The Australian Influencer Marketing Council’s (AiMCO) recent beauty influencer breakfast sessions exposed the creator economy’s hunger for face-to-face connection and the perpetual innovation within beauty influencer marketing—a category many assumed had reached maturity.
These events, organized in partnership with influencer platform Vamp, quickly sold out despite being AiMCO’s first venture into beauty-specific gatherings.
“I probably could have filled the rooms twice over with the sheer amount of interest,” reflects Patrick Whitnall, AiMCO’s Managing Director, describing the demand for the organization’s first-ever beauty influencer events.
“There was a quote from our speaker from Sydney, Celeste Godoy [Wella Company executive]. She said that she’s seeing a big movement from URL to IRL,” Patrick shares, referring to the shift from online to in-real-life experiences.
This movement toward in-person engagement represents a significant pivot for AiMCO, which held 21 events last year, many in webinar format.
“Twelve months ago, we were doing many more webinars because it means we can reach a broader space. And Australia is a big country, so trying to get to every market is hard,” explains Patrick. “But the impact that we’re seeing from in-real-life events is certainly encouraging, and with these being sold out, we need to think about doing more because people want to connect and share experiences in person.”
The breakfast format was deliberately chosen to minimize disrupting attendees’ workdays while maximizing networking opportunities. Attendees—primarily from AiMCO’s member agencies, brands, and creator talent agencies—arrived early, demonstrating their eagerness to participate despite the morning time slot.
Patrick Whitnall
Beauty’s Surprising Second Act in Influencer Marketing
Perhaps even more revealing than the format’s success was the subject matter’s drawing power. Beauty influencer marketing, one of the industry’s oldest and most established categories, proved it still has the power to generate excitement and drive innovation.
“When I first approached it, I thought, ‘Well, beauty’s such a well-experienced space and has been in with both feet since the beginning of influencer marketing,'” admits Patrick. “It just felt like a well-trodden path.”
Image: AiMCO’s Sydney event
The response challenged his assumptions and highlighted beauty’s role as a bellwether in the creator economy.
“The category itself is always innovating, of course, but I think with that innovation from a product perspective comes innovation in the influencer space,” Patrick observes. “Other categories and other markets and other businesses tend to look at the beauty industry and ask, ‘What is it that they’re doing that we can either take inspiration from or learn from?'”
“After attending the AiMCO Travel Summit late last year, I knew we had to partner with Patrick on a Beauty event,” says Gemma Shuttleworth, Vamp’s APAC Sales Director. “With over 300 campaigns activated in the last 24 months, it’s clear Beauty is a core category for Vamp and in our channel. The brands are diverse with many challenger brands and an emphasis on social and creator-first strategies, making it one of the leading categories in creator marketing.”
Gemma Shuttleworth
Curating Diverse Voices Through Strategic Panel Selection
The events’ success stemmed partly from thoughtful curation of diverse perspectives. Each panel, moderated by Gemma, featured a strategic mix of creators and brand representatives, ensuring attendees received balanced insights from both sides of the collaboration equation.
In Melbourne, “pharmafluencer” Hannah English brought her pharmaceutical science background to discussions alongside Ego Pharmaceuticals executive Courtney Barlow. English’s expertise was particularly valuable for addressing regulatory challenges regarding sunscreen promotion with entities like the Therapeutics Goods Association (TGA).
“When I spoke to Hannah, who wanted to talk to the TGA and create a conversation about the restrictiveness of being able to talk about sun safety and sunscreen, I said this might be a great platform to share your views,” Patrick explains.
Sydney’s panel featured beauty creator Mitch Greer alongside Unilever data lead Maria Paula Gudino and Godoy. This combination provided perspectives from both a diverse creator voice and major beauty brand representatives.
“What Mitch added was that she’s an amazing beauty creator, works with some amazing brands, but also is a celebrated trans woman,” Patrick notes. “It was important to hear from another diverse voice in that space while also having very well versed marketers pushing the industry forward.”
“It was a delight to host both panels with esteemed clients from Ego Pharmaceuticals, Wella and Unilever,” Gemma says. “Each panelist brought a new perspective and while common themes and trends emerged across both Sydney and Melbourne events, the panelists’ unique experiences, expertise, passion points and points of view really drove the conversation and areas of focus.”
Beyond Awareness: Beauty’s Evolution to Full-Funnel Impact
The panels highlighted a significant maturation in how beauty brands approach influencer marketing, moving beyond traditional awareness metrics to comprehensive brand impact measurement.
“People early on in their journey of working with creators often see it as just organic content for awareness and consideration,” Patrick observes. “But there’s a really big push into measuring ROI that brands are starting to see, and the impact that creator work is having in conjunction with their brand work.”
He notes that this mirrors influencer marketing’s trajectory from an experimental channel to a core marketing strategy. “ROI isn’t just about click-through rates,” Patrick emphasizes. “It’s about how creator and influencer work can impact brand lift, share of voice, and memory structures—delivering long-term wins for this industry.”
The conversations in Melbourne and Sydney showed how beauty brands establish benchmarks other industries can follow, creating what Patrick describes as “a full funnel marketing opportunity.”
From Transactional to Strategic: The Progression of Creator Relationships
Both event panels identified a clear shift in how beauty brands approach creator relationships, moving from campaign-focused interactions to deeper, more strategic partnerships.
“In Melbourne, Hannah spoke about her partnership with Tbh Skincare, launching her own product range – the first product was a serum Rebound which quickly gained cult-status and the collaboration progressed into a range of four products,” Gemma notes.
“There were always moments in a marketing calendar where you have launches, but it was felt that long-term partnerships with brands and creators were beneficial on all parts,” Patrick reports, adding that this approach allows for more authentic content development and stronger audience connections.
Similarly, product gifting—long a staple of beauty influencer marketing—is being reimagined. “Mass gifting was not necessarily the future,” Patrick explains, citing Greer’s emphasis on personalization. “If she were sent footwear, that’s not right for her; it wouldn’t work for her or her audience, and it would not be an authentic relationship.”
This change aligns with growing regulatory attention from the Australian Tax Office regarding the tax implications of gifting for both creators and brands. AiMCO’s focus on these regulatory developments made the panels’ insights particularly timely for attendees navigating compliance.
Breaking Boundaries: Beauty Content Beyond Social Media
One of the most significant revelations from the events was how beauty creator content has transcended traditional social media boundaries to become integrated into brands’ broader marketing strategies.
“Hearing about the quality of work that creators are producing for brands that is pushing it outside of social media and into out-of-home, digital media, and cinema was exciting,” Patrick observes. “When I grew up, you would see Hollywood A-lister stars on outdoor posters, but now you’re seeing great work from localized creators working with these brands.”
Sydney panelists from Unilever and Wella Company shared specific examples of how they’ve incorporated creator content into traditional advertising channels, demonstrating beauty’s leadership in creator integration across marketing touchpoints.
“It’s been fascinating to see the shift here,” Gemma states. “As Celeste from Wella touched on, brands are integrating creators into their wider marketing strategies – hosting events, appearing in brand-led advertising and on billboards. In response to the rise in demand, Vamp has developed new briefing solutions and in-platform content licensing options to make harnessing this opportunity easy and efficient for brands.”
What Event Organizers Should Know
For creator economy professionals considering similar events, Patrick offers practical advice based on AiMCO’s experience with these sold-out sessions:
“I would certainly wish that we had secured bigger venues. Look at venue flexibility and be open to spaces you may be biased towards or against,” he recommends. “Play with formats and test what your membership wants to hear and see.”
Documenting events more comprehensively is another area for improvement. “If budgets would allow, I’d love to be able to record more of these in-real-life events so we can capture the work beyond just photography. This would allow more people to benefit from the insights shared.”
Looking ahead, AiMCO plans to apply lessons from these beauty events to other industry verticals. “We’ve done events like travel or Black Friday in the past. We’re open to any spaces with a thriving economy and conversations where our members can connect and learn,” Patrick shares. The organization is also exploring partnerships around mental health first aid training to address creator burnout.
Balancing Digital Efficiency with Human Connection
AiMCO’s sold-out beauty events demonstrate that even as the creator economy pushes digital boundaries, the value of in-person connection remains paramount. Simultaneously, they prove that established categories like beauty continue to make strides when diverse voices are brought together to share insights.
“For me, if we can see growth from a revenue perspective or increasing the quality of the work through inspiration and collaboration via our events, then I think that’s what we’re hopefully providing,” Patrick concludes.
Through events like these, AiMCO aims to “continually raise the bar” for Australia’s influencer marketing ecosystem.
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The Australian Influencer Marketing Council’s (AiMCO) recent beauty influencer breakfast sessions exposed the creator economy’s hunger for face-to-face connection and the perpetual innovation within beauty influencer marketing—a category many assumed had reached maturity.
These events, organized in partnership with influencer platform Vamp, quickly sold out despite being AiMCO’s first venture into beauty-specific gatherings.
“I probably could have filled the rooms twice over with the sheer amount of interest,” reflects Patrick Whitnall, AiMCO’s Managing Director, describing the demand for the organization’s first-ever beauty influencer events.
“There was a quote from our speaker from Sydney, Celeste Godoy [Wella Company executive]. She said that she’s seeing a big movement from URL to IRL,” Patrick shares, referring to the shift from online to in-real-life experiences.
This movement toward in-person engagement represents a significant pivot for AiMCO, which held 21 events last year, many in webinar format.
“Twelve months ago, we were doing many more webinars because it means we can reach a broader space. And Australia is a big country, so trying to get to every market is hard,” explains Patrick. “But the impact that we’re seeing from in-real-life events is certainly encouraging, and with these being sold out, we need to think about doing more because people want to connect and share experiences in person.”
The breakfast format was deliberately chosen to minimize disrupting attendees’ workdays while maximizing networking opportunities. Attendees—primarily from AiMCO’s member agencies, brands, and creator talent agencies—arrived early, demonstrating their eagerness to participate despite the morning time slot.
Patrick Whitnall
Beauty’s Surprising Second Act in Influencer Marketing
Perhaps even more revealing than the format’s success was the subject matter’s drawing power. Beauty influencer marketing, one of the industry’s oldest and most established categories, proved it still has the power to generate excitement and drive innovation.
“When I first approached it, I thought, ‘Well, beauty’s such a well-experienced space and has been in with both feet since the beginning of influencer marketing,'” admits Patrick. “It just felt like a well-trodden path.”
Image: AiMCO’s Sydney event
The response challenged his assumptions and highlighted beauty’s role as a bellwether in the creator economy.
“The category itself is always innovating, of course, but I think with that innovation from a product perspective comes innovation in the influencer space,” Patrick observes. “Other categories and other markets and other businesses tend to look at the beauty industry and ask, ‘What is it that they’re doing that we can either take inspiration from or learn from?'”
“After attending the AiMCO Travel Summit late last year, I knew we had to partner with Patrick on a Beauty event,” says Gemma Shuttleworth, Vamp’s APAC Sales Director. “With over 300 campaigns activated in the last 24 months, it’s clear Beauty is a core category for Vamp and in our channel. The brands are diverse with many challenger brands and an emphasis on social and creator-first strategies, making it one of the leading categories in creator marketing.”
Gemma Shuttleworth
Curating Diverse Voices Through Strategic Panel Selection
The events’ success stemmed partly from thoughtful curation of diverse perspectives. Each panel, moderated by Gemma, featured a strategic mix of creators and brand representatives, ensuring attendees received balanced insights from both sides of the collaboration equation.
In Melbourne, “pharmafluencer” Hannah English brought her pharmaceutical science background to discussions alongside Ego Pharmaceuticals executive Courtney Barlow. English’s expertise was particularly valuable for addressing regulatory challenges regarding sunscreen promotion with entities like the Therapeutics Goods Association (TGA).
“When I spoke to Hannah, who wanted to talk to the TGA and create a conversation about the restrictiveness of being able to talk about sun safety and sunscreen, I said this might be a great platform to share your views,” Patrick explains.
Sydney’s panel featured beauty creator Mitch Greer alongside Unilever data lead Maria Paula Gudino and Godoy. This combination provided perspectives from both a diverse creator voice and major beauty brand representatives.
“What Mitch added was that she’s an amazing beauty creator, works with some amazing brands, but also is a celebrated trans woman,” Patrick notes. “It was important to hear from another diverse voice in that space while also having very well versed marketers pushing the industry forward.”
“It was a delight to host both panels with esteemed clients from Ego Pharmaceuticals, Wella and Unilever,” Gemma says. “Each panelist brought a new perspective and while common themes and trends emerged across both Sydney and Melbourne events, the panelists’ unique experiences, expertise, passion points and points of view really drove the conversation and areas of focus.”
Beyond Awareness: Beauty’s Evolution to Full-Funnel Impact
The panels highlighted a significant maturation in how beauty brands approach influencer marketing, moving beyond traditional awareness metrics to comprehensive brand impact measurement.
“People early on in their journey of working with creators often see it as just organic content for awareness and consideration,” Patrick observes. “But there’s a really big push into measuring ROI that brands are starting to see, and the impact that creator work is having in conjunction with their brand work.”
He notes that this mirrors influencer marketing’s trajectory from an experimental channel to a core marketing strategy. “ROI isn’t just about click-through rates,” Patrick emphasizes. “It’s about how creator and influencer work can impact brand lift, share of voice, and memory structures—delivering long-term wins for this industry.”
The conversations in Melbourne and Sydney showed how beauty brands establish benchmarks other industries can follow, creating what Patrick describes as “a full funnel marketing opportunity.”
From Transactional to Strategic: The Progression of Creator Relationships
Both event panels identified a clear shift in how beauty brands approach creator relationships, moving from campaign-focused interactions to deeper, more strategic partnerships.
“In Melbourne, Hannah spoke about her partnership with Tbh Skincare, launching her own product range – the first product was a serum Rebound which quickly gained cult-status and the collaboration progressed into a range of four products,” Gemma notes.
“There were always moments in a marketing calendar where you have launches, but it was felt that long-term partnerships with brands and creators were beneficial on all parts,” Patrick reports, adding that this approach allows for more authentic content development and stronger audience connections.
Similarly, product gifting—long a staple of beauty influencer marketing—is being reimagined. “Mass gifting was not necessarily the future,” Patrick explains, citing Greer’s emphasis on personalization. “If she were sent footwear, that’s not right for her; it wouldn’t work for her or her audience, and it would not be an authentic relationship.”
This change aligns with growing regulatory attention from the Australian Tax Office regarding the tax implications of gifting for both creators and brands. AiMCO’s focus on these regulatory developments made the panels’ insights particularly timely for attendees navigating compliance.
Breaking Boundaries: Beauty Content Beyond Social Media
One of the most significant revelations from the events was how beauty creator content has transcended traditional social media boundaries to become integrated into brands’ broader marketing strategies.
“Hearing about the quality of work that creators are producing for brands that is pushing it outside of social media and into out-of-home, digital media, and cinema was exciting,” Patrick observes. “When I grew up, you would see Hollywood A-lister stars on outdoor posters, but now you’re seeing great work from localized creators working with these brands.”
Sydney panelists from Unilever and Wella Company shared specific examples of how they’ve incorporated creator content into traditional advertising channels, demonstrating beauty’s leadership in creator integration across marketing touchpoints.
“It’s been fascinating to see the shift here,” Gemma states. “As Celeste from Wella touched on, brands are integrating creators into their wider marketing strategies – hosting events, appearing in brand-led advertising and on billboards. In response to the rise in demand, Vamp has developed new briefing solutions and in-platform content licensing options to make harnessing this opportunity easy and efficient for brands.”
What Event Organizers Should Know
For creator economy professionals considering similar events, Patrick offers practical advice based on AiMCO’s experience with these sold-out sessions:
“I would certainly wish that we had secured bigger venues. Look at venue flexibility and be open to spaces you may be biased towards or against,” he recommends. “Play with formats and test what your membership wants to hear and see.”
Documenting events more comprehensively is another area for improvement. “If budgets would allow, I’d love to be able to record more of these in-real-life events so we can capture the work beyond just photography. This would allow more people to benefit from the insights shared.”
Looking ahead, AiMCO plans to apply lessons from these beauty events to other industry verticals. “We’ve done events like travel or Black Friday in the past. We’re open to any spaces with a thriving economy and conversations where our members can connect and learn,” Patrick shares. The organization is also exploring partnerships around mental health first aid training to address creator burnout.
Balancing Digital Efficiency with Human Connection
AiMCO’s sold-out beauty events demonstrate that even as the creator economy pushes digital boundaries, the value of in-person connection remains paramount. Simultaneously, they prove that established categories like beauty continue to make strides when diverse voices are brought together to share insights.
“For me, if we can see growth from a revenue perspective or increasing the quality of the work through inspiration and collaboration via our events, then I think that’s what we’re hopefully providing,” Patrick concludes.
Through events like these, AiMCO aims to “continually raise the bar” for Australia’s influencer marketing ecosystem.