Brands, creators hold their own NewFronts-style sales pitches to win over more ad dollars

Ongoing creator upfront deals are generally going to the large creators that have become celebrities and media companies (think MrBeast and Khaby Lame with followings in the hundreds of millions), according to four agencies Digiday spoke with for this story. Meanwhile, mid-tier and smaller creators have been shut out as they require more flexibility in their partnerships. Negotiations for upfront and NewFronts deals kick off next month, as networks pitch their shows and packages to advertisers to buy ad time in advance.

But the movement has reached the creator space: In March, creator platform Spotter hosted an upfront-style showcase in New York City hosted by YouTubers Colin and Samir and featured creators Kinigra Deon, MrBeast and Jordan Matter. Last fall, Forbes partnered with Walmart for its first creator upfront which included brands like Gymshark, Colgate and Hulu. And this May, shopping and creator app LTK will launch its first LTK Creator Upfronts in New York at Hudson Yards, directly across from Jacob Javits Center, where major upfront presentations are held.

Ed East, group CEO of Billion Dollar Boy, sees more of these presentations highlighting creators as becoming “industry staples” and a signal of the “professionalization of the creator economy.” The same phenomenon is happening in retail media (The Home Depot called it its “infronts” presentation) as the space continues to mature.

Why creators need their own sales pitches

“With upfront and the NewFronts, they’re giving you a look at everything that’s going to be coming up in the next broadcast year,” said Deborah Makrakis, director of video investment at CMI. “Creators are kind of in the here and the now, and want to get what’s trending right now out in front of people.”

For the majority of creators, agencies say brands favor more flexible, data-driven strategies that prioritize direct relationships, real-time engagement and alignment with evolving trends. Even though agency execs agree that clients increasingly want to have more long-term partnerships with creators, the cost included in these deals starts to add up and give them pause.

“It’s still too early to say if there’s been a brand reaction following these [creator upfront] events,” East added. “While the long-term payoff will be there, these larger-scale productions with mega creators require big brand investment — and with some level of economic uncertainty, there may be some hesitation.”

It’s not just this economic moment that gives that pause. “The cost of these deals — including exclusivity, paid usage and licensing rights — can be a major barrier,” said Kelly Dye, VP of influencer strategy at digital marketing agency New Engen. “That often makes brands hesitant to commit to upfront-style deals.”

Top 1% of creators

The upfront models are more relevant for the small percentage of major influencers like MrBeast or Michelle Khare, who operate more like established media networks with stable content and large audiences. These “high-investment deals are generally reserved for top 1% creators with celebrity-level influence,” Dye added. “[They] are more likely to drive earned media value and deliver broader cultural impact, which helps offset the high cost of partnership.”

There are some 45 million professional content creators in the U.S. and 207 million worldwide. Globally, 139 million have an audience between 1K to 10K followers, while 41 million have an audience of 10K to 100K followers. About 2 million creators have more than 1 million followers, according to Linktree.

A major influencer like MrBeast can sell integrations to their content and monetize their content through upfront-style deals, since they often “have a good read” on their audience and performance data that enabled them to build large businesses, said Josh Simon, SVP of Centered, CMI Media Group’s influencer marketing division.

Zachary Rischitelli, owner at full-service marketing agency Real FiG Advertising + Marketing, agreed that the long-term creator deals are more rare and tend to “scare off than attract” brands right now —because they prefer to start testing a campaign first before they sign up for more extensive work.

“Everything changes too quickly [with influencers and trends] … which is why the idea of booking a creator for a year in advance sounds good only in theory, but not in practice,” Rischitelli said.

For massive creators like Marques Brownlee and Emma Chamberlain, a program like YouTube Select, which gives advertisers the option to buy takeovers of individual channels, potentially negates the need for individual negotiations. Yet one downside of YouTube Select is that it “doesn’t involve individual collaboration with the creator,” Rischitelli explained.

How deals and contingencies are shaped

The typical guarantees to large creators who do land deals during upfront negotiations usually focus on the “volume of content, coverage and KPIs, like number of views, engagement and coverage of a certain target audience,” Rischitelli said. Rischitelli did not specify which brands named these terms.

But unlike TV upfront deals, these guarantees often remain more flexible and subject to changes, depending on changes in the platform algorithms or audiences. The network upfront deals similarly include business outcome guarantees, like performance of an ad on store visits or purchases, but advertisers are increasingly looking for more flexibility in their upfront deals (including the option to cancel parts of their spending closer to the quarter’s start) given the current economic uncertainty.

For creators, contracts could also include number of posts or pieces of content, as well as outline any “behavioral expectations” on the creator, Dye said.

As far as contingencies if something goes wrong, Rischitelli noted that most often it’s resolved in a negotiation by the parties if results don’t meet expectations.

Added Dye: “Even with contractual contingencies in place, tying your brand to a high-profile figure comes with reputational risk.”