Media buys and mega partnerships: How the creator economy is splitting in two

“Brands are increasingly approaching the space just like they would traditional channels with a media mix that reflects what they’ve done historically,” said Zach Blume, co-founder and president of Portal A content production company on a recent episode of the Digiday Podcast.

Think of it like the media business. Companies like Disney, NBCUniversal do major upfront deals with advertisers for things like the Super Bowl. There’s negotiations for prolonged sponsorships, brand integrations and more as part of the package. That’s the relationship that’s starting to take form between big name creators and advertisers. 

The other side of the equation could be thought of as long tail publishers — recipe bloggers with ad inventory. An advertiser may make a programmatic buy to have their ad show up across various long tail publishers. Consider it a scale play, and that’s the role micro and nano creators have taken on. 

This interview has been lightly edited for clarity. 

‘Not an either-or proposition’

Blume: This is not an either-or proposition. The market is just increasing in size so rapidly that there’s room for both. Creators at the lower end of the spectrum…brand investment is just increasing in all these different areas, so they’re still seeing growth.

An exercise in brand marketing

Blume: What we’re seeing is the creators at the top of the shelf—the Druski’s, the Alix Earles and obviously Mr. Beast, all of those examples we know are being partnered with as creative partners. They’re part of a brand marketing exercise, where it isn’t just about buying ad space. It’s actually a deeper, longer creative partnership. 

The traditional agency approach

Blume: Brands are coming to us like they would a creative agency in traditional spaces, and say, “Pitch us your idea. What’s your best idea for this need that we have?” And then we pitch ideas, and then we go partner, bring in creators to those ideas.

The media agency approach

Blume: There’s the Influentials, the Whalars…Viral Nation…Billion Dollar Boy. There’s these big scaled influencer marketing agencies that are effectively media agencies for the creator economy. They’ll probably do some one-off premium projects with brands, but primarily they’re doing scaled programmatic buying across channels.