Most lists of influencer marketing examples are award winners: a famous campaign, a famous creator, a result nobody can check. They are fun to read and hard to copy. The examples below come from somewhere else. We counted a year of sponsored uploads from US YouTube channels that post in English, October 2025 to September 2026: 117,757 sponsored long-form videos from 14,564 channels, plus 48,612 sponsored Shorts and 67,154 sponsored live streams. Then we picked ten deals that each show a different shape a sponsorship can take, and checked every one on YouTube.
Each example says what happened, why it works and what it asks of you. The numbers are what we counted; how we counted is at the end.
1. The perfect fit: Gibi ASMR and Helix Sleep
Gibi ASMR makes videos people watch to fall asleep. Helix Sleep sells mattresses. Over the year, Gibi ran 24 uploads sponsored by Helix, 17 videos and 7 Shorts, and at least one in every one of the twelve months. The reads open the description: “Thank you Helix Sleep for sponsoring!”, a link with the channel’s name in it, and the current offer.
Why it works. The audience is in bed, thinking about sleep, at the moment the read plays. No other placement on YouTube puts a mattress in front of people at a better time.
What it asks of you. Find the moment your product makes sense, not just the topic. Helix sponsored 315 channels in the year, and that included a cooking channel, emmymade, and a gaming channel, AngryJoeShow, each in all twelve months. The fit is not always obvious from the channel’s category.
2. The standing slot: Binging with Babish and Squarespace
Binging with Babish ran exactly one Squarespace-sponsored video a month, every month, twelve in all. Each description starts the same way: “This episode is sponsored by Squarespace”, a link and a code with the show’s name.
Why it works. A monthly read becomes part of the show. Viewers expect it, the creator reads it in their own voice, and the brand stays in front of the same audience all year without buying every video.
What it asks of you. A longer contract and a lighter brief. You trade control over each read for a place in the show’s rhythm. Fix the cadence and the code in the contract, and leave the wording to the creator.
3. The show sponsor: This Past Weekend with Theo Von and Celsius
On Theo Von’s podcast, Celsius appeared under “Sponsored By:” in 73 episodes across the year, with the tags #CELSIUSBrandPartner and #CELSIUSLiveFit. Celsius sponsored only 19 channels on YouTube in the year by our count. It went deep with a few shows rather than wide.
Why it works. A podcast audience comes back every week and listens for an hour or more. A drink that sits on the table during the show gets seen and mentioned week after week, which a one-off read cannot do.
What it asks of you. Podcast inventory is sold per episode, often with several sponsors per episode. Ask where your read sits, how long it runs, whether it also appears in the clips the show cuts, and how the description lists you.
4. The audience match: Bobby Parrish and Thrive Market
Bobby Parrish posts grocery deals: “Top 10 NEW Costco Deals To Buy Right NOW”, “7 NEW ALDI Deals You Need To Buy NOW”. Thrive Market, an online grocer, sponsored 23 of his videos, at least one every month. The first line of each description is the Thrive Market offer, marked #thrivemarketpartner.
Why it works. Every viewer is in the middle of deciding where to buy groceries and how to spend less doing it. The sponsor sells exactly that.
What it asks of you. Be comfortable next to competitors. Bobby’s videos are about Costco and ALDI, and Thrive Market is the paid mention in them. Thrive Market sponsored 159 channels in the year, which suggests it has decided that being in the shopping conversation matters more than owning it.
5. The product is the video: The Lawn Tools and Toro
The Lawn Tools ran 31 Toro-sponsored Shorts in the year, at least one every month: “900 CFM 😱 #toropartner”, “Leaves are NO PROBLEM! #toropartner”. Each is a few seconds of a Toro tool doing its job.
Why it works. For a product you can show working, the demonstration is the ad, and a Short is the right length for it. Nobody needs a script to understand a leaf blower clearing a lawn.
What it asks of you. Product, and patience. Toro sponsored only 9 channels on YouTube in the year. It picked a channel whose whole subject is its category and kept it supplied all year.
6. The fix in under a minute: Mark Rober and Tide
“The SECRET to Fighting Laundry Stains #TidePartner” is a Mark Rober Short built around one problem and one product. It had over 127 million views when we read it. Tide sponsored 30 channels in the year, and 31 of its 44 sponsored uploads were Shorts.
Why it works. The video answers a question people actually have. The product is the answer, so the sponsorship and the content are the same thing.
What it asks of you. A real problem your product solves on camera, and a creator whose audience trusts their explanations. Across the year, 46.5% of sponsored Shorts named the brand in the title, against 8.1% of sponsored long-form videos. Shorts sponsorships tend to be about the product; long-form ones mostly carry it in a segment.
7. The event window: the FIFA World Cup on Shorts
Between May 29 and July 16, 2026, around the World Cup, FIFA ran 47 sponsored uploads with 23 US channels, 44 of them Shorts, many also tagging YouTube. Jesser’s “Who Wins the FIFA World Cup? #ad” had 167 million views when we read it, and the 47 uploads together had about 976 million.
Why it works. During a tournament, people search for it, talk about it and watch everything near it. A few weeks of Shorts from creators who already cover sport and comedy put the brand inside that conversation instead of next to it.
What it asks of you. Booking early. The window is fixed, the creators who fit are booked by everyone at once, and Shorts need to go out while the moment is live. Plan the campaign months ahead and leave room for creators to react to what happens.
8. The game launch: Ubisoft and Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced
Assassin’s Creed Black Flag Resynced launched in July 2026. Between April and September, 43 US YouTube channels ran 104 sponsored or partner uploads about it, 67 of them in the launch month. They ranged from FerrisWheelPro, with 9,100 subscribers (“Thanks to Ubisoft for providing me with access to this game! #ubisoftpartner”), to VanossGaming, with 26 million (“Thanks to Ubisoft for sponsoring this video!”). Marz’s Short, “Sponsored by Ubisoft” and tagged #ad, had 2.8 million views when we read it. Others streamed the game live for hours.
Why it works. A launch needs volume in a few days. Big channels bring reach, small channels bring dozens of playthroughs and guides that keep the game in search results after launch week.
What it asks of you. Two programs, not one: paid videos from a set of large channels, and early access for a wider group of smaller ones. Both count as material connections and both need disclosure, which is why the free-key videos carry #ubisoftpartner. Our post on finding gaming influencers for a game launch covers building that list.
9. The network buy: FanDuel and Gametime on Locked On
In the seven days from August 26, 2026, FanDuel ran sponsored uploads on 147 US channels, more than any other brand reached in a single week all year. 129 of them were Locked On channels, a network of daily shows that each cover one team. A month later, Gametime, which sells event tickets, reached 124 channels in the week from September 24, and 122 of those were Locked On channels too. Most of the uploads were live shows.
Why it works. A network sells ad slots across all its shows at once. For a brand that wants every NFL fan before the season starts, one buy reaches the fans of every team, each through a show they already watch daily.
What it asks of you. Accepting a host read in a shared slot. In one Buffalo Bills episode we checked, the description carried reads for Gametime and FanDuel one after the other. You get reach and timing, not a creator’s personal endorsement.
10. The broad program: Quince
Quince, which sells clothing and home goods, sponsored 896 channels in the year, more than any other brand. Most of its 1,877 sponsored long-form videos ran on mid-size channels: the median Quince channel had 185,000 subscribers. One of them, Heather Anderson’s “5 Must-Have Wardrobe Staples For Women Over 40”, had 3.5 million views when we read it, on a channel with 123,000 subscribers. “Thank you, Quince, for sponsoring this video.”
Why it works. Quince sells things almost anyone buys, so it can sponsor home, fashion, comedy and family channels alike, and spread its reads across hundreds of audiences instead of betting on a few. When one video lands with the right audience, as the wardrobe video did, it can outdraw channels many times bigger.
What it asks of you. A process. Nine hundred channels is not a campaign anyone runs from a spreadsheet. It takes a way to find and vet channels quickly, standard terms, a tracking link or code per creator, and reporting that compares them.
What the year looked like
The ten examples sit inside a big, uneven market.
- Most sponsorships are a segment. Only 8.1% of sponsored long-form videos named the brand in the title. A chapter marked the ad in 12.3%. The typical sponsored YouTube video is about something else and carries the brand in a read.
- Live streams are a different market. Gambling and betting brands were in 40.6% of sponsored live streams, many of them daily sports shows.
- Repeats carry the volume. Channel and brand pairings that appeared on two or more days held 83% of all sponsored placements, and 432 pairings ran in all twelve months.
- Most brands are small buyers. Two in three brands sponsored a single channel all year. A few, like Quince, Zocdoc and BetterHelp, sponsored hundreds.
How to find examples in your own category
The best examples for your brand are the deals your competitors and neighbors ran last quarter. Brand Watcher in Streamforge tracks them: which brands sponsored which creators, when, and with what result.
Market timeline
Your competitors and market, day by day, newest first
Fri, Oct 9
Corsair ran a sponsored post with
Rap Techinstagram · 14.2K views
Thu, Oct 8
Razer ran a sponsored post with
always_a_failure_tiktok · 20.7K views
Tue, Oct 6
Corsair ran a sponsored post with
Hello Pixelsinstagram · 26.5K views
Side by side
Industry avgCompetitor avgTrailing-year program shape per brand.
Market overview
Rising
Brands posting more vs previous 90 days.
One thing to watch when you study someone else’s results: a sponsored video’s views are not always the creator’s audience. A brand can pay to promote the video, and the view count then includes paid views. On TikTok, Instagram and YouTube, Streamforge flags posts whose views were inflated by paid promotion and estimates how many views were paid for.
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Get rewarded IRL with @Razer Gold #Razer 🎁💛 check out link in bio https://rzr.to/rgxneekolul 🐍Sep 16, 2026Sep 16, 20262.0M858SponsoredRazer
Get rewarded IRL with @RazerGoldGlobal #Razer 🎁💛 check out link in bio https://rzr.to/rgxneekolul 🐍💚Sep 9, 2026Sep 9, 202623.8K95SponsoredRazer1-3 of 3
Our guide to finding the creators your competitors sponsor covers doing this by hand, and tracking sponsored creator content covers keeping a record of your own.
How we counted
We looked at uploads from US channels that post in English, from October 1, 2025 to September 30, 2026, in UTC. Streamforge’s AI reads the title, description and chapters of each long-form video and Short with 5,000 views or more, and of live streams, when the text carries sponsor or ad wording, a promo code or a shopping link, and names the brands in it. We counted a brand on an upload when the upload’s own text ties it to payment: “sponsored by”, “thanks to X for sponsoring”, “#ad”, “paid partnership”, a brand partner tag or similar wording beside the brand, or a chapter marked as the brand’s ad. In a blind check, two AI reviewers read 150 counted uploads separately, and both said the brand was paid for 136 of them. Among 60 tagged uploads the rule left out, 17 showed a paid brand, so the counts lean low. Brand counts merge the names and web domains a brand appears under, so Quince and One Quince are one brand. View counts are as Streamforge last read them. Channel sizes are subscribers in Streamforge’s Discovery index as of October 20, 2026. We opened each example on YouTube in October 2026 to confirm the sponsor wording quoted here.
