Latest / Influencer Confidential / Five Things Creators Do That DESTROY Their Chances of Getting Paid Brand Deals #285

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Five Things Creators Do That DESTROY Their Chances of Getting Paid Brand Deals #285 · Influencer Confidential

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  Speaker 1: Welcome to Influencer Confidential by Sidewalker Daily. My name is
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  Speaker 1: Nina Zeta and I will be your host. I love
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  Speaker 1: working with brands and influencers on all things business strategy.
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  Speaker 1: Are you ready to learn what it takes to work
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  Speaker 1: in this influencer industry and see behind the curtain? Well,
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  Speaker 1: let's jump in. So I was at lunch earlier this
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  Speaker 1: week with some of my friends that are running influencer
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  Speaker 1: campaigns that are on the brand side, and as many
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  Speaker 1: of you guys know, that's kind of where I got
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  Speaker 1: started in this industry, being on the brand side, paying
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  Speaker 1: creators managing hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of budget.
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  Speaker 1: And we were just kind of talking and chatting about
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  Speaker 1: things that creators do that subconsciously is going to get
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  Speaker 1: them a know, in terms of a partnership. And I
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  Speaker 1: was like really asking like very specific questions because I
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  Speaker 1: knew I was going to report back to you guys.
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  Speaker 1: So what I want to go over is things that
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  Speaker 1: you may be doing that are hurting your chances of
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  Speaker 1: getting a yes and subconsciously putting you in the no
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  Speaker 1: category when you want to be in the yes category.
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  Speaker 1: So something that creators do all the time, and to me,
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  Speaker 1: it's one of the worst things that you can do,
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  Speaker 1: even if you're just getting started or advanced, is when
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  Speaker 1: you talk about a product and you're like, oh, but
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  Speaker 1: this isn't sponsored, but I just really love it, Okait?
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  Speaker 1: What Like? That's automatically a red flag for so many reasons.
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  Speaker 1: First of all, brands are watching your content, they're watching
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  Speaker 1: your stories, they are all up in there. So what
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  Speaker 1: you're basically saying is like, I love this product. It's
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  Speaker 1: not sponsored. I just wanted to tell you. So, then
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  Speaker 1: what happens with your paid sponsorships, Like, doesn't that intrinsically
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  Speaker 1: devalue those brand sponsors? I think so. Also, it kind
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  Speaker 1: of tells your audience that you're a little untrustworthy. I mean,
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  Speaker 1: I'm gonna say it. I know that sounds kind of bold,
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  Speaker 1: but if you're doing brand deals and you're like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: I love so and so, and then you're not doing
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  Speaker 1: a brand deal and you want to share this product,
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  Speaker 1: when you say stuff like you, guys, I swear this
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  Speaker 1: isn't sponsored. The brand didn't ask me to say anything.
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  Speaker 1: I'm doing this on my own goodwill, it just gives
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  Speaker 1: an ick to audience, to brand, to credibility to trust authority.
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  Speaker 1: And again I know this is something like a lot
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  Speaker 1: of people do without it even thinking about it. But
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  Speaker 1: one thing that you have to understand as a creator
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  Speaker 1: that is building your online brand, your online persona, is
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  Speaker 1: that people are watching and you never know who's watching
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  Speaker 1: your content. I actually had a creator with less than
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  Speaker 1: ten thousand followers book a big partnership with an airline company. Okay,
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  Speaker 1: they paid her for six month brand deal, and this
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  Speaker 1: was all because the brand reached out to her. They
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  Speaker 1: came to her and why the pr person loved this
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  Speaker 1: creator follows her on stories, follows her content, and she
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  Speaker 1: booked her. So when you're seeing your Instagram story views,
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  Speaker 1: you can see who's watching, but like on YouTube, you
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  Speaker 1: literally have no idea who your views are. So this
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  Speaker 1: isn't to put pressure on you or make you fearful.
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  Speaker 1: It's just to be aware of how you present if
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  Speaker 1: you're going online and you're publicly talking about this isn't sponsored,
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  Speaker 1: but I had to tell you it hurts your future sponsorships.
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  Speaker 1: They see that being done and it makes it feel
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  Speaker 1: weird for when they're paying you, Like I don't know,
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  Speaker 1: four or five six thousand dollars for a sponsored reel. Well,
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  Speaker 1: it feels not authentic. It's just a bad look overall.
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  Speaker 1: The second thing that is going to crush your chances
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  Speaker 1: of getting a paid partnership is not having a portfolio
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  Speaker 1: or media kit. Non negotiable people. If you are pitching
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  Speaker 1: without any of these items, I mean, don't even bother.
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  Speaker 1: That's how passionate I feel about this. As a content creator,
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  Speaker 1: you need a portfolio of your work, right, That is
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  Speaker 1: the simple, bare minimum to be like, hey, this is
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  Speaker 1: what I can do for you. Without that asset, they
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  Speaker 1: don't know what you can do. You know what you
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  Speaker 1: can do in your head, but they need to see it.
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  Speaker 1: And I always have creators that I work with. You
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  Speaker 1: want to show, not tell. It is so much easier
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  Speaker 1: to show the type of content you can make than say,
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  Speaker 1: oh I can do this and I can do that.
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  Speaker 1: You really want to focus on visual showing because when
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  Speaker 1: a brand can see it, then they can see their
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  Speaker 1: product in your hands and you know, obviously increase their
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  Speaker 1: chances of working with you. To my influencers out there,
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  Speaker 1: let's just say you've grown a following, you've grown a community,
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  Speaker 1: You've grown people that come to you. They like you,
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  Speaker 1: They trust you, they rely on you for information, and
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  Speaker 1: you don't have that media kit in your outbound pitch,
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  Speaker 1: or when a brand reaches out to you using that
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  Speaker 1: to pivot that free gifted too paid, you don't have
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  Speaker 1: this document ready. Again, it's just hurting your chances. I
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  Speaker 1: swear there's a psychological trigger that happens when a creator
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  Speaker 1: has a solid pitching material like a portfolio or a
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  Speaker 1: media hit. It's like something happens in the person on
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  Speaker 1: the brand side's brain that is like, wait, they deserve
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  Speaker 1: to get paid, like especially if branding is right. If
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  Speaker 1: the content looks good obviously, if it's like a hot
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  Speaker 1: mess express portfolio or media kit and the branding hurts you,
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  Speaker 1: that's a different story. But if your materials look good,
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  Speaker 1: they're strong, they're visual, they show your work, then that,
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  Speaker 1: right there is enough to get someone to want to
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  Speaker 1: be interested in learning more about your services. Now. I
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  Speaker 1: get that design is tricky and some of you guys
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  Speaker 1: may not even have time to like build out a
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  Speaker 1: full on media kit. It is obviously a lot of
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  Speaker 1: work and there's a lot that goes into it. So
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  Speaker 1: if you need support building out your pitching assets, go guys,
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  Speaker 1: get on a call with someone on my team, like
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  Speaker 1: this is what we do. We can support you, we
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  Speaker 1: can design it for you, we can show you how
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  Speaker 1: you can do it yourself. So I'm going to leave
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  Speaker 1: a link below to our success manager. You can chat
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  Speaker 1: on a call with her, ask questions about our design services,
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  Speaker 1: and we will support you in this piece. If that's
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  Speaker 1: something that you guys need. Okay, this is something that
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  Speaker 1: like no one talks about. And I had a big
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  Speaker 1: aha earlier this week on my inner circle, my community
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  Speaker 1: of creators. We were all chatting and someone was like,
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  Speaker 1: can I give away like the free gifted stuff that
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  Speaker 1: I get, like on a giveaway? Or can I sell it?
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  Speaker 1: And it was a really great question, right because people
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  Speaker 1: are like so many creators get so much pr they
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  Speaker 1: get so much free stuff, I'll never forget. There was
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  Speaker 1: this girl I was working with. She literally had an
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  Speaker 1: entire closet dedicated to all the free things that she gets,
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  Speaker 1: and she's like the materialism the consumersm it's like too much.
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  Speaker 1: She would give things away, like to homeless shelters, you know,
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  Speaker 1: And obviously that's a very different story, I think, but
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  Speaker 1: like reselling or giving it away in a giveaway, there's
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  Speaker 1: some lines here that can be blurred. And again because
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  Speaker 1: you don't know who was watching your content. Imagine you
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  Speaker 1: get a free I don't know something or other from
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  Speaker 1: a brand and then they see you doing a giveaway
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  Speaker 1: with that product. I just feel like you have to
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  Speaker 1: tread lightly. I wouldn't do it personally, and even worse,
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  Speaker 1: reselling it like that feels really wild. But again, maybe
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  Speaker 1: there's some of you that are listening in or watching
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  Speaker 1: this episode and like, I do that all the time.
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  Speaker 1: So to each his own. However, being on the brand side,
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  Speaker 1: I'm gonna tell you like I would be sensitive to this.
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  Speaker 1: If I saw a creator giving away like all their
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  Speaker 1: free pr and just being like, hey, guys, I have
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  Speaker 1: all this stuff, I just want to give it to you,
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  Speaker 1: I would just be like, I don't know if everything
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  Speaker 1: needs to be shared on the internet, and I don't
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  Speaker 1: know if this is something that would make a brand
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  Speaker 1: feel like, oh, we're gifting you something and you're just
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  Speaker 1: like throwing it away now. If there's approvals, if this
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  Speaker 1: is in your contract, if you guys have these conversations
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  Speaker 1: ahead of time, that's one thing. But if a brand
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  Speaker 1: is giving you like this major gift and then and
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  Speaker 1: you're just kind of like giving it away. When I
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  Speaker 1: say giving it away, I'm talking about like doing a
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  Speaker 1: proper online giveaway where you're like enter to get five
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  Speaker 1: thousand dollars worth of benty beauty stuff. I don't know
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  Speaker 1: I'm making this up, but then it kind of gets
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  Speaker 1: like people are kind of like, hmm, interesting behaviors. So,
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  Speaker 1: just from like an ethics standpoint, brands don't like this.
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  Speaker 1: I would stay clear. Now, if you're watching this, you're
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  Speaker 1: probably a creator. You want to make paid brand deals.
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  Speaker 1: That's what I'm here to teach. That's what I do
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  Speaker 1: you guys. And again, seventy percent of your favorite creator's
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  Speaker 1: income is probably coming from those paid brand partnerships, so
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  Speaker 1: you're not wrong. However, I will say if you start
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  Speaker 1: off free, it is harder to get paid. So what
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  Speaker 1: do I mean by this? Obviously, you know I have
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  Speaker 1: been very clear about like my thoughts on gifted collabse
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  Speaker 1: and gifted partnerships. You know, I work with creators all
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  Speaker 1: around the world, all types of creators. Creators with ten
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  Speaker 1: million followers who just want like a free living room set,
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  Speaker 1: and creators that are just getting started. Right, So I'm
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  Speaker 1: not here to bash on Gifted, but I will say
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  Speaker 1: start in gifted Land is harder to then be like, oh,
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  Speaker 1: well I did this for free, can I get paid?
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  Speaker 1: So I always say start off in the paid energy.
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  Speaker 1: Enter conversation paid, even if it's a small payment, even
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  Speaker 1: if it's a discounted payment, even if it's a payment plan, whatever.
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  Speaker 1: If you enter conversations with a brand asking to be
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  Speaker 1: paid and then you settle on Gifted, it's very different
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  Speaker 1: than entering the conversation gifted and then asking to be paid. Right,
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  Speaker 1: So this is all about like, wow, were you going
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  Speaker 1: to like increase your chances of getting paid and not
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  Speaker 1: getting a big fat no. Well, if you enter those
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  Speaker 1: negotiations being like sure, I'll do it for free as
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  Speaker 1: your first starting point, you are, again psychologically are telling
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  Speaker 1: the brand you don't value your work, you don't think
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  Speaker 1: what you do is valuable, and you know you're willing
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  Speaker 1: to just do it for exposure. Now you want to
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  Speaker 1: start conversations with sure, I'd be happy to do so,
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  Speaker 1: here's my feest to do this, or as a new client,
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  Speaker 1: I'd be happy to give you guys a discounted rate
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  Speaker 1: or one time good faith effort to you know, create
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  Speaker 1: content for you all whatever, But we want to enter
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  Speaker 1: conversations paid and settle on free. Like if the negotiation
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  Speaker 1: doesn't work and they're like, no, I'm sorry, we don't budget,
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  Speaker 1: and then again, you really want this or you want
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  Speaker 1: to get your foot in the door, I'm going to
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  Speaker 1: be okay with that, but I don't want you entering
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  Speaker 1: with free because again, psychologically, it just sets the tone
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  Speaker 1: for you to get a no off the bat, and
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  Speaker 1: we don't want that. Now. Another thing that drives me crazy,
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  Speaker 1: and I always tell my pitching students and my inner circle,
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  Speaker 1: and I scream it from the top of the rooftops
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  Speaker 1: to not use this horrible word because this horrible word
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  Speaker 1: gives free energy. And it is the word collaborate. When
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  Speaker 1: you enter a conversation with a brand partner and you're like,
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  Speaker 1: I'd love to collaborate, Collaborate gives this energy of like
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  Speaker 1: they'll do something for you, you guys do something for them,
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  Speaker 1: And it's a collaboration versus saying i'd love to work together.
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  Speaker 1: Work together equals money, I'd love to partner with you
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  Speaker 1: on this partner equals money. Collaborate is not the type
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  Speaker 1: of word and I see this so many times, Like
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  Speaker 1: I even see the word collab at you know, brand
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  Speaker 1: name dot com, Like creators are using that word collabs.
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  Speaker 1: Collab is so out, Like that word is a twenty
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  Speaker 1: twenty and before, Like we need to bury that word.
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  Speaker 1: Rest in peace to the word collabse No one hears
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  Speaker 1: in the business of doing collaborations. All the creators I
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  Speaker 1: want to work with are in the business of getting
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  Speaker 1: paid partnerships. Okay, partnerships, not collaboration. So again, if you're
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  Speaker 1: trying to increase those chances of getting paid, what you
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  Speaker 1: say matters not you know, the energy of you would
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  Speaker 1: do it just to get your foot in the door.
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  Speaker 1: When you are vague, you are walking down the path
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  Speaker 1: of getting unpaid. Vague does not feel professional. Vague feels
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  Speaker 1: like you don't even know what you're doing. So you
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  Speaker 1: got to be in charge. The brand is your client.
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  Speaker 1: You are a business owner. You are here to provide
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  Speaker 1: a service. So get comfortable getting uncomfortable, right. That's a
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  Speaker 1: big part of the whole creator business space is advocating
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  Speaker 1: for yourself, being clear on your offers, what is it
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  Speaker 1: that you want to offer the brand and showing them
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  Speaker 1: that confidence, that assertiveness that this is a business for
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  Speaker 1: you that you are a professional, not that you're willing
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  Speaker 1: to you know, take whatever that you get. Creators that
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  Speaker 1: get paid are creators that treat this as a business,
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  Speaker 1: not as a fan. Now, speaking of paid creators, if
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  Speaker 1: you are a creator that is looking for paid opportunities,
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  Speaker 1: pitch ideas, media contacts, we did recently launch our sub stack.
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  Speaker 1: It is called the Paid Creator and I'm keeping this
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  Speaker 1: newsletter y'all real simple. I'm just going to be giving
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  Speaker 1: you guys pitch ideas brand opportunities that I see UGC jobs.
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  Speaker 1: So if that is of interest to you, the substack
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  Speaker 1: link I will put below. We have a free version.
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  Speaker 1: We have a paid option. If you pay like a
• 11:35
  Speaker 1: monthly membership or you could pay for the year, you're
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  Speaker 1: going to get the media contact, you're gonna get pitch
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  Speaker 1: ideas and angle so that you guys can use this
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  Speaker 1: to move faster, no more wasting time. Okay, hit up
• 11:45
  Speaker 1: these brands on the Paid Creator newsletter. I think these
• 11:48
  Speaker 1: are brands that are looking for creators and you're gonna
• 11:51
  Speaker 1: have a way better chance of getting a conversion. So
• 11:53
  Speaker 1: go ahead and check out our subseac. I hope you
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  Speaker 1: enjoyed today's episode. If you did, make sure to rate, review,
• 12:00
  Speaker 1: and subscribe to our show and visit Sidewalkerdaily dot com
• 12:04
  Speaker 1: for more resources on all things influencer, marketing and social media.
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  Speaker 1: Until next time,