Kenya’s blue-chip companies are now ditching traditional influencers and leaning more toward comedians to help market their products or create brand awareness.
Influencer marketing has evolved, moving from simple social interaction to high-value partnerships driven by TikTok, YouTube, and Instagram.
However, as these companies race to capture the attention of digitally savvy consumers, the focus is not mainly on influencers who have many followers, but those with authentic, relatable content that feels less like an advertisement.
“Most of the feedback I’ve received from brands is that ordinary influencers don’t give you generic content. They will work as hard as possible to fit into a given brand, rather than the brand aligning to the kind of content they produce,” says Emmanuel Munga, an events and marketing manager at Kijivu Solutions.
“Comedians operate in their natural spaces, so the content produced is more organic, more personal, and more appealing to the audience. It becomes easier for them to assimilate a brand within that space, personalising it and making it feel natural, compared to ordinary influencers, where it can come off as a straight advert to the audience,” he adds.
Game of conversion
Having a huge following still matters, yet it no longer defines the deal.
“It’s for that reason that now many ordinary influencers with huge followings struggle with conversion compared to a comedic content creator with fewer followers in mind,” Mr Munga adds. It is this shift that has elevated Kenyan comedy content creators to top influencer earners.
Although not conclusive and comprehensive, a recent study report released by OdipoDev, a Nairobi-based data analytics firm, shows that top content creator earners in 2025 were comedians or content creators whose focus is on producing comedy.
The firms analysed data from 35,000 Kenyan content creators between January 1 and December 31, 2025, from which the top 20 creators ranked were based on total video views in 2025 on Instagram, TikTok and Facebook. This was in addition to the 1,171 companies that the firm analysed and collected data from.
From its report, Coca-Cola, Unilever, Safaricom, the East African Breweries Limited, and Farmers Choice led the charge, among the 1,171 companies that heavily engaged top content creators for paid partnership gigs in 2025.
The top earners
The OdipoDev report ranked Eric Omondi, a comedian, as the top earner, estimated to have raked in about Sh41 million in brand partnerships last year.
He was followed by socialite Amber Ray, with an estimated earning of Sh38 million, and Millicent Ayuwa, also a comedian popularly known as Dem Wa Facebook, ranking in Sh23 million.
Other top earners of 2025 in the report included online comedians Crazy Kennar, Tom Daktari, Jackie Vike popularly known as Awinja, and Jaymoh Decin, who the report says earned an estimated Sh21 million, Sh19 million, Sh17 million and Sh12 million, respectively.
However, according to Mr Munga, there are instances where content creators have commanded higher fees. Some are paid between Sh200,000 and Sh1 million per influencer gig.
“These days, content creators are paid monthly and depending on a content creator’s bargaining power and output,” he says. Other companies that heavily engaged top creators included Chinese smartphone manufacturer Infinix, Airtel, Naivas, and Belgian software company Odoo.
The beauty and personal care industry was the largest income generator, with 62 influencers engaged with 174 companies. Food and beverage followed with 142 companies engaging 64 influencers.
Telcos and financial services sector came in third with 60 companies deploying 47 creators.
But even as corporates now set aside big budgets for comedians, marketers maintain that the traditional content creators still play an important role in the influencer marketing ecosystem that does not necessarily targets sales conversion.
Alex Awiti, a brand reputation management expert, says influencer engagements can still deliver return on investment (ROI) depending on the brand’s positioning, product category, and pricing strategy.
“In many cases, the most immediate and measurable return from influencer campaigns is brand awareness rather than direct sales conversion,” he says.
“Brand awareness is a key objective when companies invest in influencer marketing. By leveraging influencers with strong followings, brands can increase visibility, enhance credibility, and ensure they remain top-of-mind among consumers. However, awareness alone does not always translate into revenue growth,” he cautions.
Mr Awiti maintains that the effectiveness of influencer engagements in driving actual sales depends largely on product category, affordability, and consumer purchasing power.
“An example I would give is a well-known mobile phone manufacturer that once executed what was described as a highly successful influencer campaign. While that significantly boosted brand visibility, the company later experienced declining revenues. What that tells you is that, that high engagement does not always guarantee increased sales.”
The bigger picture
For some brands, Mr Awiti says investing millions of shillings in top creators for paid partnership gigs is not always about increasing sales.
“Another observation noticed in recent years is of a multinational that has consistently used influencer marketing in the last few years, even though it continues to struggle to increase sales. Why? The reason is simple. It’s to try and maintain the strong brand presence and visibility it has enjoyed for years.”
According to Mr Awiti, factors like changing consumer habits will push brands to use top creators to try to safeguard their strong brand presence.
“In the case of that beverage company, the changing consumer habits of its products are a result of many Kenyans becoming more health-conscious. That has left the company facing revenue pressures due to the shifting consumer behaviour, as more Kenyans move away from sugary drinks due to lifestyle diseases concerns. In this case, the company has been spending millions on influencer engagement to try to help sustain its brand relevance rather than increase sales. Remaining top of mind for most brands is essential.”
Even without a sales increase, with brand awareness, that ensures that a product remains in the consumer’s consideration set, but the final conversion often depends on practical factors such as price sensitivity, accessibility, and perceived value, basically broader market and economic dynamics.
“This partly explains why many Chinese brands have successfully penetrated global markets because they combine strong visibility strategies with competitive pricing, enabling faster consumer adoption compared to higher-priced alternatives. We have seen that in Kenya already, especially with the mobile phone manufacturer,” Mr Awiti.
