4 1 working wtih brands

Right guys, let's talk about brand deals. And also, let's address the elephant in the room here. I'm recording this in a very different format.

I had recorded a whole chapter on brand deals and the sound was corrupted. So, we're starting this again. Going to keep it simple, just filming like this so I can get it out to you.

So, brand deals can be one of the best ways to monetize as a creator because brands typically have deeper pockets. They typically have bigger budgets on working with creators and brand work often leads to like more brand work. You can end up in long-term contracts with brands.

So, it tends to be a really good option for content creators. However, working with brands is a total minefield. It is complete minefield because there's no real like regulation or kind of like set rates that you offer a brand because it's very dependent on your following, the brand that you work with, your audience, your engagement rates, the type of contract that you're trying to get.

So, it all of the rates kind of tend to be a little bit different. But what I'm going to do in this chapter is go through how to find brands first of all, how to find like brands to work with, what to do if a brand contacts you, how to pitch to brands effectively, what to say to them, how to set your rates, how to consider your rates dependent on your following and your engagement rate. Then how to create really good brand friendly content, how to store, how to invoice, all of the little admin details as well.

So, we'll start with uh how to make yourself attractive to brands because that's kind of the first step. Your account needs to be really well primed so that if a brand approaches you or if you approach a brand, they can take a look at your content and the content that you've already created and see if you're a really good fit. Now, your account needs to be brand friendly if you want to work with brands.

But this does not this doesn't mean that it has to be like family friendly, like all singing, all dancing, really happy, really positive all the time. By brand friendly, it means that you have to have content on your account that is actively promoting products and services because a brand will not want to work with you if you haven't already created content that kind of is in line with what they offer. So, say for example, if it's a beauty brand, if you have no beauty products or beauty related content on your account, they're going to be less likely to want to work with you because if that's not not something you're known for, if it's not something that your audience engages with, why would they work for you?

So, I always say have a think about brands that you would like to work with. Have a list of about five or six that you want to work with, kind of end goal brands, and then start priming your account and think about the content that they would want to see if they came across your profile or if you were to actively reach out to them. So, that is one way of making your account brand friendly.

By the way, if I'm looking down, I'm looking at my notes here for this chapter. Um, so that's one way of making yourself brand friendly. Um, you also need to think about the fact that brands will not want to work with people who are actively really controversial, um, really negative, like alienating groups, using offensive language, doing explicit things on your page as well, or really overly political.

So, if you have lots of content like that, you're going to make yourself a bit less friendly to brands. So, that's something just to be conscious of. So once you've kind of done that and you've primed your account, it's time to start thinking about reaching out to brands or getting like invitations from brands.

When you start growing your following a little bit, you you will start getting the attention of brands and it's likely that a couple of brands will reach out to you. They will maybe email you if your email address is linked in your bio or they'll send you a direct message on TikTok. I would suggest having your email address in your bio or somewhere visible on your profile so that they can contact you because what will happen often is that many people who work for brands maybe marketing managers are using their personal profiles and may not want to contact you directly from their personal account.

So have your email there so that they can contact you if that's their preferred channel. When you get a request from a brand or a message from a brand, this is known as an inbound request. it's coming in towards you and you will you will start to get them as your following grows, but they're going to be all kind of different styles and quality.

What you'll notice is that when you start out, you might get messages from brands that are about gifted opportunities or about commissionbased opportunities. And it really is up to you whether you want to take those opportunities. If you're starting out and you have a relatively low following and you want to get some like brand work under your belt and you're really interested in the products and interested in the services, then it might be worth taking those products on a gifted basis and then doing a video for the brand, especially if you think it might lead to paid work later down the line.

This can be a really effective way of getting your foot in the door with certain brands and kind of working up to a long-term partnership with them. So sometimes even though you might kind of be like taking a bit of a hit initially and not getting paid for the work, it might lead to paid work down the line. That's going to be really personal and going to be really up to you.

It also depends on the brand. If it's a small business where you know they don't have a massive budget for creators, then it might be something you want to take a chance with. But if it's a bigger company, a bigger brand, and you know they have budgets for influencers, and there may be chance in their arm by asking you to do something on a gifted or commission basis, you maybe can say to them, "Look, I really appreciate this.

I would love to work with you. Unfortunately, at the moment, I'm not taking opportunities on a gifted or commission rate basis, but I would love to work with you on a paid sponsorship or a paid post. Can you please let me know what your budget for this would be?

" So, that's one way of kind of like trying to negotiate against that. They might come back and say, "Look, we don't have any budget left. We'd love to work with you on this gifted basis.

" And then you can maybe say, "Okay, I will do one video for you on a gifted basis. After that, I would love to discuss the potential of working towards a paid partnership. " So, that's kind of one way of letting them know, look, I I this isn't something I normally do and I would love to work with you further.

Just think about if it's a brand you want to continue working with, how can you best nurture that relationship rather than just being like, no, I'm not taking a gifted product. just try and be respectful and think about the end goal. So, those are inbound requests.

You also, there are a couple of things to consider if a brand does contact you and if they contact you with a really good opportunity. Say they want to work with you uh on like one Tik Tok video and they want to pay you like £300 for it, which is great as a creator just starting out. First thing you want to check is this legitimate because there are an awful lot of really convincing scams out there.

So, you want to check that the email that this uh like inbound request is coming from is legitimate. Does it align with the brand? Search the person's email address.

Make sure they have like some sort of like visibility on LinkedIn. Check the website of the brand. Again, some of these can be very, very convincing, but check out the website.

Make sure it seems kind of legitimate. Search Reddit and search Tik Tok to make sure that there are no like scams associated with this brand, especially if it's one you've never heard for from before. Um, and if they ask you to buy a product upfront, that is a red flag.

A brand should never ask you to purchase a product before working with you. The other thing you want to ask yourself is, is this in line with my content? And will my audience be receptive to this?

Because it can be very tempting to take opportunities when they come up, especially when you want to monetize your account and you're getting offered money. It can be really hard to turn that down. But if it does not align with your values and your audience, you are safer saying no to it initially and building up that trust and integrity with your audience cuz that will pay off in the long run.

Be very selective with the brands that you work with. Um, also you want to ask what the requirements of the campaign are. So if a brand wants to work with you on a campaign, make sure you know the scope.

Is it one video? Is it three videos? Do you have to like sign any contract with them that says that you can't work with competitors?

What does this entail? and are you happy with that entire package? So, those are a few things to ask when you get an inbound request.

So, now we're going to talk about outbound requests where you reach out to brands where you're actively contacting and pitching to brands to work with them. And there are a lot of creators who are very afraid to do this and very reluctant to actually like reach out to brands because they're afraid that the brand will say no. They'll be a little bit embarrassed about it.

What I would say is if you have a good following, a really good engaged following who are very receptive to the content that you're putting out and maybe you've done Tik Tok shop videos and they have done really well and generated a lot of sales, you have proof there that you are a good distribution channel for that brand. Do not underell yourself. You have value.

If you have a good targeted engaged audience, that is hu is hugely beneficial to a brand because they want marketing channels that are going to drive them sales. If you can prove that you have that, you're an asset to them. So, do not be afraid to do that.

If a brand does say no, that's okay. At least you're on their radar. Now, it's not always a bad thing.

And sometimes, genuinely, brands just don't have any additional budget left or they don't have any more room for any like influencer or creator marketing opportunity. Sometimes they can have legitimate reasons, but at least by contacting them, you're putting yourself in front of them. You're making themselves, you're making yourself on their radar.

That is still worth doing. What I will also say is when you start reaching out to brands, it really is a volume game. So, you will maybe reach out to 100 brands, you'll maybe hear back from 10 of them, and you'll maybe get a yes from one of them.

You need to be reaching out to a lot of brands. Don't expect to hear back from absolutely everybody that you reach out to. So you also when you're finding brands to work with, you need to make sure that you're contacting the right person.

So some brands, if they're bigger, will have like somebody who's head of influencer marketing or they will have an influencer marketing department. If they don't, then you want to contact the marketing manager or the social media marketing manager. And if you can't find those details, which are usually on their website somewhere, you can contact the infoat address and ask to be in put in to be put in touch with the person who deals with influencer and creator marketing opportunities.

when if you want to find brands to work with, there are multiple ways to do this. So, first of all, there will be products and services that you already use and love. Make a list of those.

The second thing is to look at other creators that you really like and you really look up to who post content in a similar kind of space to you. Look at the brands that they are working with cuz that's a good indication that those brands like working with influencers. So, make a note of those.

Another thing you can do is go through your So, we've discussed how to build a content strategy for your every ad or promoted post you see because if you see that a brand is advertising to you, if you're seeing their ads, that is a clear indication that they have budget and they are targeting people within your demographic and typically your audience will be within your demographic too. So, that's a clear indication that they are trying to actively market to get sales or leads. So, that's a really good way of finding brands as well.

Um, once you've done that, make a list, put them all in a spreadsheet, get all their contact details, and then it's time to actively start pitching to them and sending them emails or sending them Tik Tok messages. And you can do both. If a brand is really active on Tik Tok or Instagram or social media, you can reach out to them via their social media channels with a direct message or you can email them or you can do both.

I would also recommend emailing them. It's more likely to be seen by the right person. is kind of the more formal way of doing it.

When you're contacting a brand, do not do a copy and paste message to every single brand. You want to make it really individual and really personal. There is a bit of a template that you can use to ensure that you're like ticking off all the main points, but you need to customize it for every single brand that you're talking to.

So, you want to start your email. You want to make sure you're addressing the person by name. Then, you want to start off by introducing the concept of collaborating with them.

Then you want to talk about why you love the brand. What interests you about the brand and the product. Then you want to talk about why a partnership would be mutually beneficial for the two of you.

So saying that you know your audience would love this and you think it would generate leads for the brand. Then you want to give them some ideas and this is what can kind of level up your pitch. Give them a couple of content ideas that you would create for them.

By doing this, you're showing the brand that you're serious, that you're keen to work with them, and you're taking a bit of work off them. I am somebody who has worked as a brand hiring influencers. And whenever I come across an influencer who gives me ideas, who is really active and proactive, it makes me much more likely to want to work with them.

So, give them a couple of ideas of how you would integrate their products or services into your content. Then, you want to give a couple of examples of your work. You can set up a portfolio if you like.

If you are really serious about brand work, this is something worth doing. And you can use tools like Canva, the graphic design software. It has a free version.

And there are lots of like templates you can use to create your own portfolio to house all of your work. If not, send them direct links to videos that you have done. These don't have to be examples of previous brand work you've done.

But if you have done videos like promoting products, whether it's a Tik Tok shop video or whether it's just a general video of you promoting and showing a product, show them those. Show them your best work, your most effective work that you think will relate back to them. And remember, their key goal is to drive brand awareness, to drive sales, and to drive leads.

So, if you can create content that shows how you do that effectively, you're going to be much more successful. Then, you also want to give them clear examples of your stats. So whether that's the number of followers you have, the engagement rate you have, the click-through rate you have on any sort of Tik Tok shop videos or any other uh brand work that you've done and any results on any other brand work you've done in terms of the leads that you have generated or the business that you have generated for that brand.

That can also be helpful in terms of having a signature series concept of influencer marketing and how effective it can be. Then you want to end the email with next steps or a call to action. So, I have attached in this section a guide that I have written about brand deals.

And within that guide, there is an example of an email that you could send a brand, but essentially it starts off with like, "Hi, my name is Lana. I am a parenting creator with over 40,000 followers and weekly views of 2 million. I am getting in touch cuz I've been a longtime fan of whatever the brand name is, and I would love to explore the possibility of collaborating you with you.

I think my audience would be very receptive to your product, especially whatever the product name is. and I have some great content ideas that I think could work for the both of us. Then you give your content ideas.

Then you say, "Here's a link to my profile where you can find a video that will show you the quality of my product recommendations. " Um, then you can send some stats and bullet points and then say, "Let me know if you would like more information and I can send you across my rates and anything else you need. I look forward to hearing from you.

" So that's a good idea of what like what that kind of email might look like. So once you have done that and you've pitched to brands and they come back to you and maybe you hear from a couple who are kind of warm to the idea, who maybe want to know a little bit more, who seem a little bit more keen, what I would always recommend is asking them first for what their budget is because you don't want to lowball yourself. Ask them what their budget is if you have the chance to do so.

Sometimes they will just immediately come back to you and ask you for your rates. And this is where you need to think this is going to be a very helpful section of the for your content. So, and this is one of the main questions that I get from most creators like what should my rates be if a brand contact contacts me and there is no set answer to this but I can give you some guidance on how to set your rates.

So all creators will have different rates and it will really depend on your the size of your following, the engagement that you have and any sort of experience you have in like paid collaborations with brands in the past. If you have experience in generating sales for them, you can afford to make your rates a little bit higher. What I would say is do not underell yourself.

Like I said, you are a distribution channel for this brand. You are a valuable asset to them if you have a good targeted audience. So do not underell yourself.

So, what you want to do is have a base rate for yourself. The rate that you would charge someone for one Tik Tok video. That is your base rate.

And this can vary depending on the stats that you have. I always say have a minimum of about £150. If you're a creator with under£10,000 followers and a kind of okay engagement rate, your base rate should be around £150.

This should go up depending on your visual. This is where we take you have and any experience you have. There are people whose base rate is £500.

There are also people whose base rate is £1,000. You need to kind of judge it on what you think you can offer the brand, but do not underell yourself. But if you're just getting started, you have a moderate following.

I would say start at around 150 to 200 for a general Tik Tok video. So, what brands might also ask you for is usage rights to your video. Usage rights are basically giving them the rights to your video so they can use your content in other forms of marketing.

So they can use it in their Facebook ads or their Tik Tok ads or their Instagram ads. So you're giving them the rights to this. What I would suggest is charging them your base rate plus 50% of your base rate.

So for example, if your base rate is £200 and they also want usage rights, you can grant them usage rights for another £100. So you you would be getting paid £300 in total. Something else they might ask for is multi- channelannel content.

So they might ask you to like format or re-edit the video to suit different platforms. So like one Tik Tok video, one Instagram video, same concept but formatted slightly differently. If that happens, again, I would charge your base rate and then another kind of uh 50% on top.

Let's dive into storytelling. If they want a series of videos, like say they want three videos, then you can create a bit of a package deal. So, say your base rate is £200 and they want h a series of three videos, you could do this for like £550, £600 at a bit of a discounted rate.

Um, if they want you to do a Tik Tok live, there will be a lot of brands who maybe want you to come in to do a live with them to sell whilst on the live, I would charge a minimum of £300 for that. If they are asking you to do a 2-hour live, you could say, "Look, we'll start at this rate. We'll see how it goes.

" They may also offer you payment plus commission on any product sold. I would say start off with about £300 for that cuz that is a considerable amount of work. You have to also take into account, you know, your time, the travel, any child care you might need.

It it should be a considerable amount. Like I said, adjust these figures based on you and what your kind of like your engagement rate and your following is like. Um, and like because this industry is so unregulated, it's so hard to give concrete figures, but try and establish a base rate for yourself and then everything else can kind of flow from that.

Um, when you have agreed with the brand, okay, I would like to do this work. This is my rate and they have agreed, okay, this is that's fine, we're happy to pay that, then you need to request a couple of things from the brand before you get started. Number one, a campaign brief.

You want them to tell you exactly what this campaign will entail. So what what do they need in terms of the deliverables like what kind of video will this be a short video? Is it going to be a longer video?

Is there a specific format that they want? You also want to understand the timeline for posting. So when do they expect this to be delivered?

You also want to understand how many times the brand is allowed to edit or give suggestions to your video. I would always say you have like you can give the brand two chances to have edits or changes to the video before it is posted. And then you also want to agree how and when you will be paid.

So what is their process for payment? Do they pay you 30 days after the content is delivered? Do they pay you 90 days after the content is delivered?

Have that agreed upfront and understand how you will be paid as well before you sign anything. Then after that they should issue you a contract. Not all brands do this but ones that are like maybe a bit bigger or a bit more serious with their influencer marketing they might send you a contract.

This should include the scope of the work and all of the deliverable the deliverables what is expected from you and what is expected from them. It should also include information about usage rights who will own the content. Um it should also include information about termination of contract if one of you wants to like cancel or stop the contract for any reason how that would be done.

Um and then it should also agree uh it should also include an agreement from you on marking the content as advertising when you post it to your account. So, you want to make sure that somebody else reads over this contract before you sign it. It's just always good practice to have another pair of eyes on this.

If you have somebody that has a bit of specialtity in terms of reading contracts, that is great. If not, just somebody with a bit of sense that will be able to see if anything doesn't look quite right. Once you have signed the contract, then it's time to think about the deliverables.

And by deliverables, I mean the content that you're creating for the brand. Hopefully within the brief they will have given you a bit of a steer in terms of like what they want you to talk about, what they want you to say, what kind of format it should be in, what kind of video. Um, and when you're kind of happy with that, you can go ahead and create your content.

With branded content, it is important that the sound and lighting are pretty good, especially if they're going to use it across like multiple channels for their own marketing. You also want to make sure that you are showing the product when applicable quite early on in the video. You need to kind of show the product.

This is very important for most brands. You also want to shoot in 4K with your back camera just to ensure the best quality. You also want to stay, especially if you're posting the content to your own account.

You want to make sure that the content is really in sync with the rest of your content that it doesn't sound like an ad, that the tone is the same, that you're upholding the same values, you're speaking in the same way. It needs to feel quite seamless. So, one good way of doing this, I've talked about this in other chapters, is to see yourself as solving a problem rather than selling a product.

And that kind of makes you sound a little bit more natural. How does this problem solve a problem for your audience rather than why should somebody buy this? That can kind of make it feel and sound a bit more organic.

I would also suggest trying a couple of variations in terms of what style of video. If the brand hasn't been quite clear on what they want, try a couple of different versions and record as much footage as you possibly can so that if they have suggestions and edits to make, you have footage there that you can go back and reuse. So once you've created the content, the brand will often ask you for a first draft so they can take a look and see if they are happy with it.

This is where I would invest using some kind of like cloud storage or something where you can host the content and send it to them. something like Google Drve or making use of things like we transfer or Drpbox can be a good option. If you're somebody who wants to work with brands longterm, it can be worthwhile investing in a bit more cloud storage so that you can store your content properly.

Um have and making sure that you're labeling your content well so you're labeling all the files so that they are easy to find whenever you need them. So making sure that you know it's maybe like brand name version one or brand name product name version one. labeling it in a way that's going to make it easy for you to access those files.

Once they're kind of happy with that, um, and they sign off on your content, then it comes to posting your content. So, with posting your content, you need to market as an ad, which you can do in Tik Tok. When you're coming onto the publish page, when you scroll down, there's a section for advertising.

If you have been paid for content, you need to market as an ad. Technically, even if you are gifted a product or you're earning commission, you should also mark that as an ad as well. Like technically, you should be doing that.

Make sure you're doing everything by the book. If you do an ad, you haven't marked as an ad. This could mean very bad things for your account.

You could get reported to the advertising standards authority. You could also get your account removed on TikTok. That is a huge violation if you're not marking advertising as advertising.

So, make sure you're doing that. Um, what a brand might also ask you for is your spark code. especially if this is a brand who has their products on Tik Tok shop.

So your spark code is a code that you can generate once you've published the post. You go to the bottom the right hand corner, slide across to like advertising tools, scroll down and you'll find your advertising code. Then you can generate that code and send that to the brand.

When you send that code to the brand, that means that they can use it in their advertising or marketing. They can promote that post for you to help it reach a wider audience. This can be very worth doing.

Apologies, I'm struggling with a cold here. Once all of that is done, you've posted the content, everybody's happy with it, it's getting good engagement. Now, what I will say is typically branded content and content that is marked as promoted does not get as good engagement as your organic content.

There are a couple of reasons for this. Tik Tok does not push this content out as far and wide as other content because they know that people are less likely to engage with branded content. So, it doesn't get as good visibility.

Typically, as well, when people do branded content, it's not as good and authentic as their organic content. So, the more authentic you can make it, the more of a chance it has to spread far and wide. But typically, branded content does not get as good views.

That's just something to keep in mind. So, you really need to make sure that the quality of the content is good enough to kind of override that. But once you do that and it's posted and it's getting the views, the the brand may then ask you for some reporting and feedback and analytics.

Even if they don't ask you for this, I would be quite proactive and send them a bit of a report after the content has been posted, like maybe a week to two weeks afterwards to tell them, "Here's how many views it got. Here's how much engagement it got. Here's how many clicks.

Here's how many orders from my site. Here's any feedback that people have had, any suggestions that they've had, things they like about the product. Doing that will make the brand more likely to want to work with you.

Again, if you are giving them direct feedback, this is quite important. What I would also say is once you've done that and you're all happy with that, make sure you stay in touch with the brand and thank them for the opportunity and say, "I would love to work with you guys again if it has all gone well. " because having long-term partnerships with brands can be more lucrative than you going out and continuously pitching to new brands.

So, try and nurture those relationships. The last part of this is all about like invoicing and payment. If you're working with a bigger brand that has maybe a finance or an accounts payable department, sometimes it can be quite tricky to actually get paid.

So, whenever at the start when you have agreed how you will be paid, make sure you have that firm in your mind. When you have posted your content, immediately send your invoice to the brand and CC in the accounts payable. So use your contact that you have with the brand, CC in the accounts payable as well and ask them to send you back an email to confirm that they have received your invoice.

Make sure that you know that most of the time payment will be made about 30 days after you have the content has been posted and you have sent your invoice. Make sure if you are not paid within the time frame that they you have been told you would be paid, follow up. Send more emails.

Make sure you're getting confirmation that those emails have been received. Do not be afraid to call up and ask the brand for when you will be paid. Don't be afraid to do that.

Sometimes you have to do that. Um don't be shy about chasing things. You deserve to be comp compensated for the work that you have done.

Um don't be afraid of sending multiple emails as well. Also, in the brand guide that I have attached to this chapter, there is a template of what an invoice could look like for you as well if you've never sent an invoice before. Um, so that is what to do in terms of like finding brands, pitching to brands, creating branded content.

So, just to kind of like summarize in terms of tips, always be professional with every brand that you work with. Be professional. Keep the communication very clear, very prompt, and very respectful.

Make sure you're quite adaptable. Um, brands may have specific requirements and be sure that they align with your audience's expectations, but be prepared to adapt yourself a little bit. Keep your followers at the center of everything you do.

They are the reason that you have opportunities like this. If you're creating content that is branded, make sure it is valuable and authentic and aligns with them. Your followers are the most important thing here.

It is very crucial to the long-term long-term success of your account that you keep your followers at the center. Also know that there are plenty of opportunities to go around. This can be a big thing if you especially if you're friends with other creators or if you have community with other creators on this app.

You may see them get opportunities that you would like and you may feel jealousy towards them. That is totally normal. But there are lots of opportunities to go around and just cuz somebody has got an opportunity that you haven't got yet.

It doesn't take anything away from you. It is best to cheer on people when they get good opportunities because if you do that and you celebrate them and you share their work, brands will be more likely to want to work with creators in the future, including you. Also, change your mindset and realize that brands benefit as much from you as you are benefiting from them.

Like I said, you are a distribution channel. They are commodifying your audience. They are benefiting from you.

You're giving them something. So, do not be afraid to pitch to them. See your value.

Set your rates at an appropriate level. Do not underell your work. And make sure that you're kind of sticking to your guns with things and that you have boundaries and you're not being pushed in to promote things in a way that doesn't align with you.

Stick your ground with it. I hope you find that helpful in terms of working with brands. If you have any further questions on how to work with brands, please let me know.

And like I said, the guide that has been linked with this chapter goes through all of this in written detail as well.