092: Minisode – From Mommy Bloggers to Influencers with Paula Bruno
What do soccer sidelines, mommy blogs, and multi-million-dollar influencer campaigns have in common? Paula Bruno. In this mini episode, Danny Gavin sits down with the founder of Intuition Media Group to explore how influencer marketing has evolved from the early blogosphere into today’s creator-first economy.
With nearly 25 years in branding, Paula brings a strategic, practical, and deeply human perspective to working with creators. From why listening is more powerful than posting, to how brands should actually approach metrics, Paula breaks down the future of social-first marketing—and why you don’t DM creators unless you know their dog’s name.
Key Points + Topics
[01:31] Paula shares how Intuition Media Group began in 2008 when “influencer” wasn’t even a word—it was the era of mommy and travel bloggers.
[01:45] In her opinion, Instagram changed the game in 2010–2013, and brands started leaning into social creators as part of broader strategies.
[02:21] A conversation with a friend on the soccer field pulled Paula back into marketing after taking time off to raise her kids.
[02:35] Her involvement with women’s leadership groups and early startup investing helped spark the creation of Intuition.
[03:15] Paula defines influencer marketing as upper-funnel by nature—not paid media—and often centered around brand awareness KPIs like bounce rate and clicks.
[03:53] She shares how different platforms require different success metrics: YouTube = retention rate and watch time, TikTok = engagement and views.
[04:10] She also stresses that follower count isn’t the focus—views and genuine engagement matter more for impact.
[04:33] Most brands enter influencer marketing unsure of their goals. Paula leads them through strategy sessions around audience, culture, tone, and platform fit.
[05:09] Her #1 tip? Get in the space and listen. Listening to competitors, creators, and cultural conversations is where brands should start.
[05:45] Paula believes brands often miss the mark with influencer outreach—mass emails and scripts are out. Personalization and genuine relationships are in.
[06:10] Paula shares how influencer marketing is moving toward co-branded products and creator-led discovery.
[06:30] She cites examples like Poppy and Alex Earle’s Abercrombie collab as proof that creators don’t just influence—they move products.
[07:10] AI is a helpful tool for search and discovery—but Paula insists that authenticity and emotional resonance still drive results.
[07:45] Paula warns brands against chasing vanity metrics, arguing that one deeply engaged superfan is worth a hundred passive ones.
[08:20] Smaller creators with tight communities often deliver more meaningful ROI than big-name influencers with diluted audiences.
[08:55] She warns against over-relying on tools—strategy and human creativity are what drive sustainable growth.
[09:30] Paula describes a common misstep: brands hand creators a script and expect magic.
[10:00] Her advice for new marketers? Stay curious. Ask questions. “This space changes every five minutes—that’s what makes it great.”
[10:40] Paula closes with a call to action: Brands shouldn’t just activate influencers—they need to build something with them.
Guest + Episode Links
Full Episode Transcript
Danny Gavin Host
00:05
Welcome to the Digital Marketing Mentor. I’m your host, Danny Gavin founder of Optige, marketing Professor and the host of the Digital Marketing Mentor. Today, we’re thrilled to welcome Paula Bruno, CEO of Intuition Media Group.
With nearly 25 years of experience in marketing and brand building, including 15 years at the helm of Intuition, Paula has dedicated her career to helping brands grow, innovate, and thrive.
Under her leadership, Intuition has become a pioneer in the influencer marketing space, collaborating with leading brands like Canon USA, TikTok, and Hyundai to enhance their influencer capabilities and drive impactful content.
Paula’s expertise spans brand strategy, community engagement, and even mergers and acquisitions, making her a true connector and builder in the industry.
How are you doing today, Paula?
Paula Bruno Guest
01:05
Thank you so much. I’m doing great. Got some spring weather here in New Canaan, connecticut, I think we’re all doing pretty good, no more rain, so doing great.
Danny Gavin Host
01:15
Thank you for having me, my pleasure. We’re going to talk about influencer marketing, and that’s a topic that we haven’t really discussed a lot on this podcast, and so we’re really excited to jump in today. So let’s start from the beginning. When did you first start doing influencer marketing? And I don’t know if that was at the beginning of your agency, but would love to have a little bit of historical perspective.
Paula Bruno Guest
01:31
Yeah, we started it back in 2008. It was more. You know, it really wasn’t called influence then. It was really all mommy bloggers. It was mommy bloggers and travel bloggers, et cetera. No one really used the word influencer for a few years. It kind of started from there and then Instagram became really big and I think that around 2010, 2012, 13, everybody started talking about influencers and brands started leaning more into it. That’s kind of how it all started back in 2008. And ever since then it just has grown. You know the trends. We actually work on all different platforms Instagram, youtube, tiktok, etc.
Danny Gavin Host
02:15
And so why did you get into it in the first place? Was it, like you knew, a mommy blogger? I’m like, hey, I’ll help you make money. Like where did it come from?
Paula Bruno Guest
02:21
I was working and then I stopped and had kids for a few years. And then, through my friend, Jackie on the soccer field, we were talking and I was getting involved in these different organizations, like I said, and we were having all these meetings and groups and getting exposed to different groups like angel investing or women in philanthropy or you know different types of groups, and through one of those groups I became involved in vetting new startups and so one of the startups was this business. That’s when the internet was just starting to bubble up, I knew that there was something, there was a kernel of something that was going to be big, and so I wanted to be involved and that’s kind of how it all transpired.
Danny Gavin Host
03:03
So we’ve talked a lot on the podcast lately about paid media and campaign performance. How do you measure the success of influencer marketing campaigns and what metrics do you or let’s say the clients find the most valuable?
Paula Bruno Guest
03:15
I think when you’re working with influencers, the way we work with influencers is changing quite a bit. So it’s not paid media. So we’re not working in paid media. It is very heavily client driven. Typically it is much more upper funnel brand awareness KPIs, you know, driving clicks to the website, bounce rates, but primarily it is creating that brand awareness. Those are the primary KPIs.
Danny Gavin Host
03:41
So with brand awareness, that would be some of the metrics of how many people engaged with their post or how many people saw it exactly.
Paula Bruno Guest
03:48
I mean those types of those types of metrics, of course, yes.
Danny Gavin Host
03:51
Yes, the softer metrics.
Paula Bruno Guest
03:53
Yeah, it’s like views and engagement, watch time when does that watch time fall off? It differs by platform as well. On YouTube we’re looking at retention rate and you know watch time. But On YouTube we’re looking at retention rate and watch time. But on TikTok we’re looking also for watch time, but we’re also really looking at the engagement and we’re not really looking so much at followers count, not so much a follower count, but we’re looking at views.
Danny Gavin Host
04:18
When companies and brands come to you, do they say, hey, we want a campaign with so many views or with engagement, or is it more like general? Like, hey, we know influencers need to be a part of our strategy. Please help us do that and then teach us, like, how should we measure?
Paula Bruno Guest
04:33
That’s the biggest thing. Like, most of them come and they know they want to be in space but they don’t know how. So they come to us and say how are we? You know where we go? And that’s when we hold a strategy session on okay, so who is the audience? You know what that demo looks like? Where is that audience? You know how we tap into it? And what’s happening culturally in those different platforms? How can we help them get into that cultural conversation? What’s the best angle to get in there?
Danny Gavin Host
05:03
What advice would you give brands at building and maintaining authentic relationships with influencers to ensure long-term success?
Paula Bruno Guest
05:09
Yeah, they have to be in space. I know that there’s a lot of brand safety issues, but they have to be in the space, they have to be creating those conversations. Maybe it’s their social team who is creating DMs, who is DMing the influencers? First of all, I think the biggest thing if you haven’t been in it is to get in it and listen, listen, see what your competitors are doing, listen and see what the audience is talking about, see how other brands are doing it Really, listen and seeing what’s happening culturally and then start immersing yourself in it. Maybe you find some creators who already very authentically love your brand. How can you tap into that? Can you DM them? Can you send them something? Can you send them a PR gift, you know, to start the conversation or DM them or comment on them. So it’s really kind of getting into the different platforms and starting that conversation.
Danny Gavin Host
06:10
Are there any proprietary or even just off the shelf tools that you use or suggest when it comes to listening?
Paula Bruno Guest
06:17
I was at some conferences. And one thing about using the tool to outreach, sometimes if you’re using the tool to reach out, to call it how many influencers you want to reach out to, sometimes they don’t respond right because it’s coming from a tool, so it’s kind of like a cattle call right. It’s not personal. For us it’s really important. We could use that feature of the tool if we wanted to. It’s just something we don’t do. We’d rather email.
Danny Gavin Host
06:44
So, as the creator economy continues to evolve, what do you believe the future holds for influencer marketing and how can brands stay ahead of the curve?
Paula Bruno Guest
06:51
They have to be in it. They have to really be in and listen to what’s happening right now. I feel this whole year, a lot of different things have been bubbling up. If you have a CEO, he wants to see the numbers right. He wants you to work with the biggest influencer. What I’m advising the brands that I work with is don’t focus on how many followers or subscribers they have. Really look at the quality of the engagement and their community. Do they have fans and not just fans? Do they have super fans? Do those super fans move from platform to platform with them? Do they have a really engaged community? I think that that is the future Smaller communities, more community focused.
07:36
I think you’re going to see more influencers doing co-branding deals. Think about Alex Earl with Skinny Jeans and Frame. Right, skinny jeans have not been around for a really long time. She just did a co-brand with frame and did some skinny jeans and they sold out. Well, everybody’s thinking about going back to skinny jeans. So that’s just one example. Like even poppy. Like poppy sold, but poppy really was social first. That’s how they grew. All of the brands are just social first. One other thing I think AI is going to be really big and I think we’re starting to see that right now, not only in how creators create their content, but how much content is out there and how easy it can be for brands now to create content, find influencers and all that. The last thing I think that we haven’t really seen a lot of, but I do think we will in the next five years, is live selling, social commerce. It’s going to be big.
Danny Gavin Host
08:40
Do you think influencers are scared at all? Because of AI and technically you can create fake influencers.
Paula Bruno Guest
08:47
No, I don’t. I mean, I think that some brands may use AI to create videos and fake influencers, but I, I don’t think, I don’t know. You never know. Um, I don’t envision that they’re going to take over the creator economy. I don’t think it’s going to replace your content creator.
Danny Gavin Host
09:05
Is there value to one-off campaigns like an influencer, or is it more important to stick with a certain group and then have these long-term strategies with them?
Paula Bruno Guest
09:16
I feel it’s important to have a long-term strategy. However, when you’re first starting with influencers, you might want to dip your toes in you know and test a few one-off campaigns to really see what you know, maybe do an AB test and really see where you’re going. I do see a lot of value in long-term partnerships.
Danny Gavin Host
09:34
So, given your experience in shaping standards for influencer compensation and your thought leadership on the topic on LinkedIn, what best practices should brands follow to ensure fair and effective compensation models?
Paula Bruno Guest
09:44
It’s a tough topic for everybody. When you’re working with creators, you need to look at them as they’re creating content for you, right? So they bring their expertise and their value, which they should be paid for, and then they also have their platform or their audience, which you know. You’re going to use that content and put the content on the platform. No, you don’t have to. I mean, you can do UGC content if you wanted to, or you’re not going to put it on the platform, but you know, I feel that they need to be compensated fairly and not just you know, hey, can you do a post for a product, right?
10:24
I think there is a place for gifting. I don’t want to say, you know, carte blanche, you can’t do gifting. I do think there’s a place for it, but there shouldn’t be strings attached with it. Everybody loves to get a nice influencer PR box and they usually will do some type of content for that, but there shouldn’t be expectations surrounding that, like we’re going to send you a box of your favorite protein powder and we want to have, like, a TikTok video and then we want to have 30 days usage, and you know that’s not. So I think that there has to be a value exchange, and I also think that you have to take other things into consideration too. So it’s not just a flat fee. If you’re talking about exclusivity, you need to pay for exclusivity and you also need to pay for any paid usage rights that you’re getting. So all those things go into the fee.
Danny Gavin Host
11:11
So where can listeners learn more about you and your business?
Paula Bruno Guest
11:14
They can find me on LinkedIn and then Intuition Media Group and if you’re a brand, you can reach out to me on LinkedIn or via our website, via email.
Danny Gavin Host
11:22
Well, Paula, thank you for being a guest on the Digital Marketing Mentor.
Paula Bruno Guest
11:26
Thank you.
Danny Gavin Host
11:26
And thank you, listeners, for tuning into the Digital Marketing Mentor. We’ll speak with you next time. Thank you for listening to the Digital Marketing Mentor podcast. Be sure to check us out online at thedmmentor.com and at thedmmentor on Instagram, and don’t forget to subscribe on Apple Podcasts, spotify or wherever you listen to your podcasts for more marketing mentor magic. See you next time.