Glossary/Paid collaboration
What is a paid collaboration?
Short answer
A paid collaboration is advertising settled in money: the brand pays a creator to prepare the material, to publish it on their profile, or both. The scope, the dates and the amount are agreed up front, the material has to be labelled as advertising, and the settlement goes through an invoice or a contract.
What exactly is a paid collaboration?
An agreement about a specific result, not a favour. The creator commits to delivering defined material by a defined date, the brand commits to paying the agreed amount. Everything that is not in the terms is room for a dispute: the number of revisions, how long the post stays up, the right to use the material in advertising.
What should be in the terms?
Five points that close most of the later misunderstandings:
The format and number of pieces — for example one reel and two Instagram Stories with a link.
The publication date and how long the material has to stay on the profile.
The amount, the payment date and the form of settlement.
The number of revisions that are included in the price.
The scope of rights: whether the brand can use the material in paid advertising and for how long.
How is paid work different from barter?
In the form of payment and in what can be enforced. Barter is settled in product, so the value is a matter of opinion and the two sides often understand it differently. Paid work has an amount, a date and a document — it is easier to price, to plan and to check afterwards.
Where to order it or find tasks
Related terms
Words that come up in the same conversations. Each has its own definition in the glossary.
- Barter
- Settlement in a product or a service instead of money: a dinner, a treatment, an order from the shop. For smaller companies it is often the first way into a collaboration. Read more
- Rate per post
- The amount a creator expects for one published piece of material. It depends on the format, the topic, the reach and on whether the brand wants to use the material in advertising later. Read more
- Product seeding
- Sending a product to creators without ordering any particular publication. The brand counts on some of them showing the thing themselves, but has no guarantee and no deadline for it. Read more
- Brand ambassador
- A creator who works with one brand over a long time and regularly, rather than on a single campaign. The audience starts to associate the brand with a particular person, which works more strongly than a one-off mention. Read more
Frequently asked questions
Do you have to pay up front?
That is a matter of agreement. A common model is a deposit at the start and the rest once the material is approved; on the platform the amount is secured up front and goes to the creator after the work is accepted.
Are rates negotiable?
Usually yes, but what you negotiate is the scope, not the price itself: the number of pieces, how long the post stays up, the advertising rights. Simply asking for a discount without changing the scope rarely works.
Does paid work have to be labelled?
Yes, always and clearly, whatever the amount. The label has to be visible straight away, not hidden among the hashtags.
