How to get brand deals.Even as a small creator.

1. What brands actually look for

Follower count gets you noticed. It's rarely what gets you hired. When a brand decides between creators, it's usually weighing these:

• Audience fit

  Are your followers the people who buy its product? A 5,000-follower account full of new runners is worth more to a running shoe brand than 200,000 followers who came for memes.

• Engagement that looks real

  Comments that respond to what you said, saves and shares, steady views. Brands check, and they've got good at spotting inflated numbers.

• Content they could imagine running

  Brands look at your last ten posts and ask whether their product would sit naturally among them. Consistency of style and quality matters more than one viral hit.

• A clear niche

  "Budget meal prep for students" is easier to hire than "lifestyle". A niche tells a brand exactly which campaigns you fit.

• Reliability

  Answering emails, hitting dates, following a brief. Brands rebook creators who make their job easy, and repeat deals are where creator income gets stable.

2. Make yourself easy to hire

Many brand deals start with a brand finding you. Make sure that, when they do, getting in touch takes ten seconds.

• Put a business email in your bio

  Brands rarely send serious offers through DMs, and DMs are where the scams live. A dedicated email address also keeps deals out of your personal inbox.

• Say what you do

  One line in your bio that names your niche and that you work with brands: "Plant-based recipes · brand collabs: hello@…".

• Pin your best branded-style work

  Pin two or three posts that show how you'd feature a product, even if they weren't paid. If you've done paid work, pin the best.

• Have a one-page rate sheet ready

  Your platforms, audience basics (top locations, age range), engagement, two or three examples, and starting prices. Brands ask for it in the first reply.

• Add a Hire me link

  On HotInfluencer you can turn on a public Hire me page with your verified accounts and track record. A brand describes what it wants, the budget and the timing; you get an email, and can turn the request into a protected deal with the form already filled in, or decline. Put it in your bio next to your email.

3. Where brand deals come from

Brands you already use

The easiest first deals are with brands you already buy and talk about. You can show your audience already sees the product, and your pitch writes itself. Smaller and newer brands are far more likely to reply than household names, and often more flexible on terms.

Direct pitching

Most creators who land regular deals pitch. Not mass emails, but a short, specific message to the right person at a brand that fits. More on that below, and in depth in our pitching masterclass.

Platform marketplaces

YouTube, TikTok and Instagram each run a marketplace where brands find creators for campaigns. Eligibility depends on your country, account type and sometimes audience size, and it changes often, so check each platform's current rules (details in the next section).

Creator marketplaces and agencies

Third-party marketplaces let brands post campaigns that creators apply to, and talent agencies represent creators for a commission. Both can bring steady work, but read how and when they pay you: some pay weeks after the campaign ends.

Affiliate programs as a way in

Many brands run affiliate programs open to anyone. If you drive sales through your link, you have hard numbers to take back to the brand's team and ask for a paid, flat-fee deal.

4. YouTube, TikTok and Instagram: what's different

YouTube

Sponsorships on YouTube are usually integrations: a segment inside a longer video, or a dedicated video. Videos keep getting views for months or years, so YouTube deals tend to pay more per piece, and brands care about average views per video more than subscribers. YouTube's own marketplace, Creator Partnerships (formerly BrandConnect), is built into YouTube Studio for creators in the YouTube Partner Program in supported countries.

TikTok

TikTok rewards fast, native-looking content, and brands often want UGC-style videos they can also run as Spark Ads. That makes usage rights a big part of the price. TikTok's Creator Marketplace now lives in TikTok One; you need to be 18 or over, in a region where it's available, and individual campaigns may set their own requirements.

Instagram

Brands typically buy Reels, Stories and carousel posts, often in bundles, and increasingly ask for collab posts that appear on both accounts. If you have a Creator or Business account, look for the creator marketplace and branded content tools in your Professional Dashboard; availability depends on your country.

5. How to pitch a brand (with a template)

Find the right person first: an influencer, partnerships, social or brand marketing manager. LinkedIn and the brand's own posts (who's tagged in launches) are good places to look. A general "hello@" inbox works for small brands where the founder reads everything.

Keep the pitch short, specific to the brand, and end with one clear question.

Subject: [Your niche] creator × [Brand]: [one-line idea]

Hi [name],

I'm [your name], I make [type of content] for [who your audience is] on [platform] (@[handle]). I've been using [product] for [time], and my audience keeps asking about [related topic].

Idea: [one or two sentences, e.g. "a 60-second Reel showing a full week of meal prep with your containers, ending on the freezer test my followers always ask for"].

A few numbers: [average views or reach], [engagement rate], [top audience location / age].
Recent work: [link], [link].

Would you be open to a paid collaboration this [month / quarter]? Happy to send rates and a few more ideas.

[your name]
[email] · [Hire me link]

If you hear nothing, follow up once after about a week with something new: a fresh idea, a recent post that did well, or a timely hook. Then move on. Silence is common and rarely personal.

6. Pricing your first paid deal

The biggest pricing mistake new creators make is quoting one number for everything. A brand deal is really several things bundled together:

• Creation

  Your time to plan, film, edit and post.

• Distribution

  Posting to your audience, on your account.

• Usage rights

  The brand reusing your content in ads or on its own channels. Price it by duration and channel.

• Exclusivity

  Not working with competitors for a period. It costs you income, so it costs extra.

Our influencer pricing guide walks through each part with examples. If a brand offers only free product for a deal with deliverables, dates or usage rights, it's asking for work: politely give your price instead.

7. Closing the deal without getting burned

A "yes" by email isn't the finish line. Plenty of creators land their first deal, deliver, and then spend two months chasing the payment. Close every deal the same way:

1. Check the brand is real. Find its website yourself and check the email domain matches. Never log in through a link to "see the brief". Here's how to spot fake brand deals.
2. Put the terms in writing: deliverables, dates, revisions, usage rights, exclusivity and price. Use our influencer contract template.
3. Get paid before you post. Full payment held until approval is best; a 50% deposit is the minimum. If the brand insists on invoicing, use our invoice template and short terms.
4. Only start once the money is there.