- I'm gonna cut straight to the chase,
(mellow electronic music) in this week's video,
we are gonna be talking
specifically how much money brands are willing to pay
for a sponsored Instagram post.
Now the general consensus that I've gathered
through talking with friends,
and other people in the world, is they have no idea
how much money Instagrammers actually make,
or how much somebody has actually paid for a post.
Here's a specific story that really made me realize
that I should probably make this video.
So I was talking to a lady a few weeks ago,
and she was like oh I follow your life, it's so exciting,
but, but, tell me, how much money do you make off the posts?
So I began to tell her everything
that you're about to hear in this video
(mellow electronic music) about engagement rates,
distribution, quality of content, how to work with brands,
and how it's an actual business model to make make money.
And literally by the end of it, she was just like so,
so Instagram sends you a check?
And I was just like, oh boy.
(mellow electronic music) We need to make this video so,
let's jump into this week's content, woo.
(funky pop music)
All right, so I wanna add a quick disclaimer here.
I have a lotta friends that work in the industry,
and I can't just go up to them and be like,
oh how much did you get paid for this,
and I can't share specifically on camera
how much these people make,
but through general conversations,
and industry standard rates, and through my own experience,
and how much I get paid, I can tell you roughly
what people are gonna be making.
Again, these numbers fluctuate, some people charge less,
some people charge more, but here's like the average
that I'm about to share with you.
All right, so now that the disclaimer's outta the way,
let's call this section
"How Much Do People Get Paid On Instagram".
So specifically, there is an industry standard,
this is based off of companies like Hashtag Paid,
which is an agency out of Toronto
that does a lot of brand negotiations,
and kinda connects influencers to brands,
as well as socialbluebook.com.
You guys can go to these websites
and type in your own information,
and find out for yourself how much you could be making.
But, the industry standard,
the thing that you been waiting for
this whole entire time is (drum rolling)
20 cents to 50 cents per engagement.
And you're probably sitting there, well Chris,
what is, what is an engagement?
So to clarify what an engagement is,
to people that do not know,
that specifically means a like, comment or share,
and when you total all those things,
and times that by 20 cents or 50 cents,
you're gonna get a ballpark number.
So let's say you get around 500 likes,
or 500 engagements on a post,
you're gonna be making anywhere between 80 to $150, roughly.
I need to double check,
I think I did that calculation in my head,
let's double check that.
Uh huh, times, actually the number is 100 to 250.
Apparently I can't do math.
So that's a pretty wide spectrum and ballpark number,
you got 20 cents here and 50 cents,
and everything in between.
So what are brands looking for,
and how do I get closer to that 50 cents number?
From my experience, there are four categories
that brands look for when they're looking to hire you
for a sponsored Instagram post.
Number one, distribution.
Number two, the quality of your content.
Number three, the engagement,
how well do people engage with your content,
and number four, your brand, what do you represent,
what's the content that you guys are showing.
So let's deep dive into all these categories.
Subcategory number one, distribution.
What does that mean?
Ultimately, Instagram is your way
to distribute your content,
and if you have a certain amount of followers,
you're gonna have a certain amount of reach.
So brands are gonna look for how far is this content
actually gonna go.
So now that we know how far your content is going,
let's break down those people
that are actually looking at that content.
That's called demographics.
Now demographics are age ranges, gender,
where they are from, these are all the things
that your brand's gonna start looking for.
I got an almond croissant, took a bite of it,
now I'm really worried that there are gonna be
almond pieces in my mouth.
I know somebody's gonna tag me,
being like almond piece at this part,
or at this part, almond found in this area (laughing).
All right the next section is quality of content.
How does your content look?
Is it professional, are you curating your account well?
How do the individual posts look?
As well as your whole body of work.
And by body of work, I mean like Instagram grid,
'cause you know how people are always like
it just doesn't suit the grid.
It's important, brands look for that.
So this is where you guys could win.
Let's say you don't have as many followers,
but you have really good quality content.
You can still be making good money.
Let's bring up a case study,
this is my friend @lostcoordinate,
he has 25,000 followers,
which is actually a relatively small number,
in terms of like the industry
and people who have like 100,000
or 200,000 or a million followers.
But he has really incredible content,
and that's where he's winning.
If you look at his feed, you can understand
why brands wanna start working with him.
He's got amazing colors, it's curated really, really well.
His captions are always on point,
so all of his content is professional.
So because of this,
brands are gonna start paying him more money,
because the quality of his content is good,
and they might even license some of that content
for their own social media, which means
that he can start getting paid even more money.
And I know you guys are probably sitting there
on the other end thinking
well he has 25,000 followers,
or that person has 100,000 followers.
Even if you had like 100 or 500 followers,
but the quality of your content
is like (tongue clicking) next level,
brands still wanna work with you,
so always remember brands are looking
at the quality of your content as well.
I wanted to add a little side note,
when you think of the whole job of being an Instagrammer,
yes, the photo does matter, but the captions,
in my opinion, are just as important as the photos.
So you'll have to start writing really good captions,
you can't be lazy, you can't just be
putting emojis all the time,
and hoping that's gonna get some engagement going on,
and people are gonna wanna
like start commenting on your stuff, no,
put some thought into it,
actually start writing things out, start microblogging.
You guys can do some of this research afterwards,
but write some thoughtful things, because ultimately,
brands are gonna read your captions too.
And that could be the reason they work with you
or won't work with you.
All right, the next sub category,
we were kinda just talking about it,
in the quality content section,
that subcategory is engagement.
Now specifically, this is the likes,
the comments, the shares, how legit are your likes,
comments and shares, so tip number one,
don't buy your engagement.
Don't buy followers, don't buy likes, like just don't do it,
'cause it's actually gonna work against you,
your brands will see that and be like, hm,
that's a pretty high number of followers,
and pretty low engagement,
sounds like I'm gonna call bull (beeping) on that one.
Brands don't wanna work with those people,
they wanna work with people who have authentic engagement.
That's a really key word, authenticity.
Don't buy followers, that's my rant, don't do it.
Don't, ever, stop, now, I see you, I see you,
you're going to the website, don't, don't do it.
John, don't do, stop.
That's good, don't do it.
As this becomes a more legitimate industry,
brands are getting way smarter.
They're even hiring companies to audit your account,
before they even decide to work with you.
Literally there's companies that will go to your account,
and be like nah, he buys followers, nah, he buys engagement.
Don't work with them, ever, don't do it, Jonathan.
The quality of your engagement is really important too,
so if you write a really thoughtful caption,
are people writing thoughtful messages back?
Are they actually engaging with you?
Are you engaging back with them?
Brands look at this, ultimately if you just have a page
that just says sick tones bro, bro those tones,
fire emoji, devil emoji (laughing).
All these types of emojis, that's not thoughtful engagement,
that's just like random comments.
Now one thing I wanted to note specifically on engagement,
even if you're getting 300 to 400 engagements on a post,
that's still really good,
and it's worth something to a brand.
'Cause when you think about that,
that's 300 or 400 people
that are sitting behind their phones,
engaging with your content.
Imagine all those people in a room,
brands would pay a lotta money to get the chance
to speak to 300 or 400 people in a room.
Have you ever been to an event and they're like
we would like to thank our sponsor, Hebu-Jebu,
for sponsoring tonight's night.
If you wanna get your hands on some Hebu-Jebu,
you can go to the local Hebu-Jebu store,
and buy some of it, and then people are like wow,
I really like Hebu-Jebu better now.
So that's the same example,
ultimately at the end of the day.
They're paying to get in front of that audience.
I really hope somebody creates a brand called Hebu-Jebu.
I don't know what the product is, but I,
you guys can leave comments below,
of what you think that product would be.
A little pro tip when you guys are writing captions.
Don't put generic captions that you see other people,
and being like what did you do today,
what's your favorite thing about today?
Because that's just not real engagement.
Try to have thoughtful conversations.
For example, I did a post a few weeks ago,
where I posted a photo of a camera,
and I actually noticed that within the community,
a lotta people feel like they don't have other people
to go out and shoot with, so I said comment below
where you're from, your age, what you like shooting,
and hopefully people get the chance to network,
and actually go out and find a community
to go out and shoot with.
That post got 3,000 comments, which is just like.
(imitates bomb exploding)
(imitates wind blowing)
That, yeah, it was a lot.
It's the post that actually has the most comments on it.
Try to find things where people
will actually join in thoughtful conversation,
and maybe share a bit more,
because that's gonna actually land you
potentially more brand deals, and get you paid.
The last category is brand, what is your brand,
what are you posting about?
How often are you posting?
These are all important factors.
Now consistency is probably the number one key to success
in terms of your branding.
How often are you posting?
I would recommend around two to three times a week,
so that you're staying relevant,
people are seeing your content, what are you posting about?
Now a little hot tip here, is don't post about things
that you're not genuinely passionate about.
I have a lotta people who are always like
I love traveling, I'm gonna post travel content.
But can you keep it up?
That means you have to be traveling all the time,
so unless it's actually built into your lifestyle,
talk about things that are relevant to your interests.
If you're into fishing, post things about fishing,
it's a really great niche,
and you'll attract fishing brands to come and work with you.
So let's talk about a dope squad member as a case study.
This is @alenpalander.
Alen's page is highly curated,
his photos are absolutely amazing,
and he attracts a certain type of brand.
Now what he's posting about generally are luxury brands,
so he's got watches, he's wearing suits,
he's got Mercedes Benz in there,
these are all like high level luxury brands.
So the more he posts about that,
he's gonna attract other luxury brands.
So really think about what you wanna be posting about,
is it genuine to you?
It's genuine to Alen,
Alen's kinda boojie so it makes sense
that he'd be posting these things.
Alen, I see you, great page, keep it up.
But ultimately, brands wanna align with other partners,
you're the partner in this situation, hey partner.
They wanna partner with those types of people,
that match their brand and lifestyle.
So we work with brands like Corona,
because they're like oh, they're always outside,
and he has long hair that looks like
it should be on a beach, and that kinda makes sense.
Use the information from this video
to hopefully start landing brand deals,
and you can start making some money,
and ultimately, chase down some dreams,
'cause I know for a lotta people,
they wanna be Instagrammers and YouTubers in the future.
I think there was an article that I saw
that the number one job that kids wanna be
when they grow up is a YouTuber or Instagrammer,
verses an astronaut.
Or we should be YouTuber astronauts.
There's an idea.
Ultimately this is a real career choice,
you can make money in these fields,
and brands are willing to work with you,
more now than ever before, because advertising dollars
are switching from TV over to social media,
so yes, it's a legitimate career choice.
I highly encourage you guys to go check it out,
if it's something that you really wanna put time into.
But remember, this is still a job,
it has its ups and downs,
but it's one of the (fingers snapping)
coolest jobs that you guys can have in the world.
I feel grateful every day to be able to do this stuff,
and to get the chance to teach you guys,
and post cool content and work with cool brands,
so yes, there's opportunity for you guys as well.
I do wanna leave on a few notes.
If you guys are interested
in growing your Instagram account,
I did a whole video about last year,
about how to beat the algorithm,
and ultimately just like good posting techniques,
so you can grow your account,
and ultimately get more engagement,
so you guys can check out that video, here.
We do a lot of cold calling, to work with certain brands,
so I actually have an email template,
if you guys wanna go pick it up.
Ultimately it's $10, and I want you
to think about something for a second,
let's say even if you make $80 off a brand,
or a $1,000 or maybe even $10,000 off a brand,
what's 10 bucks?
It's a small investment, helps fund this YouTube channel,
and all the people that are involved
with editing videos and making content.
All that stuff helps, so I sincerely appreciate it,
if you guys wanna go pick that up,
you guys can go check it out in my Sellfy Store down below.
And there's also a bit of a sale going on,
so if you wanna pick out Lightroom presets too,
that sale is still on.
I appreciate your support
from the bottom of my heart, really it means the world.
All right, we're at the end of this video.
If you guys saw some value in it, please press like.
It actually makes a difference.
Subscribe and hit the bell to be notified for future videos,
and I wanted to ask you guys specifically a question,
would you guys like me to dissect my fee,
how much money I'm making on posts?
Would that information be valuable to you?
Would you like to see a YouTube video on that?
Would you guys like to see an Instagram post on that?
I can share more of that information,
if you guys are interested, so comment below
if that's something that you see some value in.
In the meantime, share your accounts,
and I'll be checking out some stuff below.
You guys are the best, love you, have a great day.