The report provides a guide to building a sustainable influencer marketing strategy through paid partnerships. The guide includes three steps: selecting sponsored ambassadors based on organic brand affinity, granting influencers creative agency, and making storytelling central to sponsored activations. The report also introduces earned media value (EMV), a proprietary metric used to quantify the estimated value of consumer engagement with digital earned media. EMV is based on the platform where the content was published and engagement received from followers and consumers. The report suggests using EMV to evaluate the earned performance of individual marketing campaigns and benchmark brands within the competitive landscape. The guide is intended for brands, influencers, retailers, and publications.