I started creating content and focusing on my brand on social media and creating over 5 years ago. But I wasn’t making any money for years doing it. Why? Because I didn’t think it was possible. And I didn’t know how.

The #1 thing holding me back was my mindset and letting other’s opinions and lack of knowledge about the space control my thoughts that it wasn’t possible.

But once I shifted my mindset, and saw that it WAS possible..

I put all my effort in. And my first year I made over $100k as a creator.

I know you are reading this blog post because you WANT to do that too.

But I also know you’re holding yourself back from it because you don’t actually think it’s possible for yourself.

But it is.

And it’s even EASIER now. We have so many platforms to join as creators and ways to find and land brand deals, it really is easier than ever.  The tools, the resources, it’s all there now.

The Creator Economy is now a $100-billion-dollar industry. Businesses and brands are trying to take advance of this opportunity to have their products and services in front of their target customers and that’s done nowadays through creators.

And the cool part is as a creator you get a say in how that’s done. AND get paid for it.

And we need your unique perspective and angle as a creator.

So first you gotta decide:

You can do this.

Imagine what is possible once you stop doubting yourself. Imagine being able to work on your own schedule so you can travel whenever you want, or spend more time with your family.

Today I’m covering all the ways you can work with brands and make money from collaborations as a content creator and influencer. So cozy up, grab your fav drink, keep reading (and after you can head on over to watch the latest youtube where we dive in how to secure that bag from anywhere as a creator Click here to watch the video

6 Ways to Work with Brands as a Creator

1. Sponsored Content

This is the staple influencer “brand deal” – that post you see that says “paid-partnership” or #ad. Many creators work in “one-off” brand deals, but the goal is to build relationships with brands for long-term partnerships and sponsored posts. These are all about reaching YOUR specific audience and tapping into your personal brand. Now, we might just start with ONE social media channel. Let’s say Instagram. You can have a sponsored, IG story, a static Photo post, a Carousel post, a Reel, or ALL OF IT. You can price each thing individually and then packaged together as a discount.

Now here’s how you can increase that payout, even MORE, is offering sponsored content on MORE than one social media channel. So offering a TikTok, a feature in a youtube video, or a feature in a blog post.

2. UGC & Content Creation

You can make videos and take photos for brands that you DON’T have to post on your social pages. You can also turn these into long-term partnerships. It’s a little bit about your brand, and a little bit about really selling and showing off the product.

3. Affiliate

Or where you earn a commission from a sale everytime someone makes a purchase using your custom link. You can bake this into your partnerships or start out a partnership with a brand by just joining their affiliate program. This is a great way to build stats on how well you can convert your audience (and then pitch sponsored posts and more to the deals).

4. Content licensing and usage rights

This is photos or videos of yours that include the brand and you give them license to post on their social media, website, or use in other advertising forms (so you charge differently for digital vs. print!). Usually, this approach is with content you’ve already created and then license them to use.

5. Event attendance

This one is location dependent and you certainly will have more opportunities in larger cities, but this is a great way to start building in-person relationships with brands. This is a chance to meet the team members on the brand side who run or manage campaigns for creators and marketing efforts. Eventually, you can charge as an influencer to attend events for a brand (or charge for doing a posting about the event).

6. Press & Brand trips

Yes, this is the whole “getting paid to travel” as a creator! Some press trips are with tourism boards if you want to or are working in the travel space, and many are brand destination trips (an example is when I went to Mexico with Herbal Essences and we explored and learned all about their new product launch and then scheduled several postings about it!).

The best part about all this, is you can have any # of followers and be working with brands on a regular basis.

Tips on how to structure brand deals to make more money

I know what you might be thinking – you don’t have a lot of followers, so how can you make a lot of money working with brands?

It’s by stacking your offers with all the different ways you can work with a brand as I went over above.

Let’s do an example.

You have 1,200 followers on Instagram and about the same on Tiktok. You ALSO have a blog.

You reach out to a brand and they want to partner with you! (yay!)

Now, they might only be able to do $150 for a post on your Instagram. BUT here’s where you can offer them so much more to get that deal up to over $1,000!

• IG Photo post ($150)
• Stories series set ($50)
• IG Reel ($200)
• Tiktok ($100)
• Blog Post ($200)
• 3 UGC videos ($100/each)

Offering all of those can get you to $1000. And that’s if you only have 1,000 followers?! Now, these numbers are hypothetical (look out for a new blog post on how to price yourself as a creator by subscribing to my newsletter) but this gives you an idea that you can make serious money just by creating content (and NOT with a lot of followers).

The first time I made over $10k in a month working with brands, I was SHOCKED (and yes, it was WELL before I had 100,000 followers!) – I spent way less time than in my 9-5 and made way more money. THIS is why I pivoted to content creation.

And YOU can do it too!

Watch the video on youtube for even more tips! Cheers to landing those brand deals!

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One last thing!

If you want to learn even more about becoming a social media content creator and influencer and working from anywhere, I’d like to invite you to join my FREE online training & workshop!

Can’t wait to see you there!

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Any questions? Just leave me a comment!

Sending Sunshine,

Kelly

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