Guides
Part of Brand deal income: five parts bundled into one number
What brand deal income metrics actually belong in your own report?
Brand deal income metrics to keep about your own work, why published rates answer nothing, and which claims to refuse when you report back to a buyer.
Two different sets of numbers surround a sponsorship. One answers the brand's question, which is whether to spend money here again. The other answers yours, which is whether this line of work is worth running at all.
They are not the same numbers, and using theirs to run your business is how creators end up busy, well reviewed and quietly unprofitable.
What to take away
- Measure the deal, not the post. Hours, approval time and days to payment decide whether this is worth doing far more than reach does.
- No published rate can tell you what to charge, because a fee without its terms attached is not a price.
- Report to brands honestly and narrowly. Claiming an outcome you cannot support is the fastest way to lose the relationship you were trying to keep.
The numbers you keep about your own business
None of these come from a platform. All of them come from a file you keep yourself, filled in as each deal closes.
Deal Metrics to Log
- Total hours, including approvals and chasing
- Days from brief to publication
- Revision rounds used against rounds agreed
- Days from delivery to money in account
- Share of period income from largest buyer
- Repeat rate, by buyer
- Approaches declined, with the reason
The numbers you keep
| What to record | What it tells you | Where it misleads |
|---|---|---|
| Total hours, including approvals and chasing | Whether the fee survived contact with the work | Easy to undercount, because waiting feels like nothing |
| Days from brief to publication | The real cost of this buyer's process | A single slow campaign distorts the average, so look at the spread |
| Revision rounds used against rounds agreed | Whether your scope language is holding | A buyer who never revises may simply not be reading |
| Days from delivery to money in the account | Your actual cash cycle, which is what you plan against | The contract's terms and the payment behavior are different facts |
| Share of period income from the largest buyer | The concentration risk in this line | Feels fine right up until the buyer changes agency |
| Repeat rate, by buyer | Whether you are building relationships or doing one offs forever | A repeat on much worse terms is not a win |
| Approaches declined, with the reason | What you are turning away, and whether the reasons still hold | Nobody logs this, so nobody learns from it |
| Live conversations that have a named person and a date | Whether next quarter exists | Optimistic pipelines are the norm; be strict about what counts |
| Unsponsored pieces published in the period | Whether the asset the brands are buying is still being maintained | The first thing to slip when a campaign runs late |
The two rows people never keep are the declines and the hours. They are also the two that change decisions, because together they tell you what this work actually costs and what you are choosing between.
Why published rates cannot answer the question you are asking
The question is always some version of "am I charging enough". Rate cards, surveys and shared screenshots feel like they should answer it. They cannot, and it is worth knowing exactly why.
Same Fee, Different Product
One organic post
- Deliverable
- Single post
- License
- None
- Media
- Own channel
- Amplification
- Organic only
- Exclusivity
- None
Post plus full rights
- Deliverable
- Post plus more
- License
- Long term
- Media
- Worldwide
- Amplification
- Paid boost
- Exclusivity
- Wide
Why published rates cannot answer
- A fee is not a price until the terms are attached.The same number can cover one organic post, or that post plus a long license, worldwide media, paid amplification and a wide exclusivity. Those are different products. Comparing the numbers compares nothing.
- The figures are self reported and unverifiable.Nobody publishes the deal they took at a discount because they needed the month covered.
- Who answers is not random.People report figures when the figure is flattering or when reporting it is part of their own business. That selection is invisible in the result.
- The buyer varies more than you do.Budgets differ by category, by market, by season and by whether the money came from a brand team or an agency retainer. None of that is in the number.
- Your costs are not their costs.A production you can do alone in a morning and one that needs a second person and a location are different jobs behind the same headline.
The wider version of this argument, and why it applies to every published creator income figure, is in income benchmarks. What honest disclosure about a survey looks like is written down in the American Association for Public Opinion Research's professional standards, and no rate screenshot has ever met them.
What to do instead is unglamorous. Derive a floor from your own costs and your own slot value, and quote the components separately as the brand deal income guide sets out. Keep a private record of what you actually agreed, so that your comparison set is your own history rather than strangers.
What to report back, and what to refuse to claim
Brands rebook people who make their job easy. That means a short, honest wrap after each campaign, and it means not overstating what happened.
Can You Claim It?
Did the brand give attribution data isolating your piece?
State the result as attributable
Report delivery and platform figures only
State what you can support: what you delivered, when it published, where it ran, what the platform reported for that piece, and what you observed in the response, including anything that went badly. Add your read on why, marked clearly as your read.
Draw the line. Do not credit your piece for sales, sign ups or brand lift unless the brand provides attribution data that isolates it. If they ran several things that month, your post is one of them. Saying that plainly builds more credibility than a flattering chart.
Do not present platform reported figures as verified. Do not compare the campaign to other clients' results.
A sentence worth reusing: here is what happened, here is what I can and cannot attribute to this piece, and here is what I would change next time. Brands hear the opposite of that all day.
Claims to keep out of your reporting
Claims to keep out
- Anything about revenue you did not see the data for.
- Any number that came from a tool estimating someone else's business.
- Guarantees about future performance, in a report or in a pitch.
- Audience descriptions more precise than what your own analytics actually support.
- Results from a different campaign presented as a likely outcome for this one.
Every one of these is a short term win and a long term liability, and one of them is a claim about a third party you cannot substantiate.
Claims to Leave Out
- Revenue you never saw the data for
- Numbers from tools estimating others' business
- Guarantees about future performance
- Audience claims beyond your analytics
- Other campaigns' results as likely outcomes
The quarterly review
Once a quarter, an hour, using the file rather than your memory.
The Quarterly Review
- Return per hour by buyer, using recorded hours
- Cost recovery per deal, fixed costs written down
- Buyer concentration, and whether it moved
- Terms accepted that you said you would not
- Whether the unsponsored floor held
- One buyer to stop, one term to stop conceding
The point of doing this quarterly rather than monthly is that individual deals are lumpy and a month tells you nothing. The same reasoning behind a stable monthly series applies here, as set out in career metrics.
Common questions
Should I show a brand my audience data?
Show what is relevant to their decision and accurate. Screenshots with the dates and definitions visible are better than a summary you typed, and a media kit that quietly uses a good month is a problem waiting to be checked.
What if a campaign performed badly?
Say so, first, with your read on why. The alternative is that they work it out from their own data and conclude you either did not notice or hoped they would not. One honest bad report is worth more than three good ones you cannot back up.
How do I price a license when I have no comparison?
Not from a benchmark. Work from what the permission costs you: the term, the media, whether it competes with your other income, and what it prevents. That is the reasoning in the brand deal framework, and it produces a number you can defend when asked.
Which single measure matters most?
Days from delivery to money, followed closely by hours per deal. Between them they tell you whether this income line is a business or a hobby with invoices attached.
