In our second guest episode, host Ceci Carloni sits down with George Mani, Chief Growth Officer at ehko.ai, for a provocative conversation about how creators are becoming the new media companies—and why traditional media's resistance to change is creating the opportunity of a generation.

📺 The Death of Traditional Media: George shares his journey from finance to media, witnessing firsthand how zero-click search, walled gardens restricting traffic, and the expensive TV newsroom model are all fundamentally broken. His work with multicultural publishers revealed a harsh truth: brands showing up only for Heritage Months without year-round authenticity is bad business—and the $1.7 trillion LGBTQ purchasing power proves multicultural isn't niche anymore.

🔥 Creator Burnout & The Pressure Cooker: With media budgets shifting from 10% to 70% flowing through walled gardens, creators face unprecedented pressure from brands expecting unlimited scale at unsustainable rates. George unpacks why the "more is more" advertising mentality doesn't work in the creator economy, how creators receive tens of thousands of DMs daily, and why the industry needs to shift from quantity metrics to quality influence.

🤖 AI as Augmentation, Not Replacement: ehko.ai's mission is to create digital "auras" of creators—not headless avatars, but authentic extensions that handle administrative burden while preserving the human connection that makes influence work. George delivers a bold prediction: within years, AI-generated content will flood social platforms, but this will only make genuine human creators more valuable. He argues AI should automate tedious tasks so creators can focus on what matters: building community and producing content.

From why creators are the new media infrastructure to how brands must fundamentally rethink measurement in the walled garden era to building sustainable economic futures for creators—this conversation captures a watershed moment where the entire media ecosystem is being rebuilt in real time.

The Big Three by Influence Weekly: 3 Biggest Stories. 1 Essential Conversation.

In this year-end episode, hosts Ceci Carloni and Nii Ahene explore three stories that reveal how brands are fundamentally restructuring around creator-first strategies:

🧼 Unilever Admits Defeat (And Wins): The CPG giant's home care division transformed Cleanipedia—a 20-year-old cleaning tips website—into a global creator platform working with 2,000 creators across multiple countries. Their new CEO strategy includes "Said by Others" as a core pillar, essentially admitting that creators deliver brand messages better than Unilever itself. We explore this massive power shift and whether raw, unpolished, socially-native content from regular people is now the winning formula for legacy brands.

🏨 Radisson's Creator Hub Revolution: The global hospitality brand launched a platform specifically for nano influencers across 210 hotels, trading free three-night stays for content instead of cash payments. We debate whether this democratizes access for smaller creators or risks normalizing unpaid work, and if brands building their own internal creator systems signals the end of agencies and marketplaces.

📊 The M&A Market Awakens: Despite a 69% drop in deals last year, 2025 saw a major rebound with blockbuster acquisitions like Publicis buying Captivate for $175M. Quartermass Advisors' new report predicts even more $100M+ deals in 2026—but here's the twist: all the value is going to companies that help brands work with creators, not companies that help creators themselves. We explore what this means for where the real power and money sits in the creator economy.

From Unilever giving up brand control to Radisson building creator infrastructure to M&A revealing who actually captures value—this episode shows how 2025 reshaped the fundamental structure of the creator economy.

The Big Three by Influence Weekly: 3 Biggest Stories. 1 Essential Conversation.

The Big Three by Influence Weekly: 3 Biggest Stories. 1 Essential Conversation.

In our first-ever guest episode, host Ceci Carloni sits down with Alex Dahan, founder and CEO of Open Influence, to explore the complete evolution of influencer marketing from a founder's perspective who's been in the trenches since 2013.

🚀 From Clothing Line to Agency Pioneer: Alex shares how selling out his own products through early Instagram promoters led to founding Open Influence at 19—before "influencer marketing" was even a term. We dive into the early days of convincing brands that social media was the future, battling misconceptions about creator effectiveness, and why execution has always been the true differentiator in this space.

📊 Data, Community & What Actually Works: After 12 years working with brands like AT&T, Uber, Mercedes-Benz, and Amazon, Alex reveals what's fundamentally changed (data-driven decision making) versus what's stayed constant (content is still king, community is queen). He explains why 2017 was the industry's breakthrough moment and why he believes we're still in the infancy stage despite consolidation.

🤖 The AI Revolution & What's Next: Alex delivers a bold prediction: within 3-5 years, AI-generated content will outnumber human-created content on social platforms. But rather than replacing authenticity, he argues this will make genuine human connection even more valuable. We explore how agencies must balance automation with execution, why self-serve tools have become commoditized, and what the next wave of innovation looks like.

From entrepreneurial origins and leadership lessons to the future of AI-flooded social feeds—this conversation captures both the historic arc and forward trajectory of an industry that's still just getting started.

The Big Three by Influence Weekly: 3 Biggest Stories. 1 Essential Conversation.