Influencer Value what a post is worth

Sponsored post pricing sits somewhere between a maths problem and a negotiation, and most creators lose the negotiation before it starts because they bring the wrong number. Follower count is the number everybody quotes and nobody should use. What the advertiser is buying is attention: how many people see the post, how many of those care, and what a thousand of those people cost elsewhere in that niche.

Start from reach, not followers

Reach is the share of followers a post is actually shown to, and it varies enormously. A well-established account can reach forty per cent of its followers with an ordinary post; an account grown through giveaways might reach four. Multiplying followers by a fixed rate is how prices get detached from value in both directions: quiet accounts get overpaid once and never again, loud small ones get underpaid forever.

Use the median of your last ten posts rather than the best of the year. The advertiser is buying an ordinary post from you, not the one video that escaped.

The niche sets the ceiling

Advertisers pay per thousand impressions what a customer is worth to them. A software brand with a $400 lifetime value can pay thirty or forty dollars per thousand impressions and still be comfortable; a humour page selling T-shirts cannot pay five. This is not a judgement about the content, it is arithmetic on the other side of the table, and it explains why two accounts with identical reach can be quoted ten times apart. Asking what the advertiser's product costs is not rude; it is the only way to price honestly.

Engagement turns reach into persuasion

Two hundred thousand impressions with two hundred interactions is a billboard. The same impressions with eight thousand saves and comments is a recommendation. Advertisers know the difference because their own conversion data shows it, which is why a smaller account with a devoted audience can charge a higher rate per view than a large indifferent one. When you quote, lead with the engagement figure and the percentage, not with a screenshot of the follower count.

Price the deliverables separately

A package is easier to sell and much easier to argue about when each part has a number: one post, one story set, one reel, plus a line for usage rights and one for exclusivity. That way, when the brand asks to cut the budget, you can remove a deliverable instead of discounting everything. It also stops the quiet expansion of scope that happens when a “simple post” becomes three revisions and a link in the bio for a month.

Know your floor

Below a certain number, the work costs more than the fee. Shooting, editing, the email thread and the risk of turning down another job do not shrink because the campaign is small. Decide your floor in advance — the amount below which you politely decline — and the negotiation becomes shorter, calmer and better paid. The formula on this page gives a value; the floor is what protects it.