The Influencer Agreements Series: Overview

Our first minisode of the seventh season of “The Creative Influencer” podcast is available today for download on iTunes, Spotify, and premier platforms everywhere. This minisode is the first in a multi-part series about the ins and outs of Influencer Agreements. In this minisode, Jon gives an overview of what is to come and sets the scene.

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A transcript of the episode follows:

Welcome to the first minisode of 2023. This year we are going to try something different. We’re going to go through the contracts that are presented to influencers and break down the important provisions in each of those contracts.

We’ll start by taking a deep dive into the key terms of management agreements. These are extremely important because an unfavorable management agreement can bind an influencer to working with that manager for several years.

After working through the terms of management agreements, we’ll turn to Influencer Brand Agreements. Then we’ll look at the provisions of merchandise agreements, podcast agreements, personal assistant agreements, tour agreements, editor agreements and agency agreements.

We’ll talk about the systematic approach I use to the review of all of the various agreements that are presented to influencers.

Here we go.

When I receive any influencer agreement, I first review it to confirm that the agreement actually reflects the basic terms that were agreed to. Many times, the person who negotiated the agreement with me does not accurately communicate those terms to the person drafting the agreement. That results in a contract that doesn’t match the deal. That’s when we push back. We tell the brand or agency that the agreement must be changed to track our deal.

This is the time for an important digression. Rarely does a manager, brand, merchandise manufacturing company, podcast production company or tour producer ask the influencer to provide an agreement. Instead the influencer will be presented with a “standard” agreement. And that is exactly how they will refer to their agreement – it’s our “standard agreement.” You should take that with a grain of salt. Agreements are always negotiable and that is where I come in.

We start this series with manager agreements because the first person on an influencer’s team is often a manager. The second person hired generally is me, the lawyer. The third team member varies depending upon the influencer. It could be an editor or personal assistant or agent or glam squad.

Because I’m the second person on the team, I’m generally not there when the first management agreement is negotiated. Hence the need for this series—too often I see agreements that are bad for the creator.

So, in our next minisode we’ll start our discussion of influencer management agreements. As we go down this road, please let me know if you’d like us to elaborate on any topic.

And so, our journey begins.