 What's up everybody once again is brand man Sean and I have to do this video really quickly because I've been seeing something nasty out there lately and it's something to be cautious of particularly for you TikTok influencers but so many artists as well one because so many artists are becoming influencers because of TikTok really quickly but also there's a lot of artists that face some of these scenarios in general so I have five things that you really need to look out for and it's more about perspective to understand how you can navigate your situations to some people it might seem like fluff but for those who are actually making progress in it you'll understand so number one be clear on if you're a priority in your situation so many people are getting scooped up by these agents right and these massive agencies and they're so many artists or there's so many influencers you don't even know how much your business can be maximized because there's so many people that they're paying attention to they're really using you as leverage so understand you are the leverage if I'm an agency I'm trying to get these five influencers these 10 influencers because now I can reach out to these organizations and say hey I got five 10 influencers on hand and I can leverage their pool their collective reach to get these brand deals so it's not just about you it's about them having you as an asset in their pool of assets right so they can use you as leverage it's not necessarily just about these one-off deals and how can I maximize your career they're just giving you a percentage right well they're taking a percentage which it leads me into number two which is huge huge huge huge you don't have to just take that primary deal and focus on percentages what I mean by that is I'll rephrase that a lot of times when people get deals the most important thing that they focus on is the percentage how much am I paying this person from how much money I bring in whether that's the manager or whether that's the agent right and that's cool you do want to get the best percentage you know the deal that makes sense you don't want to have to pay 50% for all the money comes in so you might get 10% 5% whatever that is however there's a another way to look at it do not just pay focus on percentages focus on what gets managed and there's a huge issue where a lot of influencers in my opinion are missing out on money and really could be said are getting ripped off what do I mean by this so when an agent comes in most times people are just saying hey well now all the money comes in you get a percentage of this keep bringing me money keep bringing me money keep bringing me money however they don't completely consider what gets managed as well an agent should be eating what they kill right that's simple you eat what you kill but what a lot of people are doing is having their agencies and some of these managers take over their inboxes as well you're already bringing that money in you don't think about it but people are reaching out to you for the presence that you created that money that's being brought in that potential money has nothing to do with the money that they are bringing in because of their partners that one or two call one or two or maybe three calls that they make for everybody because they have a few partners and I'm bringing in this agent or I'm or this influencer I'm going to call these two companies bringing this influence I'm going to call these companies and leverage these same connections again and again and again no it's that's outside of the business that you're already bringing in you don't have to pay them for that you can get somebody else to manage that you can save money in that way but most people are just allowing everything to be managed all money in is being managed you can actually say yo I'm going to hire somebody you probably have a friend that would be willing to do that especially if you're really popping and they didn't get their influencer program popping or there's probably somebody in college it's not necessarily even a hard job you get somebody trustworthy to hire all right and you can pay them a fixed income and then all of the money that comes into your inbox they can do quality control check on whether it's worth you checking out or not and then you post or make a deal accordingly right you don't have to have a sponsor an agent handling all of that side because if that money is coming to you it's inbound it's not something that they're going out there and getting themselves so you don't have to pay them a cut of that if you make your situation that way and so you'll also save money right because you're going to be paying somebody a fixed fee a fixed income that they would probably be very happy with versus cutting out a lot of business and for one and then also paying a percentage of it for two which you don't have to pay you're losing money but that brings me to number three because when I talk about losing out on business that's something that happens a lot because agents all of a sudden you know why you go your prices go from 500 to 1500 all of a sudden when you get an agent right 500 to 2000 5000 it's not just because that's all your market value a lot of the part of it is because the agent has to get paid right and they want you to still be happy so I need to up the price so I can take money that makes me happy and makes you happy right it's not necessarily about this is what you're worth a lot of people are being overpriced just because they have an agent I've seen people or have been in deals where I'm like eh no I don't want that influencer I'm sorry I really want this influencer but when I see your price I don't not want it because it's not in my budget I actually have the money in my budget it's just because you aren't worth it this agent is getting greedy and overpricing the influencer and then on the other hand there's these posts that you would be happy to do right up these these things that you would be happy to partake in you already have to post and somebody's offering you music to post to and you can take money you already have to post anyway of course you'll go ahead and do it for $500 a thousand dollars whatever the number is but because the agent comes in they might overpric it now you lose out on money on a post that you were going to have to post anyway right because you'd have to say active on your profile and that's something to really think about right you know you want to have content you want to be in control of your situation and because if you have opportunities to get paid for what you're going to do already versus having to get into these brand deals or do some of these more awkward situations or just post a piece of music for free right then you're always going to be missing out opportunities and you're also going to be having a lack of control due to the lack of awareness of your full situation in the business opportunities that are coming in now number four ego this isn't just agents this gets even more particular when we talk about managers the only lookout of the the the approach your managers are taking when it comes to how they make recommendations because a lot of times these agents and managers are making recommendations of things within their network they're trying to scratch you know somebody else's back they're playing politics not what's best for you they're supposed to be playing what's best for you however they're just trying to either capitalize on a favor pay somebody back do something for somebody else so they can leverage it for another situation i'm going to do the the something that's not complete best it's seven out of ten best versus 10 out of 10 best for you the influencer because now i know that's going to allow me to do this other thing with this other influencer and i get to manage a situation i'm managing these multiple characters personalities as opposed to just saying hey what's best for this one person so that's one aspect of it but the other ego part of it is just the fact that some of these managers especially they will make recommendations against what you should be doing if it's coming from somebody that they feel like it's a threat to their job right if they feel like you're saying something or well you're being told something by somebody and they're upset that they didn't tell tell you and you're too excited about that advice they will actually recommend against it or slowly start to say you know maybe we shouldn't be working with that person right i even see it slightly on occasion just working with artists as a marketer right i have the agency and we might be talking to artists and giving them certain advice or telling them things based on real data and things that we're seeing and knowing what they could do and you'll get a feeling that some of these managers will say oh man you know we can do this ourselves we don't need to pay these people right and it's not about i'm being frugal they'll use money a lot of times in situations or use like some character questioning as uh as an excuse to go against certain people but the reality a lot of times is they don't want the other person to become a threat where you're utilizing them more than their advice right because now at some point you might realize you don't need them or might realize they aren't bringing results like they should so that's another thing agents can have that as well you see that even more right because um with managers because managers can get a lot more sensitive to it they're integrated into your process even more than agency and then last but not least cheesy post number five that is something that i see so much when people take these agency deals they start posting posts that just aren't on brand or they feel so fake or they're just obviously marketing something and it doesn't even seem like it's something that the person likes come on man like don't let them mess up your brand don't let them mess up your relationship with your audience because i've seen that again and again there's a couple of influencers that i visualized and right now when i say this that are big and yeah i don't see it lasting for too much longer if they continue on the route they do because of the agents that they have and the posts that they're making because of it right you even see it in the comments but for whatever reason the agents aren't paying attention to the comments and how the the crowd is responding to them but it's only a matter of time so protect your brand and again i'll summarize these things one make sure you're a priority in your situation there are agencies agents that will maintain your priority doesn't mean that they can't have more than one influencer more than one artist but make sure you are acknowledged and treated as a priority right you can be an entrepreneur you don't have to just be talent number two pay attention not to just a percentage of the deal but also pay attention to what gets managed because there's a real opportunity for you to just hire somebody and manage the business that you are already bringing in and then hire somebody like an agent to bring in new business they should not be touching the business that you already have it doesn't make any sense number two you can lose a lot of deals a lot of times if you have these people agents or managers particularly if you don't trust them and or they don't necessarily understand your brand and they're not all for you you can lose out on a lot of deals just because they're so worried about their cut in a lot of other politics that has more to do with their situation versus price whether it's good for you or not right they'll have you they'll have some situations where they're able to get more money right out of a situation but then there'll be some situations because of politics they'll take less money than they could and that that consideration doesn't apply when it comes to things outside of their network though there might be something that you would really want to do if you knew about it and you might even say you would do it for free whatever but there might be something you really would want to do if you knew about it but you never get to find out about it because you have that filter in your situation and number four ego keep your agents ego intact keep your managers ego intact think independently take their recommendations but still think independently and analyze situations yourself even if you go with their recommendation right but you say i'm not sure if that was right that time take note and collect a file mentally to understand okay this has been three or four times it's starting to become questionable i need to make sure i'm auditing what's going on always audit your business right and the people around your business number five don't ruin your brand with cheesy posts and things that don't make sense for who you are and what you're trying to accomplish that simple so hopefully those were helpful influencers if you have any questions for me artists if you have any questions you can put them in the comments below and always reach out to me i'm at brand man shon on instagram i'm not a manager i'm not an agent but i do want to make sure you guys make those those best deals right with those types of people i'm not trying to manage anybody so this is not me just calling somebody out just because but i know a lot of great managers and agents and i know a lot of bad ones keep that in mind if you like this video go ahead to like button i would really appreciate that and also if you like it you might as well share it especially if you have some friends that can use this knowledge in this perspective right here and last but not least if you're not subscribed you know what to do hit that subscribe it's the mat work