eBay: The Cast
From one-off influencer deals to a fully integrated ambassador program with storefront attribution, brand lift tracking, and a million dollars in results.
MY ROLE
Senior Social and Influencer Manager — Strategy, Architecture, Casting, Execution
PARTNERS
JOAN Creative, DEPT, Edelman, Condé Nast
PLATFORM
Social, CRM, Onsite, Experiential, PR/Comms, Branded Content, Digital, Audio/Podcast, OOH, Display, Affiliate
PROGRAM SIZE
22 creators across micro, mid, macro and celebrity tiers
$1M+
Directly attributed social commerce revenue
45%
Higher AOV among creator-referred buyers vs. category average
291%
Growth in brand mentions
16%
Average brand perception lift
4x
Higher TOMA vs. benchmark
THE PROBLEM
A list of influencers is not a program.
When I stepped into the Senior Social and Influencer Manager role at eBay Fashion, the influencer program was transactional: a roster of creators contracted for one-off Instagram posts and stories with no consistent brief, no tiered structure, no affiliate attribution, and no way to measure which creators were actually driving business outcomes versus vanity metrics.
THE ARCHITECTURE
Built for commerce. Designed for culture.
I built The Cast end-to-end: defining the program structure, writing the casting criteria, handpicking the 22-creator roster (11 of whom were prior eBay collaborators with authentic, long-standing relationships with the brand), developing briefing standards, building affiliate storefront attribution into the program from day one, and integrating the program across every relevant marketing channel.
The integration was the differentiator. This was not an influencer program that lived only on Instagram. The Cast connected to onsite eBay storefronts, CRM email campaigns promoting creator inventory, paid social amplification of top-performing organic content, branded content campaigns with Condé Nast (Vogue, Teen Vogue, and GQ), and experiential activations at the Teen Vogue Summit, the Vogue Vintage Market in New York, and The Hollywood Edit.
Nava Rose starred in Teen Vogue's Watchlist Campaign. Enya Umanzor, Albert Muzquiz, Emma Chamberlain, and Aimee Kelly starred in Vintage Obsession Confessions, a branded content series with Vogue. And the program's most culturally significant moment came at the Met Gala.
THE ROSTER
22 creators. Every tier. Every audience segment.
The roster was built to cover distinct fashion audience segments and commerce behaviors: resale enthusiasts, luxury collectors, streetwear communities, sustainable fashion advocates, and style-forward Gen Z audiences. Highlighted names were featured in Condé Nast branded content, earned press, or major brand activations.
BUSINESS RESULTS
Attribution infrastructure that proved it.
Every metric was trackable to the individual creator level because I built the measurement framework before the program launched. Creator-attributed GMV, Average Order Value among creator-referred buyers, Earned Media Value by tier, brand perception lift, and Top of Mind Awareness were all tracked and reported quarterly to marketing leadership.
Every metric was trackable to the individual creator level because I built the measurement framework before the program launched. Creator-attributed GMV, Average Order Value among creator-referred buyers, Earned Media Value by tier, brand perception lift, and Top of Mind Awareness were all tracked and reported quarterly to marketing leadership.
+291%
Growth in brand mentions across the program's active period
+16%
Average brand perception lift measured across the full creator roster
EARNED PRESS AND BRAND PARTNERSHIPS
From the pages of Vogue to the Met Gala red carpet.
CREATOR CREDENTIALS
The roster that defined a cultural moment.
Cast members went on to be recognized by Time, Forbes, and GQ during and after the program, reflecting the caliber of creators The Cast was built around.
WHY IT MATTERED
A program architecture others could build on.
The Cast was not a one-cycle influencer campaign. It was a system: casting criteria, briefing standards, affiliate attribution, measurement infrastructure, and cross-channel integration that could be optimized, replicated, and scaled. The measurement framework it introduced became standard infrastructure across the eBay US brand team.
The quality of the roster reflected a philosophy I hold about creator programs: the best ambassador relationships are built on authentic affinity, not transactional reach. When Nava Rose sources pieces from eBay for a dress she wears to the Time100 Creators event without being asked to, that is what genuine brand alignment looks like at work.
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