The Role of Influencer Marketing in Today's Crowded Digital Landscape w/ Ryan Davis of People First

“You’re basically seeing your psyche projected back at you when you open any of these social apps these days.”

Ryan Davis is a longtime progressive digital strategist. He got his start as an internet organizer on Howard Dean’s 2004 presidential campaign, worked on Barack Obama’s groundbreaking 2008 campaign, and later founded Blue State Digital’s social media team. Since then, he’s worked with hundreds of nonprofits and campaigns around the world. Today, he’s the Founder and CEO of People First, one of the largest social impact influencer agencies in the US, and the author of The Month in Digital.

In this episode, Ryan and I get nerdy about what influencer work actually looks like heading into 2026—especially for campaigns that don’t have a huge budget, a big staff, or celebrities on speed dial.

We talk about why “influencers” shouldn’t be treated like a replacement for celebrity endorsements, why micro and nano creators can be more useful than the biggest names on your feed, and why the real point isn’t “going viral.” The point is scaling persuasion the same way you scale field: more trusted messengers, more conversations, more communities, more repetition.

We also dig into platform fragmentation (your internet is not my internet), why Nextdoor is an underrated battleground for hyperlocal issue conversations, and why campaigns and orgs should be investing in owned content like email and blogs—not just to fundraise, but to tell stories and show up in the places people are now getting information (including AI-driven search).

If you’re trying to run a modern comms program without losing your mind, this one’s for you.

Some key takeaways from my conversation with Ryan

• How campaigns are using influencer relationships right now
• How the TikTok sale affected influencer work (it’s not what you think)
• We nerded out on Nextdoor (yes, it’s a thing)
• Big influencers vs micro/nano influencers
• Influencers aren’t about “going viral.” They’re about scaling field
• Why your internet is different than everyone else’s (and why that matters)
• Why it’s time to think beyond the viral launch video
• How to do influencer work with a small budget
• The new tool People First launched for small campaigns: Val
• Email still matters—but your email can’t only be fundraising
• Blogging, Substack, and the new reality of SEO/AEO
• Serialization that isn’t about the candidate

One of my favorite ideas from the conversation: serialized content that’s about the campaign or the issues, but not dependent on the candidate being the main character. Ryan floated the idea of docu-style vertical series where a staffer or organizer becomes the through-line—letting campaigns produce consistent, platform-friendly storytelling without needing the candidate to carry every single episode.

My favorite quote (and the mindset shift it demands): “You’re basically seeing your psyche projected back at you when you open any of these social apps these days,” he wasn’t just describing algorithmic personalization—he was describing a strategic trap campaigns fall into.

If the people on your team are highly engaged political consumers, your internal sense of “what’s breaking through” is going to be skewed. You’re in the bubble by definition. The job isn’t to dominate the bubble. The job is to build enough credible, distributed messengers (and enough repeatable content) to reach the people who aren’t thinking about you at all.

If you’re running digital for a campaign or nonprofit and you’re trying to build something sustainable—something that reaches beyond the choir—this conversation will give you a bunch of practical ways to think about creator strategy, platform fragmentation, and scaling persuasion.

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