Creator marketing has become a core growth channel for brands. But one challenge remains: knowing what a creator partnership is truly worth.
Unlike media buying, creator marketing has never had a shared benchmark for fair market value. Teams are often left relying on their knowledge of past deals, spreadsheets, rate cards, or negotiation experience – making it difficult to know if investments are priced consistently and confidently.
That's why Companion is launching Creator Investment Intelligence – a new tool that establishes fair market value for creator partnerships and brings greater data and transparency needed to plan budgets, negotiate fairly, and invest with confidence.
It combines two new features:
- Benchmark Algorithm: Instant, data-backed fee guidance factoring in creative craft, deliverables, and usage rights - not just follower counts.
- Budget Tracker: A centralized dashboard to track quotes, negotiations, and final fees across all your teams, regions, and campaigns.
Informed by $173 million dollars worth of verified creator deals - spanning 180,000 verified creator deals and covering more than 50 regions worldwide, Creator Investment Intelligence is now available to Companion clients – bringing the fair market value framework we've used internally to the wider creator marketing industry.
Why creator pricing has been so difficult
Creator marketing is not one-size-fits-all. Two creators with similar audience sizes can deliver completely different levels of craft, engagement, and value. That makes pricing far more complex than follower counts or public rate cards.
And, many brands still manage creator investment across fragmented spreadsheets, teams, regions, and agencies, making it difficult to know if partnerships are priced fairly.
Without a reliable benchmark, teams are left asking:
- Are we pricing this partnership fairly?
- How does this compare with similar creator collaborations?
- Are different teams paying consistent rates?
- How should we budget for future campaigns?
The challenge isn't reducing creator fees. It's having the data to make confident, informed investment decisions.
Priced on Guesswork: The State of Creator Investment
In our latest research with Censuswide - surveying 1,000 marketing and procurement leaders in the US and UK - 45% of brands admit to mispricing creator partnerships, paying above or below fair market value. This surges to 58% in the UK.
The challenge isn't just pricing. It's because the industry has never had a shared benchmark for fair market value and the channel has outgrown the systems built to price and govern it.
Nearly half (49%) say managing creator budgets across teams, markets and regions is one of their biggest challenges. And 73% still track creator spend on spreadsheets and emails. Of the 81% of brands negotiating in-house, only 40% have confidence in their teams to negotiate a fair rate.
Read the Full Report: Priced on Guesswork
Introducing Creator Investment Intelligence
Creator Investment Intelligence is Companion's new solution for pricing transparency and budget governance.
It combines two new features:
- Benchmark Algorithm
- Budget Tracker
Together, they help brands establish fair market value, improve budget planning, and bring greater consistency to creator investment across global teams.
Rather than relying on assumptions, teams can make pricing decisions using intelligence built from thousands of verified creator negotiations conducted over the last decade.
Benchmark Algorithm: Pricing based on real creator work
At the heart of Creator Investment Intelligence is Companion’s proprietary Benchmark Algorithm – built from thousands of verified creator deals.
Unlike traditional tools that rely on public rate cards or simplistic follower-based pricing, Benchmark Algorithm, it calculates a Suggested Fee based on the real factors that shape creator value:
- Platform and content format
- Region
- Usage rights
- Exclusivity
- Seasonality
- Turnaround times
- Creator niche
- Predicted content performance
This means pricing reflects the work behind a partnership – not simply the size of an audience.
For marketers, it builds confidence before entering negotiations.
For procurement teams, it introduces a more consistent approach to evaluating creator investment.
For creators, it ensures fair pay and helps reinforce that the value of their work extends beyond follower numbers alone.
For the creator economy, it contributes towards establishing fair market value and provides greater transparency on creator pricing
Budget Tracker: Bringing creator spend into one place
As creator programs scale, spend often becomes fragmented across teams, markets, and agencies. Without a single view of budgets and negotiations, it’s difficult to track investment, compare decisions, or plan ahead.
Budget Tracker brings creator spend into one place – giving teams the visibility they need to manage budgets.
It combines a Fee Calculator, secure Budget Groups, and budget optimization workflows into a centralized dashboard that helps teams manage creator investment with greater visibility.
The tool also brings historical negotiation intelligence together in one place, giving teams visibility into previous quotes, negotiations, and agreed contracts with specific creators. Instead of starting from scratch every time, brands can make decisions using a clearer understanding of previous partnerships.
And instead of disconnected spreadsheets and fragmented conversations, teams can work from a shared source of truth.
This makes planning easier, governance stronger, and future budgeting more predictable.
Fair market value benefits everyone
Brands gain the confidence to make informed investment decisions using a benchmark built on real creator campaign data, while creators benefit from pricing that reflects the craft and complexity behind their work – not simply audience size.
By bringing pricing intelligence, negotiations, and budget history into one place, Creator Investment Intelligence helps teams build more transparent and consistent creator partnerships.
Part of Companion's growing creator payment ecosystem
Creator Investment Intelligence expands Companion’s mission to make creator marketing more transparent from end to end.
From discovery and campaign management to measurement and payments, Companion helps brands manage every stage of the creator lifecycle. Through Early Pay, developed with Lumanu, creators can access more flexible payment options, including payment upon completion of deliverables.
Together, these tools help brands build more transparent partnerships – from agreeing fair value to delivering fair payments.
Bring greater confidence to every creator investment
Explore how Creator Investment Intelligence can help your team establish fair market value, optimize budgets, and negotiate creator partnerships with confidence.
Book a demo to start using Companion and discover how Creator Investment Intelligence can support your creator marketing strategy.