JoinBrands, a creator economy marketplace managing over 150,000 creators and 10,000 brand partnerships, is expanding globally with launches in the UK, Canada, Australia, and Germany. 

The platform, which has distributed over $8 million to creators, reports receiving 500 new creator applications daily through its mostly self-service platform.

The expansion maintains strict geographical requirements, ensuring creators are physically located in the markets where they create promotional content. 

“JoinBrands was created to solve the problem that brands face working with influencers and creators, where they have to do a lot of outreach and find the right people, then negotiate contracts and rates and content rights,” says co-founder Ian Sells. 

“Creators get rated and reviewed, so you can see who’s done the most jobs, who has the most ratings, [and] who has a portfolio of work that is appealing to you,” Ian explains. “We allow almost every creator that can follow instructions and pass our multiple certifications to join [the platform] and apply for jobs.”

The platform has since developed beyond its user-generated content (UGC) roots to focus more on micro-influencers, TikTok shops, and affiliate creators. Some brands report that their ads become four to five times more effective through the platform.

Inside the Multi-Market Launch

JoinBrands’ global growth focuses on facilitating localized creator-brand relationships in each market.

“The goal is to help brands in those countries work with influencers and creators in those countries. It’s very localized,” Ian explains. “A brand in Italy may want to work with creators in Italy or Germany, so they’re selling their products in those countries.”

The platform maintains strict geographical requirements for promotional content creation. “We don’t have people working for companies promoting stuff in Germany or the United States. They have to be physically located in Germany to be promotional UGC creators for them,” Ian says.

Despite the regional expansion, JoinBrands plans to maintain consistency in its core service offerings. “For the most part, we’re keeping it the same. You can do any type of job that we already have in the U.S., whether that be UGC image and video campaigns or TikTok or Instagram campaigns,” Ian notes.

A Self-Service Model Driving Growth

JoinBrands distinguishes itself through a self-service platform model that has already distributed over $8 million to creators while helping brands significantly reduce content creation costs. 

“Our unique approach is doing it as a platform where you can choose who you want to work with and work directly with the creators once you chose them,” Ian explains. “We just set the minimum platform prices. So you’re not negotiating everything individually… that way, the jobs get done quicker.”

The platform facilitates matches through creator self-selection rather than algorithmic matching. “They see that you are selling a hat in this country. You’ll have creators that reach out to you and say, I want to work on that hat campaign,” Ian says. 

Brands can also proactively search the creator database for talent matching specific characteristics or demographics. The model has delivered significant cost savings for brands transitioning from traditional content creation methods. 

Ian explains, “Brands that normally are from outside the U.S., needing to hire a film crew, get a location, do all these things to do a shoot for a product which once cost thousands of dollars… now they can do it virtually from anywhere. Brands have told us how much money they’ve saved using our platform. [We’ve seen] brands having their ads be more effective by four or five times, lowering their acquisition cost and generating more sales.”

Eyeing Creator Income as Key Metric for Global Success

During its expansion, JoinBrands focuses on creator earnings and cross-market opportunities as key indicators of success. The company’s established U.S. presence is a springboard for global growth.

“We feel like we’re some of the first to go into these markets with a platform from the U.S. that’s very well-versed,” Ian says. “Our clients in the U.S. can easily tap into creators in those regions by switching marketplaces as well; it’s not just brands working with creators in those regions.”

The company measures success through creator compensation and market activity. “Our metric is how much business we can drive through those different markets and how much we can pay out to creators in each of those markets as far as giving them a side income or even a full-time income,” Ian explains.

Platform development remains driven by user feedback. 

“We’re always offering more tools for the creators and brands to better utilize the platform, make things faster and easier, and add functions based on what users suggest,” Ian notes. We always focus on the customer and use product-led growth to grow our business.”

Tackling Pain Points While Expanding Platform Features

JoinBrands aims to enhance content attribution and compensation while balancing between creator earnings and brand budgets.

“Creators want to make more money, and brands want to pay less,” Ian explains. “I wish that social platforms let you put tracking links on there so we can attribute sales and growth of creators from social campaigns. If that were the case, this business would grow even faster, and so would creator earnings.”

The platform is rolling out new features to address these challenges, including TikTok GMV tracking for TikTok creators and a novel “recurring creators” program allowing brands to hire creators to be their spokespeople. 

“We’ll be able to show you which creators are producing the most revenue for brands,” Ian says. “We have a platform built for what we call recurring creators, which is a unique thing where you can hire creators on retainer to do postings every day, every other day, twice a day through our platform.”

JoinBrands maintains its focus on accessibility while expanding its capabilities. 

“We’ve built it so anybody can sign up and become a creator [or] launch a campaign,” Ian explains. We don’t block you by having to pay large subscription fees. We try to charge a reasonable platform fee so that it makes sense for you to work within the platform versus trying to work on the side to save a few percent.”