Latest / Success Story with Scott Clary / Lessons - How Content Creators Can Maximize Their Value | Gigi Robinson - Full-Time Content Creator

Transcript

Lessons - How Content Creators Can Maximize Their Value | Gigi Robinson - Full-Time Content Creator · Success Story with Scott Clary

• 0:00
  What's what's some advice when people are like negotiating with some of these big brands?
• 0:14
  Are there any things that you have to watch out for that that could have screwed you over
• 0:18
  when you first started?
• 0:19
  Yeah, I mean, negotiation is always a little awkward, but I think if you handle it with
• 0:27
  this attitude of like, hey guys, I don't want to, you know, take up any of your time.
• 0:33
  Let's just cut to the chase.
• 0:34
  What's your budget?
• 0:35
  Yeah.
• 0:36
  Like, obviously after you built a rapport with them and after you've gone through the
• 0:40
  deliverables, they want to work with you.
• 0:42
  Like, I think beating around the bush is the biggest detriment to creators because it
• 0:47
  teaches you that the brand has like the upper hand because they're paying you.
• 0:51
  But really, you're the upper hand because you're the original content.
• 0:55
  They don't want to do a fully produced ad anymore.
• 0:57
  They want your original content.
• 0:58
  So a lot of the times they're willing to pay, you have to know what to ask.
• 1:03
  That's the biggest thing that people are speculating now is, okay, well, what's my
• 1:07
  rate?
• 1:08
  How should I know what to charge?
• 1:09
  Throw my number out there.
• 1:10
  When somebody agrees to it, upcharge.
• 1:13
  The next time they agree to that higher number, okay, upcharge, right?
• 1:17
  And as you grow the brands that you work with, you're also going to grow your portfolio.
• 1:21
  You're going to grow your business.
• 1:22
  And I think they go hand in hand, but making sure that you don't meet around the bush.
• 1:27
  Like, if a brand is like, this is an example that happened last week.
• 1:31
  A brand came to me and was like, oh, you know, they're a really big tech brand.
• 1:35
  They're like, we really want to work with you.
• 1:37
  We think it's great.
• 1:38
  You know, it's probably going to be about 12 Instagram stories and two Instagram posts
• 1:43
  per month for five months.
• 1:46
  And here's our budget.
• 1:48
  And it was so low, I mean, less than $100 per item, which is just out of control, considering
• 1:56
  my rate is well over $2,000 per item.
• 1:59
  And it's like a moment where I had to say, I really would love to work with you and find
• 2:05
  a way to make this, you know, happen for both of us because the brand's incredible.
• 2:09
  I'm a huge fan.
• 2:10
  However, that budget is not going to work.
• 2:13
  And transparently, it would not be worth my time.
• 2:17
  And I really again appreciate it.
• 2:19
  Please let me know, you know, keep me posted.
• 2:21
  And that's a moment where like, you have to be willing to lose it all.
• 2:24
  I'm okay with it because I'm not okay with producing those deliverables.
• 2:27
  So knowing that, knowing also usage rights and exclusivity and exclusivity, meaning if
• 2:35
  you're doing an ad with Starbucks, you probably can't do an ad with peets or Dunkin'
• 2:39
  Donuts or Tim Hortons, et cetera.
• 2:42
  And then usage rights, meaning you will post the content and the brand can use it in their
• 2:49
  own paid advertisements at their discretion.
• 2:52
  So they may pay you $5,000, but run $50,000 in ad spend behind it, right?
• 2:58
  So you deserve to be getting paid for that per month, like a residual, essentially.
• 3:05
  And then on top of that, there's something called white listing, which is where the
• 3:09
  influencer will post the content and then the brand will put also ad spend behind it and
• 3:16
  make it look like an organic post, but really it's a sponsored ad.
• 3:20
  You also deserve to be paid extra for that because your content's being showed to other
• 3:24
  people kind of like in a new audience and you deserve again to be compensated.
• 3:28
  So knowing about those things, reading up on the industry, something I did when I was
• 3:33
  in my internship at Paramount was called doing the daily trades.
• 3:36
  And essentially what I did was I read three articles a day, kind of did a very high level
• 3:41
  one sentence summary on what's going on in that industry, just so I could be in the
• 3:46
  know, definitely doing that when starting out too, so that you can use that to leverage
• 3:52
  with brands saying, oh, well, other creators in the industry are charting this or, you
• 3:56
  know, oh, I saw this ad by them, I want to emulate that so on and so forth.
• 4:02
  And as you're growing your own personal brand, you're putting out content, the one thing
• 4:06
  that we didn't touch on, which thought you've done exceptionally well is PR.
• 4:10
  Like you have publications, people have written incredible articles about you.
• 4:16
  And I feel like even for me, like I know content, but the PR is like a missing piece in
• 4:21
  the puzzle that I feel like content creators, they've never had exposure to that world.
• 4:25
  They have no idea where to even start with PR.
• 4:28
  So where do people start with PR to start getting some third part, because that's really
• 4:33
  what validates, right?
• 4:34
  Like you can put your own content out there, you could work with big brands, but when
• 4:37
  like a Forbes or a Vogue or anything, they speak about you, they're like, whoa, okay.
• 4:43
  So, you know, this person's on to something, they're figuring something out or they're
• 4:46
  creating something exceptional.
• 4:48
  So how do you, how do you get that?
• 4:50
  Yeah, that's a great question.
• 4:52
  I mean, I think also my, the biggest thing that I say to people around me is why do you
• 4:59
  want PR?
• 5:01
  And what do you think you're going to get out of it, right?
• 5:03
  Is it that you simply want more eyes on your content?
• 5:07
  Are you looking to generate sales?
• 5:08
  Are you looking to get like verified to be honest, like what is your intention behind
• 5:14
  it?
• 5:15
  And why do you think it's going to help you?
• 5:17
  And until you're clear on that, you're not ready for PR.
• 5:21
  Like that's what you need to do first and foremost.
• 5:24
  Second of all, once you start reading the trades value industry, you're going to start
• 5:29
  to get real familiar with the journalist, like reporting on it.
• 5:33
  So guess what?
• 5:34
  You can get active on Twitter.
• 5:35
  You can DM them.
• 5:36
  Hi, I'm a creator in this industry.
• 5:38
  I absolutely love your article on blah, blah, blah.
• 5:41
  Um, you know, let me know if you ever need a source in this industry, like I do blah,
• 5:46
  blah, blah.
• 5:47
  And that's how it relates, right?
• 5:48
  It's a very easy way to kind of get your foot in the door.
• 5:51
  Um, there's also things I know is going viral on TikTok a while ago called helperreporterout.com,
• 5:56
  which is where you can basically, there's like open calls for, uh, uh, like sources needed
• 6:03
  kind of situation and, uh, a lot of the times you can submit them and like they won't come
• 6:09
  through.
• 6:10
  Sometimes you'll submit them and it'll be like a cool article like you really never know
• 6:12
  what can come out of it.
• 6:14
  So if you have free time to kind of waste, like submit yourself for, like you can definitely
• 6:20
  do that as well.
• 6:22
  Um, and last but not least is, um, going in and paying for it and like you absolutely
• 6:30
  can pay for PR and once you get to a certain level, you'll get a certain amount like I started
• 6:35
  paying for PR because I was having too many inbound requests coming at me and I couldn't
• 6:40
  manage it.
• 6:41
  So I needed somebody to help me kind of weave through what was like good, what was bad.
• 6:46
  Also like even like as an influencer specifically attending these events that are put on by brands
• 6:52
  or movie premieres getting out there is really important and a lot of the times you, you can
• 6:59
  also naturally get invited to those.
• 7:01
  I just don't even have like the capacity to like, uh, what sort of like manage those, those
• 7:08
  inbound.
• 7:09
  So I have.
• 7:10
  You have to like fill this through them and see what's good and what's bad.
• 7:12
  Yeah.
• 7:13
  Exactly.
• 7:14
  And like that's a cool level to be at and I think that that's the point where like you're
• 7:19
  literally paying somebody to do a job for you.
• 7:22
  So that's, um, that's again kind of like my journey with PR and I think it's been extremely
• 7:28
  beneficial for me because not only does it validate like where I'm at in my career,
• 7:35
  uh, it, it validates me as like an industry leader and professional and like disruptor
• 7:40
  in the industry and, um, I think it's, it's just really cool.
• 7:44
  But it's, it doesn't mean that I'm successful, right?
• 7:46
  Like just because somebody has PR doesn't mean that that's their end all be all that they're
• 7:50
  successful.
• 7:51
  It's like the work that they're actually doing that measures up to it is the success.
• 7:55
  Um, that's, that's what it's really about.
• 7:57
  And it's about like how happy it makes me like just because I have like a cool feature.
• 8:02
  Like doesn't mean that I am like this like on this other, it's not like another, another
• 8:09
  point of happiness.
• 8:10
  It's just, it's just a, it's just a verified doesn't mean that it's a new point of like
• 8:16
  a new benchmark, right?
• 8:18
  Like I guess in some ways it's like, yes, like you can be trustworthy, but there's a bunch
• 8:22
  of trustworthy like people out there that aren't verified.
• 8:25
  Like you, there's no secret club.
• 8:27
  It's not like Soho House, like we don't need to gatekeep here.
• 8:31
  Um, so I think that yeah, that's just some things to, to think about.
• 8:36
  Um, and, and I guess, you know, I want to, I want to, I guess we, we've gone through
• 8:41
  a ton of stuff with content creation.
• 8:44
  Um, I guess any advice for, you know, we got through a lot of advice too, but like, like
• 8:49
  the most important advice in your mind for somebody who's just starting out into creating
• 8:54
  content, trying to build their own personal brand, what advice would you, you teach over
• 8:58
  to them?
• 8:59
  Yeah, I would go back to what I mentioned before, if finding your, your, your why and asking
• 9:04
  yourself why you do what you do or why you, if you have an idea of writing that down
• 9:08
  and really digging deep and saying, why is this important to me?
• 9:12
  Maybe the answer is because you want to make your mom and dad proud.
• 9:14
  Why do you want to make your mom and dad proud?
• 9:16
  Okay, because, you know, they, you want to have a better life for your future family.
• 9:22
  Okay, why is future family important to you because you care about, you know, family
• 9:26
  and building relationships and you want to be available to your kids, maybe in a way
• 9:32
  that your parents weren't okay, why is being available important to you?
• 9:36
  So on and so forth, like, and you can do that, I, I know that was like a more family-focused
• 9:40
  example, but that's like how you kind of can go down that rabbit hole and, um, just
• 9:46
  not giving up on yourself and knowing that it takes a process.
• 9:49
  As I mentioned, I came home in 2020 as a very different person than the person that's
• 9:56
  sitting on this call of you right now and I'm extremely proud of that growth and knowing
• 10:01
  that if you make it through like a month or a year, like even, even in January, like
• 10:08
  I was really like, I was like, getting like doubts like in January, I was like, what
• 10:15
  is going on?
• 10:16
  Like, am I doing this right?
• 10:17
  My health started acting up like I started getting really like the New York City winter
• 10:22
  blues kind of vibe.
• 10:23
  Like I was not doing well.
• 10:26
  So I started a breathwork challenge with my breathwork teacher.
• 10:30
  So that was something that I focused on for my health, for my mind, my body.
• 10:34
  And then I started looking and like reading a lot more motivational things around money.
• 10:39
  So like a lot of self-improvement in your moments of doubt and then I just kind of was
• 10:43
  like putting it out there.
• 10:44
  I was like, there's no reason why I don't deserve to be paid for the work that I do because
• 10:48
  it's really fucking amazing.
• 10:50
  And that's when like out of the blue, the last week of January, I like entered what
• 10:56
  mean my breath teacher call like the vortex, which is just like this kind of like portal,
• 11:04
  like it's an energy portal.
• 11:06
  It's a state of like being and you're just, I know this sounds kind of witchy and crazy,
• 11:12
  but just go with me.
• 11:13
  But like literally it's like the last week of January opens like I get this article up
• 11:20
  in Forbes.
• 11:21
  I was, like I think I had another article come out that I was interviewed for Fox for
• 11:26
  a second time.
• 11:28
  Then I like submitted my sports illustrated video.
• 11:32
  I got that news.
• 11:33
  I landed three brand deals that were like pretty big.
• 11:37
  I got invited to New York Fashion Week.
• 11:39
  I then got COVID, which was definitely a sidebar, but that's fine.
• 11:44
  It was not not bad at all.
• 11:46
  And then I go to Miami, I land like sports illustrated officially.
• 11:52
  Then I like land another brand deal.
• 11:54
  Then like I come home and I'm going to all these events and then my health stuff starts
• 11:58
  up again, which was like super shitty, but whatever.
• 12:02
  And then just like things keep coming.
• 12:05
  And I think it's really about rewiring yourself and you can't really work on your business
• 12:12
  until you're okay in your mind.
• 12:15
  My hierarchy is always like health and mindset and then business or health mindset, school,
• 12:26
  business, personal life and relationships and then like self care.
• 12:32
  So I need to like put self care higher up.
• 12:34
  I probably need to also like get, you know, once school is done, I'll just bump business
• 12:41
  up.
• 12:42
  But yeah, just having a hierarchy and figuring out what works for you and until you figure
• 12:46
  that out, you're going to be a little bit lost.
• 12:48
  So yeah.