How much should I charge for a sponsored post?
How to compare rates, show a brand what your audience can offer and turn a sponsorship brief into a quote you can explain.
A brand wants to work with you. They like your content, the product seems like a good fit, and then comes the question: “What’s your rate?” You want to make the most of the opportunity, but it is hard to send a confident quote when you are still working out what to base it on.
A follower count gives you somewhere to start. The harder questions are what the brand expects from the partnership, what you can show about your audience and how much work the brief involves. Here is how we recommend thinking through those questions before you put a price in an email.
Check what is behind a rate before comparing it
When you find a rate in a guide or hear what another creator earned, look for the details that would make it relevant to your deal. Which platform and format? Was it a single post or a package? Did the payment include permission to use the content in ads? Was it cash, gifted products or a combination?
When comparing rates from other creators, check whether a figure is an asking price or an amount someone actually received. They answer different questions. A creator's rate card tells you what they are offering; a completed deal tells you what was agreed for that particular brief.
Our advice is to compare the work and the terms as closely as the audience size. A brief sponsored mention, a dedicated product demonstration and a sponsored post that the brand can also run as an advertisement are different proposals. A number without that context is a clue to investigate, not a reason to lower your quote.
Show what your content can do for this campaign
Research by Tian, Dew and Iyengar in the Journal of Marketing Research studied how follower count affects views on TikTok. Their analysis of trending-hashtag videos found that the benefit of a larger following varied with the content and campaign. Product demonstrations and dance or outfit-change campaigns showed different patterns. A follower count did not carry the same implications for views across every kind of campaign. The study measures views rather than fees.
Our takeaway: bring examples that resemble the content the brand wants to commission. For a product demonstration, show the views your recent demonstrations have received. Explain whether an example is typical of your work or an unusually successful post. We would use a representative selection, rather than build the pitch around a single viral hit. That gives the brand something concrete to assess alongside your follower count.
A smaller audience can still deliver sales
Beichert and colleagues, writing in the Journal of Marketing, tracked purchases from Instagram campaigns. In their field studies for fashion and beauty brands, the groups with smaller followings generated more sales revenue per follower than the groups with larger followings. That is evidence that a small audience can have commercial value. It does not establish a fee for your account or mean smaller creators always outperform larger ones.
Our takeaway: make the commercial case for your audience. Explain who follows you, why the product fits your content and what happened when you covered something similar. If you have tracked sales or enquiries from a previous partnership, include them and explain how they were measured. Match that evidence to the brief: a brand trying to generate sales has a different reason to hire you from one trying to introduce a product to as many people as possible.
Apply the same thinking to your niche. A cooking channel can explain how a kitchen tool fits into a recipe its viewers already want to make. A running creator can show how a product fits into a training routine. Those are concrete reasons for a partnership. Build the pitch around that fit. Our view is that a convincing explanation of why your audience would want the product is more useful than a generic claim that your niche commands a premium.
Be clear about what your price includes
Before sending a number, ask what the brand wants you to post and what it hopes the partnership will achieve. If those details aren’t clear from its message, ask for them in writing. Our recommendation is to settle four things: what you will create, where it will appear, how the brand may reuse it and whether the deal limits other work you can accept. That turns a vague request for your rate into something you can actually price.
- The content: agree on how the product will feature in your post, the format, the deadline and any approval or revision requirements. A brief mention within your usual content is a different commitment from a post dedicated to the brand.
- Publishing: specify which of your accounts the sponsored content will appear on and which placements are included. If the brand wants additional versions or posts on another platform, include that work in the quote.
- Usage rights: clarify whether the brand wants to repost the content or use it in paid advertising, and for how long. We recommend pricing those permissions separately so both sides can see what they are agreeing to.
- Exclusivity: find out which other partnerships you would have to turn down and for how long. Consider that lost opportunity when deciding whether the fee works for you.
A narrowly defined permission and an open-ended advertising license are very different commitments. State the scope, then put a price against it.
Your opening quote needs room for a conversation
Your opening quote should reflect what you’re offering the brand: a place in your content, an introduction to your audience and your recommendation.
If you haven’t done a sponsorship before, use your regular content to make that offer concrete. Show who follows you, how similar posts have performed and why the product fits their interests. You don’t need previous brand deals to demonstrate that fit.
The rough figures below or an estimate for your account can help you choose an opening number. Be clear about what it includes, and consider additional requirements such as extensive revisions, advertising rights or exclusivity separately.
If the budget is lower than your quote, discuss scope before reducing the fee. A shorter usage period or fewer deliverables may make the project workable. That gives the brand a concrete choice and keeps the conversation tied to the work.
A reply can be simple: “My fee for [deliverable] is [amount], including [revisions] and publication on [account]. Paid advertising rights and exclusivity would be quoted separately. Could you confirm whether you need either?”
What does that look like in dollars?
One reference comes from Kazimier Smith’s working paper, whose 2024 draft analyzed more than 15,000 self-reported reviews of accepted brand collaborations. Its fitted estimates were approximately $145 per deliverable at 10,000 followers and $448 at 100,000 followers. Those figures include cash and gifted-product value, and follower counts average the platforms listed in each review.
These figures can help you get your bearings when choosing an opening quote, but individual sponsorships can pay substantially more. The value of your offer depends on the audience you bring, your recommendation and the terms included. Use your proposal to explain what the brand will receive and why the partnership makes sense for your audience.
Find a starting point for your account
Tippity estimates a sponsored-post rate range from your audience size, platform, content format and niche. Our model is informed by research on real sponsorship deals. The result is an estimate, not a quote: use it as a starting point, then shape your proposal around the brief, your audience and what your regular posts show about their interests and engagement.