the post, and views how many times it was displayed. This is an awareness measure, but only if you know who those viewers are. Ask the creator for screenshots of their stats with demographics: country, city, age, gender. Reach among dog owners is worth far more to a pet food brand than the same reach among random people — which is why such a brand should look for creators in the pets category rather than go by follower count alone.

Engagement

Engagement rate shows what share of the audience reacted: liked, commented, saved or shared the content. Saves and shares usually say more than likes, because they require a conscious decision. Read the comments too. Questions about price, availability or size signal purchase interest that no equivalent will ever show.

Clicks and website traffic

Every creator should get their own link with UTM parameters. Then your analytics will show how many people came from a specific post, how long they stayed and what they did. For stories with links, CTR — the share of people who clicked after viewing — is also useful. In categories where the purchase is considered, such as technology or automotive, traffic and time on site can matter more than immediate sales.

Discount codes

An individual code for each creator is the simplest way to attribute sales. It works even when the viewer did not click the link but typed the shop address manually or bought a few days later. Remember that codes get shared on deal sites, so some orders with a code do not come from the creator’s audience. Codes are especially useful in fast-purchase categories such as food or home products.

Sales, conversion and cost per acquisition

From clicks and codes you get the number and value of orders, and from them the conversion rate. The key metric for sales campaigns is cost per acquisition (CPA): all the costs of working with a creator — fee, value of product sent for testing, production costs — divided by the number of customers or orders acquired. You can compare CPA with acquisition costs in other channels, which AVE does not allow.

ROI

At the end of the chain is ROI, a comparison of the campaign’s profit with its cost. When calculating return, use margin rather than revenue, and remember the effects that come later: returning customers and content you can keep using if you hold the rights. A step-by-step guide to measuring results is in our article how to measure the results of a creator campaign (in Polish).

How to match metrics to the campaign goal

• Brand awareness — reach within the target audience, views, brand recall checked with a short survey, growth in brand name searches.
• Engagement and community — engagement rate, saves, shares, comment content, follower growth on the brand profile.
• Traffic and consideration — clicks from UTM links, CTR, time on site, add-to-carts.
• Sales — orders from codes and links, conversion, CPA, ROI.
• Content for further use — number of assets with usage rights for ads and how they perform in paid campaigns.

Write the goal and metrics into the brief before the collaboration starts. Then the creator knows which stats to deliver, and you do not have to chase them later.

How to show results to a client without AVE

A good report starts with the goal, then shows metrics matched to that goal, and ends with conclusions: which posts and creators performed best and what to change in the next campaign. Breaking results down by creator helps decide whom to continue working with. A ready structure for such a document is in our article influencer campaign report for a client — template.

If the client is used to one big number, offer a single figure that makes business sense instead: total sales attributed to the campaign, or cost per acquisition compared with other channels. It is just as easy to remember and shows the result honestly.

How Blogger Bank solves the problem of evaluating creator campaigns

To avoid rescuing your report with advertising value equivalency, you need order from day one of the collaboration. On Blogger Bank:

• Instead of vague agreements over email — you describe the goal, formats and the stats you want in the brief, so creators apply already knowing what is expected.
• Instead of choosing by follower count — you review creators who applied to your brief themselves and pick those whose audience matches your target group.
• Instead of negotiating each contract separately — the contract with the chosen creator opens automatically on the brief’s terms.
• Instead of hunting for content and stats across messengers — conversation, content approval and payment are in one place, so it is easy to gather data for the report and evaluate each collaboration.

Browse the influencer catalogue, then create a brand account and publish a brief that states up front how you will measure results.