How to brief and manage creators

1 The bottom line

Brief creators with proven examples, a few hard rules and room to make the video their own, then review early work and run them as one group. Creators know their audience, and the program only scales if quality holds without you scripting each video.

2 Key takeaways

• Brief with examples and a few rules, not scripts. Scripted videos feel like ads and views drop.
  • Pok Pok used to hand creators a list of values to mention, and it came across as disingenuous. Melissa Cash, Pok Pok33:35
  • Cal AI asks for two things, show the core screens and show them early, and managed about 300 actively posting creators in one month. Daniel Heintzman, Cal AI18:38
• Review every video early, then step back. Early checks stop wasted spend, and later checks slow you down.
  • The best founders review videos before posting during the first 3 days, and hand off once CPMs are reliably under $4. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
• Staff the program with people who know content, at about one manager per 10 creators. Knowing good content is the hard skill, and management is easy to learn.
  • Praktika's influencer lead was a creator in Poland before running the program. Adam Turaev, Praktika43:58
  • Fewer than five creators per manager wastes money, and more than 15 gets lost. Drew Levin, SideShift11:20
• Run creators as one group so they learn together. Post and pay programs lose the compounding learning.
  • One Discord with channels for wins, ideas and feedback keeps creators motivated and sharing. Dillion Verma, Halo AI30:46
• Give new creators a few weeks, then cut the bottom. Most views come from a small top group, but slow starters can turn into stars.
  • A creator nearly cut at day 28 of 30 had a video go huge on the last day and is now one of the best. Melissa Cash, Pok Pok37:12
  • Pingo cut 30 to 50 creators and now sits at about 100. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo25:03

Do not tell influencers how to do their job.

Adam Turaev, Praktika

2.1 Build the team first

Do the strategy and coaching yourself at the start, then hand work to people who know content.

• Make content yourself before you hire or manage creators. Dris, Methods51:55
  • Record one 30-second video every day to learn what goes viral and what companies expect. Dris, Methods51:55
  • Test hooks and formats on your own accounts, and hand creators only the ones that hit. Jay, Nomad Table26:40
  • Jay posts daily and has been the top views person for 2 to 3 months while managing 60 to 70 creators. Creators take feedback better from someone doing the same work. Jay, Nomad Table10:25
• Act as strategist and coach first, then shift to recruiting. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift7:57
  • Before you have content market fit, find winning formats and hooks, review every video and coach creators. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift7:57
  • Once formats are proven, the key job is recruiting: messages, filtering applicants and onboarding calls. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift7:57
  • Nobody has 20 to 30 hours a week for UGC, but 10 to 15 dedicated hours is very valuable. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift3:17
• Hire one campaign manager for every 10 creators, up to 15 at most. Drew Levin, SideShift11:20
  • Start with a generalist who has gone viral and run creator programs. Try a one-month pilot at a $2 to $4,000 retainer, roughly $150 per creator. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift3:17
  • Add about 5% of all creator bonuses so the manager pushes for quality. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift3:17
  • Suno has around eight creator managers who also act as coaches. Drew Levin, SideShift11:20
  • Coconote uses one coach for every 12 creators. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote19:37
• Staff the program with former creators. Adam Turaev, Praktika43:58
  • Promote your top creators into recruiting, strategy, coaching and video reviews. They need less handholding. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift36:15
  • If you lack a good creator pool, bring in an outside manager first. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift36:15
  • Praktika has more than 100 creators, with in-house leads and coaches who each run 20 to 30 creators. Adam Turaev, Praktika43:58
  • StudyFetch split scouting and negotiating from full-time creative managers. Contractors running operations failed on incentives and dedication. Kieran, StudyFetch37:30

2.2 Recruit and onboard

Make every step from first message to first post easy, because friction kills a program early.

• Interview each creator briefly and train them with a short course. Nicole, Glam Up and Sprout32:00
  • Spend about 15 minutes to vibe check seriousness. Experience is a bonus but unnecessary. Nicole, Glam Up and Sprout32:00
  • Require a video course with a quiz after each module, linked to a CRM via Typeform. It covers getting started, warm-up, content bank, policies and account management. Nicole, Glam Up and Sprout32:00
  • Over 50% of creators finished the course with no prior experience and went viral within the first 2 weeks of a new account. Nicole, Glam Up and Sprout32:00
  • Coconote's founder usually decides within 15 to 30 minutes of interviewing a creator. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote19:37
• Standardize onboarding from the first message to the first post. Drew Levin, SideShift14:19
  • Send a message saying what you need, hold a 5-minute booking call, then use a Notion page where creators join the campaign and submit handles. Drew Levin, SideShift14:19
  • Give creators a landing page with testimonials from other creators, and teach them your metrics and viral formulas. Ryan Thorpe, Flo37:50
  • Flo automated interview, brief, video, editing, invoicing and payment, and allocated thousands of videos across about 20 apps. Ryan Thorpe, Flo37:50
  • Some apps hire someone full-time just to run creator interviews. Drew Levin, SideShift14:19
• Move the deal from email into a chat app. Alex, Boost App Social15:50
  • After a creator replies by email, a VA sends a pre-recorded founder video and adds them to a Telegram group. Alex, Boost App Social15:50
  • Telegram handles back and forth, large MP4 files and signed contracts, and phone notifications keep creators responsive. Alex, Boost App Social15:50
  • This flow produced 200 to 300 creatives with signed contracts. Alex, Boost App Social15:50
• Pitch the deal as freedom, which can also lower the price. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI7:00
  • Tell creators to keep making their normal videos and just sneak the app in. Pair it with a long-term partnership offer. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI7:00
  • This framing often lowered rates enough to make deals profitable, and price was the only common reason deals failed. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI7:00

2.3 Write the brief

Give a one-page brief of examples, hooks and CTA spots, and let creators choose the format.

• Write the brief with references, hooks and CTAs, not full scripts. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift15:45
  • Keep it to one digestible page: reference videos, hook ideas, where the CTA plugs in, alternative CTAs and messaging themes. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift15:45
  • Send a Google Doc of best performers and tell creators to recreate them or do their own thing. Cedric Roberge, Pep AI20:40
  • Hand over an A4 page with the app, the marketing angle and the hooks that work, and reject obviously low-effort work. Alex, Boost App Social29:30
  • At Pep AI a slideshow creator is the top performer, and a comedic creator's videos reach hundreds of thousands of views, one at 400,000. Cedric Roberge, Pep AI20:40
  • Boost App Social remixes five creator videos into about 15, with faster cuts, to feed the algorithm more variety. Alex, Boost App Social29:30
• Send a working example and the reason it worked. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo38:55
  • When a format goes viral, send the video, why it likely went viral and the key steps. Ask creators to recreate it as closely as possible in their target language. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo38:55
  • For a brand new format, make the example video yourself first. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo38:55
  • A variation of the crying Pingo meme went viral with one creator and was then scaled across creators. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo38:55
• Keep format research in house. Yannis, Superwall25:00
  • Creators left alone miss details like red backgrounds and screenshot overlays for news content. Yannis, Superwall25:00
  • Do the flopping yourself so creators follow a recipe that is close to guaranteed to earn them money. Still leave some creative freedom for motivation. Jay, Nomad Table26:40
  • One good text hook worked across the board, and eventually almost every creator got a big video with it. Jay, Nomad Table26:40
• Match the brief to the creator type. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch32:32
  • Influencers with their own following build familiarity and get no push to convert. Performance creators get tight direction, a specific CTA and a thought partner role. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch32:32
  • Let each creator keep their natural style. Use a hard CTA with the website in the last 4 to 5 seconds for demo videos, and a soft CTA for lifestyle creators. Kieran, StudyFetch28:10
  • Once the app is known, ask big creators for four day-in-the-life videos a month so viewers see it several times. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI21:51
  • Viewers who heard the brand from influencers convert better when they later see the performance videos. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch32:32
  • A Harvard student's lifestyle videos wove in the study calendar, flashcards and a quiz between ordinary scenes, with no heavy CTA. Kieran, StudyFetch28:10

2.4 Set a few rules

Pick a small set of rules that protect conversion and the product, and drop the rest.

• Require the app on screen early, and motion at the start. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI22:22
  • Get the app in within the first 15 seconds, using the golden moment, such as taking a photo to log food. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI22:22
  • Show the camera, the photo analysis and the result screen. Daniel Heintzman, Cal AI18:38
  • Fill the first five seconds with movement, such as hand action or several reacting faces. Creators who just talk to camera tend to stall. Dawson Gibbs, Evo Marketing26:50
  • Earlier than 15 seconds looks like an ad, and later hurts retention. Evan Yadegari, Locked17:01
  • Ads placed at the end lose most viewers because retention curves drop straight down. Daniel Heintzman, Cal AI18:38
• Make sure the real product shows, and let curiosity carry the name. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo16:40
  • Count only virality that uses the product. Videos that go viral without the app get views but do not convert. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo16:40
  • The best converting videos barely say the app name. They show the creator scanning breakfast in a vlog. Alfie Dickens, Cal AI22:22
  • Seed a pinned comment like "What's this app? I need this", have the creator reply with the name, and show the name big on screen. Evan Yadegari, Locked17:28
  • Everything that has gone viral at Pingo since August used the app. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo16:40
• Change the app so it films well. Jake Castillo, Cal AI16:10
  • Remove UI that interrupts the magic moment. Cal AI's streak popup added a fourth beat to the scan, analyze, result flow, so creators avoided showing their first scan of the day. Jake Castillo, Cal AI16:10
  • Build creator-only screens that look better on camera, and let creators ask engineers for more in Slack. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote11:20
  • Coconote's creator-screen video of the lecture-recording use case hit 18 million views, about 99% organic. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote11:20
  • Cal AI added a "tracked with Cal AI" caption for subtle integrations but skipped it for hard ones because it hurt views. Jake Castillo, Cal AI16:10
• Keep product rules on one sheet and let growth content run loose. Adam Turaev, Praktika50:36
  • Give creators near unlimited freedom for upper-funnel content, with a single sheet of what you will and will not do. Adam Turaev, Praktika50:36
  • Cursing avatars went viral in ads but confused users in the app. It was Praktika's biggest failed experiment of the year. Adam Turaev, Praktika50:36

2.5 Review and coach

Check videos before they post at the start, coach execution, and step back once results hold.

• Review every video before it goes live in the early days. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift16:52
  • Check lighting, pace, dead space, hook, story sense and whether the integration feels natural. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift16:52
  • Record Loom videos of good and bad examples to separate bad messaging from low-quality content. Canyon (Kenyon Prasad), Sideshift16:52
  • Ask for the first video in the group chat before posting, so unbranded or off-topic ones can be redone. Cedric Roberge, Pep AI20:40
  • Evo approves every video and checks that creators are doing something with their hands. Dawson Gibbs, Evo Marketing26:50
  • StudyFetch approves every video even with hundreds of creators, and tracks posting schedules in Asana. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch22:58
• Step back once CPMs hold, and step in fast if they rise. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
  • Give video reviews before posting during the first 3 days, and run a weekly call to walk through videos. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
  • Once you reliably hit sub $4 CPMs, hand day-to-day work to campaign managers. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
  • In the top 50 SideShift programs, founders mainly do payouts and a monthly check-in. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
• Coach execution before you change the idea. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo42:00
  • Many flops had good ideas but bad lighting, an odd camera angle, awkward framing or weak audio. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo42:00
  • Have coaches review work and walk creators through their metrics. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote19:37
  • At Pingo about 30 of roughly 100 creators come up with their own ideas. 20 are good and 10 are standout. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo42:00
  • Halo AI fed every video above a million views into an agent in its Discord. Creators ask it for scripts and ideas, and it pattern matches on what worked. Dillion Verma, Halo AI27:21
• Judge creators on many data points and automate the tracking. Jake Castillo, Cal AI38:00
  • Build a renewal score from many metrics, and add incrementality tests and follower demographics to see where spikes came from. Jake Castillo, Cal AI38:00
  • Start with a heavily automated Google Sheet, then build software for deals, contracts, posts, views, bonuses and payments. Jake Castillo, Cal AI40:15
  • Cal AI had 50 to 70 influencers posting on a single day, so attribution got murky. Jake Castillo, Cal AI38:00
  • During the days a 20 to 30 million view video runs, you can see its exact downfunnel impact. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote27:50
  • StudyFetch tracks views and engagement over time with internal tools on TikTok's API plus spreadsheets. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch22:58

2.6 Run the group

A connected group learns faster, stays motivated and makes cuts easier to decide.

• Put all creators in one chat and share what worked. Nick Lawton, SideShift10:35
  • Break down videos with watch time data and ask which variable drove results, such as the wording or the audio. Then apply those findings to more videos. Nick Lawton, SideShift10:35
  • Use one Discord with channels for wins, ideas and feedback. Dillion Verma, Halo AI30:46
  • Pingo creators share what went viral in a Discord so the middle pack follows the leaders. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo42:00
  • Milestone bonuses spark creators asking each other for engagement. Dillion Verma, Halo AI30:46
• Build real relationships to beat creative fatigue. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch23:15
  • Position the program as mutually beneficial, almost like consulting, since 20 to 30 videos a month is new for most creators. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch23:15
  • Text creators almost daily, call them, share their sign-up numbers and give new creators free lifetime access before dealing. Cedric Roberge, Pep AI45:11
  • Bring creators into your Slack so they see user feedback. Koby Conrad, Sunflower16:55
  • Pep AI creators reply to follower questions and go live on TikTok to promote the app. Cedric Roberge, Pep AI45:11
  • With one influencer, a 50/50 split, weekly update calls and a say in ideas made it feel like their game. His YouTube Shorts promo got over 50 million views and drove 2 to 3 million downloads in about two weeks. Rafael Kramer, Superwall40:00
• Give new creators a few weeks, then cut the bottom. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo25:03
  • Expect it to take a couple of weeks, since no one has gone viral in week one. Melissa Cash, Pok Pok37:12
  • Tell creators that continued posting makes failure impossible. The main churn is creators who see 100 views on their second video and quit. Dris, Methods13:55
  • Cut the bottom, keep the top, coach the middle, and set an internal deadline to decide on each new creator. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo25:03
  • The top 20 to 30 percent of Pingo's creators produce most views, and the bottom is dead spend. Morrie Schonfeld, Pingo25:03
  • Long-tenured creators are the highest paid on Methods. Dris, Methods13:55
• Keep a creator who hits, even if you cannot explain why. Ryan Thorpe, Flo21:21
  • Spend less on follow-up videos from the same creator, about 25K instead of 100K, and keep working with proven creators. Ryan Thorpe, Flo21:21
  • One creator hit 66.9 million views and kept hitting for over a year. Copying her video across 20 to 40 other creators did not work. Ryan Thorpe, Flo21:21

2.7 Where they disagree

Brief depth, review length, team size and cut speed all depend on your product and your people.

• Some operators script closely, others barely brief at all.
  • Nicole gives a content bank with an emotion cue and shot type for each line, and films example videos for creators to copy. Nicole, Glam Up and Sprout46:00
  • Flo specifies the trending sound, hook type, length and shots per second. Ryan Thorpe, Flo30:21
  • Yannis suggests about 80% fixed structure and 20% room for ambassadors' own spin. Yannis, Superwall25:00
  • Praktika, Pok Pok and Cal AI say scripts hurt, and Cal AI says scripting would not allow 300 active creators. Adam Turaev, Praktika43:40
  • Flo counted 25 to 27 cuts in a 10 to 15 second video, built from data across all its videos. Ryan Thorpe, Flo30:21
• Some review every video forever, others step back or never approve.
  • StudyFetch approves every video even with hundreds of creators. Esan Durrani, StudyFetch22:58
  • SideShift's best programs review only for the first 3 days, then hand off once CPMs are under $4. Drew Levin, SideShift12:21
  • Adam did not like Gustavo's correction video and let it post. It got 10M views each on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, and ARR moved from $1M to $10 to 12M. Adam Turaev, Praktika43:40
• Some run hundreds of creators, others run a handful.
  • Cal AI had about 300 actively posting creators in one month. Daniel Heintzman, Cal AI18:38
  • Coconote ran 5 to 10 creators, at most 12, with the founder meeting each one. The goal was Navy Seals, not the Navy. Brett Bauman and Zack Hargett, Coconote27:50
  • Cluely started with fewer than 20 consistent creators. Dris, Methods24:25
  • The top 1% or 0.1% of creators produce around 90% of views. One company with 2,000 creators got only 500,000 views in a month. Dris, Methods24:25
• Some cut fast, others wait.
  • SideShift managers cut bad creators fast, because low-ticket videos mean high churn. Drew Levin, SideShift11:20
  • Pok Pok waits a few weeks, and says cut-fast programs only work with the manpower to manage hundreds of creators. Melissa Cash, Pok Pok37:12