Social media has always blurred the line between reality and aspiration—some of today’s most popular influencers aren’t even sentient at all. Meet AI influencers: computer-generated personalities who help commerce businesses reach new audiences and drive real sales.
These virtual creators represent a major shift in how brands connect with customers. As online competition intensifies, smart merchants are exploring every opportunity to stand out and meet customers where they already spend their time—scrolling through social feeds.
Here’s what you need to know about AI influencers and how they can help grow your business.
What is an AI influencer?
An AI influencer is a computer-generated character designed to promote products or brands on social media platforms. These virtual personalities can look like real people, animated characters, or even fictional mascots. They come with unique personalities, voices, and backstories that help them connect with their human followers.
“AI influencers are gaining popularity in marketing and ecommerce because they offer a cost-effective and efficient way to promote products and engage with consumers,” says Ariel Sims, senior vice president of paid social for global marketing agency Digitas. The numbers back this up: 73% of marketers believe AI can largely automate influencer marketing.
Noteworthy AI influencers in ecommerce
Here are some of the most popular AI influencers making waves in ecommerce:
Lu do Magalu
Created by retail giant Magazine Luiza in 2007, Lu do Magalu is the oldest and most popular virtual influencer on Instagram with 7.8 million followers.
Lu serves as the brand’s friendly spokesperson, promoting products, offering styling tips, and chatting with customers on social media. Her Instagram feed showcases product testing and reviews, plus interviews with customers about their favorite purchases.
Lil Miquela
With 2.4 million Instagram followers, Lil Miquela has worked with major brands like Prada, Calvin Klein, and Samsung for sponsored content and social media campaigns. Described on her Instagram profile as a “21-year-old Robot living in LA,” Miquela promotes products while maintaining a carefully crafted online persona that includes music releases and social commentary.
Imma
With 390,000 Instagram followers, Imma is a popular virtual influencer in Japan, where her primary audience is located.
She’s also built a global following through brand campaigns with fashion houses like Coach, Fendi, and Prada. Imma represents the future of virtual influencers—she even gave a virtual TED Talk in Vancouver in April 2024 alongside her human creator Sara Giusto.
Shudu
Shudu is a virtual model with more than 237,000 Instagram followers. She’s appeared in digital editorial spreads for Country and Town House, Nylon, and international editions of Vogue, while also working with clothing, fragrance, and makeup brands like Karl Lagerfeld, Rabanne, and Fenty Beauty. Shudu is now one of several models from digital modeling agency The Diigitals.
The AI influencer market
AI influencers are part of a booming influencer marketing industry—and they're carving out an increasingly significant share. Here's how the broader market sets the stage for virtual influencer growth.
Market size and growth projections
The overall influencer marketing industry reached $23.6 billion in May 2025 and is expected to grow 17% annually over the next seven years, hitting $71.04 billion in 2032. This rapid expansion means more opportunities for AI influencers as brands look for cost-effective alternatives to traditional influencer partnerships and ways to stand out in a crowded space.
Adoption across industries
While fashion and lifestyle brands currently lead influencer marketing spending, health and fitness is projected to see the highest growth rate. AI influencers work especially well for these visual industries because you can design them to perfectly match your brand aesthetic. Take fashion retailer Bershka—its AI influencer TikTok content regularly gets tens of thousands of likes while giving it complete control over its brand message.
Impact on ecommerce sales
As the influencer market grows, AI influencers are proving they can compete with—and often beat—human creators. Virtual influencers get engagement rates 1.48% higher than human influencers, according to a leading influencer marketing group. This matters because 74% of shoppers say they’ve bought products based on influencer recommendations, whether that influencer is human or AI.
The results speak for themselves: 66.4% of marketers report that adding AI to their influencer campaigns improved outcomes, boosting reach, relevance, and conversions. As the influencer market keeps expanding, AI influencers are grabbing a bigger share by offering brands more control, consistency, and better value than traditional partnerships.
How to use AI influencers in ecommerce marketing
You can hire AI influencers to work as digital brand ambassadors for your business. Just like human influencers, they create and share content—product placement photos, unboxing videos, and social media posts. You can also use them for interactive campaigns like polls, quizzes, or contests to boost engagement and brand awareness.
“Using an AI influencer may make more sense than using a human influencer in certain situations, such as when cost, control, or niche targeting are critical factors,” Ariel says. “AI influencers are also a great match for experimental campaigns and content ideas that would be difficult for humans to execute.”
AI influencers can speak different languages and adapt their cultural references, helping you connect with audiences around the world. And unlike real influencers who need sleep in between their busy schedules, AI influencers can create content consistently, keeping your social media feeds active and engaging.
Product launches and collections
Virtual influencer marketing works especially well for generating buzz around new product launches and seasonal collections. The novelty of virtual influencers grabs attention, while their programmable nature lets you quickly coordinate promotional content across platforms.
Feature them in unboxing videos, countdown stories, or behind-the-scenes reveals to create excitement and drive early demand. You can even embed this content directly on your Shopify product pages for social proof that boosts credibility and conversion rates.
Cross-channel promotion strategies
Cross-channel promotion—running coordinated social media marketing campaigns across multiple platforms—gives you much better results than posting on just one channel. AI influencers make this easier because you can reuse existing assets and adapt content more efficiently than human influencers, meaning faster turnaround times without losing quality.
For example, a virtual influencer might debut a new product with a TikTok teaser, expand on its features in an Instagram carousel, and appear in email campaigns announcing the launch. You can then use paid ads to retarget engaged users with the same digital face for consistency and brand recognition.
Cross-selling opportunities
Don’t limit your campaign to single products. AI influencers can showcase full looks, bundles, or themed collections in one seamless scene. This strategy can boost your average order value (AOV) and increase the chances that followers find something they want to buy. It’s also budget-friendly—featuring multiple products in one post doesn’t typically cost more than highlighting just one.
Beyond performance, cross-selling with AI influencers helps build stronger brand stories. By showing how products work together—like a complete skin care routine or styled outfit—you create recommendations that feel natural and helpful rather than pushy. For example, AI model Shudu shows off outfits from the Fila x Aries collaboration to help promote both brands.
Customer journey mapping
Virtual influencers can play strategic roles at every stage of your customer journey:
- Awareness: Introduce your brand through short-form TikToks or Reels that grab attention with engaging or viral content
- Consideration: Offer deeper insights by sharing product tutorials, testimonials, or answering common questions in Stories or carousel posts
- Purchase: Direct traffic to curated landing pages, offer exclusive promo codes, or appear in retargeting ads to convert hesitant shoppers
- Retention: Maintain engagement after purchase with personalized thank you videos, product usage tips, or loyalty program updates
This coordinated presence creates a more seamless and personalized AI customer experience, offering consistency and value at each touchpoint.
Abandoned cart recovery
AI influencers can also help you recover lost sales. By adding them to your abandoned cart email campaigns, you can create a personal, branded touch that stands out in crowded inboxes.
Instead of sending a generic reminder, your AI influencer could appear in a short video or graphic saying something like, “Hey, noticed you left something behind—want a second look?” This personalized approach feels more human and engaging while being completely automated. You can even customize the tone or content based on what’s in the cart or how the shopper behaved on your site.
For Shopify merchants, integrating AI influencers into email flows through tools like Shopify Email or third-party apps makes this easy to implement—turning potential drop-offs into conversions with branded, AI-powered personalities.
Pros of using an AI influencer for online stores
AI influencers offer big benefits to ecommerce businesses:
Control and brand consistency
When you create your own AI influencer, you get much more control than you would with human influencers. Unlike real people who might make controversial statements or get caught up in scandals, AI influencers can be designed to maintain a consistent, brand-safe persona.
“AI influencers can consistently create content that showcases brand voice and brand image,” Ariel says. “Another pro is that AI influencers can leverage data and advanced algorithms to create content that is not influenced by other brands but is instead inspired by the people who follow and engage with the brand itself.”
Cost efficiency and scalability
Basic AI influencers can offer significant cost savings compared to human influencers (though highly complex ones can be expensive). You don’t need expensive photoshoots, travel arrangements, or ongoing contract negotiations. This makes AI influencers an appealing option for brands looking to stretch their marketing budgets.
“AI Influencers are great for productivity and cost control,” Ariel says. “They can be available 24/7, interacting with followers and potential customers, continuing to build community, and driving engagement.”
Innovation and creative freedom
Working with human influencers gives you access to their existing audience, but it’s unlikely to attract people outside that group. AI influencers, on the other hand, can generate attention well beyond their follower base.
The novelty factor alone sparks curiosity and conversation, making your content more likely to earn organic reach. And because virtual influencers aren’t bound by reality, you can explore new storytelling formats—animated sequences, surreal visuals, or interactive content—that turn traditional campaigns into standout creative experiences.
Take Furla’s collaboration with digital avatar Noonoouri. The brand created a TikTok-style dance video that doubled as a L’Officiel Italia cover, blending high-fashion editorial with social-first storytelling. The animated spot shows how a virtual influencer can turn simple product placement into a shareable creative moment that reaches well beyond the brand’s usual audience.
24/7 customer engagement
Unlike human influencers, AI influencers are always online, making them powerful tools for continuous customer interaction. They can send brand-aligned responses to comments and messages automatically—incredibly valuable for building engagement.
Their 24/7work schedule also means they can post any time, ensuring global audiences receive consistent content and communication. Fashion retailer Coach brings this idea to life with imma, an AI influencer who’s active across every time zone, all day, every day.
Loyalty program enhancement
Adding AI influencers to your loyalty program creates an exciting perk for customers. Their digital nature lets them deliver exclusive content—early product previews, personalized thank you messages, or members-only tutorials—that feels custom-made at scale. They can also gamify the loyalty experience by celebrating milestones or unlocking rewards, creating a sense of community that deepens customer retention.
Cons of using an AI influencer
While AI influencers offer plenty of benefits, they also come with a few significant drawbacks:
Authenticity challenges
According to a 2025 report, 36.7% of marketers worry about the lack of authenticity in AI influencers and whether they can make genuine connections with audiences.
“Influence by its very nature relies on authenticity,” says Dickon Laws, global head of innovation services for global creative agency Ogilvy’s Emerging Experience Lab. “That’s the main reason AI influencers are fundamentally a paradox, as they aren’t authentic in any way. They are, by definition, artificial.”
This concern played out publicly in 2025 when Meta ended its experiment with CGI Instagram influencers after receiving backlash over transparency issues, personality misalignment, and audience discomfort. The project showed how easily virtual personas can be perceived as inauthentic or deceptive if not carefully managed.
But here’s the surprising part: A 2024 study found that under certain conditions, people actually saw a virtual influencer as more authentic than a human one. This higher perceived authenticity led to greater trust and increased purchase intent.
This means that while authenticity is still a real concern, what people consider “authentic” might be more flexible than we think—especially when the AI influencer acts consistently and aligns with brand values.
Take Lil Miquela, one of the most-followed CGI influencers. She owns her artificial nature by poking fun at herself. In a recent post about her futuristic “cyber nails,” she jokes there were “100 outtakes,” turning a highly produced image into a relatable, self-aware moment that feels surprisingly human.
Emotional connection limitations
Because they’re not human, AI influencers may struggle to form strong emotional bonds with followers. AI technology still has limitations when it comes to replicating human expressions and interactions, which might hurt their ability to build deep follower loyalty.
“Consumers could also be hesitant to share experiences and communicate with what they associate as a ‘robot,’” Ariel says. Some studies found that human influencers get significantly higher engagement rates than AI influencers.
Ethical considerations
Most importantly, there are ethical concerns when using AI influencers. You need to be transparent about using AI to avoid misleading consumers—deception can seriously damage brand trust. This issue will likely get trickier as AI tools improve, making it even harder to tell humans from computer programs.
AI influencers implementation framework for ecommerce
Here’s a five-step framework to help you launch, track, and optimize AI influencer campaigns for maximum impact.
1. Define campaign objectives and KPIs
Tracking influencer marketing performance isn’t as straightforward as email marketing or search ads. Their value often lies in longer-term brand building and shaping buyer intent rather than immediate conversions. You’ll still see some quick wins—just know that return on investment (ROI), lick-through rate (CTR), or conversion rates won’t tell the complete story.
This makes it critical to clearly define what success looks like with measurable outcomes. For example, if you want to build brand recognition in a new audience segment, engagement metrics like likes, shares, and comments may be more important than direct conversions.
Here are KPIs that can align with your campaign goals:
- Brand awareness: Track impressions, reach, and engagement rate to see how well your campaign expands visibility
- Product interest: Monitor click-through rate, product page views, and wishlist adds to gauge interest in specific items
- Sales performance: Use conversion rate, average order value (AOV), and influencer-attributed revenue to measure direct impact on purchases
- Customer acquisition: Watch the percentage of new visitors, email sign-ups, and discount code redemptions to see how effectively you’re attracting first-time customers
2. Select the right AI influencer based on brand alignment and audience demographics
Choosing an AI influencer isn’t just about trendy aesthetics—it’s about matching style, tone of voice, and personality with your brand and target audience. Use tools or criteria that assess not only demographic alignment, but also the emotional traits that build trust and connection.
A 2024 study found that for virtual influencers to drive strong purchase intentions, they need to look trustworthy, feel relatable, and sound genuinely convincing. Look for personalities that seem credible, empathetic, and competent. Tools like influencer analysis platforms, sentiment tracking, and audience matching software can help you assess whether an AI influencer communicates these key traits effectively.
Virtual doll-turned-influencer Qai Qai is a great example of audience matching. Her upbeat, child-friendly persona aligns with Gabby Bows’ colorful butterfly hair clips, making the collaboration feel both authentic and relatable to parents and kids alike.
3. Create product-focused content that highlights unique selling points
When your campaign focuses on conversions, highlight specific product benefits or features. For example, a virtual influencer might emphasize a product’s ease of use, portability, or premium materials as part of their story. This targeted messaging can help move customers from interest to purchase, especially when paired with clear calls to action and shoppable links.
4. Implement proper tracking with platform-specific tools
To accurately assess your AI influencer campaign performance, you need end-to-end tracking that connects influencer activity to actual sales outcomes.
Start by setting up UTM parameters on AI influencer shares. These tagged URLs let you track where traffic comes from and how users behave once they reach your site. Pair these links with campaign-specific landing pages tailored to the influencer’s audience to improve engagement and attribution.
Use Shopify Analytics events to track what users do once they land on your store. These built-in events record actions like product views, add-to-cart behavior, and completed checkouts—giving you a clear picture of how influencer-driven traffic converts down the funnel.
5. Analyze performance and optimize for future campaigns
After your AI influencer campaign goes live, schedule regular performance reviews—weekly during the campaign and a full analysis after it wraps—to spot trends in engagement, traffic, and conversion.
Test different formats, messaging, and platform combinations. You might find that one platform consistently outperforms others, or that certain creative styles generate better click-through or completion rates. Use these insights to improve future campaigns and maximize ROI with each round.
Measuring AI influencer ROI for ecommerce
Tracking AI influencer ROI for your online store takes more than surface-level analytics. Because virtual influencers often interact with customers at multiple touchpoints—social content, product pages, email flows—you need a clear measurement framework.
Key performance metrics
To accurately evaluate AI influencer campaigns, track both marketing engagement and ecommerce impact. Here are the core KPIs to monitor:
- Engagement rate: How actively your audience interacts with AI influencer content (likes, shares, comments)
- Click-through rate (CTR): How often users take the next step after viewing a post
- Conversion rate: What percentage of AI influencer traffic actually completes a purchase
- Average order value (AOV) lift: Compares order size from AI influencer traffic versus traffic from other sources
- Incremental sales: The additional revenue generated that wouldn’t have happened without the campaign
Tracking AI influencer-driven sales
Attribution is one of the trickiest parts of influencer marketing—especially when multiple touchpoints influence a shopper’s decision. To isolate AI influencer impact, use a mix of:
- UTM parameters: Track influencer-driven traffic across campaigns and platforms
- Shopify Analytics events: Connect AI influencer interactions to actual sales events like add-to-cart or purchase
- Customer data platforms (CDPs): Map multitouch journeys and attribute sales across the funnel, not just the last click
These tools help create a complete picture of how AI influencers contribute to conversions. The goal isn't just proving ROI—it’s understanding where in the funnel AI influencers work best so you can focus on what drives results.
AI tools to enhance influencer marketing
Even if you’re not ready to partner with an AI influencer, don’t write off AI entirely. According to a 2025 report, 66.5% of marketers say AI improved their influencer marketing campaign outcomes.
Here are eight AI tools that can help ecommerce businesses build better influencer marketing campaigns:
Influencer identification and matching platforms
These influencer marketing tools help you find creators (virtual or human) who align with your target audience, brand values, and campaign goals. They simplify vetting influencers, managing partnerships, and tracking performance.
- Shopify Collabs: Native to Shopify, this creator partnership tool offers a seamless way to manage campaigns without leaving your store’s back end.
- UpPromote: For performance-based campaigns, this Shopify app makes it easy to recruit influencers, track referral sales, and automate commission payouts.
- Heepsy: This database lets you filter by niche, location, audience size, and engagement rate, making it especially helpful for finding micro-influencers and checking audience authenticity.
- CreatorIQ: Best for brands scaling up their influencer marketing, this enterprise-grade tool helps you find and evaluate creators based on deep audience insights, authenticity scores, and campaign fit. It’s ideal for marketers who want to manage influencer programs at scale.
Performance analytics and optimization
These AI ecommerce tools help you track social sentiment, engagement, ROI, and more.
- Shopify Analytics: Native to your Shopify dashboard, this tool tracks key ecommerce KPIs like traffic sources, sales by influencer, and conversion events. It’s a reliable way to connect social campaigns to store performance—no manual tagging required.
- Modash: Ideal for ecommerce brands scaling their influencer programs, Modash provides detailed audience insights, including demographics, engagement rates, and fake follower detection. Its Shopify integration enables seamless tracking of promo codes, UTM links, and sales.
- Find Your Influence: With its predictive pricing engine, this tool uses over a decade of campaign data to forecast costs and expected outcomes. Paired with real-time performance dashboards and post-campaign insights, it’s built for businesses who want full visibility into what they’re paying for and getting.
- GRIN: Built for brands managing large-scale creator programs, GRIN’s reporting suite offers customizable dashboards that track everything from content performance to affiliate revenue. It’s especially useful for in-house teams who need detailed, ROI-focused data on influencer campaigns.
AI influencer FAQ
How do you make an AI influencer?
Start by defining your target audience and creating a persona that resonates with them. Develop your AI influencer’s backstory, personality traits, and visual style. Then use AI image generation tools to create consistent visuals of your character across different settings and scenarios.
What are AI influencers?
AI influencers are computer-generated characters designed to act like real people on social media. They use AI to interact with audiences through programmed responses to comments and messages, while CGI technology creates their realistic appearance in photos and videos.
Are AI influencers legal?
Yes, AI influencers are currently legal with no specific laws restricting their use. However, you should consider ethical implications like transparency with audiences and potential impacts on brand trust if people feel misled.
Who is the most famous AI influencer?
Lu do Magalu holds the top spot, with 7.8 million Instagram followers. Created by Brazilian retailer Magazine Luiza, she's been active since 2007 and regularly promotes products while engaging with customers.
Do AI influencers make money?
Absolutely. AI influencers generate revenue through brand partnerships, sponsored content, affiliate marketing, and direct product sales—using the same monetization strategies as human influencers.
