Good morning. Animal conservationist Maya Higa recently got engaged, and her photoshoot got photobombed...by a bear.
Most people would edit the bear out, but for someone who works and livestreams with wildlife, it fit just right. Congrats to the couple.
Today’s lineup:
Why brands don’t care about follower count anymore
YouTube partners with the largest online retailer
How an ASMR creator balanced out her audience
3 Rules for Working with Brands in 2027
Syd (left) moderates a discussion with Rachel Karten (right) at Coffee With Creators / Photography by Tiffany Rose
Hi everyone, Syd here. Last Friday, I had the pleasure of leading a conversation with social media consultant and newsletter creator Rachel Karten at Coffee with Creators to talk about what brands are looking for from creators heading into 2027.
Karten has consulted for brands like Google and Cava, helping the latter achieve upwards of 6M views on a social campaign. During our Q&A, she broke down three rules for creators working with brands in the year ahead.
Here’s what you need to know →
Prioritize accounts reached over follower count. If you’ve spent time on your TikTok For You Page or Reels feed recently, you know that the majority of the videos you see come from accounts you don’t follow. Brands are noticing this phenomenon too.
“Right now, a piece of content needs to appeal to non-followers more than followers,” Karten said. “I think that brands are realizing that the quality of the video is more important than the relationship with the audience in some ways.”Don’t email the CMO. Email the social media manager. Coming out of Cannes, we stressed the importance of building relationships with brands you want to work with, but not every creator needs to take a top-down approach. Karten said social media managers are generally more tuned into a brand’s social needs, and may be more likely to greenlight your pitch than an executive who isn’t as close to the day-to-day content.
Consider going in-house. “A lot of brands have no idea how to entertain,” Karten said.
She predicts more brands will hire in-house creators to produce high quality content across long and short-form video. For example, the idea for Liquid Death’s recent data center ad campaign came from a comedian the brand brought into its writers’ room for a day.
Zoom out: The best brand partnerships in 2027 won’t go to the creators with the biggest following or view count, but go to the ones who have a perspective the audience trusts. Creators that position themselves as experts can become better partners for brands that want to go beyond a traditional ad read.
Missed out on Coffee With Creators this time? Apply to save your spot for our next event in LA, September 25.
YouTube Partners with Amazon for In-Video Shopping
Creators can now tag Amazon affiliate links directly in their videos / YouTube Creators
Last week, YouTube expanded it’s US shopping affiliate program to include Amazon products, letting creators tag them directly within their long- and short-form videos and livestreams. Previously, creators could only share Amazon affiliate links in their video descriptions.
Why it matters: Creators now have another way to turn product mentions into affiliate revenue, without sending viewers to a link buried in the description. At the same time, Amazon gets deeper access to the most-viewed streaming platform on TV.
How it works →
US creators enrolled in the YouTube Partner Program and the Amazon Influencer Program will get their standard Amazon commission (reportedly 2-4% of the sales price) when viewers purchase products tagged in their videos.
YouTube pays out the commission through AdSense checks.
The catch: Creators can only tag items from Amazon’s curated catalog of highly-requested and trending products. If a creator wants to list a product that’s not in the catalog, they have to request it through YouTube Support.
Between the lines: The partnership is another move in YouTube’s push to compete with TikTok Shop, whose US ecommerce sales are expected to surpass $23B this year, outpacing retailers like Costco and Target.
In his 2026 letter to creators, YouTube CEO Neal Mohan said the platform is focused on becoming a “premier shopping destination” and recently opened YouTube Shopping’s affiliate program to creators in YouTube’s Partner Program with 500+ subscribers.
How we see it: Similar to its play with original content, YouTube is providing a shopping platform without funding production. Unlike TikTok Shop, which has a fulfillment operation that ships items for sellers, YouTube is relying on outside brands, vendors, and marketplaces to handle everything after a purchase is made.
How an ASMR Creator Is Raising Her CPM
BeauxASMR shares how she's broadening her audience / BeauxASMR
BeauxASMR spent seven years building a YouTube audience of 880K subscribers with soft-spoken videos about makeup, film reviews, and Spanish language (via whispering).
Last month, she compared notes with other ASMRtists (the community’s term for ASMR creators), and discovered a major revenue gap.
“I learned from a bunch of other creators that they're making double digits [in the tens of thousands] every month with a third of my follower count,” Beaux told us.
The reason: Geography. YouTube ad rates vary by country—advertisers in the US, UK, and Canada pay a premium, while rates in other markets can run a fraction of that.
Since Beaux posted every other video in Spanish, a large share of her audience came from lower-paying ad markets—which pulled down her CPM (cost-per-mille, or what advertisers pay per 1,000 ad impressions). The result: Beaux was making between $2.5K–$3K per month, while peers with a third of her following were making $10K+ per month.
What she’s doing: Diversifying her audience, not dropping Spanish. Beaux told us her TikTok audience skews more English-speaking, so she’s using TikTok to funnel them to YouTube. That broadens her audience mix and brings more viewers from higher-CPM markets to YouTube alongside the audience she’s already built. Although the shift is recent, she’s already seen a slight increase in AdSense revenue.
Have you ever reshaped your audience to align with your business goals? Hit reply and tell us about it.
👀 Creator Jobs
Sibling channel Jalin Siu is hiring a YouTube video editor to work on long-form videos.
Theorist is looking for a content coordinator to work on title and thumbnail packaging for its YouTube videos.
Major League Soccer (MLS) is hiring a director of creators to lead its creator strategy.
🔥 Press Worthy
Markiplier becomes the largest shareholder in GoPro.
Kai Cenat is hosting a fashion show next month in NYC.
Hank Green launches an algorithm-free content app for kids called ClockwiseTV.
Film creators Cinema Therapy are crowdfunding their first feature film, The Vessel.
Ina Garten launches a YouTube channel and podcast.
Substack rolls out a “creator match” feature that connects creators with similar audiences to each other.
