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Gifted collaborations tend to have a stigma around them when it comes to Influencers who take their job seriously and who are working towards turning their online promos into a full-time career. That said, not all gifted campaigns are bad and some may even lead to paid promos down the line!
In this article, we will outline what to do if you get a gifted request, how to potentially negotiate the offer into a paid deal, as well as when it’s a good time to say YES to a gifted offer.
Step 1: Negotiating a Gifted Offer
Once you’re ready to negotiate with the brand, you simply need to respond to their request with a counter offer. Be sure to thank them for reaching out and including you in their gifted offer and ask a few follow-up questions to see if they’d be interested in working with you in a PAID capacity.
But First.. Ask yourself a few Q’s to make sure you’d like to work with the brand in a more official capacity.
How to know if you should negotiate with a brand
- Do your research on the brand. How does their Social look? Does their website checkout? Do their branding, tone of voice, and user experience feel like something your audience would relate to? Ask yourself if their brand and audience aligns with yours.
- Then ask yourself if you would take the time to pitch them on your own if they hadn’t reached out to you. Some things to consider here would be:
- Would you actually use the product?
- Would your audience use it?
- Do the brand values align with yours?
- Is the price point in line with what your audience spends on products like this?
If those things are a yes, it’s time to negotiate for a paid collaboration. Try one of the following follow-ups to begin your negotiation.
- Thank you so much for reaching out! I’ve had some time to check out your brand and I’d love to potentially work together. Can you tell me what your budget is for this campaign?
- Thank you for your email! I’ve taken a look at your brand and I love what I’m seeing so far. Next month, I have some space in my content calendar for a promotion! Could you please send over your budget and what you’d like to see as far as deliverables? Once received, I’d be happy to respond with a few creative concepts for the campaign.
- Thank you for thinking of me! I’m a big fan of “brand name”. I’m currently booking campaigns for Q2 and would love to get something on the books with you this Summer. If you could send over the budget and desired deliverables, I’d be happy to shoot over a few ideas that I know my community would love to see.
Step 2: Send Creative Concepts
Once you’ve sent your counteroffer to the brand, they may respond with a request for one or more of the following:
- Your rates
- Analytics (media kit!)
- Ideas that you have for an activation/promotion
It’s your time to shine! Respond to their message with your media kit. Make sure that you have up-to-date stats and you should also add three creative concepts (ideas) of what you’d like to create for the brand.
Usually, at this stage, you’ll give the brand three different ideas within a ‘rate range’.
For example:
- Story promotion only (lowest investment for brand)
- Stories + Static Posts (Mid investment for brand)
- IG Post or Reel + Stories + Blog Post with Pinterest Activation (highest investment for brand)
Make sure to include specific examples of what each option would look like! Really go all out, and walk them through what your content would look like, sound like, and what it would convey to your audience!
Step 3: Send a Pitch Deck
Once the brand shows interest in one of your concepts you can showcase the whole idea with a Pitch Deck. A pitch deck is a document that is going to include; creative ideas outlined for the brand, content examples, a breakdown of the cost, and a timeline for the project.
Bonus Content: When to say yes to a gifted collaboration
There is a time and a place to say yes to a Gift Collaboration. Here are some tips to keep in mind if you are thinking about saying yes to a gifted offer:
- Would you spend your money on this anyway?
- Is it genuinely going to save you money to accept it?
For example: if you’ve been shopping around for a Peloton for months, and Peloton reaches out to offer you one of their bikes in exchange for a promotion, this might be something you should consider when you take into account the cost.
Don’t forget to calculate the cost of your time to create the content, before deciding if it’s going to be worth it. A free Peloton might be worth it since you were already going to buy one anyway. But a pair of free sunglasses from a cheaper brand, in exchange for hours of your time, might not be worth it.
The other time you should think about accepting a gift collaboration offer is if you’re looking to build a relationship with the brand for future paid collaborations. If they’re a brand you’ve been dying to work with, and this gift collaboration could be a stepping stone towards a paid job, then it might be worth saying yes to.
Remember though, a gifted collaboration should have no strings attached. You create the content because you want to, not because you are obligated to. There is a general understanding in the industry that if you receive a product and you genuinely like and would use it yourself, you should give the brand a mention (in your story is fine). But, again, this should not be mandatory and at your discretion only. Maybe the product isn’t the quality you thought, or it’s not something that would align with your audience after all.