Strictly's most influential professional dancer

Strictly’s Dianne Buswell potentially earns 19 times more than Nancy Xu on Instagram

Research has revealed that Strictly Come Dancing professional dancer, Dianne Buswell could earn nearly 19 times more for a sponsored Instagram post than co-star Nancy Xu.

The study, which was carried out by beauty comparison site Cosmetify, found that while Buswell could earn £3,355 per post, due to her follower count of 842,715, Xu isn’t as influential with 21,831 followers, indicating a fee of just £178 per post.

To determine how influential this year’s cast of professional dancers are on social media, Cosmetify analysed their Instagram profiles and used marketing calculators to work out how much they could be paid per sponsored post, finding Buswell in first place.

The Australian pro dancer would only need to be paid for 15 sponsored posts to make the equivalent of her Strictly Come Dancing salary of £50,000.

No doubt her relationship with ex-Strictly partner and YouTube star Joe Sugg is a contributing factor to her influential social media presence.

With 652,706 Instagram followers, Gorka Marquez is the second most influential professional dancer on this year’s Strictly, and can rake in £2,598 per sponsored post. That’s on top of the £50,000 salary he makes from the BBC’s hit dancing show, as well as revenue from solo projects.

Last year’s winner and The Masked Dancer UK judge, Oti Mabuse, is the third most influential dancer on the show. With more than half a million followers on Instagram, she can expect to earn an average of £2,340 per post.

Giovanni Pernice has the fourth largest following out of all of this year’s Strictly professionals, with a total of 476,128 followers. This means he can charge around £1,897 per sponsored post, but that figure could increase drastically as a result of his new relationship with influencer Maura Higgins, who has more than three million followers.

Aljaž Škorjanec is the fifth most influential professional dancer, potentially earning £1,852 per sponsored post. The Slovenian dancer and choreographer has 465,896 Instagram followers – almost the same as his wife and fellow professional dancer, Janette Manrara. While Manrara doesn’t make it onto this list because she left her role as a professional dancer to take over from Zoe Ball as presenter of It Takes Two, her following of 441,751 means the couple could receive a combined earning of £3,608 every time they both post sponsored content.

Again, he doesn’t feature on this list, but longest running professional, now turned judge, Anton Du Beke, has 245,923 followers on Instagram, meaning he can expect to make £978 per sponsored post. 

At the other end of the scale, along with Xu, Luba Mushtuk, Nadiya Bychkova and Graziano Di Prima are among the least influential Strictly Come Dancing professionals. With under 150,000 followers, they all earn less than £500 per sponsored Instagram post.

But while Mushtuk is the second least influential dancer according to this research, she still has nearly three times more followers than Xu, meaning she could charge £314 for a sponsored post.

Bychkova has 26,489 more followers than Mushtuk, but can only expect to be paid £457 per Instagram post – that's £2,898 less than Buswell.

As the fourth-least influential professional Strictly dancer, Di Prima can only charge slightly more for a sponsored post. With 121,230 followers on Instagram, he can expect to get paid £482 per post.

But that doesn’t mean things can’t change for the least influential professional dancers. When asked to comment on the study, a spokesperson from Cosmetify said: “Each episode of Strictly Come Dancing is viewed by millions, suggesting that the professionals can expect to gain even more followers on social media, which increases opportunities for the dancers outside of the Strictly season.”

How much the Strictly Come Dancing professionals can earn on Instagram

Professional	Instagram handle	Follower count	Pay per post
Dianne Buswell	diannebuswell	842,715	£3,355
Gorka Marquez	gorka_marquez	652,706	£2,598
Oti Mabuse	otimabuse	588,142	£2,340
Giovanni Pernice	pernicegiovann1	476,128	£1,897
Aljaž Škorjanec	aljazskorjanec	465,896	£1,852
Karen Hauer	karenhauer	270,485	£1,075
Neil Jones	mr_njonesofficial	226,051	£899
Johannes Radebe	johannesradebe	224,816	£899
Amy Dowden	amy_dowden	206,633	£823
Katya Jones	katyajones	178,433	£709
Graziano Di Prima	grazianodiprima	121,230	£482
Nadiya Bychkova	nadiyabychkova	85,366	£457
Luba Mushtuk	lubamushtuk	58,877	£314
Nancy Xu	nancy_xuxi	21,831	£178

How did the top three most influential professional dancers get where they are today?

Dianne Buswell

Former Australian Open champion Buswell became a professional dancer at the age of 21, when she joined touring dance company Burn the Floor.

Four years later, she became a professional dancer on the fifteenth season of Australia’s Dancing with the Stars, returning to Burn the Floor when she was eliminated from the show.

In 2017, Buswell joined Strictly Come Dancing for its fifteenth series, also taking part in a Children in Need special the same year. The next year she reached the final with YouTuber Joe Sugg and has been a professional dancer on the show ever since.

Gorka Marquez

Marquez discovered his talent for dancing at age 12, going on to represent his home country of Spain at the World Latin Championships in 2010, and reaching the semi-finals of the 2012 World DanceSport Federation World Cup.

Before he made his first appearance on Strictly Come Dancing in 2016, he toured all over the world with Burn the Floor as one of their leads.

From 2016 to 2018, he was a professional dancer on the BBC’s dancing show, partnering with Eastenders actresses Tameka Empson and Maisie Smith and X Factor winner Alexandra Burke. He returned this year, making it to week three with Coronation Street actress, Katie McGlynn.

Oti Mabuse

South African-born Mabuse wasn’t always destined to be a dancer. She studied civil engineering at university before embarking on a career in professional ballroom dancing and has since been awarded a number of accolades.

Some of these include winning the German Championship PD Freestyle Latin, coming second place in the European Championship Latin in 2014 and placing third in the World Cup Freestyle Latin in 2014, as well as winning the South African Latin American Championship eight times.

She was a professional dancer and a judge on the German television series Let’s Dance and a dance captain on The Greatest Dancer, before becoming a panellist on The Masked Dancer and a professional dancer on Strictly Come Dancing.