Acceleration Partners Appoints Suzannah Tarkington as Vice President of Influencer to Scale Full-Funnel Performance Marketing Operations

Acceleration Partners, a global leader in partnership marketing, has announced the appointment of Suzannah Tarkington as Vice President of Influencer, a move that signals a significant strategic pivot toward the integration of creator-led content and performance-based attribution. Tarkington, a veteran with over a decade of experience in media, advertising, and influencer marketing, is tasked with overseeing the agency’s "Performance Influencer" division. This appointment comes at a critical juncture for the digital marketing industry, as brands increasingly demand that influencer campaigns move beyond vanity metrics—such as likes and impressions—to deliver measurable commercial outcomes like sales, subscriptions, and long-term customer acquisition.

The hiring of Tarkington is not merely an addition to the executive roster but represents a fundamental shift in how Acceleration Partners (AP) structures its service offerings. By placing influencer marketing under dedicated executive leadership with P&L (Profit and Loss) responsibility, the agency is elevating the discipline from a peripheral service to a core growth practice. Tarkington’s mandate includes scaling the agency’s full-funnel influencer capabilities, managing client growth, and refining the operational infrastructure required to bridge the gap between traditional brand-building and data-driven performance marketing.

A Decade of Experience in the Creator Economy

Suzannah Tarkington joins Acceleration Partners following a seven-year tenure at Fohr, a prominent influencer marketing platform and agency. Joining Fohr as its 26th employee, Tarkington played a pivotal role in the company’s evolution, eventually rising to the position of Senior Director of Client Services. During her time there, she was instrumental in scaling the client services team fivefold, overseeing complex programs for a diverse portfolio of global brands, including Sephora, COTY, The RealReal, Colgate-Palmolive, and DICK’S Sporting Goods.

Tarkington’s work at Fohr was characterized by a focus on community-centric marketing and the use of technology to validate creator impact. One of her most notable achievements was the launch and management of the "Sephora Squad," an industry-leading ambassador program. Unlike traditional campaigns that prioritize follower counts, the Sephora Squad utilized an application-based process that incorporated audience testimonials to measure a creator’s genuine connection with their community. Under Tarkington’s guidance, the program expanded from 27 to 72 members within its first three years, notably prioritizing diversity; in 2021, 79% of the selected creators were BIPOC (Black, Indigenous, and People of Color).

In addition to her work in beauty and retail, Tarkington contributed to the expansion of the DICK’S Sporting Goods Varsity Team, a program that attracted more than 10,000 applicants. Her experience also extends to the technical side of the industry, where she utilized predictive intelligence and campaign data to inform casting and investment decisions for The RealReal. This background in data-informed creator selection aligns closely with Acceleration Partners’ focus on measurable performance and ROI.

The Strategic Evolution of Acceleration Partners

Acceleration Partners has built its reputation as a powerhouse in performance-based partnership marketing. The agency currently manages programs for more than 200 brands across 40 countries. In 2025, the agency’s managed programs generated an estimated $8.6 billion in revenue for its clients, facilitating over 110 million conversions. Historically, the agency has been synonymous with affiliate marketing, but it has spent the last several years diversifying its capabilities to include content marketing, performance PR, and influencer relations.

The appointment of Tarkington is the latest step in a multi-year strategy to dominate the "Performance Influencer" space. This journey began in earnest in 2022, when Acceleration Partners acquired Influencer Response and Volt Agency. Those acquisitions provided the agency with the technical and operational framework to handle direct-response influencer management and paid social amplification. By integrating these capabilities, AP has been able to offer brands a more holistic approach to creator partnerships, combining the creative storytelling of influencers with the rigorous tracking and optimization of affiliate marketing.

Defining the Performance Influencer Model

The "Performance Influencer" model, as championed by Acceleration Partners, seeks to resolve a long-standing tension in the marketing world: the divide between brand awareness and conversion. Traditionally, influencer marketing lived in the upper funnel, focused on reach and cultural relevance, while affiliate marketing lived in the lower funnel, focused on the final click and purchase.

Under Tarkington’s leadership, the agency aims to collapse this distinction. The performance influencer approach starts with a business objective—such as a specific sales target or customer acquisition cost (CAC)—and works backward to select creators, determine compensation, and design content. This model treats influencer marketing as a measurable system where every dollar spent is tracked against its contribution to the customer journey.

Key components of this model include:

1. Outcome-Based Compensation: Moving away from flat-fee "pay-for-post" models toward hybrid structures that include performance-based bonuses or commissions.
2. Long-Term Relationships: Shifting from one-off activations to "always-on" programs that allow creators to build genuine affinity for a brand over time.
3. Data-Driven Selection: Using historical performance data and predictive analytics to identify creators who not only have high engagement but also a proven track record of driving conversions.
4. Full-Funnel Attribution: Utilizing advanced tracking technology to understand how a creator’s content influences a customer, even if the final purchase happens days or weeks later through a different channel.

The Convergence of Influencer and Affiliate Marketing

The industry is currently witnessing a massive convergence of marketing channels. As social media platforms integrate shopping features—such as TikTok Shop and Instagram’s shoppable posts—the line between "content" and "commerce" has blurred. Creators are increasingly acting as digital storefronts, utilizing affiliate links and personalized discount codes to monetize their influence.

Simultaneously, affiliate marketing has evolved. What was once a channel dominated by coupon and cashback sites is now increasingly driven by high-quality content creators and editorial publishers. Brands are finding that the same partners they once managed through separate influencer and affiliate teams are now overlapping. This creates operational inefficiencies, including fragmented data, redundant budgets, and inconsistent messaging.

Tarkington’s role is designed to address these inefficiencies by providing a unified strategy. By bringing influencer and affiliate operations under a single agency umbrella, brands can gain a 360-degree view of their creator partnerships. This integration allows for more sophisticated media buying, as brands can use paid social to amplify high-performing creator content, further driving performance and scale.

Industry Implications and the Future Agency Model

The broader implications of this move reflect a maturing influencer marketing industry. According to recent industry reports, the global influencer marketing market size is expected to reach $24 billion by the end of 2024. As budgets grow, so does the scrutiny from Chief Financial Officers (CFOs) and Chief Marketing Officers (CMOs). The era of "experimental" influencer spend is giving way to a requirement for financial accountability.

For agencies, this shift necessitates a higher standard of service. It is no longer enough to have a roster of famous names; agencies must now provide the infrastructure of a performance firm. This includes legal support for complex contracts, automated payment systems for thousands of creators, robust data privacy compliance, and cross-border execution capabilities.

Tarkington’s appointment suggests that Acceleration Partners is positioning itself as the blueprint for the next-generation agency—one that is as comfortable with creative direction as it is with data science. Her responsibilities in managing the division’s P&L and commercial strategy indicate that AP views influencer marketing as a significant driver of its own corporate growth, rather than just an add-on service for existing affiliate clients.

Conclusion: A Unified Vision for Growth

As Suzannah Tarkington takes the helm of the influencer practice at Acceleration Partners, the focus will be on demonstrating that cultural influence and commercial performance are not mutually exclusive. The challenge for the agency will be to maintain the authenticity and creative freedom that makes influencers effective, while imposing the discipline and measurement required by modern performance marketing.

The success of this initiative will likely be measured by the agency’s ability to move large-scale consumer brands away from fragmented, campaign-based influencer tactics toward integrated, data-backed growth systems. With Tarkington’s extensive background in community building and AP’s global infrastructure in performance marketing, the agency is well-positioned to lead the next phase of the creator economy—one where every post is a measurable step in the customer journey.