Guide · 6 steps
How to set your rates as a creator (without guessing or undercharging)
Most creators undercharge on the first paid deal, then anchor the next ten to that number. Here's how to break the cycle.
There is no public 'CPM book' that tells you what to charge a brand for a single Instagram Reel from a 40K-follower account. There are rough benchmarks (we'll cite some below), but the actual number that holds up in a negotiation depends on your engagement, your audience composition, the deliverable, the exclusivity, and what the brand can pay this quarter.
What you can do is set a rate you can defend, anchor every conversation to it, and move on with confidence. This guide walks through six steps to get there.
Calculate your reach-adjusted CPM benchmark.
Start with the broad-strokes industry benchmark for your platform — somewhere in the range of $100 per 10K followers for a single in-feed Instagram post, scaled up for higher engagement and down for lower. (These ratios shift every year; treat them as a floor, not a ceiling.) Now multiply by your engagement-rate premium: a creator with a 6% engagement rate on Instagram is worth meaningfully more per follower than one at 1.5%. The resulting number is your reach-adjusted starting point for in-feed deliverables on that platform.
Add a deliverable multiplier.
A Story is not worth the same as a Reel. A pinned Reel is worth more than a non-pinned one. A YouTube integration depends entirely on the placement (pre-roll vs mid-roll vs full dedicated). Build a multiplier matrix: in-feed = 1.0, Story = 0.3, Reel = 1.2, Reel + Story bundle = 1.4, dedicated YouTube integration = 2.5–4.0 of your in-feed rate (scale by length). Don't price each deliverable from scratch — price them by ratio to a known baseline.
Apply exclusivity and usage premiums.
Two add-ons that the brand will ask for and expect to pay extra: exclusivity (you can't post for competitors for N weeks/months) and usage rights (the brand can use your content in their own ads). Exclusivity is typically priced at 20–50% of the base rate per quarter of exclusivity; usage rights are typically 50–100% of the base rate, depending on whether the brand wants paid-media usage or just owned-channel usage. These are negotiated; they shouldn't be bundled into your base quote.
Quote a range, not a single number.
When a brand asks for your rate, reply with a range — 'in-feed Reel for a brand of your size typically runs $X to $Y depending on usage rights, exclusivity, and delivery timeline.' The range does three things: it signals you've thought about it, it forces the brand to volunteer the constraints (which lets you anchor higher), and it leaves you room to come down a bit if other terms are favorable. A single number gives the brand nothing to negotiate against but you.
Never accept the first counter.
Brands counter. Almost always, the first counter is somewhere below what they're authorized to pay — because countering low costs them nothing if you say yes. Always counter back at least once, even if you'd have been happy with their first offer. Two real moves: ask what's flexible besides the rate (timeline, usage scope, exclusivity period) and trade a small reduction in rate for a corresponding reduction in deliverables or scope. Never reduce the rate without reducing what's being asked for in return.
Track every quote so you can anchor next time.
The single biggest cause of undercharging is forgetting what you quoted last time. Keep every request — Collaffy's inbox does this by default — and skim the last three to five deals you closed before quoting a new one. If you charged $2,500 for a Reel in March, you should not be quoting $1,800 for the same deliverable in July. Past quotes are the only reliable floor for future ones, especially in a market where rate inflation is real.
Bottom line
Rates aren't a personality test — they're a math problem you do once and reuse. The framework above gets you to a defensible number in five minutes the first time you do it, and ten seconds every time after. The biggest mistake is treating each new pitch as a blank page; the second biggest is accepting the brand's number without a counter. Avoid both, and you'll be in the top quartile of creators on rate discipline alone.
Ready to put this into practice?
Claim your link