Nielsen 2026: 81% of Indian marketers rate creators, 42% track ROI

Indian marketers believe in creators more than marketers almost anywhere else Nielsen surveyed. They are also less likely to prove it with joined-up measurement. That is the useful tension in Nielsen's 2026 Annual Marketing Report, which Business Standard and Social Samosa both reported on 3 November 2026.

Who did Nielsen survey?

Nielsen polled 1,200 marketers: 200 each in India, the US, the UK, Italy, France and Germany, according to Business Standard. Social Samosa names the report "Top 10 Signals Shaping Marketing Budgets in 2026" and says it covers budgets, creator partnerships, sports sponsorship, AI and measurement. These are marketers' own views and spending plans, not audited spend, so read them as a sentiment check rather than a market size.

How effective do Indian marketers think creator content is?

Very. 81% of Indian marketers rated influencer and creator content very or extremely effective. In the US the figure was 54%. Both outlets report that this 27-point gap was the widest between India and the US for any channel in the study. Note that this is about creator content in general, not one platform or one category.

Do Indian brands measure what creators deliver?

Less than you would expect from that confidence. Only 42% of Indian marketers said they measure ROI holistically, across traditional and digital media together. The US was at 48% and Italy at 53%. Business Standard describes India as the lowest of the markets it covered on this point. Nielsen also found that 8% of US marketers do not measure returns on sponsorship, influencer and creator spend at all; no India figure for that was reported.

Social Samosa's reading is that investment is growing faster than the ability to measure it. That matches what many Indian brands see: creator budgets are approved on gut feel and screenshots of views, then questioned at the next budget review.

What else did the survey find about Indian budgets?

• Events and sponsorship: 94% of Indian marketers expect to increase sponsorship and event media spend over the next 12 to 24 months, the highest of the six markets. The US was at 75% and Italy at 67%. This covers sporting and cultural events broadly.
• Sports as a test bed: 61% of Indian marketers see sports sponsorship as a way to test new audiences or markets, against 54% in the US and 32% in Germany.

The event finding matters for creator work too. In India, launches, college fests, food festivals and sports screenings increasingly run with creators on the ground, so event and creator budgets often sit in the same plan.

We could not open Nielsen's own report page for this post, so the figures here come from the two news reports above, which match each other on every number we used.

Our take from Delhi

The 81% figure is good news for creators, but it should make brands slightly nervous. High confidence with weak measurement is how budgets get cut the moment a CFO asks for proof. Before the next campaign, agree what success means (sales codes, link clicks, search lift, store footfall or saves), set it up before posts go live, and report it next to your other channels instead of in a separate deck.