Working with Creators: How to Choose and What to Agree
Follower count is the worst criterion. What to look at instead, and which points to put in writing before starting.
Choosing a creator by follower count is like choosing a shop by counting people walking past the window: it tells you the traffic, not the relevance.
What to look at instead
- How closely their audience resembles your customer, not you.
- The quality of the comments: real questions or just emoji.
- Consistency over time, not the one post that did well.
- How they talk about products: in what tone, and how often.
- Whether they've already worked with direct competitors, and when.
What to agree beforehand
Collaborations that go wrong rarely fail on the content: they fail on what was never defined.
- How many pieces, in which format, on which channels.
- Who approves, within what time, and how many revisions are included.
- How long the content stays published.
- Whether you can reuse it in campaigns, and for how long.
- What happens if deadlines slip.
Transparency isn't optional
Content resulting from a commercial agreement must be labelled as such, following platform rules and applicable regulations. It isn't a formality: it's what protects both you and the creator.
Measuring without kidding yourself
Views from a collaboration say little on their own. Agree in advance what you'll watch: enquiries received, page visits, searches for the brand name in the following days.
Sources and Further Reading
Official documentation and guidelines cited or useful for going deeper.