- Jen Glantz is an entrepreneur who runs social-media accounts, a podcast, and a newsletter.
- She started monetizing her following, and brand deals now make up 20% of her income.
I'm an entrepreneur, and for the past 10 years, I've been sharing the details of my life on the internet. I started out as a blogger and eventually began to use social media, a podcast, and an email newsletter as ways to grow my customer base and expand the reach of my personal brand.
But it wasn't until last year that I decided I wanted to start monetizing these different content streams by working with brand partners and sponsors.
After years of slowly building my audience, I realized that I was reaching close to 100,000 people a month on all of my platforms and could start doing deals with brands who wanted access to the people who followed me. I started off by building a media kit using a free template on Canva, which showcased what platforms I have, the types of content I create, and the numbers that support each vertical — from follower count to my email open rate to how many listeners my podcast gets every month, and more.
After I had a media kit ready to go, I started looking for brands who wanted to work with me. Today, more than 20% of my income comes from brand sponsorships.
Without using an agent or manager, here were the three ways I found my first handful of sponsors to work with in 2021 and 2022.
1. I reached out to brands directly
The very first approach I took was to make a list of brands that I genuinely loved and used regularly. I picked skincare, jewelry, and clothing companies I'd followed for years and reached out to them directly.
After searching on LinkedIn for the name of the brand's partnership or influencer manager, I located their email using a free tool called Any Mail Finder and drafted my pitch.
Here's my email template:
I'm Jen Glantz. It's wonderful to e-meet you! I'm reaching out because I've been a fan of [brand name] for several years, relying on [name of product] to get me through [a specific use case of when I use the product].
As a social media, newsletter, and podcast content creator in the wedding space, I'd love to work with [brand name] on a partnership to spread the word about your unique and incredible products.
I'm sharing my media kit with you today and hope we can chat more about working together this season.
While I only heard back from one of the three brands I initially pitched, I was able to close a small brand deal with a sunscreen company I use regularly called Solara to post an ad in my newsletter and do a TikTok video about its newest product launch. It helped me secure my first well-known brand partnership that can help lead to more deals in the future.
2. I used an influencer-management platform
One passive way that I've been able to land new brand deals is by using free influencer and creator-management platforms. These platforms let you create a profile, where you can share details about your content-creation verticals (social-media channels, newsletter, or podcasts) as well as your pricing for brand deals based on what kind of content you're open to creating or the types of ads you'll run. After you list that information, brands from beauty to fashion, kitchen supplies, and more can contact you if they believe you're a good fit for them.
You can also use these platforms to search for brands interested in working with content creators and pitch them directly on the platform. While these platforms are free to use, some might take a fee once you book a deal with a brand, while others charge the brand and not the creator.
For social-media brand deals, I use AspireIQ and Tinysponsor, and for newsletter and podcast ad deals I use Swapstack.
3. I post for free and tag brands
If there's a brand that I really want to work with and they haven't responded to my email pitch, I start creating content for free and tag them in my posts. I'll share my favorite products or items from them in an Instagram story, mention them in a TikTok video, send the brand account a DM, or talk about them in my newsletter.
The hope is that when they see these mentions and maybe even reach out to work together, I have a portfolio of content I can share with them about their product or service. This shows the brand your true commitment and also gives them a taste of the kind of content you can create for them.
Be sure to tag the brand in your posts, use their branded hashtags, and use any additional hashtags that are relevant to them. You can often find these hashtags by looking at the ones the brand has used in recent posts. While I don't advise creators to work for free, doing this occasionally to get on a brand's radar might be a good move, especially when starting out.
I recently did this with a skincare company that I really liked and that hadn't responded to two pitch emails I'd sent. Showing them what I'd created for free helped me enter the negotiation phase, and we're in talks about doing a 2023 partnership.