How Much Should You Charge Brands? The Creator Pricing Rules No One Tells You - Mikhailla Fitzgerald

Transcribed from the episode audio, so you might spot the odd typo.

Alycia: I was scrolling on Instagram a couple of weeks ago, and I saw this reel, and it literally made me stop what I was doing because it was guessing how much influencers would make on a post. And when I was thinking about How Do I Podcast and the problems that we're coming up against as podcasters and creators, I saw that so many people, they wanted to monetize. They had no idea how to. We've spoken about that a little bit on the podcast. But the second problem they were coming up against, like, "Okay, now I know how to, but I don't know how to price myself.

I have no idea what I should be charging." So I was like, "Okay, we need to talk about this on the podcast." And today, I am joined by Mikhailla Fitzgerald. I am so excited to have you on here.

Mikhailla: Hi. Glad to be here.

Alycia: Let's talk about that reel for a second because on that reel, you were saying that you would charge $500,000 for a partnership for a particular creator. Yeah. When someone is starting out and they're wanting to value themselves and fi- when they're wanting to find out how much they should charge, where do they begin?

Mikhailla: Yeah, this is a really interesting question because I have mixed opinions about it, particularly running a talent agency that manages creators. You have creators coming through your door, and your job is actually to monetize them, get them brand partnerships. But the biggest flag for me is, as a creator, you also don't want to monetize too early. because the most important thing from the beginning is actually community, your organic content, and having the space and capacity for that before you monetize too much.

So, if we talk about, like, how you value yourself from the beginning, you actually need to look at your whole strategy. What sort of brands do I want to align with? And then what value am I placing on my time as well? What is this taking me away from? Because you might get this partnership that's offering you a really great rate, but is it actually a product that you could see yourself promoting in six months' time, 12 months' time, or is it just because of the money?

So you've got to work out that strategy, uh, before you sort of go into the pricing.

Alycia: Tell me some of the creators that you work with at the moment.

Mikhailla: With at the moment Yeah. We manage actually a good variety of creators across, like, the finance space, beauty, fashion, travel, lifestyle, parenthood, and some of those creators are Steph Pays, she's very much in the, organization realm and began sort of as a mommy influencer. We have Tash Invests in the finance space, Cass Adventures in the travel space, which is really fun working across the travel industry.

Alycia: The thing I love abouttwo of those creators that you've mentioned is they both have podcasts, so they are perfect for what we're talking about today. Before we go into, like, the nitty-gritty of pricing yourself, how much is the most that you've seen a creator with a small audience charge?

Mikhailla: Yeah, great question.

Alycia: So,

Mikhailla: What we would price a creator, for example, in the last few weeks that we booked, she has under 25,000 followers on her Instagram, and we were able to secure her a deal for $8,000 for one reel and 30 days' usage.

Alycia: That's insane. That is incredible. Okay, let's talk about usage. I actually had this as a question for you for later on, but I have seen so many creators start to price in usage rights at the moment. For someone that has just heard that and doesn't know what that means, what does that mean?

Mikhailla: Yeah. So this is essentially your content taken by the brand as ownership, and they can utilise that content however they want, wherever they want. But as an agency, we usually have certain restrictions and limitations around that use as well, so.

Alycia: Hmm, okay. We're gonna talk about what you should be doing in those pricings, but let's go back to the beginning. We have seen, like, the rise of micro-influencers over the last few years, and even through the agency and the studio, we have seen podcasts with literally, like, 300 downloads get five, six figure deals with their podcast, which is insane. So someone sitting here is like, "I want to monetise my podcast. I want to go out to brands."

Where should they start to look for brands that they want to align themselves with?

Mikhailla: I think it goes back to your strategy, firstly.

Alycia: So I think working out who do you actually want to align with and where does this fit within your brand piece already.

Mikhailla: So those podcasters that you speak about that might have sort of that lower view number but get these really higher deals, they actually might've been what a brand was looking for all along. So I think it's looking together at then how do we build the pitch deck and actually chat to that client and learn about that, that client's goals and wants, and then tie the two together, and that's sort of where we, you know, begin the perfect match.

Alycia: Yeah. Perfect. And would you go out to, like, brands that you're using already in your everyday life? Like, is that a good place for someone who's literally got no idea, they've just built this incredible audience, and they think it's time to start monetising?

Mikhailla: Yeah, definitely look within. I think this is where social media catches up with a lot of people. They start to look on the outside, who is somebody else working with? They screenshot that, then they're like, "I wanna work with that brand." But when you actually look within, when you open up your fridge, your cupboard, you take a photo of that, have an actual look at the brands that you're utilising every single day and start there, rather than seeing, okay, who's already paying for other creators.

Alycia: Okay. So say someone's now, they're like, "Cool. Got my brands, got my list," what's next? Like, where do they start in terms of going out to pitch to them that they wanna start a partnership?

Mikhailla: Yeah. the best piece of advice I would give a creator is how can you capture the attention of the brand first, where they are and where you're going to be? So I think we've seen this done quite successfully with a few creators already, actually putting themselves out there on social media. This is actually probably - not done enough as well. People get nervous. Creators are really nervous to do it. But we've had a few creators that we've worked with across this strategy, and that's where we've won some of the best partnerships because it really speaks to the heart of, like, we wanna work with you and we're not stopping at anything, or we're not waiting for somebody else to get there.

I'm doing the work up front to show you how serious I am about this partnership. So it starts either at the content you're creating or the DM in their inbox, and then you get that support of your manager, the pitch deck, the media kit. That's kind of the whole package, but equally to secure a brand partnership, you're going on a journey.

Alycia: Yeah. Cool. Okay. We're gonna dive into each of those kind of elements. Um, so now we understand the brand that we wanna talk about, and we're gonna maybe send them a DM. Yeah. You and I have both seen terrible pitches over our years in this industry. What is something that they should have in that message that's gonna actually capture their attention?

Mikhailla: Yeah. Proof. Proof already that they like the brand and they can show it, not just talk about it. Like, even just send them a video. You know, bring that human element into it as well, rather than just the message component.

Alycia: Yeah. Okay. So like a video of you using the product? Yeah. Okay.

Mikhailla: Like make the video your pitch

Alycia: Yeah. I love this. Okay. And then we're going to, say they say yes, where do we go after that? Because they're gonna probably ask you for a rate card, and if someone's never had a partnership before, that's something that I think most creators would be like, "Ah, Mikayla, what do I do?" If they don't have an agency, they're just starting out, what would they begin with there?

Mikhailla: They say yes. Where do we go after that? Because they're gonna probably ask you for a rate card. Yeah. If someone's never had a partnership before, that's something that I think most creatives would be like, "Oh, Mikayla, what do I do?" They don't have an agency, they're just starting out. What would they begin with there? Yeah. So I think the important, um, step too to that is taking it over to email. You wanna keep it really professional now. You've done your creative component to capture their attention, now you wanna show it the professional side. So you bring it over to email, and yes, now you've gotta price yourself out.

So, how you go about that, if you're a creator just starting out, it is going to be a little bit harder because you probably don't have a really good understanding of the market, so you could easily price yourself out of market or underprice yourself, and you usually get a good indication of that by how quick or how slow they respond. So, I think if I'm a creator just starting out, I'm really wanting to understand the brand's goals and what they're working with and what they're looking for, and get from them their sort of deliverable list. And then from there, you can kind of see if they start to bring together what their budget is, and you can start working around that, whether you price up from there or you price down

Alycia: Yeah, okay. All right. So what about if you have, like, a really cagey brand? Like a brand that's not going to be like, "Oh, this is what we'd like, and this is what we usually do." You have a brand that's like, "No, I'd like to see from you your rate card, and I wanna know what you would deliver for us."

Mikhailla: Yeah. So you will do the same strategy but in reverse. You'll build a pitch deck, and it is kind of like your media kit, but it is more customised to the brand. So you're taking them on that journey and that story that you already sent them on socials, but you're building that further. What can you deliver? What does a package with you look like? And yes, the pricing question, I can't-- I feel like I can't give that off the cuff here without giving an example creator, because there are so many different factors that come into play when we do look at pricing, and we're not just looking at, oh, how much can a brand pay?

What is their budget? We're actually also looking at the creator and what are their engagement analytics, what are their insights, what is their audience based in Australia is important if that's part of the brand goals., How much organic reach do they have across their content? Do we need to factor in something like, paid usage, which is going to give them additional access to their content for ongoing use?

We have to look at kind of a few different factors, and you probably noticed the first thing I didn't mention there was actually the follower count, because it's not what you should be looking at. And I think when the industry began many years ago, people just looked at that following number. But over time, brands have become smarter to realise that it's not really about how many people are following you, but who are you actually reaching, and from who you're reaching.

Yes, you could have 20 comments on your reel and it looks like you're getting great engagement, but what is the quality of those contents at the same time? Like, what is your community coming to you for that feels like it's going to bring value to this brand? And that can also be a part of your pitch deck, is like, that's a proof point. Like, if you feel like this brand is just seeing you for the first time and they're not paying attention, like, tell more of that story as well so that they can learn about your community

Alycia: Yeah, and that's exactly what these podcasts that have had these huge returns, that's exactly what they have. Like they've got these teeny little audiences, but they are so hyper niche and so targeted. And for a brand to reach, you know, even if it is 300 people, but they're exactly those 300 people that they wanna talk to at the level that they wanna talk to. Like one of them in particular, they're all at a C-suite level for a particular industry, and everyone's like, "That's who I'm trying to target."

Like I could-- would have to spend thousands on advertising to reach that same person, or they're all listening to this podcast. everything that I love that we've spoken about here today that I need to frame up before we continue is, like, we're talking about pricing yourself. You have not once mentioned CPM, and anyone who has listened to any previous podcasts we've had on this will know that, like, I personally completely disagree with that metric as a value of your podcast and how much you should monetize it for. Because, like, unless you have thousands of people, like an industry average for a CPM, like a good one, is $30 per thousand downloads.

So, like, for every thousand dow- downloads, you're gonna make 30 bucks. Like, that is not gonna scale for most people. And so what you're positioning as in everything you've spoken about is, like, how can you present yourself to a brand and the value that you bring with the community that you have and that you're building, um, which I think is really clever.

Mikhailla: Yeah. And this also trains creators to not think about how do I go out to market in a mass format, but how do I really focus in on this as quality? Okay, if I wanna land these six brands over the next 12 months, what do I need to do to actually land them? And, like, that is often what it takes for us when we're really going after a brand alignment and a good quality partnership.

It's not overnight. I wish it was. Yeah. But the real work is actually done in the pitching, in the strategy that often takes months.

Alycia: The parts that you've recommended that I think lots of people should be paying attention to right now is the pitch deck that you've mentioned that is fully customized to that brand, Is there anything else you'd recommend having in there? We've got, you know, your follower count is in there, but it's not important. The demographics of your audience- Yeah... the value that you bring, the type of content that you wanna create, the deliverables that you think. Is there anything else that should be in that pitch deck?

Mikhailla: Yeah. I think if you do have any, like, PR about you as well, I think that's always a good, feature, but I would keep anything out of that that is sort of old and irrelevant now. So more so utilising that from a recent perspective, and then deleting anything that kind of starts to outdate. But giving a different overview of your content styles as well. So you really wanna capture all the different niches that you cover as well, and visually show that, how it comes through.

Alycia: Yeah. Perfect. And something we've seen, and I know you and I have spoken about previously off mic, is, like, looking at those brand values. Like, go on their website, look at their About page. Like, see what's important to that brand and how you can bring that. Like, ask AI to help you bring that into your deck as well. Don't use AI to write your deck. But like, you know, if you can incorporate that and they see their own language in there, and it looks like content that they're creating, like, they're automatically gonna be like, "Oh, they get us."

Like, "They understand what's important to us, too."

Mikhailla: Yeah. Yeah, absolutely. The one thing I would say you should never do is actually share a rate card. Um, that rate card should be very personal to you, like in your private documents, because every single brand, it's going to require that customisation, and the moment you sort of start to qualify your partnerships based off a standard rate is the moment you show that you're highly negotiable

Alycia: Mm.

Mikhailla: Because you will negotiate from there. So you wanna make sure that you are packaging up based on what their goals are. You need your mental rates- Yeah... keep them aside, but you never wanna go and share a full rate card.

Alycia: Okay. So we've spoken to a brand in the DMs. They've said, "Yep, cool. Send us across your rate card." We're going, "Hey, we're not gonna send that. We're gonna send you this pitch deck instead." Do you have any numbers, any figures on there at all? Or is it just, like, what you're gonna deliver?

Mikhailla: Um, I personally wouldn't until you start to get a feel for how they've taken the deck on board.

Alycia: Okay. Yeah.

Mikhailla: Yeah, and I would open up the conversation around whether you wanna chat through about it further, but you wanna see what they come back with first.

Alycia: Okay, cool. And so they, so they come back and they're like, "Yep, love this, but what are your rates?" I'm only speaking from, we have been on the flip side of this, right? Like I've seen these conversations. I know there are brands who will love this. They'll just go along for the ride. But I also know especially for small creators, there are brands that are just like, "No, tell us the money."

So I'm asking you very tough questions, but I'm asking it because we've had lived experience with this for creators. Yeah.

Mikhailla: And to be honest, like, the industry, it's so fast-moving, so it is something that we constantly battle, because they need the rates fast, because they need the campaign to be executed fast as well. So I, I think that's, that's the point that you give some rates. Yeah,

Alycia: Cool. so let's keep this very hypothetical, because I know there's a thousand different things that are going to influence this, but let's give some, like, ranges of rates if you're okay with this. So say someone's got, you know, under 1,000 followers on Instagram. They've got, you know, an audience of around the same size. Um, if we put them in, like, buckets, what sort of rates would you be charging

Mikhailla: Yeah. Oh, this depends on so many factors. I'm just gonna like loosely quote this,

Alycia: And there's so many

Mikhailla: There's so many resources-

Alycia: Like guys, Google ChatGPT, like everyone can give you some ranges, but I think knowing from someone who's in the industry where you would kind of place them, I feel like it's going to have a lot more weight behind it as well Yeah.

Mikhailla: So a creator with 1,000 followers? Okay. Creator with 1,000 followers cr- putting the content on their page as well as part of brand partnership, I'd probably price them anywhere between 800 to

Alycia: And I think people listening to this will have probably like dropped their phone at that statistic because they just don't think that that is something that brands will pay. But like, you've seen this, and again, it's about that first thing that you've spoken about here, which is that pitch deck. How can you convey the value? Because like we've seen this, like people do not believe me when I say this, but like I've seen these deals get approved Yeah And it's because of the value of your audience.

Like back when we had Renovating Australia, we were getting these deals and that's like, what? Six years ago. Yeah Like the landscape's changed even more since then. And like if you have this hyper-targeted audience, there's so much value in that. let's go 50,000.

Mikhailla: Yeah. So interestingly enough, I actually wouldn't move the mark a huge amount for someone with 50,000 followers. So their price range would be roughly between 3,000 to 9 to 10,000. And I do wanna explain the thinking behind that, because someone with 1,000 followers, they should be valuing themself really highly if they are thinking about working with brands at that stage of their career. So that is probably the important difference there.

Whereas someone with 50,000 followers is probably getting a lot more brand opportunities to explore different partnerships as well, and what their deliverables might look like is also a little bit less than somebody with 1,000 followers and what they might be securing as a part of those rates.

Alycia: Hmm. Okay. What sort of things would they be securing, do you think?

Mikhailla: So someone with 1,000 followers, um, for the rates that I quoted, I'd probably be looking at, like, one reel, 30 days usage rights, probably a different cut that they can also utilise for ads, and I'd probably steer away from anything on your stories

Alycia: Yeah. Okay. Okay, and that's really good to note as well, that agencies and big creators will charge separately from reels to stories. Like, you will have different rates for them. Yeah. Do you think, like, someone should have different rates for podcast, stories, reels, emails? Should they have different rates for all of them or have, like, a bundle price?

Mikhailla: Absolutely. Everything should be in your, like personal documents should be separated, and you should know exactly the value that you want for them. So if you're pricing your reel at 5,000, and then you might have an email list of less than, you know, 2,000 people, you might be pricing your EDM placement for $500. If they want that fully exclusive, ownership, then you might be pricing that higher around that $1,200 mark. But every single deliverable needs to be different. Even with your stories, standard is that brands love to book three frames when they're working with a creator. But industry side, three frames can actually damage the reach as well of the particular content.

So we look at things like a two-frame package, and then if they want the third frame, we might space that out onto another day and talk about how it gets a better reach by formatting it that way. But again, that's now taking up two of your paid days that you could be working with another brand. So again, you don't wanna undervalue that. You wanna keep that nice and high.

Alycia: Yeah, and the opportunity cost, like we will continue to talk about this throughout the episode, like, because that's where so many small creators, they go, "Oh my God, money. Like, I'll do whatever you need." Mm. But it's like, okay, cool, that's right now. Like, what is this gonna look like in 12 months' time? So, I think that's really important to take into consideration. Other things that I know that we have \\ seen included in packages as well is like your show notes mentions, as well as EDMs.

LinkedIn is a whole 'nother channel. Like, if you have an audience in LinkedIn, if you're a corporate podcast or you've built a following there, like that can be monetised separately. TikTok, like there are so many places, and, and YouTube of course, you have your AdSense that you can earn from there, and then placements there. Like, there are so many different places that you can earn money with a podcast, and people just go, "Oh, just pop a, an ad in, and that'll kind of be the end of the day." So we've spoken about a pitch deck for everything. High level, what is a media kit used for? 'Cause you've mentioned that as well.

Mikhailla: Yeah. So a media kit should house all the formalities about you, your social platforms, your about me, um, general overview of your content with actual links to that, your insights, all of, like, the proof points that we spoke about. Whereas the pitch deck is more customized to the brand that you're trying to work with. it's almost taking a part of your media kit and rebuilding it into your pitch deck, but now you're telling the story of how you and the brand are going to align.

Alycia: Yeah. Perfect. That makes so much sense, and I think, again, that, like, thought of not having your rates in there so that you have that opportunity to have a conversation about it, because we've seen, again, huge amounts of money be left on the table because we think, you know, "Oh, we'll value it as this," and then you find out from the brand when you talk to them later, "Oh, we had, like, a $50,000 budget for this partnership."

Like- Yeah... okay, hi, we just left all of that on the table. Like, I think that is really, really smart a- advice as well. I'd love to talk to you. What has been one of the best negotiation tactics that you've seen?

Mikhailla: Oh, I don't know if I can speak about this on air.

Alycia: On air.

Mikhailla: Um a look. Okay. So we had this scenario where we knew we wanted to go after a particular partnership, but we had two offers on the table, and the client that we wanted to work with, it was going to take a much longer process to secure that partnership. So we actually shared with them that we had another offer on the table for the creator ready to go, and it was kind of a now or never for them to sign with her, and that completely skipped a process that would've taken much longer and ultimately got us the deal.

Alycia: Yeah. That, like, fear of missing out. I think there's so many things you can bring into, like, a negotiation room, and there's, like, amazing podcasts on, like, how to negotiate in sales, which is effectively what you're doing. Like, you are being a salesperson. If you don't like sales, that's when you should get an agency, and we'll, we'll talk about that a little bit later. But, like, bringing that in to show them, like, there is demand for you and that you do need to, like, make a decision. You, you need to run the risk that, like, you might lose them if you have that, if they're not ready and they've got a process, but it might also get you the deal.

What about when you're trying to increase rate? Like, we've seen some really clever strategies here around, like, you know, a brand has a certain budget, and you've come in with, like, "This is my rate. This is what we're gonna deliver," and the brand's saying, like, "Oh, well, we could only do it for this amount," or, like, you know, you're trying to get them to increase the amount that they're paying you.

What are some strategies you've used there?

Mikhailla: Yeah. It's balancing the value. But what I have sort of found is if they're willing to get into that negotiation conversation already, that you can actually usually climb it without adding too much more on. So I'm always cautious to not overpromise and then sell yourself on more deliverables that is actually reasonable for the partnership. Cool, you might have, like, a $10,000 deal and it looks fa- fabulous on the table because you're like, "I'm getting $10,000 for this." But if that $10,000 you now actually miss out on three other partnerships because they're taking up more space across your, like, partnership opportunities, then is it actually really valuable?

So I think the most important thing there is just if the conversation is open, tip it up a little bit, and then usually you'll get one more over.

Alycia: Over. Yeah, and hold, hold things in your back pocket. That is brilliant advice because I have walked into some partnerships, and I've seen them doing, like, the podcast, a reel, some stories, an email. I'm like, "Whoa, guys, like, what are we... Like, this is your whole life. This is a full production and just for this one partner." And the biggest op- missed opportunity there is, like, you can't put another partner on because otherwise you're gonna be sending, like, six emails a week. Like, that is not sustainable, and it's not gonna be a great experience for your community as well, and that is where we've seen some big creators and big podcasts make big mistakes in that they've brought on, like, six, seven ad partners.

They now need to shove them all into one episode, and I've seen, like, Reddit threads full of people being like, "This is so annoying. It's just ad after ad after ad." And they've lost that, like, sense of community 'cause they're just trying to- fit in all the sponsorships that they've created

Mikhailla: And interestingly enough, we do have this with creators when they create a podcast. Um, predominantly, obviously, where their brand partnerships exist is on social media, and they move over to the podcasting space, and they launch episodes. Episode one doing well, episode two doing well. It's time to monetize. Let's monetize it, right? That is the hardest thing as an agency to sort of support that because it's like you're building a whole new community from the ground up. You don't wanna monetize too early. It's the same format for social media with a podcast, is like just being really strategic and intentional about where you are monetizing, not for the sake of the size of the partnership deal that you're trying to secure, like you said, and the value that you put behind it.

So, you really wanna protect every single platform you have at all costs and the access to that, and ultimately underselling it can be doing you a disservice long term.

Alycia: Yeah. Uh, especially because you don't know where your growth's gonna take. Like if you had this really steep growth trajectory, we saw it with, The Psychology Of Your 20s. Like we were talking to Gemma around her podcast, and when she started out, she was charging like 500 US dollars an episode, which she was stoked with. She was so excited. But she brought on a manager, and the manager was absolutely mortified, as you can imagine.

'Cause if she like divided that out, that was like a 50 cent CPM. Like it was terrible, a terrible deal. She knew no better, but she had locked in all these spaces. She had all these deliverables, and then she realised like, "Oh, hang on, I've built this audience. It's now like quadrupled in size, but I've locked in for 12 months at a rate that is like so undervalued for where the podcast is now."

Yeah. Have you ever seen that with a creator? And like, what would you recommend to them to negotiate through that?

Mikhailla: Yeah, absolutely. I think you always wanna have termination clauses in a contract. That's the most important thing, and I think with contracts as well, particularly in the creator industry, I think we are very protective around our creator contracts, often to the point where, you know, I feel like people just wanna close a deal. So they'll just say yes, they'll bend to that rule, they'll deal with it later, and it hurts. And as an agency, one of our jobs is to look at that first, spend

Alycia: First,

Mikhailla: The time in that first. It is still very painful for us, but it does protect us a lot late, later, particularly around like the usage rights component. You know, - There might be an allowance for one week usage right, and that's negotiated in, but you see the content still running live three weeks later. What is your clause around that, that now allows you to, you know, seek compensation as a part of that? So there are so many areas in the contract that shouldn't be overlooked, and particularly if you are in those initial stages of growth and you're doing a long-term partnership, also thinking, okay, my audience, let's say you've currently got 50,000 followers, but in 12 months' time, I'm still in this partnership and now I have 2 million followers.

What happens to this partnership? You know, are we still servicing it because of the loyalty component, they began with you from the beginning? Or are we thinking about clauses that protect us and the rate potentially moves with your audience growth?

Alycia: Mm, that is such a good point. On contracts, we've seen, like, I think the, the pinnacle for so many podcasters in their mind is like, "I get acquired by a network," or, "I get this huge network deal," or, "I get..." Like, you know, we've seen Call Her Daddy, $125 million, uh, for a three-year deal. Insane amount But with that, what sort of things should people have in their contract to protect themselves?

Mikhailla: A lot. Um, I'm pretty sure, like, our contracts are always, like, a six-page document, and honestly, we've continued to build clauses over time through mistakes that have been made, because I don't think from the beginning anyone could understand what the perfect contract looks like until, you know, issues start to come up along the way. A recent one that I'm a massive fan of is the reputation clause around creators. So, Something's happened bad with a brand. Creator's about to go live with this content. Brand wants to pull the partnership because they have bad media happening at the moment, and, like, there was no clause to protect the talent if the partnership was pulled due to, you know, the brand having issues.

They would just activate the termination clause, right? Because the content might not be delivered yet. We might not be at that stage where you could terminate based on where it is up to in the contract. But we might have spent months in negotiation with the client, um, concepting, turning away competitors, all of those sort of things. So, the reputation clause is probably a really big one that still allows the creators to be paid no matter what happens to the brand. If they get bad media, that's on them. Our creator still gets paid.

Alycia: And would that work vice versa as well? Like, if a brand's going through some really negative publicity, as a creator, you probably don't wanna be aligned with them. Yeah.

Mikhailla: Yeah. Yeah. And word for word that one of our clauses actually been transferred into a client contract I've seen recently, so

Alycia: So- Oh, no way.

Mikhailla: Yeah,

Alycia: That is hilarious. Okay. That's really good. Uh, anything else, like around IP or anything like that? 'Cause I know that's been a huge deal, especially with creators that use their name for something. Like, we've seen some massive legal cases over the last few years.

Mikhailla: Yeah, I don't think a lot of creators understand the wording in contracts, particularly if you're self-managing. Um, There is a lot of contracts that include a clause around giving your content in perpetuity, which is basically unlimited access to your content beyond the term forever and ever. And this is something we've had to fight a fair bit in contracts as well, and even educate people client side, because they don't even know the terminology and what it truly means.

But this could mean for a creator that, let's say, you're working with a really significant key brand, and 12 months' time, your audience size is way bigger, and you decide to sign a deal with a competitor, guess who can still use your old content and mess up your current deal? And, you know, they can do whatever they want with that.

Alycia: We've seen this, like, I'm part of so many UGC groups, and there are p- are people going like, "Oh, what should I, you know, charge for this? What are you thinking?" And there's seasoned creators that are in there that are all on them about those usage rights, and they're like, "No, you need to make sure there's a limited timeframe on them." I've never thought about the fact that, like, it's because, you know, you w- might have a competitor down the track.

Yeah. But, like, back in the day, that was n-no one thought about that. That wasn't something that we ever thought. We're like, "Yeah, we make this video. Who cares if you use it?" But, like, the opportunity cost of them having that, especially as you grow, like you think about, you know, you did a video with Alex Cooper years ago when she had, like, a million followers. You did? Did you actually? I think so. Oh.

Mikhailla: No. No. Like, did you ever- We can leave that in.

Alycia: Did. I mean, did you? Um, but, like, you know, her audience is so much more valuable. The cost of that video for a brand would be significantly more, so I think as a creator, like, brands would love to not have that in there, and if you're self-managing, these are great things to look out for. Anything else that they should look out for in, like, a pitch from a brand or a contract that's got things in there?

Mikhailla: Yeah. Another big one in contracts is the duration of the partnership. So even though you might be working to a specific campaign timeline, a lot of delays can occur as a part of campaign timelines, and I've seen this quite often where the campaign period isn't really defined. It's a commencement date is listed, but there's no clear end date, and so any delays that occur, you know, obviously affect when you're actually getting paid and that content going live. But by the time that content might go live, You might just not be interested in that brand anymore, and you might wanna pull out of that campaign, and now you've lost that money because you're like, "Well, that took way too long to get live." And often also rates increasing around that period, so we'll usually have clauses that cover if there is delays beyond one month, delays beyond two months, and sort of price that accordingly, and that just helps to make sure everything's on track.

Alycia: Yeah. Perfect. Cool. And I think for podcasters, we have that little bit more control in terms of, like, you are placing the ads in your own content, so you'll know. That's a really good point for anyone that's doing social editions though, and, like, working with brands that have social activations. Maybe they're wanting that placement around a particular activation or campaign that they have. If you've got them slotted in for May, and then all of a sudden they're delayed, like, that is your opportunity cost for the brand partner that you're gonna have in July. So I think that's so important to keep in mind as well. Amazing. Okay.

Contracts are going to sound terrifying for people that are listening now because there is, there's a lot in there. Like, these are legal documents, and yeah, you can get AI to look through them, but there's so much that AI won't even know to put in there. If they haven't had the runs on the boards, they haven't seen the mistakes. I've spoken to a few creators that have wanted to get representation. They've gone to an agency, and they've been knocked back. So what sort of things are you actually looking for when creators approach you?

Mikhailla: Yeah. First thing that we sort of look for as an agency is their insights. We'll have a look at, like, their audience demographic, how many people in Australia are following them, the gender, the age group. We'll have a look how active they are across their platform. So are they consistently posting? Are there any recent brand partnerships, examples that we can see from them?, And sort of having that conversation as well. So what are their goals? Where does this fit together? Usually before we get to that stage, we've done sort of that first initial assessment.

They'll go through a bit of a form process around that. But for us as an agency, like, a really big thing is about working with creators in a consistent format. So we equally also wanna know that they're hungry and eager, and usually you get a pretty good indication from how they complete the form\, and apply for us, and then the sort of conversations that we have as well.

But every agency, I feel there is an agency out there for every creator. We are all very different, and maybe if they are getting knocked back, that's probably the question they could ask. "Hey, I'd love to know why I'm not a fit." And then could they give you a recommendation for another agency that they might think is a fit for you as well?

Alycia: Hmm. Yeah, and like, uh, if you know why you're getting knocked back, that's something you can work on. Like, if it's engagement rates, okay, cool. Well, how do I get my community to engage more? Like, what am I doing here that's not, like, going to be valuable for a brand? Mm. Um, and those sort of things. And-

Mikhailla: Mm. And those sort of things. And- And even just on that as well, like it could be timing as well. You know, we have creator categories we like to work in. We're conscious of not having too many creators the same, so we could be overpopulated in a particular area and looking to build out another niche at that time. So it also really just depends about the, the company goals and what we're after then

Alycia: Yeah. Love that advice. Okay, I have two listener questions for you that have been doing some creator, uh, work here. The first one is from Georgia. Great name, by the way. Hi. My daughter's name is also Georgia. Uh, "I've had four brand collabs this year, and every single one of them was gifted. I got free product but no money. At what time am I allowed to ask to be paid, and how do I say it without them ghosting me?"

Mikhailla: Ooh, that's a great question By the way, if you're working on gifted partnerships, make sure that it's gifted with no requirements. Don't have yourself held to creating content as a part of gifting, because really it's a risk that a brand should take. If you are accepting a gift, I, you know, accept it intentionally with the idea that you're gonna share it. But you don't wanna be held to any contractual terms that come as a part of a paid partnership. So I think it depends how the partnership worked. If they were very casual and, you know, there was no contractual agreement, which legally you should still have, um, then I don't know if you would ever get to the stage with a paid partnership with a brand like that, but if there is sort of a contract behind it, that process, you definitely need to be going back to them and presenting some different opportunities of how they can work with you moving forward.

Alycia: Yeah, and probably bringing all the stuff that you spoke about at the start, like show the value, show the engagement, show the people that have, like, gone and, like, sent a DM saying they love the product as well-

Mikhailla: Yeah. Um, so- And that's, that's-- It's great for the creator to look at that data themselves. This is actually something I feel like a lot of creators don't do soon enough, is like, "How did my content actually perform? And did it perform that way because I had a contract that said I had to do X, Y, Z, and it didn't perform well? Why don't you go now and test it in a format that you wanted to do, and again, take that and show that proof point. I've got a series idea. I think if we work it around this, which is my passion point, and it works in with an organic series I'm building, and I can incorporate your product and look at the performance I'm able to achieve if we go down this angle versus following this."

Brands are very open to you pitching different ideas if it means that it's going to get organic reach as well.

Alycia: That's a, a good point for people to feel empowered to push back on scripts and things that people, that things that brands deliver to you, 'cause we have seen creators, again, go out and they get this massive partnership. They're so excited about it. They get the script. Like, you know your community better than anyone else. If you don't think your community's gonna resonate with these words that you have to say, ask them to change. And most of the time- Yeah... like, would you agree they would say yes? Absolutely. Yeah.

Mikhailla: Like, it's, even like case, it's doing your own case studies as a creator. It is, "Okay, this didn't work, but I think if I try it like this, I know it will work 'cause this works for everything I'm doing when I'm not in a brand partnership." So test it, prove it, show it. Build your own case study around it, and that will increase your value, too.

Alycia: Yeah. Perfect. And if Georgia now is like, it's not a brand that she's working with, she's just only ever done gifted stuff, and now she's about to do her first paid- Okay what would your suggestion be to her in that scenario?

Mikhailla: I would show all of the work that she has been doing and build a pitch deck around that

Alycia: Mm. Yeah. Love this. Cool. Uh, next one is from Jade: "A brand loved my pitch. They said, 'Let's do it.' They asked for my rates," which we've spoken about this, so this is gonna be interesting, "and then they vanished the second I sent them. What happened, and what should I do?"

Mikhailla: I would always go back to the brand and follow them up. It might not be that they've genuinely ghosted you, but it's a busy, fast-paced industry, and sometimes it takes us three follow-ups before we get a signed, sealed deal, and we'll feel ghosted. so it just genuinely might be that you're on the bottom of their list right now, and you need to follow them back up. And then if they don't respond to that, like, ask for some more feedback around it as well. But by the third time, if they haven't come back to you, I, I would say just keep moving on.

Find their competitor. Go to them. Brutal.

Alycia: I love that. I want to do some fun little questions to wrap up. What is the biggest myth in the creator industry?

Mikhailla: I think the biggest creator myth is that you have to wait for the opportunities to come to you.

Alycia: Yes, love that. You need to go out and grab them. What is the first thing that you look at when you open someone's profile?

Mikhailla: Someone's profile? Their bio. Is it? I do.

Alycia: I thought it would be, like, the number of views on their reels. That's so

Mikhailla: I don't even look at the number of views on their reels. No. That's so interesting. I mean, I look at their bio and their most recent content, and then I'll start to go to reels. But I always start in the bio, and to be honest, it's actually the, the thing that lets down a lot of creators. It's usually the first thing we work with on a creator as well, and it starts to increase their opportunities, and it's not just the format of like, "This is who I am," but it's like, where are you located? Where is your email? So many people don't have- Yes... their email or their management's email in their actual, like, bio.

They put it on the little email tab. Mm. But a lot of agencies and brands work on a computer, and you don't see that. You have to go onto your mobile to collect that, and so, so many errors happen in that process or talent not qualified through. It's such a simple thing, but- Okay... they'll be so surprised how much more work it creates.

Alycia: Love this. Guys, check your bio. Very good advice. Uh, what are the best creators doing right now?

Mikhailla: Carousels.

Alycia: Ooh, You're seeing, like, really good performance on them?

Mikhailla: Such good performance. I think over the last five months, like, our creators that have doubled down on the use of carousels has increased their reach significantly. It's even grown their audiences. Like, creators that we've had stagnant for years are now growing new audiences through carousels, but it's also one of the easiest formats to just consistently repeat as well. So, it's not about creating a whole new carousel every single time, but it's about, "That worked.

How can I now keep that up and build on it?" And it becomes also very familiar within your community. So, doing carousels and incorporating ManyChat, you know, that simple component. Yes, it increases engagement a little bit, so it looks, it doesn't really move the dial overall on your engagement rate. But what it does is, if you're a creator who's trying to monetize in other ways, it's providing that monetization channel, and when you're working with brands, it's also giving them that opportunity as well.

So, it's doing you a service because it's increasing the links that you're generating through for the brand.

Alycia: Yeah, and we've-- Tell me, is it true that if you put a link in your story, like the link button, that Instagram will throttle the amount of new views to your stories?

Mikhailla: For some reason, it, yeah, it definitely staggers it, so you have to also be really strategic with your links. I did this just yesterday, where I shared a story, and the first thing I just wrote was, "Surprise." And nobody knows what the surprise was. They could've thought I was announcing a pregnancy or

Alycia: Yeah. Oh my God, I actually saw this. Yes, I was like, "What is this?"

Mikhailla: They got the, it got the watch, and then the next story was actually the link- So you gotta have a strategy behind everything as well. Being really intentional is important.

Alycia: Yeah, not just like throwing up a, "Click here for the link." Like wh- who is gonna click that and why? And what value? Like, I think, again, coming back to what you started to, uh, with at the start, like what value are you providing to your community? Like, if you're doing this partnership, how is your community benefiting from this partnership? We're seeing that with podcasting as well, like our carousels are outperforming all, all reels, like for big creators as well, and they've all incorporated them into the strategy.

Like, I think ev- there would not be a day that I do not open my Instagram and get served a Burnouts podcast carousel, because I love them. I'm like, "Oh, what is this?" And like, you know, not every time will that convert to a listen, but like the comments on a lot of them are like people like, "Oh my God, what is this?" Mm. And again, Instagram, going from short form to long form, I say this all the time, it's the hardest thing to get someone to do. But if you can get them to comment and you can send them a link, when they do have space in their day to actually consume content or they're looking for a podcast, it's in their inbox.

It's not like they have to go back and find the reel and find your link in bio. Like, it's such a smart strategy to include. So, love that. Amazing.

Mikhailla: Can I actually... I'm just gonna jump in here. Yeah. This is something that I feel is also not yet tapped into in the podcast- Mm... market, um, on the social side of things, is actually working with creators to almost stitch the podcast's short-form videos that happen. Because any time I see, like, a creator usually interview someone on their podcast, I'm listening. I'm interested, like, what the perspective is. But then if I see, like, a podcast, um, short form pop up, I don't know anything about the person, much of that, I'm just like, I'm halfway there, but I'm not all the way there.

But if you were to pay and work with creators or work on a strategy around that, that then gets the creators to stitch almost and like, "I was just listening to this podcast the other day." 'Cause right, it's a general organic recommendation, but it's almost like you can supersize the strategy behind it, so- Yeah

Alycia: So. Yeah.

Mikhailla: Was something to case study test

Alycia: We have seen that with, um, and Grace from Diary of a CEO also used this strategy and grew her audience really quickly because of it, is the recommendations of other podcasts. Like, using that to say, like, "Oh, a podcast I've been loving this week."

Mikhailla: Oh, yes. I have seen those.

Alycia: Yeah. Like, that content for her as a creator herself performs outrageously well. But, like, having that credibility, like, that trust factor, if you love this creator and they are saying, "Hey, I loved this," of course, like, products, of course you've got that, like, um, proof built in that you're gonna go and buy that product. If they say, "This podcast is good"-

Mikhailla: Yeah

Alycia: Go and listen to it. But even doing, and we do it a lot with our clients' podcasts, I need to do it better with my own, I will, um, is we- You

Mikhailla: Such good

Alycia: Need to do something... I know. I know. But we actually do content outside of the podcast- Yeah... to promote the episode. So it's not the clips that are doing it, it's like, you know, Caller Daddy does do this, Burnouts do it. the Him and Her podcast, which is now rebranded as The Bostics, they do the most amazing versions of this. Like, they will sit down with, uh, Terry Dubrow, who is, you know, a plastic surgeon, amazing person.

They sat down with him and they said, "Okay, analyse my face." And, like, that was the content, was him, like, analysing his face and saying, like, "You should get this done," or, "You should get that done." It was analysing Michael, so the guy, so it

Mikhailla: It was like-

Alycia: Really scroll-stopping content, and then in it, they, like, mention that they interviewed him on their podcast. And that piece of content, people will, like, watch that content, they'll be excited about that po- co- content, and then they recognise there's also a podcast off the back of it. it's such an easy strategy, and people just need to be doing that stuff more, because you think about the content that you consume, like me as a person, I hardly ever watch reels unless they're funny. Like- Yeah I can watch educational reels, I'm like, "Give me the information." Carousels, I'll watch all day long- Yeah... and save all day long. So really good thoughts there. What's something really simple that would make people have better content?

Mikhailla: I feel like the first thing that comes to mind for me is having the right equipment around you. I think I see this evolve over time. Like, a creator begins, they've got their phone, and that works great. But when you've got, like, the tripod, the mirrors, the lights, like all of that sort of stuff around you and you have it consistently, I find creators create more consistently.

Alycia: Yeah. If you make it easy for yourself, like that simple tip of like doing your hair and makeup every morning so that like if you wanna film something, if that's something that's important to you- Mm... then you're ready to go. It's not like, "Oh, I can't do that 'cause this is not there." Like removing all those friction points so that it's easy to create content whenever you want to.

Yeah. So question that we ask everyone to the podcast, what is one podcast that is regularly on your rotation, and why do you keep coming back to it?

Mikhailla: Yeah. I listen to a few different podcasts, but it depends sort of what I'm going through in my current phase of life. So I've listened to, like, Mel Robbins. I love, like, anything around her relationship stuff. I have No Bullshit Leadership when I'm trying to work on, like, my leadership skills. But probably one that I always come back to is definitely Call Her Daddy, and particularly if she's got, like, good, juicy guests on there.

She's so good with her marketing on socials, and it always just loops me straight over there. It's saved, it's, like, to listen to next, and then I'm on a walk the next day listening to it. So I like it 'cause it just kind of like tunes me out of everything else- Yeah

Alycia: I have not listened to the Kim Kardashian episode yet. It's on my list. When I was doing research for this, I was like, "Oh my God." That particular episode just on Spotify has over three million downloads.

Mikhailla: You know, my fave was Megan Fox.

Alycia: Mm. Have you listened to that one? No. Good?

Mikhailla: Yeah. I

Alycia: Got such an interesting story... she

Mikhailla: Was not what I expected. I think that's what really hooked me into all of her episodes, was just, like, What she builds with trust with a celebrity is just, it's so mesmerizing, but getting to know them in such a different format as well.

Alycia: I've found, like, the more I dig into her as a creator, there are such people on, like, such a big divide with her. Like, they either love her or they completely tear her apart, which is just, there's all the controversy at the moment, but

Mikhailla: Built-- Yeah. There's

Alycia: Anyway. Anyway, um, love that. Mikaela,

Mikhailla: Michaela, thank

Alycia: You so much for joining us today. I know this will have been so helpful for someone who is just starting out. Where can people find you and the best place to connect with you? Yeah.

Mikhailla: You? Yeah. You can find me @Michaela on Instagram or usually on Hume Management as well.

Alycia: I, we will pop it all in the show notes so everyone can come along and find you, but thank you so much.

Mikhailla: All right. Thanks for having me.