How to choose the right creators for your brand

Introduction

Most brands still pick creators the way they picked billboards: by size. But a creator is not a placement — they are a relationship with an audience, and that relationship is what you are paying for.

After eleven years and thousands of partnerships, we have learned that the right creator is usually smaller, more specific and more opinionated than the one on your first shortlist.

Start with audience fit, not reach

Ask for audience demographics before you ask for rates. A creator whose viewers are 70% in your target market will beat a creator three times their size whose audience is spread across the world.

• Country and city split of viewers
• Age bands against your buyer persona
• Share of returning viewers per video

Read the comments, not the likes

Likes are cheap. Comments that ask “where is this from?” or “does it work for oily skin?” are the clearest signal that an audience buys on this creator’s word.

We score the last 30 posts for purchase-intent comments before we ever send a brief.

Check past partnerships

Scroll back through a creator’s sponsored posts. Do they still sound like themselves? Do their viewers push back, or ask for links? A creator who has turned down brands is often the one worth booking.

Conclusion

Choose creators like you would hire a salesperson: for the trust they have earned, the people they reach and the way they talk about things they love.