Building sustainable influencer partnerships within the creator economy

Influencer marketing has become an integral part of retail branding strategies. As the creator economy continues to expand, influencer collaborations are now viewed as strategic partnerships rather than promotional activities. Despite this transition, sustaining authentic and long-term brand-influencer partnerships remains a significant yet underexplored challenge. Combining Social Exchange Theory (SET) and Self-Determination Theory (SDT) into a unified motivational-exchange framework, this research focuses on how brand practices operate simultaneously as relational exchange resources and as psychological need-satisfying inputs within influencer–brand partnerships. With a mixed-methods two-phase approach, this study exmains how brand ethical–purpose alignment, autonomy support, and AI co-creation are linked to influencers' sense of ownership and thriving, as well as citizenship behaviours and partnership continuity. In Study 1, 22 semi-structured interviews were conducted with professional influencers across four regions, intended to understand their lived partnership experiences. In Study 2, responses from 422 influencers were analysed using structural equation modelling and moderation analysis. The study also examines serial indirect pathways through which brand practices are associated with voluntary citizenship behaviours and partnership continuity via Collaboration Ownership and Influencer Thriving. The findings suggest that autonomy support, purpose alignment, and AI co-creation enablement are positively associated with influencers' ownership and thriving. These again are associated with higher levels of voluntary advocacy and intentions to continue partnerships. Therefore, the research positions influencer collaboration as relational rather than transactional and highlights the significance of autonomy, ethical-purpose congruence, and relational fairness in understanding sustainable relationships between influencers and brands.