What’s their engagement rate?

3%. (560 + 40) ÷ 20,000 = 600 ÷ 20,000 = 0.03, which is 3%. By Hennessy’s book, that’s a good level.

Which one should he pick?

B: smaller audience, but real and on topic. B’s engagement is about 3.8%, A’s about 0.3%. And B’s viewers are already into filming, so they look like Misha’s clients.

Looks fake: check the stats or pass. Real growth, even viral growth, brings both followers and reactions. Hennessy treats a jump without reactions as a sign of bought followers.

How should he read this?

Be wary: this looks like bots or like-for-like groups. Real comments talk about the post’s topic. Generic phrases that fit any post often come from paid engagement services or “pods”.

How to choose a creator

Lesson 25 of 31 in the course “Million Dollar Sales Course”. Free, with animations and a quiz.

Why you need a creator

Last lesson you built your brand. But your own audience grows slowly, and creators already have one. Brittany Hennessy explains why brands pay them: people skip, block and scroll past regular ads, but when a creator they trust shows a product, they notice it. It’s basically the partner from lesson 23, only on social media. And you don’t need someone with a million followers. Hennessy writes that some creators made a full-time living with just over 100,000 followers, and from 10,000 the industry already calls you a “micro-influencer”. For Misha, a small creator who talks about filming is often more useful than a big entertainment one: their viewers already want what Misha sells. But follower counts are easy to fake, so next we learn to tell a real audience from a fake one.

The engagement formula

A brand’s first question about a creator is how many followers they have. The second is their engagement. Engagement rate (ER) shows what share of followers actually react to posts. The formula from the book: likes plus comments, divided by the number of followers. Hennessy takes the average of the last 10 posts so one lucky post doesn’t skew the picture. Example: a creator has 20,000 followers and gets 500 likes and 40 comments on average. (500 + 40) ÷ 20,000 = 2.7%. The 2018 book calls 1.5–2.5% decent and over 3% a good goal. Today benchmarks depend on the platform and the topic, so compare creators within the same niche. All else being equal, Hennessy always picks the one with higher engagement: it means the audience really responds.

A follower spike

Bought followers show up on the growth chart. Hennessy followed one up-and-coming creator for months. One day she saw the creator had gained 30,000 followers and was almost at 100,000. She was excited at first, but then noticed the engagement was far too low for that many followers. The growth chart showed almost the whole spike happened in about two weeks. Hennessy realized the followers had been bought, and never booked her for a campaign. Real growth is usually smooth. And if a creator blows up after a viral video, likes and comments grow along with followers. A follower spike without more reactions is a red flag. You can check the growth chart in social media analytics tools or ask the creator for a screenshot.

Read the comments

A like is a single tap, but a comment takes time and effort, so Hennessy pays special attention to them. A good sign: people ask on-topic questions, share tips with each other and the author replies. A bad sign: generic phrases like “cool pic bro” that would fit under any post. Hennessy writes that comments like these come from services that like and comment on your behalf for money. There are also “pods”, groups where people agree to like and comment on each other’s posts. Hennessy thinks they do more harm than good, because the reactions don’t come from real interest in the content. For you, it means a high ER isn’t everything. Read the comments under 5–10 posts before you pay.

Who those followers are

After engagement, Hennessy looks at who the followers are. The three key parameters: age, gender and location. A creator’s age doesn’t always match their audience’s: a 35-year-old making bright DIY content may have teenage viewers. Location matters if your product is sold in one country or in one language. This data is visible in a professional account’s analytics, and an honest creator will show you a screenshot. Compare it with your ideal client profile from lesson 2. Misha needs teens and young people who film on their phones and speak his language. A creator with a million viewers in another country will sell almost nothing for him.

Fake followers burn out

Why is faking bad not just for brands but for the creator too? In 2014, Instagram deleted a huge number of fake accounts and bots, and celebrities’ follower counts dropped overnight. According to Hennessy, rapper Ma$e went from 1.6 million to 272,000 followers, and he deleted his account. Fake followers don’t buy, don’t comment and can disappear at any moment. So Hennessy’s advice is simple: don’t buy followers, likes or comments, even if “a friend recommends a great deal”. When you pay a creator, you’re paying for access to real people. If there are no people, the money goes nowhere.

Check the creator

Let’s practice. Misha needs viewers who want to learn editing. He has four made-up profiles to choose from. A: 120,000 followers, ER 0.4%, gained 40,000 in a week. Looks fake: a huge spike but almost no reactions. B: 15,000, ER 4.1%, commenters ask about editing. This is the best option: the audience is real and it’s the right one. C: 60,000, ER 2.2%, but most viewers live in another country and speak another language. Misha’s course doesn’t fit them. D: 8,000, ER 6%, but it’s a baking blog. Great audience, just not into editing. Takeaway: audience size comes last. First the topic, then real engagement, then the numbers.

Do it yourself: creator checklist

Make a list of 10 creators in your topic and check each one against the card. Topic: their viewers look like your client from lesson 2. ER: work out the average of the last 10 posts and compare with others in the niche. Growth: a smooth chart, no jumps of tens of thousands in a week. Comments: on-topic questions and author replies, not generic phrases. Audience: ask for an analytics screenshot showing age, gender and location. Ads: no more than 3 sponsored posts out of 10, otherwise viewers are tired of ads. Keep the best 3–5. And never buy followers yourself. Next lesson, we’ll write a brief for a creator, agree on payment and cover how to label ads properly.

Check yourself

What’s their engagement rate?
Correct answer: 3%. (560 + 40) ÷ 20,000 = 600 ÷ 20,000 = 0.03, which is 3%. By Hennessy’s book, that’s a good level.
Which one should he pick?
Correct answer: B: smaller audience, but real and on topic. B’s engagement is about 3.8%, A’s about 0.3%. And B’s viewers are already into filming, so they look like Misha’s clients.
What does this mean?
Correct answer: Looks fake: check the stats or pass. Real growth, even viral growth, brings both followers and reactions. Hennessy treats a jump without reactions as a sign of bought followers.
How should he read this?
Correct answer: Be wary: this looks like bots or like-for-like groups. Real comments talk about the post’s topic. Generic phrases that fit any post often come from paid engagement services or “pods”.

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