If there’s one thing no career counselor or teacher could have predicted decades ago when kids were asked “what do you want to be when you grow up?”, it’s this new profession.
Who would have guessed, for instance, that by 2025 it would be the flashiest – and one of the most profitable?
Who wouldn’t want to make up to €25,000 for a single post on social media and spend their day engaging with their fans?
It may once have been dismissed as a trend or passing phase, but by 2025 Greek influencers have become full-fledged entrepreneurs – and with dizzying turnovers.
Behind the stories, filters, and reels lies a well-structured economic ecosystem bringing in tens of thousands of euros each month for those who know how to handle their audience, the brands, and the tools of digital influence.
The publication of the balance sheet of Ioanna Touni’s single-member company – one of the country’s best-known influencers – shed light on a world whose truths even the tax authority (AADE) is trying to uncover:
What do influencers really make?
What do they charge per post?
Who are the top performers, and what real value do they deliver to clients?
Given that her financial disclosure stands like a voice crying in the wilderness – since no other influencer does the same – we get a rare peek behind the curtain of digital influence and attempt to answer the age-old question:
“How much do Greek influencers really make?”
According to market insiders, Greece’s influencer industry this year is reaching – if not exceeding – €90 million in annual turnover.
This figure, they clarify (calling it a conservative estimate), includes both income from brands (advertising contracts, sponsorships, ambassador deals) and revenue from personal e-shops, workshops, guest appearances, even NFTs or personal branding tools.
The most active players have moved up a level: they found schools, license products, and create joint ventures with clothing or cosmetics companies.
In truth, influencer marketing is no longer “just a post.”
It’s an entire sector of professional content creators, with fees that rival – and sometimes surpass – those of a corporate CEO.
Influencer, that unknown species
What is an influencer?
There’s no single definition, but one could say it’s someone who can sway their followers to a meaningful degree – whether in social attitudes or consumer behavior.
In other words, someone who can get their audience to do something – say, love a product and choose it.
In Greece’s advertising market, influencers are considered those with social media accounts (mainly on Instagram or TikTok) with over 10,000 followers.
There are around 1,500 such profiles, about 500 of which belong to companies – meaning roughly a thousand individuals operate as influencers.
There are also agencies, like Rênfluence, which handle influencer-based ad campaigns on behalf of brands.
“We know what they really charge”
About 900 influencers are registered on that platform.
Its founder, Giorgos Karavokyris, explains:
“The platform guides companies to the right influencer for their products.
We have verified data from Meta – their demographics, gender ratios, age segments, story views, follower countries, fake-follower rates, and pricing – so we can determine who’s the best fit and ensure value for money.”
Experts point out that, for product promotion, the most in-demand aren’t the celebrities we know from sports or TV, but those who became famous through social platforms themselves.
Often, the direct donations they receive from followers have already made them wealthy.
Beyond that, they produce sharper content, know exactly how to use Instagram the way audiences want to see them, know how to work the algorithm – and can dedicate massive amounts of time to doing so.
Contrary to what most people believe, to become a truly successful influencer, one needs much more than luck — it also requires a great deal of time and commitment.
They must constantly engage with social networks and their followers, consistently post original, creative, and high-quality content, read extensively, and stay informed about how algorithms work.
Videos must have a specific structure and filters. They must also interact with their audience — reply to messages and comments, and engage in conversations with users. Not everyone can do this; that’s why the top influencers in Greece are around twenty.
Profession… Touni
The influencer many describe as the “Kardashian of Greece,” Ioanna Touni, caused a stir with the publication of her company’s balance sheet in the GEMI (General Commercial Registry).
In 2024, her company J. TOUNI Single-Member IKE reported:
- Turnover: €2,063,213
- Net profits: €1,541,461
- Pre-tax profits: over €1.8 million
- Net position: €2.47 million
- Fixed assets: jumped from €5,847 to €242,023 in one year
- Inventory: from €2,800 to €232,680
However, such transparency is not common among most influencers in the country — not necessarily due to tax evasion, as one might think.
On one hand, many influencers record their income from other activities under the same company, making it difficult to draw conclusions.
On the other hand, some prefer to keep their income “under the radar” so as not to provoke public opinion, attract media attention, or, above all, draw the “interest” of criminal elements.
Many influencers have gone on to establish companies. Some maintain personal IKEs (private limited companies), others run general partnerships with collaborators or partners, while in other cases, external entities (managers, platforms) are used.
The more organized ones have integrated their earnings into a full business model — complete with accountant, tax advisor, partnership contracts, invoicing, performance targets, and reporting systems.
Elena Galyfa
Fay Skorda
The more “primitive” ones issue simple service receipts or work “via DMs” (direct messages): negotiations through Instagram and payments via Revolut or PayPal.
Sometimes not even that — payments are made off the books.
Of course, there are also influencers with virtually “zero real income,” who do it simply to receive free products or services.
For instance, someone might offer to promote a hotel to their followers in exchange for an all-expenses-paid vacation, or do the same for a restaurant in exchange for a free dinner.
In many cases, this “works” — or leads to other situations — since a business owner’s refusal can result in something resembling blackmail:
“If you don’t host me at your hotel, I’ll tell my followers it’s dirty.”
“If you don’t invite me, I’ll say the food at your restaurant is inedible.”
Dimitra Alexandraki
Dimitris Alexandrou
From there, the real problem begins when the large sums mentioned never pass through the tax office.
Payments in kind (products, trips, accommodations), undeclared collaborations, and private deals with small businesses all contribute to an ecosystem with minimal to zero transparency.
The Independent Authority for Public Revenue (AADE) has started investigating.
Sources report that by 2025, over 150 targeted audits have already been carried out on influencers with more than 100,000 followers.
The trigger?
The massive gap between lifestyle projection and declared income.
People constantly showcasing properties, luxury clothing, trips to the Maldives, and nights out in Dubai clubs were found declaring less than €10,000 a year.
Tax experts explain that a specialized “task force” of ten auditors has been established within AADE to focus specifically on influencers.
Their job is to scan profiles using digital tools and Artificial Intelligence, comparing the lifestyles portrayed online with what is declared to the tax office.
Last year alone, 20 tax IDs (AFM) belonging to well-known influencers were audited.
Alexandros Kopsialis
Fanis Lampropoulos
The Most Successful
Let’s now see how this ecosystem is structured in Greece.
Greek influencers are now divided into three main categories:
- Micro-influencers (5,000–50,000 followers):
They maintain strong bonds with their audience, are authentic, have lower collaboration costs, and are ideal for small and medium-sized businesses.
They charge €100–300 per story and €300–800 per feed post. - Macro-influencers (50,000–500,000 followers):
Professionals with organized content, agencies, recurring collaborations, and higher rates.
A story costs €400–1,000, while a full post + stories package ranges from €1,500–3,500. - Mega-influencers (over 500,000 followers):
Celebrities, often with television or media backgrounds.
Collaborations with them start at €4,000 per campaign and can reach €30,000 for monthly contracts.
Brands view them as a safe publicity investment — though not always value for money.
For 2025, as rates continue to rise, it is estimated that mega-influencers can reach or exceed €20,000 per month from collaborations, with the most successful combining affiliate marketing, product placements, their own product sales, and subscription services.
For example, an influencer’s online shop with 2,000 monthly orders can yield more than €200,000 net annually.
Most Profitable Categories
The most sponsorship-heavy sectors are:
- Fashion & Beauty – leading in collaborations.
- Mommy/Family – enjoying high audience trust.
- Fitness/Wellness – loyal and active fanbase.
- Travel – expensive but with limited ROI.
- Tech & Finance – niche but high-value collaborations.
Behind these profiles lie e-shops, clothing brands, cosmetics, courses, subscription platforms, video-on-demand services, book series, and even ticketed workshops.
For example, a beauty influencer may earn income from sponsored posts, affiliate sales through “link in bio,” their own e-shop products, beauty seminars, and sponsored reels.
A travel influencer, on the other hand, apart from direct advertising, may collaborate with hotels, travel agencies, or airlines, benefit from YouTube monetization (i.e. payment per view — though in Greece the amount is quite small), produce paid vlogs, or sell preset/edit packs.
Greek influencers generate €90 million a year — See the list of their rates and earnings
The total annual earnings for top creators in Greece are estimated to exceed €200,000.
In some cases, they reach €300,000 or €400,000 — especially when there is international reach.
As for mega-influencers, they are usually people who are already professionally successful and are monetizing that success through their massive social media followings.
Just as abroad, where top influencers include figures such as Cristiano Ronaldo, Ariana Grande, or Jamie Oliver, in Greece the people with the most followers across Instagram, TikTok, and Facebook (and thus the greatest influence, whether or not they call themselves influencers) are:
- Akis Petretzikis and Kostas Tsimikas – 1.8 million followers each
- Eleni Menegaki and Eleni Foureira – 1.3 million each
- Andreas Georgiou – 1.2 million
- Ioanna Touni and Alexandros Kopsialis – 1.1 million each
- Athina Oikonomakou, Konstantinos Argyros, Sakis Tanimanidis, Sakis Rouvas, and Fay Skorda – 1 million each
The “Kingdom of Nothing”
“The Queen of Nothing.”
That’s what they called Kim Kardashian for many years in the United States.
The Armenian-American star managed to become one of the most influential, powerful, and wealthy personalities in the world’s largest economy — by doing exactly what her haters always accused her of: a lot of things… and at the same time, nothing at all!
If there is one person who truly embodies the concept of the influencer, it’s Kim Kardashian.
From her early reality show days to the creation of a business empire with her KKW Beauty and SKIMS brands, Kim didn’t follow the trend — she created it.
On Instagram, she has 364 million followers, and her estimated income per post can reach up to $1.5 million.
Her annual income, according to the latest available data for 2023, exceeds $80 million.
Kim has built a beauty empire, shapewear brand, media production ventures, app launches, and even pursued legal studies — while turning her entire family into influencers, all of whom starred in the reality show that carried their surname.
Kim Kardashian
According to some, the profession of influencer is not new.
In a way, many people throughout history have done something similar — starting with the gladiators of the Roman Empire.
Certainly, long before hashtags and sponsored posts, there were other forms of influence.
The most characteristic examples include:
- Marlene Dietrich and Audrey Hepburn, who became style icons making brands dance to their rhythm.
- Madonna, the first to use her public persona as a platform to control culture.
- And Paris Hilton, whom many consider to be the first influencer — before the term even existed.
In the modern digital era, the first recognized influencers were:
- PewDiePie in gaming (YouTube’s king for a decade),
- Zoella in beauty (United Kingdom), and
- Huda Kattan, who turned her makeup blog into a global beauty brand.
As a business icon, Chiara Ferragni stands out — Europe’s closest thing to digital royalty.
She began in 2009 with her blog “The Blonde Salad”, and within a decade became a Harvard case study on how to turn personal style into a global empire. Earning up to $20 million annually and boasting over 29 million Instagram followers, she operates across fashion, jewelry, beauty collaborations, and her own Ferragni Brand. Her partnerships with Dior, Lancôme, Pomellato, Tod’s, and hundreds of other luxury houses highlight her global influence. Despite being hit hard by scandals over lack of transparency in her charitable work, Ferragni remains one of the most influential figures in global digital marketing.
The world’s top footballers also dominate the influencer field.
Cristiano Ronaldo, with over 615 million Instagram followers, reportedly earns $2.3 million per post. Lionel Messi follows closely, with similar financial figures. Both have turned athletic glory into influence — and influence into global commerce.
The “golden girl” of Instagram is Kylie Jenner (of the Kardashian family).
She has over 400 million Instagram followers, earned more than $600 million from selling 51% of Kylie Cosmetics, and has an estimated net worth exceeding $700 million. Kylie achieved something few others have: at just 21 years old, Forbes named her the youngest self-made billionaire — though not without controversy over the “self-made” label.
The New Forces
Today, the most powerful influencers likely to dominate tomorrow include:
- Khaby Lame — the Senegalese TikToker with over 160 million followers, who rose to fame without speaking a word, mocking the absurdities of modern internet culture and “wannabe” influencers.
- Emma Chamberlain — from quirky YouTube vlogger to fashion collaborator with Louis Vuitton, Cartier, and even Met Gala host.
- MrBeast (Jimmy Donaldson) — arguably the most powerful YouTube influencer, known for massive philanthropic projects and greater advertising influence than traditional media. His story deserves analysis — and admiration — as a model for young creators who dream of becoming “like him.”
Who Is the World’s Most Powerful Influencer?
If your answer isn’t MrBeast, you probably haven’t been on YouTube in at least five years. Starting at age 13 from his bedroom in North Carolina, Donaldson began by uploading gaming videos. Today, he’s the #1 YouTube creator, with over 250 million subscribers on his main channel and a digital ecosystem exceeding 300 million followers.
The numbers are staggering:
From “I Counted to 100,000” to a real-life “Squid Game” recreation (375+ million views), MrBeast turned YouTube into a cinematic experience — and used his vast earnings to give back: houses, cars, scholarships, food, and even sight-restoring surgeries for blind people.
His projects include:
- Feastables — a snack and chocolate brand with millions in U.S. sales.
- MrBeast Burgers — a virtual fast-food chain with thousands of partner restaurants.
- Beast Philanthropy — a foundation focused on fighting hunger and helping vulnerable groups.
He also runs multiple channels — Beast Gaming, Beast Reacts, Shorts, Kids — all with huge audiences. His annual income exceeds $100–150 million, and his net worth is estimated near $500 million — all before turning 30.
But MrBeast did more than create viral videos.
He made kindness captivating, philanthropy entertaining, and success feel attainable. He didn’t rely on looks, lifestyle, or scandals — his weapon was always the idea. To a new generation, he represents a role model: an “ordinary” guy who became extraordinary simply by never stopping creating.
Now, streaming giants like Netflix and Apple TV are offering him exclusive deals.
As for the future?
He says he’s not motivated by money, but by the legacy he’ll leave behind. He wants to become the greatest content creator of all time — and by the looks of it, he’s on his way.
MrBeast isn’t just an influencer. He’s the face of the digital future.
And hopefully — that’s a good thing.
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