In partnership with
Hi friend 👋
My last email before laste week was all about keeping people in the loop. Then I went quiet.
Excellent follow-through, Tara 😂
But I’m back! As you might already have noticed.
We've got a lot to catch up on, and I'm resisting the urge to cram everything since August into one email. You'll get all of it, just not all at once 😉
Today I want to talk about a champagne problem. The kind that feels a little awkward to admit when business is good:
You can land a great deal and still be sitting there wondering how on earth you're going to actually afford to do it. I’ve seen a lot of this!
And I don't mean you priced it wrong, and nobody's even paying you late. You've agreed on the fee, the contract's signed, and you've already got this idea you just know the brand is going to love, so you're excited (as you should be!). And then you go to book your editor, or there's travel involved, and you realize money has to leave your account way before any of the campaign money comes in.
The brand isn't doing anything wrong, they're sticking to the payment terms you both agreed to. And your editor, fair enough, would also like to get paid. So you end up kind of stuck in the middle of the two, having a really great month on paper.
So please celebrate that deal! I just also want you to look at what it's going to ask of your bank account before it gives you anything back(we’re about preparing you for everything here!)
Which means before we even talk about what you're getting paid, let's talk about what you're going to have to pay for first.
Put dates next to the money
The first thing I'd do is write out everything it's going to cost you to deliver this campaign and when each of those payments is due. Does your editor want a deposit before they start? When do the flights actually need to be booked? Then take the money you're expecting to come in and put it on that same timeline, so you can see both sides next to each other.
And when I say a date, I mean an actual date, not "net 30." Because my first question is always, okay, thirty days from when?
Check what starts the clock in your contract. If you can only invoice once the content is live, then all the time you spend making it happens before those thirty days even start, and that's a very different plan than getting paid thirty days after you sign.
Just so you know what's happening on the other side of this, since I'm on the paying side every month: net 30 usually isn't something anyone decided about you personally. Invoices run on cycles. On our side, we can't invoice a brand the day every single post goes live, because then we'd literally be sending them an invoice every day of the month. So invoices get batched, they go through approvals, and then the clock starts. And I will say, terms stretch. I've watched net 45 turn into something a lot closer to 90 days. Odds are nobody's trying to be shady, it's just how big companies move money, so you're better off planning for it than getting surprised by it.
If the money's coming to you through an agency or a manager, ask when it actually reaches you, not just when the brand pays them, because those are almost never the same day. And if you're getting paid from another country, look at what really lands in your account, because I've seen a $2,000 payment show up as $1,800 (spoiler: double currency conversions are the worst).
Then look at everything else that has to get paid while you're waiting, because the money sitting in your account right now might already be spoken for. If you want the quick version, this takes about 10 minutes:
Write down every cost to deliver the campaign and when it's due
Next to it, put the date each payment actually reaches you (not the date the brand sends it)
Add everything else you've already committed to in that window, like your team, your tools and any other campaigns
Find the point where your balance gets the lowest, because that's the number you're really working with
Basically, you're trying to figure out whether you can cover this campaign and still pay for everything you've already said yes to. A deal can absolutely make you money overall and still leave you short halfway through delivering it, and nobody's going to spell that out for you in the contract.
And I'm not preaching from the cheap seats here. At Creator Match 🧩 we've got brands paying us on one timeline and creators waiting on us on another, every single month. The minute we get funds from a brand, we release them, we don't sit on that money. But I've also been in planning meetings doing the math on what would happen if we had to pay creators before a brand paid us, and even at our size, that's a huge hit. So if it keeps an ops nerd like me up at night, I promise it's worth 10 minutes of yours.
Ask for a payment schedule that actually works
If the dates don't work, I wouldn't walk away from the deal right away. I'd ask what can change.
A lot of the time you don't actually need a bigger fee, you just need some of it sooner.
A deposit can cover what it costs you to get started, and on a longer campaign you can ask to get paid at milestones you both agree on instead of waiting until everything's done. Just know these are things you have to bring up and negotiate before the work starts. Don't assume the brand already offers them, because a lot of the time it won't come up unless you ask.
One heads up from the agency side, though. If the deal is coming through an agency, a deposit might not be on the table at all. At Creator Match we can't pay creators upfront. We pay per post, net 30, because we need the brand to pay us first. And it's not about taking advantage of anyone. Some of our campaigns are huge, and if we ever fronted all of that to creators and then a brand didn't pay, we wouldn't be able to rep any brand at all. So if that's your situation, your best move is getting a really clear answer on when the money reaches you and building your plan around that date.
You also don't have to walk anyone through your whole financial situation. Just keep it about what it takes to deliver the work. You could say something like:
"I'd love to make this work! There are some production costs I need to cover before the content goes live. Could we do an upfront payment of [amount], received before production starts, with the rest due [date]?"
Use the costs you mapped out earlier to pick that number, so you're asking for the payment that fixes the actual problem and not some random amount that just feels safer.
If they can't pay earlier, ask if the brand can book and pay for the travel directly. I've heard way too many horror stories about creators fronting travel for an event and then never getting that money back, so honestly, let them book it. Or see if there's a version of the content that costs less to make but still keeps what makes the idea great.
They might still say no, and that's okay. At least then you get to decide whether you can comfortably cover the gap, instead of saying yes and just hoping another invoice comes in on time.
And whatever you end up agreeing on, get the amounts, the dates and any conditions in writing. "We'll sort something out" is not the answer I want you booking flights on.
Talk soon (for real this time 😂),
Tara
& now a word from our sponsor!
Speak naturally. Send without fixing.
Wispr Flow turns your voice into clean, professional text you can send the moment you stop talking. No rough transcription you have to clean up. Actual polished text, ready for email, Slack, or any app.
Speak the way you think. Go on tangents. Change your mind mid-sentence. Flow strips the filler, fixes the grammar, and gives you text that reads like you spent five minutes writing it.
