Posted on
16/11/2022

Influencer Contract: Tips and Tricks

Collaborating with influencers without a legal basis has long been the norm in the past. While the influencer marketing industry is growing every year, the general requirements and legal frameworks are also increasing. Therefore, you should no longer enter into any cooperation with influencers without a contract or similar legal document. What do marketers need to consider when creating a contract for Influencer Marketing? Find out now.

Contract placed on a table with a pen in hand
Contract placed on a table with a pen in hand

Key Takeaways

  • Contracts are legally binding documents that represent respective interests and outline respective boundaries
  • Core elements of a influencer contract are:
  • Formalia (such as Names, addresses, and so on)
  • Prices and deadlines
  • Creative freedom and KPI
  • Disclosure agreement
  • Content ownership

What Exactly Is a Contract for Influencer Marketing?

As in (almost) every relationship, a contract is the written legal agreement between two parties, so in the field of influencer marketing between the influencers and the brand or company. A contract, again, as in (almost) every relationship, is necessary to set the framework, terms, and boundaries of a collaboration between the parties involved.

So what does a contract for influencer marketing entail? What matters most is basically what you hope to get out of the collaboration. From that you can determine the elements of your contract with influencers. Thus, before creating the contract, answer for yourself the following questions:

  1. What content or products do you want from your influencers?
  2. How often and how many posts, stories or videos do you want your influencers to share and over what time period do you want to collaborate?
  3. What is the price range of your influencers? What is the IM budget? And how much compensation do the influencers receive?

In addition, options for dispute resolution and general legal protection of both parties should not be missing. It is a good idea to create and use a template for this purpose, which you can then edit and change individually. This way, you can adapt the contract to the current needs of the influencer and the type of campaign.

In the US, influencers are regulated by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC), yet in Europe the rules are more complicated. While the European Commission imposes rules and laws on influencers, social platforms, and advertising practices, each country can draft and enforce its own laws – as is common in a federal system. Quite generally, legislation for influencer marketing regulations revolves around labeling and transparency. At the same time though, Germany, for example, is reacting to the over-labeling of postings, which made it impossible for consumers to tell when something was actually advertising and when it was not. Section 5a (4) UWG states that “a commercial purpose of a commercial act is generally not to be assumed if it primarily serves the purpose of information and opinion formation and no remuneration or similar consideration was granted for it.” Therefore, you must note that the regulations may differ depending on the country and national law.

These Are the Elements You Need in Your Influencer Contract

Just like in any contract, you should start any influencer contract with the personal data of all parties involved. This includes the respective names, key data about the collaboration, and the description of the campaign. If you plan to create a template, then it  should make room for these details at the beginning. As stated before, one of your questions is how long the collaboration should be. Generally speaking, influencer marketing is  more effective in the long run and a partial brand friendship is desirable. Still, you may have a different time frame in mind.

Of course, a contractual agreement is also about the salary that the influencers demand. The price depends on many factors, such as the reach, engagement rate, character and duration of the collaboration. In general, you can say that the price for a cooperation is potentially related to the level of reach of the respective influencers. Become more confident in negotiating prices with influencers by reading the Kolsquare Quick Guide on what to consider. But besides the question of how much you offer influencers for a partnership, the type of compensation also plays a role.

This results in what payment terms and structure you, but also your influencers, want. Evidently, a low-risk compensation structure is desirable: What amount do you pay upfront and what is the balance? What is the deadline for which payment? When will your content be ready? The more precise you are, the easier it will be to implement the agreements at a later date. This way you can also position yourself as a reliable cooperation partner. Logically, you will not pay until both parties have signed the contract.

Also, the creative ideas and expectations of both you and the influencers should be contractually regulated. While we often stress the importance of letting influencers be creative and not restricting their voice or style, it’s still good to address your core goals beforehand. Also, be transparent with your KPIs.

Before you even set up or modify a contract, you should be sure that the influencer is a good fit for your brand or company. Do the influencers appeal to the exact target group you want to reach? Furthermore, we recommend a disclosure agreement, so you can know more about the performance of your influencer marketing campaign through data analysis. Read more about data-driven influencer marketing in general at this point.

Be sure to clarify who owns the content you create. For one thing, this is important during the campaign: Have you agreed that you can edit your influencers’ content? Also, be sure to allow influencers to share your name, photo, and company logo with their audience to further increase the  awareness of your brand.

One of the last things to think about is the question whether you want to include disclaimers in your contract. You can explicitly prohibit your influencers from working with brands or competitors – at least during your cooperation. In addition, there are of course termination and immorality clauses. Finally, you can also consider including morality clauses for more security for both sides.

Hence, these points provide an overview of what you absolutely need to discuss in a contract for your influencer marketing and how you can protect yourself and your brand and, to an equal extent, the influencers.

About Kolsquare

Kolsquare is Europe’s leading Influencer Marketing platform, a data-driven solution that allows brands to scale their KOL Marketing strategies and implement authentic partnerships with KOLs (Key Opinion Leaders). Kolsquare’s technology enables marketing professionals to easily identify the best Content Creators profiles by filtering their content and audience, and to build and manage their campaigns from A to Z, including measuring results and benchmarking performance against competitors. Kolsquare has built the largest community of influencer marketing experts in the world, and offers hundreds of customers (Coca-Cola, Netflix, Sony Music, Publicis, Sézane, Sephora, El Corte Inglés, Lacoste, …) the latest Big Data, AI and Machine Learning technologies to drive inspiring partnerships, tapping into an exhaustive network covering 100% of  KOLs with more than 5,000 followers in 180 countries on Instagram, TikTok, Twitter, Facebook and YouTube. As a Benefit Company, Kolsquare has been pioneering Responsible Influence by championing transparency, ethical practices, and meaningful collaborations to inspire change.

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