How creator recaps count results
Creator recaps usually lead with reach, views, engagement and an estimated value: what the same attention would have cost as paid media. That estimate is often called earned media value. It’s a way to describe reach in dollars. It isn’t a result, and it rises with views whether or not anyone bought anything.
Results come from three places. Creator codes and links trace some buyers to a creator. Paid boosts of creator posts, sometimes called whitelisting or partnership ads, get results from the ad platform’s own attribution. And timing: sales, tickets or sign-ups that rose when a creator posted.
Each of those can be useful. Each can also be stretched. Look at how every number in the recap was counted before you compare creators.
Where results get counted twice
- Codes that leak. Creator codes end up on coupon sites. People who were already buying find them at checkout, and the creator gets credit.
- Boosted posts. When paid spend goes behind a creator’s post, your creator report and your paid-media report can both count its results.
- Timing on a busy week. Launch weeks stack creators, ads, press and email. Every one of them will point to the same spike.
- Fans who were coming anyway. A creator who already loves your brand often reaches people who already love it too. Their code gets used by regulars.
The way through is one list. Start from your own numbers for the campaign weeks. Mark which results used a creator code, which came through a boosted post, and which arrived on days a creator posted. Then mark every report that counted each one. Results with two marks are the overlap. Results with a code from a coupon site go in their own pile. What’s left is what your creators earned, and it’s usually a better basis for the next round of bookings than reach.
Do this creator by creator. Some will look much better than their reach suggested, and some much worse.
A checklist for your next creator recap
| Look at | What to look for | Why it matters |
|---|---|---|
| Code sources | Where code uses came from | Coupon sites inflate creator results |
| New vs. existing buyers | Code users who were already customers | Regulars would have bought anyway |
| Boosted posts | Posts with paid spend, and which reports count them | Two reports, one result |
| Estimated value | How it was calculated | It measures reach in dollars |
| Shares | Shares compared with views | See share rate |
| Comments | What the creator’s audience said | Shows whether the fit was right |
Get the answers in writing, creator by creator. A table with each creator’s posts, codes, code sources, paid spend and reported results makes the comparison fair. If results can’t be split that way yet, start keeping the table now, before the next round of bookings.
Questions worth asking
Ask them of whoever runs your creator program, in-house or a partner.
- How many code uses came from coupon sites?
- How many code users were already our customers?
- Which posts had paid spend behind them, and do those results also show up in our paid-media reports?
- How is estimated media value calculated, and what would we judge creators on without it?
- Which creators’ audiences shared and commented the most?
Our guide to which posts work shows how to compare posts fairly, and our glossary entry on the creator code covers codes in more detail.
What a regions-on, regions-off test looks like with creators
Creators are the hardest channel to test, because organic posts go wherever the algorithm sends them. You can’t switch a creator off in one region. Two approaches work.
First, test the paid part. If you boost creator posts, run the boost in some regions and pause it in matched ones for a few weeks, then compare sales in your own numbers. That’s a regions-on, regions-off test, also called a holdout test, and it tells you what the spend adds.
Second, stagger the creators. Space posts out instead of stacking them in one launch week, and line each one up with your own numbers by day. It isn’t proof the way a regional test is, but it separates creators who move results from creators who post on a busy week.
Want to see what worked for your brand? Try it free: pick a question, and we answer it with your own numbers and what people say online. No card.