• Now, it is 100% important for all influencers to have relationships with brands, especially as you get bigger and you're represented. Let's say you have half a million followers and you're paying $5,000 for a post and I reach out to you, and your agent responds, and we negotiate, and you post. Great, cool.

    I've just given you five grand and you can't even be fucking bothered to answer an email and just say like, "This is so exciting. I love the brand so much. I'm going to kick you over to my agent, and hope this works out, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah." I think that as an influencer, you need to insist on having the relationship because that is really all you have. Again, as we were talking before about this stuff becoming commoditized, don't fool yourself in thinking that the influencer space is not going to be commoditized.

    As supply rushes into the market as it is right now, individual demand for each individual influencer will fall in accordance with how much the supply is going up. Your ability to continue to do what you do and charge your rates will be predicated on, one, your ability to create action and actually get your audience to do something, and two, your relationship with those brands. You need to concurrently be working on both of those things. It is just so irresponsible to not have a direct relationship with the brands.

    This is the whole joy of having an agent is that they get to be the bad guy who pushes on the contract terms, who pushes on the price, who pushes on the amount of deliverables and how long you have to be at the events and all that stuff. You get to be the final one who, once a year, you go out to dinner or drinks with them. You send them champagne when you see that they got engaged. Again, how many times do we have to say it, follow your brand contacts on Instagram and comment on their shit. This is very simple. This is very, very simple.

    You have half a million followers and you're commenting on their photos and all their friends are like, "Oh, my God that influencer is like you guys know each other." Like, "Yes, we work together. It's not a big deal." That's a moment, for the person at that brand, that is cool that you can create 20 times a day very easily. Again, follow all your brand contacts and mute them. Then once a week, go into the accounts that you've muted, go in, interact a little bit, do some commenting, boom, done. This is an hour of your life, people, and I promise it will bear fruit.

    If you have an agent and you are not maintaining your brand relationships you need to rapidly change that. If your agent is keeping you from those brand relationships fire them without question don't hesitate just done because if if you stop working together they take those relationships with them to wherever they go next you don't get to keep them. You need to make it a big part of what you're doing.I don't know what percentage of your time you should be spending doing this but if it was less than 10% I would be alarmed.
    Episode #140
    - Niche Mastery, Sponsored Instagram Stories, Brand Interactions