For each brand request, influencers today can demand an additional fee, says Amy Sturgis, founder of UK-based communications agency ASC Global. Among the criteria to consider are: content usage (how long a brand would like to use a creator’s images for and how long that content stays on the feed); location (whether the creator’s image will be used on social media, e-commerce, physical store fronts, ad campaigns or billboards); paid media (ad spend behind the content); trips (which require an attendance fee and the agreement of number of posts); on top of the outright cost of hiring an influencer to work with.
“Monetisation opportunities have diversified immensely since the early days. There’s the basic costs of posts and stories that everyone sees, as well as larger, more structured deals that may involve royalties, equity, creative, marketing and product consulting services, and so much more,” says Aimee Song, who founded her blog Song of Style in 2008.
Brands tend to begin a relationship with a one-off post to ensure that the influencer’s audience is a good match, before they offer a monthly retainer or longer-term contract with a set number of posts as deliverables, says Sturgis. Influencers whose content performs well will then often go on to become brand ambassadors, where they become a more formalised face at the brand’s events and in its campaigns, she adds. But, don’t be quick to dismiss traditional advertising channels, Sturgis says. “If an influencer is right for the brand, then [the ROI] is more immediate than a print magazine, but weekend supplements, like the Sunday Times Style and Telegraph in the UK, are still top performers and targets for our clients alongside influencer campaigns.”
The evolution of the OGs
The OGs have grown up and are no longer using the OOTD (outfit of the day) hashtag they helped popularise. However, of the 19 OGs identified by Vogue Business, at least 13 still make money through brand deals.
For those that have stuck around, it has required constant evolution, says Launchmetrics’s Bringé. She points to Bryanboy’s ability to diversify across different social media platforms, which Launchmetrics says has garnered him over $40 million in media impact value (MIV) — a measure of the value of all media placements and mentions across print, online and social media. Ferragni’s ability to scale her presence beyond social media (she has fronted campaigns and created capsule collections for Amazon Fashion, L’Oréal Group and Tod’s, which she joined as a member of its board of directors last April) earned her over $400 million in MIV in 2022. “The super smart ones are those who are expanding beyond just creating [social media] content,” Bringé adds.
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