Nearly 74 marketers we polled said they’d kinda cooled off on gifting. 

Two years ago, we ran our first survey on gifting – which was a main part (or all) of marketers’ influencer programs. 

Today, it’s more of a footnote. 

And there are a ton of reasons – gifting is hard, there are a ton of moving parts, and – creators aren’t open to gifting. 

In fact, that was the top challenge marketers highlighted (followed by it was hard to get creator response). 

And I guess it makes sense – the economy sucks, and you can’t pay your rent in gifted product. 

But is it really true? I spoke to 25 creators and asked them about gifting – the good, the bad, and the ugly. 

Turns out, creators hadn’t really given up on gifting – quite the contrary. They just pushed back on deals they felt weren’t fair. 

How creators *really* feel about gifting

According to creators, 6 in 10 of the brand offers in their inbox are gifting. 

A third of those creators said they regularly accepted gifted products from brands – and another half said they did so when they already knew and liked the brand. 

There’s also nuance here – because creators told us they much prefer no-strings-attached gifting to barter deals. 

We asked creators to rate both barter deals and no-strings-attached gifting from 1-5, with 5 being “love it” – and the results were telling. No-strings-attached ended with a 4.2/5 rating, while barter deals were flipped at 2.4/5. 

No one said they loved barter deals. 

“Well of course they don’t love barter deals, Whitney. They just want free stuff without having to do anything for it.”

That’s also not really true. Of the products creators accepted in both cases, they ended up posting about half the time. They just accepted fewer barter deals than they did no-strings-attached deals. 

In fact, those that did accept barter deals posted more consistently because they were pickier about the deals they accepted in the first place. 

What ultimately turns creators off about gifting

Not all creators accept gifted products. Creators said they stopped accepting gifted products because it just wasn’t worth it to them to barter for labor. Others said that even no-strings-attached offers started feeling like there were strings after all. 

And for the creators who still accept gifted products, there were several complaints.

Creators say gifting can harm their authenticity and audience trust 

Sometimes, gifting can put creators in a position where they have to choose between their audience’s trust and the relationship they’re building with a brand. 

Their audience is always going to win – that usually means not posting about a product they don’t believe in. 

We asked creators why they don’t post a gifted product, and it came down to product quality or whether the product worked.

If a creator can’t properly demo a product, or if the product doesn’t work for them, how can they promote that product in good conscience? Considering that they’re also not getting paid for the post, it doesn’t make a whole lot of sense to risk damaging the trust their audience has in them. 

And, sometimes ghosting was the easiest way for creators to get out of that impossible situation. 

Creators feel too much pressure to post

We’d all prefer they let the brand know they weren’t moving forward, but sometimes if a brand is too aggressive in their follow-ups or expectations, creators just feel it’s better to go silent. 

Creators said that brands put a lot of pressure on creators to post content. They cited: 

• Aggressive follow-ups (one creator mentioned having to block a brand)
• Short (and often unrealistic) timelines for content turnaround
• Total control over the content

One creator said that it felt like brands forget creators have lives too – and that daily messages weren’t appropriate unless they were getting paid. Another mentioned that they avoid barter deals because brands got too aggressive in their communication style (note: the 3rd top reason creators don’t post about a gifted product).

And this pressure wasn’t exclusive to barter deal gifting – more than half of the creators we spoke to said brands always or often still pressured them to post when the deal was positioned as no-strings attached. 

And those unclear expectations are a nightmare for creators to navigate. One creator we spoke to, Zoe, mentioned that hiding the real intent of the gift robs creators of their ability to evaluate offers appropriately – and it destroys trust. 

And how can we expect creators to be honest and transparent with us when we’re not doing the same for them?

I’m not saying it’s the right way to handle things – but I can still understand why a creator might ghost a brand who was already being pushy about posting in the first place. 

Creators said brand expectations didn’t match what they offered

Over 8 out of 10 creators we polled said brands tend to ask for Stories and Reels/TikTok videos in their barter deals. 

While many said that Stories were acceptable, many said a Reel or TikTok video was too big an ask for gifting campaigns – mainly because it takes so much more production work. 

An anonymous creator mentioned that some brands demand video content – despite the product actually being better for static Story posts. 

Christy, one of the creators we spoke to, said that gifting would be fine if brands just kept things simple. 

It’s about the ask being more expensive than the gift

The biggest throughline we’re seeing with gifting is creators pushing back, refusing to post, and ghosting when it just doesn’t feel fair. And this is where the friction really comes in. 

The creators we spoke to really drove this home: sometimes brands asked for way too much in return for way too little. 

For example, creators said that 40% of the brands that offered barter deals also asked for usage rights. 

While a third of creators said that they’d agree to usage rights if they really liked the brand and product, 4 in 10 said that usage rights weren’t on the table unless payment was. 

Creators told us some of their most egregious demands in return for gifted product: 

• 365 days of usage rights 🙃
• Multiple reels with a set script for each, with rounds of approvals
• Three 60-second videos for a $20 product
• Asked for 5 reels in return for a dog treat
• Full ad rights with perpetual use 
• Usage rights for 5 months, two TikTok’s/Reels accompanied with a full script and brief

And the marketers we polled on gifting know this is too much. Many marketers actually spoke out against their peers who used gifting as a cheap alternative to paid collabs with creators – in lieu of building a real relationship with them. 

Anna Jędrzejewska highlighted how too many demands in a gifting campaign can destroy a relationship before it even gets a chance to bloom. 

And the thing is – there’s a real opportunity to use gifting to build relationships with creators, vet them for future campaigns, and test out their enthusiasm for the brand and product before launching a further paid collab. 

Getting creators to fall back in love with gifting

It really doesn’t take a lot for creators to feel appreciated in a gifting campaign. 

It just comes down to making sure they don’t feel like a number. 

When asked, over a third of them mentioned that even a handwritten note included in the gift made them feel special – something a third of the marketers we polled said they included in gift boxes. 

One influencer, Petra (@petpetcrochets), noted that a thoughtful, personalized package made the collaboration feel genuine and respectful. It made her want to work with the brand again. 

Zoe echoed this too – mentioning that the intention of the gift means so much more than the product itself. 

Even just being honest about the budget (or lack thereof) can go a long way. An anonymous creator mentioned that when a brand is honest that it’s not in the budget, they’re more likely to publish a Story and thank the brand if they end up liking the product. 

For other creators, like Vicky, having a brand circle back once they got a budget showed her that they were serious about wanting to work with her. 

For other creators, it’s about feeling included. One creator, Todd, mentioned that the brand kept in touch with him even after the collab finished. 

Now – I want to make something super clear. 

A handwritten note is not the teaspoon of sugar that helps your shopping list of demands go down. That’s the antithesis of making a creator feel special. 

But if you focus on:

• Genuinely delighting your creator
• Choosing creators for whom your gifts are a perfect match‍
• Following up to get their honest opinions on your products

You’re going to get so much more out of gifting. 

Gifting is about give first, and take second

Creators haven’t really cooled off on gifting – they’ve just cooled off on doing a ton of work and dealing with a ton of stress in return for a product that isn’t worth the hassle. 

And so, if you’re struggling with gifting, and creators are ghosting, or they’re just not responding to outreach, it might be time to ask yourself some tough questions. 

• Would I respond to my offer?
• Would my offer be worth what I’m asking for?
• What can I do to make this more attractive to a creator?

I know we’ve got numbers to hit. But remember that for every 10 emails in a creator’s inbox, 6 of them are from brands, just like you, also offering gifted products. 

So make it special, make it attractive, and for god’s sake – don’t ask for perpetual usage rights. 

‍