Legible niche
If a brand cannot describe what you do in ten seconds, you will not make the shortlist.
How to get brand deals — from the buyer's side of the table.
We read creator pitches for a living and we brief brands on who to pick. Most creators who struggle to get deals are not lacking followers. They are unreadable — a brand cannot tell in thirty seconds who watches them or why it would matter.
What a brand is actually deciding
When a brand looks at your profile they are answering one question: will the people who watch this person buy my product? Everything else — your follower count, your editing, your consistency — matters only as evidence towards that answer.
This is why follower count fails as a pitch. Two hundred thousand followers tells a brand nothing about whether those people are in India, whether they are the right age, whether they can afford the product, or whether they trust your recommendation. A creator who answers those questions clearly with twenty thousand followers is an easier yes than one who answers none of them with ten times as many.
Fix these before you pitch anybody
Make your niche legible in one line. If a brand cannot describe what you do after ten seconds on your profile, you will not be shortlisted. Broad lifestyle accounts are the hardest to sell and the lowest paid, because nobody knows what they are buying.
Know your audience numbers. Age split, gender split, top cities, top countries, and your genuine average views and engagement over the last ten to fifteen posts — not your best one. These are in your platform analytics. A creator who cannot produce them looks either inexperienced or evasive.
Have three pieces of work that look like an ad you would be proud of. If you have never done a paid collaboration, make them for products you actually use. Brands need to see how you handle a product on camera, and unpaid practice is cheaper than losing a paid brief.
Clean up the fake growth. If you bought followers early on, that decision is now costing you money — your engagement rate reads as suspicious and any competent agency screens for exactly this. It is better to have a smaller real audience.
Inbound beats outbound, and it is not close
Cold-pitching brands works occasionally, and it is exhausting. The creators with consistent deal flow are almost always the ones brands and agencies can find — which is a different problem and a much more solvable one.
Being findable means: a niche stated plainly in your bio, a contact email that is visible and monitored, tagging brands you genuinely use, being registered with agencies that match on audience data, and posting consistently enough in one lane that the algorithm knows what to categorise you as.
Joining a matched network is the highest-leverage version of this. You fill a profile once and get considered for every relevant brief afterwards, instead of pitching individually forever — that is what our creator network is for.
If you are going to pitch, pitch properly
- Lead with fit, not with numbers. One line on why your audience is their buyer, before any statistic.
- Name a specific idea. Not "I'd love to collaborate" — an actual concept for an actual product.
- Attach your numbers as evidence, not as the headline. Audience split matters more than reach.
- Include your rate or a range. Refusing to name a number wastes both sides' time and reads as inexperience.
- Keep it under two hundred words. The person reading has forty of these today.
What actually gets you the second deal
The first collaboration is the hard one. The second is decided almost entirely by how you behaved during the first — and this is where a lot of otherwise strong creators lose long-term income.
Hit the deadline. Follow the brief on the things the brand said were non-negotiable, and push back before shooting rather than after if you disagree. Send drafts when you said you would. Do not disappear between approval and posting. Keep the post up for the agreed term.
Brands talk to each other and agencies keep records. A creator who is reliable at 40,000 followers gets rebooked at 100,000. That compounding is worth more than any single rate negotiation.
Then get the pricing right
Once deals start arriving, undercharging becomes the main thing that limits your income — and the item creators most consistently give away free is usage rights. What to charge brands covers how rates are actually built and how to quote without underselling.
If you would rather make content than grow an audience, UGC work is a parallel route with no follower requirement at all.
(01) — The essentials
What matters most.
The parts worth getting right before anything else.
Real audience data
Age, gender, cities and honest averages. Not your best post — your typical one.
Three sample ads
Made for products you actually use, if you have no paid work yet. Cheaper than losing a brief.
Findability
Visible email, consistent lane, and registration with networks that match on audience data.
(02) — FAQ
How to get brand deals, answered.
How many followers do I need before brands will work with me?
Fewer than you think, provided your niche is clear and your engagement is real. Brands are deciding whether your audience will buy their product, and a creator with twenty thousand followers who can answer that clearly is an easier yes than one with two hundred thousand who cannot. For UGC work, where you produce content for the brand to use rather than posting it, there is no follower requirement at all.
Should I cold-pitch brands directly?
It works occasionally and it is exhausting. Creators with consistent deal flow are almost always the ones brands and agencies can find, which is a more solvable problem — a plainly stated niche, a visible contact email, consistent posting in one lane, and registration with networks that match on audience data. Joining a matched network is the highest-leverage version: you fill a profile once instead of pitching forever.
What should I put in a pitch email?
One line on why your audience is their buyer, then a specific idea for a specific product, then your numbers as supporting evidence rather than the headline, then a rate or range. Keep it under two hundred words. Refusing to name a number wastes both sides' time and reads as inexperience.
I bought followers when I started. Does it still matter?
Yes, and it is probably costing you money now. Inflated counts drag your engagement rate into territory that reads as suspicious, and any competent agency screens for exactly that pattern before shortlisting. A smaller genuine audience is worth considerably more to a brand than a larger inflated one.
Why did a brand ghost me after the first campaign?
Most often something operational rather than creative — a missed deadline, a draft that arrived late, silence between approval and posting, or the post coming down before the agreed term ended. Brands talk to each other and agencies keep records, so reliability compounds. A creator who is dependable at forty thousand followers gets rebooked at a hundred thousand.
(03) — More for creators
Keep reading.
(04) — Contact
Ready when
you are.
Free to join, no follower minimum for UGC work, and every deal through us pays.