More creators are launching their own ad agencies.
The latest is Natalie Marshall, better known as Corporate Natalie, who launched Expand Co-Lab earlier this month. (See our timeline above).
This isn’t exactly a new trend. In 2017, YouTuber Caspar Lee invested in Influencer, which was founded two years earlier, and took on a senior role at the company. Dhar Mann’s Fifth Quarter agency launched 2022—but it didn’t start seriously scaling clients until early 2024.
These creators are positioning their in-house ad shops as alternatives to traditional agencies, as they can move faster, require fewer resources and are native to social platforms.
“We’re just scrappier. And we’ve done it,” Max Reisinger, CEO and co-founder of Creator Camp, which launched Camp Agency in February, told us. “A lot of our team has hundreds of thousands of followers and are looking to translate those learnings to work with actual brands.” Creator Camp has done campaigns for Anthropic’s AI chatbot Claude and Switzerland’s tourism board.
All of that is true. Still, more ad agencies is probably not the solution to the real challenges to influencer marketing. And there’s only far you can scale an agency based on relationships and reputation.
Zooming out, these launches come as brands are looking for more direct ways to work with creators. While agencies can add structure and help streamline negotiations, the added layer between creators and brands can lead to miscommunication and make it hard for brands to know exactly what they’re spending their money on.
For example, 51% of brand marketers said they didn’t fully know how much of their budget was going to influencers, according to a December survey by the Association of National Advertisers. Their reliance on ad agencies, which serve as middlemen and take a cut of brand spending, can be partially to blame. On average, agencies take about 30% of brand spending on influencers, leaving 70% for creators, per the ANA. But as you can see in the chart below, their fees vary heavily.
Some of the challenges creators face when working with brands can also be exacerbated by third-party agencies. The most common complaints we hear are late or low payments, having to redo work and never hearing feedback from brands. Not having a direct line of communication is likely a big reason why.
But building an ad agency that can address these issues at scale requires more than an understanding of creative and social media.
As more influencer marketing budgets are now going to paid ads, these creators will need to provide brands with robust ways to buy, extend and measure their campaigns. That’s also where the big money is.
Otherwise, they’ll likely be limited to mostly organic campaigns with established brand partners—or have to work with another agency or a brand’s in-house influencer team on projects.
To bridge the gap and bring legitimacy to their operations, some creators are bringing in seasoned ad executives. Last week, Cooper’s Unwell announced that it had hired Joanne Bradford, a former executive at online shopping company Honey, as president. Part of her job is to oversee the Unwell Creative Agency.
Even so, the agency landscape is a “minefield,” Ian Schafer, president of Issa Rae’s branded content studio Ensemble, told Scalable. He added that these recent moves are likely an effort to scale the creators themselves, rather than compete with traditional ad agencies or holding companies, which have been snapping up influencer agencies.
We agree. The biggest benefit to running an in-house agency is streamlining creators’ own operations while ensuring they get paid on time—and most importantly, paid well. That’s because the roughly 30% fee that brands dedicate to third-party ad agencies could now be cash in creators’ pockets.
It’s hard to argue with that.
Unwell at Unwell
The Alex Cooper drama continues.
Her company Unwell has seen about 20 staffers exit, including the head of brand marketing and the chief growth officer, over the past year or so, Bloomberg reported. At the same time, Cooper’s podcast network has struggled to make other shows into hits: Three original podcasts made for Cooper’s SiriusXM channel were canceled within a year of launch. Staff have also anonymously complained about tension with Cooper’s husband, Unwell CEO Matt Kaplan.
Unwell declined to comment to Bloomberg.
Alix Earle, who was part of Cooper’s podcast network until February 2025, still hasn’t publicly shared what led to the falling out despite Cooper recently calling for her to do so on social media.
It appears that team Cooper has been trying to distract from the bad press by putting out some positive news, including hiring Bradford as we noted above. (It’s worth pointing out that the executive’s LinkedIn says she’s been with the company since last June, including as a strategic advisor.) News also broke last week that Cooper will make her acting debut alongside Anne Hathaway. In the movie adaptation of Colleen Hoover’s book “Verity,” she will appear as herself to interview Hathaway’s character.
The situation is a reminder of the challenges of building a media company around a prominent creator, including replicating success beyond “Call Her Daddy” and managing the impact of online drama on the business. As we’ve noted previously, Cooper is one of few creators who has successfully evolved her content and audience—and one of few female creators to build a media business.
How Creators Are Powering AI
What do AI and the creator economy have in common? They’re both foundational shifts for marketers in terms of how they reach audiences.
And as AI continues to reshape how people search, shop and entertain themselves, creators play a massive role in ensuring that brands show up in LLM answers. Read more about this and what it means for the creator economy in a recent interview Jasmine had with Zoe Soon, vice president of experience at the IAB.
The Round Up
Meta Platforms is planning to lay off about 8,000 employees, or about 10% of its workforce, next month, Reuters reported. The company is also planning further layoffs during the second half of the year.
Netflix will launch a TikTok-style vertical video feed within its app later this month. The streamer has been testing the feed since last year.
Snap announced Doug Hott, its vice president of finance, would become its new chief financial officer next month, replacing long-time CFO Derek Andersen. The move comes days after layoffs and as an activist investor pushes for cost reductions.
OpenAI announced ChatGPT Images 2.0, its new image generation model, which can create more complex and realistic images, including with dense text. During a virtual briefing with press, we asked OpenAI reps how they expect creators to use the new feature. Use cases include: generating thumbnails, marketing assets or graphics for videos, such as complicated diagrams for science channels.
On a related note… Watch our recent conversation with Julie Walsh Smith, CEO of Complexly, where she explains why the company has taken a stand against using AI in its work, including educational series like SciShow and Crash Course.
Deals, Deals, Deals
OnlyFans is in discussions to sell a minority stake in a deal that values the company at about $3 billion, the Financial Times reported.
Andreessen Horowitz invested in a new media company called Monitoring the Situation, or MTS. The new video show, which will operate primarily on X as an ongoing livestream, will cover what’s happening across tech, business, politics and culture.
The MTS launch was all over our X feeds, which other people also noticed. X users had lots of thoughts, with some speculating that X was helping boost its visibility. Others have said TBPN, a show with a very similar concept, has become less visible on their feeds since OpenAI acquired it.
The Team, the talent management firm formerly known as Wasserman, is attracting interest from buyers including UTA, private equity firm Permira, former Endeavor chairman Patrick Whitesell and a group that includes Reddit co-founder Alexis Ohanian and Chris Giliberti, the CEO of Hollywood software firm Avail. The sale comes after emails from its founder, Casey Wasserman, appeared in the Epstein files.
The Onion, a satirical site, still wants to take over ring-wing conspiracist Alex Jones’ InfoWars site and relaunch it as a parody of itself. The new plan involves licensing the website from the court-appointed manager of the InfoWars website, the New York Times reported.
Introducing Scalable Research
One of the most common questions we get asked is where to find quality research on the creator economy. That inspired us to launch Scalable's proprietary research database, which brings together a curated collection of ready-to-use charts from reliable sources, all in one place for free.
Whether you're researching trends or building a strategy, you’ll find high-quality visuals for presentations, reports, client pitches and more. You can also find our popular timelines of executive hires and other business moves to keep you up-to-date on how creator economy companies are developing. Check it out here!
It’s a resource that we will be updating regularly. We’d love to hear your feedback and data requests. Send us your thoughts by responding directly to this email.
Streamers Still Want Podcasts
Hulu announced four more podcasting deals, including for comedy show “Handsome.” New episodes of the shows will appear exclusively on Hulu first.
Netflix also announced a new podcast deal: former NBC anchor Brian Williams will interview public figures, including actors and journalists, in a new show premiering later this year.
Read more about how the podcasting wars are heating up here. And tune into our recent interview with YouTube podcasting exec Steve McLendon, who explains why the video giant isn’t planning to respond with its own exclusive deals. Watch below or tune in anywhere you get your podcasts.
Creator Moves
🏆The Webby Awards winners were announced on Tuesday. Winners included The Try Guys, MrBallen, Zach King, comedian Zarna Garg and activist Malala. Justin Bieber also snagged an award for livestreaming on Twitch—more on that here. We were honored to be judges for the Webbys this year! Check out the full list.
Tan France, the “Queer Eye” star, launched a new digital series called “Honorable Gays” on YouTube on Monday. Co-hosted with content creators Rob Anderson and Eric Sedeño, the trio discusses and judges moral dilemmas on Reddit.
Joe Rogan joined President Trump at the White House over the weekend for the signing of an executive order aimed at encouraging expanded research into psychedelic drugs, CNN reported. Rogan’s appearance at the Oval Office comes after the top podcast host has criticized Trump for his handling of the Iran war.
Megan Rapinoe and Sue Bird, who called off their engagement, will also end their Vox Media podcast, trading off hosting duties for their final episodes.
