It’s been over a year since we took a look at the top 100 digital marketing influencers, according to data from Buzzsumo, so now seems like a good time to get our research hats back on, and return to Buzzsumo to highlight the top 100 digital marketing influencers in 2020.
Influencer marketing continues to be an extremely popular marketing tool for brands in various industries. According to Influencer Marketing Hub’s 2020 State of Influencer Marketing report, 91% of respondents believe influencer marketing is an effective form of marketing, and 63% were planning to increase their influencer marketing budget in 2020.
As a result of this rise in popularity, brands are spending more time and resources on finding the perfect influencers for their campaign. Thankfully, Buzzsumo (a tool I use a lot!) has handy influencer reports that make the task much easier. These reports have evolved since last year’s report, hopefully making the findings more valid. For a full overview of everything Buzzsumo, give my blog post on why it’s the perfect tool for content marketers a read.
A quick overview of Buzzsumo’s influencer reports
BuzzSumo’s influencer tool highlights key influencers from within a certain industry by searching for either a topic, domains, or for specific users. These individuals, or companies, are then ranked depending upon their ‘influence’ on the specific search variable. Influence can be a difficult thing to define, however, Buzzsumo states that someone is influential when they impact the reach of a post or article. The reports have changed in the last 12 months, and you can now refine the search by whether the account includes your search term, shares articles about that search term, or if they share articles from a specific source.
The influencer report then ranks users based on various factors including the content they create and share, the average number of retweets they receive, and the relevancy of their content – in other words, how much they are likely to affect, or influence, a piece of content’s reach.
For this list, I have once again chosen to remove any companies in order to highlight the specific influencers. This has meant missing out on some large brands such as Moz and SEMrush, however the main aim of this task is to highlight the top influencers specifically, and not the top brands. This is the only way that this data has been manipulated, other than that the list is exactly how it has been pulled off Buzzsumo and neither myself nor Browser Media has had any impact on individual ‘rankings’.
Key stats about the top 100 digital marketing influencers for 2020
- The number of followers for each account varies dramatically from under 2,000 to nearly 1 million, however, the average number of followers is 94,000. This highlights the fact that having more followers doesn’t necessarily mean greater influence.
- On average 20% of all tweets from the top 100 were retweets. This goes to explain why these individuals have been highlighted as the ‘most influential’ as they are likely to engage with posts.
- 38% of all posts from the top 100 are replies, which indicates the fact that they are likely to join in with conversations and engage with other users.
- The average number of retweets users in the top 100 get is 16, therefore, they are being followed by a highly engaged group. This highlights the fact that their audience is likely to engage with their content and share it further with their own followers.
BuzzSumo’s Top 100 Digital Marketing Influencers for 2020
- Sorav Jain – @soravjain
- Rand Fishkin – @randfish
- Neil Patel – @neilpatel
- Dan Knowlton – @dknowlton1
- Eric Enge – @stonetemple
- Barry Schwartz – @rustybrick
- Rahul Wadhawan – @rahul_wadhawan
- J.J. De la Torre – @delatorrejj
- Douglas Karr – @douglaskarr
- Amit Panchal – @amithpanchal
- Brian Dean – @backlinko
- AJ Ghergich – @seo
- Atef – @atef
- Jay Feitlinger – @jayfeitlinger
- Avinash Kaushik – @avinash
- Derek Edmond – @derekedmond
- Tod Maffin – @todmaffin
- Nathan Allen Pirtle – @workwthecoach
- Fadhila Brahimi – @fbrahimi
- Ammar Mohammed – @ammr
- John Lincoln – @johnelincoln
- Martin MacDonald – @searchmartin
- Shashi Bellamkonda – @shashib
- Bill Sebald – @billsebald
- Gareth O’Sullivan – @_garethg
- Alex Jiménez – @ralexjimenez
- Genís Roca – @genisroca
- Ian Schafer – @ischafer
- Oli Gardner – @oligardner
- Marc Cortes – @marccortes
- AJ Kohn – @ajkohn
- Andrew Grill – @andrewgrill
- Jon Henshaw – @henshaw
- Stoney deGeyter – @stoneyd
- Mordecai Holtz – @mordecaiholtz
- Paddy Moogan – @paddymoogan
- Ned James – @ned_james2
- Jonathan Lacoste – @lacostejonathan
- Geoff D. – @geoffdx
- Herve Kabla – @hervekabla
- Andrew Hickey – @andrewmhickey
- Saul Colt – @saulcolt
- Russ Mann – @mktgmann
- Scott Gulbransen – @lvgully
- Stacey MacNaught – @staceycav
- Glen Allsopp – @viperchill
- Ryan Deiss – @ryandeiss
- Larry Kim – @larrykim
- David Edelman – @davidedelman
- Justyn Howard – @justyn
- Adam Audette – @audette
- Casie Gillette – @casieg
- Fili Wiese – @filiwiese
- Dhariana Lozano – @dharilo
- Pete Blackshaw – @pblackshaw
- Muhammad Hisham Abu Al-Qambiz- @abualkomboz
- Shama Hyder – @shama
- Ed Leake – @edleake
- Franz Russo – @franzrusso
- Nathalie Nahai – @nathalienahai
- Darren Rowse – @problogger
- Khai – @thamkhaimeng
- David Iwanow – @davidiwanow
- Warren Whitlock – @warrenwhitlock
- Gianluca Fiorelli – @gfiorelli1
- Alex Domínguez – @alex_d_b
- Julie Joyce – @juliejoyce
- Leonard Kim – @mrleonardkim
- Matthew Kobach – @mkobach
- Erik Huberman – @erikhuberman
- Brent Csutoras – @brentcsutoras
- Danny Sullivan – @dannysullivan
- Jeremy Goldman – @jeremarketer
- Matthew Knell – @matthewknell
- Mark Traphagen – @marktraphagen
- Dennis Yu – @dennisyu
- Henneke Duistermaat – @henneked
- Tom Goodwin – @tomfgoodwin
- Kassy Pajarillo – @kassypajarillo
- Jeff Gibbard – @jgibbard
- Jim Sterne – @jimsterne
- Mike Allton – @mike_allton
- Rebekah Radice – @rebekahradice
- Neal Schaffer – @nealschaffer
- Stephen Waddington – @wadds
- Adel de Meyer – @adeldmeyer
- Ted Rubin – @tedrubin
- Mark Schaefer – @markwschaefer
- Minter Dial – @mdial
- Alex Moss – @alexmoss
- Winston Binch – @winstonbinch
- Gbenjo – @gbenjo_abimbola
- James Malone – @jmalonepr
- Brian Solis – @briansolis
- Rebecca Lieb – @lieblink
- Talia Wolf – @taliagw
- Noah Kagan – @noahkagan
- Bernie Borges – @bernieborges
- Dana DiTomaso – @danaditomaso
- Ryan Robinson – @theryanrobinson
Congratulations to everyone who made the top 100!!
** Disclaimer – Browser Media has had no influence or impact on this list, it is solely based on Buzzsumo’s influencer reports. To ensure the data remains fair and impartial there has been no alteration from any other sources. **
