---
title: 'How To Get Sponsored On YouTube Even If Your Channel Is Small'
source: 'https://youtube.com/watch?v=Aw1cvGBPhVI'
video_id: 'Aw1cvGBPhVI'
date: 2026-07-28
duration_sec: 1113
---

# How To Get Sponsored On YouTube Even If Your Channel Is Small

> Source: [How To Get Sponsored On YouTube Even If Your Channel Is Small](https://youtube.com/watch?v=Aw1cvGBPhVI)

## Summary

This video features sponsorship coach Justin Moore, who shares strategies for YouTube creators to secure brand deals, even with small channels. He emphasizes proactive outreach, understanding brand goals, and smart pricing.

### Key Points

- **Proactive Outreach** [00:30] — Creators should actively reach out to brands instead of waiting for them. Justin secured a sponsor for his new podcast by pitching ConvertKit, highlighting audience alignment.
- **Views Aren't Everything** [02:32] — A creator with under 1000 subscribers and few views got a paid deal because his niche (budgeting for active duty military) matched the brand's target audience. Brands value repurposing content.
- **Focus on Brand's Needs** [04:10] — Don't lead with your stats; instead, research the brand's objectives and show how you can help achieve them. It's about positioning, not a 'dog and pony show'.
- **Pricing: ARC Framework** [06:08] — ARC stands for Awareness, Repurposing, Conversion. Pricing should vary based on the campaign goal. Conversion campaigns have strict CPA limits; awareness campaigns allow more negotiation.
- **Pricing: DUE Rule** [08:35] — DUE stands for Deliverables, Usage rights, Exclusivity. Scope the deal carefully and price in these factors to avoid leaving money on the table.
- **Handling Budget Objections** [09:43] — Ask for budget range before proposing. Offer multiple packages to fit their budget. Never just lower your rate without concessions; be willing to walk away.
- **Avoiding Gaslighting** [12:20] — Brands may compare you to others or push for affiliate-only deals. Counter by highlighting your unique value: control, usage rights, and unique content formats.
- **Upselling with Goals** [13:55] — Tie packages to the brand's goals. Higher packages achieve more goals, creating a natural incentive to upgrade. Avoid linear pricing (e.g., 1 video vs. 2 videos).
- **Common Mistake: One-Size-Fits-All** [15:55] — Treating every deal the same leaves money on the table. Customize proposals based on the brand's objectives to stand out and command higher rates.
- **Final Advice: Don't Be a Victim** [17:10] — Take control of conversations, educate brands, and accept that not every deal will close. Shift from passive to active mindset.

### Conclusion

Successful brand deals require proactive outreach, understanding brand goals, and strategic pricing. By focusing on value and customization, creators can secure sponsorships regardless of channel size.

## Transcript

- If you wanna do brand deals
or sponsorships as a
YouTube content creator
and you don't know where to start,
this video is going to help you a ton.
And to make sure you get the
best information about this,
I called in my buddy Justin Moore.
He's gotten the content
creators he works with
over $5 million in brand deals.
So he has tons of experience,
he knows what he's talking about,
and he's here to share
that information with you.
So get ready to take some notes
because we're starting right now.
So, Justin, do you think
creators should do some outreach
when it comes to brand deals
in order to get the ball rolling,
or should they wait for
brands to reach out to them?
- Sure, Nick, it's a great question.
So, you know, when I was launching
my podcast, "Creator Debates,"
I decided that I wanted to get a sponsor.
I mean, I'm a sponsorship coach,
so I should probably have a
sponsor for my podcast, right?
But I had no data to back up
exactly how this podcast
was gonna perform.
Remember, it was brand new, right?
To be fair, I did have some
other platforms, right?
I had a newsletter, I had another
YouTube channel and so on.
So I had a little bit of track record.
But essentially what I did
was I approached ConvertKit,
which is a, you know,
an email marketing platform for creators.
And I basically gave him a pitch.
I said, "Look, I am launching this show
that has your exact persona
of the types of customers
that you're trying to reach.
Will you sponsor me?"
This was basically the pitch.
They said, "Let's give it a shot."
The deal was essentially, you know,
we'll kind of review it
every 30 days basically,
but they have continued to be the sponsor
through all of Season 1, and
now have renewed for Season 2.
And so it's as much
about approaching a brand
that you know has a
very specific objective
that they're trying to reach
a specific type of customer,
and knowing that that's,
you know, that type of
personas in your audience,
and letting them know what's
going on in your world.
A lot of times I think
creators are frustrated
when they see another creator get a deal
from their dream brand, and they're like,
"How come the brand
didn't know that, like,
I'm the one who was the most
authentic fan of their brand?
I've been using it for three years."
And all this stuff too.
Brands don't have like a pulse check on,
like, every creator out there.
It actually takes you
getting on their radar
and reaching out and saying,
"Hey, like, I'm a perfect fit
to help, you know, promote your brand."
And so I am a very, very big
fan of shooting your shot
when you reach out to a brand.
And this is really, you know,
kind of the number one mistake
is just sitting on your hands
waiting for brands to come to you.
And, you know, I think this
is why most creators think
that brand deals are
unpredictable, because they say,
"Oh, you know, brand deals are
great when you can get 'em,
but you can never really
rely on that income."
Well, that's because
you're not supplementing
your inbound deal flow
with outbound pitching.
- So how many views do
you think content creators
should be getting on average
before they start seeking brand deals?
- So let me tell you a story
about a YouTuber named Mike.
So back when I ran an
influencer marketing agency,
we were approached by
a major phone company.
And they were kind of a budget carrier.
And they knew that their product resonated
with folks in the fire community,
you know, financial independence,
retirement early, and so on.
But they were really
struggling to find creators
that could authentically
speak to that audience.
And so they approached my
agency with this challenge.
They said, "Hey, can, can you help us?"
And so we said, "Absolutely."
And so we went out there and
we did a bunch of discovery.
And so we looked across all
sorts of different creators
and we found Mike.
At the time, he had less
than 1000 subscribers.
I mean, he was probably getting
a couple hundred views on average.
They moved forward with him,
they paid him a bunch of money.
And you're probably thinking,
"Wait a minute, he had
less than 1000 subscribers,
only a couple hundred views
on average, what gives?"
Well, it's because Mike didn't
just talk about budgeting.
He talked about budgeting
for active duty military,
budgeting for active duty military.
And so the brand was thrilled.
Again, they paid him a bunch of money,
and you wanna know why?
It's because they turned around
and they used that content
that he made, they cut it down,
and they ran a bunch of ads to
reach other people like him.
So it's not always just
about the average views
that you're getting on your videos,
because there's all these other ways
in which brands can receive value
from the content that you create,
not the least of, which
is repurposing it, right?
Embedding it on their
website, repurposing it,
reposting it on their social channels,
running paid advertising
with it, and so on.
- So from your experience,
what should content creators prepare
when they are wanting
to start on brand deals?
- So this is an easy one. Nothing.
You don't have to prepare
anything, and you wanna know why?
It's because it's not about you.
It's about how you can
help the brand achieve
their business objectives.
And so this is a really
important learning lesson,
which is that when a lot
of creators reach out
to a brand and propose a collaboration,
oftentimes it takes the form of this,
"Hi, my name is Justin.
I have 45,000 YouTube subscribers.
I, you know, get this many
average views per video.
This is my audience demographics."
Blah blah blah blah blah right?
They just made the brand
fall asleep, right,
or delete their email, right?
Because that's what
every single creator says
when they reach out and try
and pitch a collaboration.
And so the mindset shift here
is you have to understand
what is going on in the brand's world.
Because remember, brands do
not have random pools of money
to just dole out, divvy
out to random creators
that reach out and pitch them.
You know what they do have money for?
They have budget set aside
for their own initiatives.
So maybe it's a new product
launch or a new feature launch,
or maybe they're launching in a, you know,
and they were in the UK
and they're coming to the
US or something, right?
And so they have money allocated for that.
And so your job is to try
to research and understand
and make an assumption
about what is going on
and important to them in
their world right now.
And when you reach out and you say,
"Hey, it seems like
you're trying to do this.
You're trying to move the
needle on this objective.
I can help you do that by sponsoring me."
So at the end of the day,
it's actually a positioning exercise.
So it's not about you.
It's not about a dog and
pony show that you have to do
to convince the brand
that you're the best fit.
Now there's an element of that,
but at the end of the day,
it's helping them understand that,
hey, if you part with this money,
this budget that you've allocated,
I'm gonna help you get
to this objective faster.
And so I think
it's a really, really
important thing to understand.
- So one question that I get a lot
from content creators is pricing.
A lot of people don't know where to start
when it comes to pricing
their sponsorships.
What do you recommend
when it comes to pricing?
Do you have a formula of some kind?
Or how do you work that out?
- Okay, so there are two main
buckets of pricing levers
that you need to consider,
so let's talk about the first one,
which is understanding the
brand's success metrics.
Literally, what would be a win for them?
And the framework that I
have is called ARC, A-R-C.
So when you reach out to a brand
or they're reaching
out to you and you say,
"Hey, what would success
look like to you?"
They're gonna say one of three things.
Number one, they're gonna say,
"This is an awareness campaign.
We are just trying to spread the word."
Secondly, it's going to be a
repurposing campaign, right?
Where they're going to take
that content that you create
and use it in all these
different ways, right?
Embed it on their website,
use it for paid advertising, et cetera.
And then the final goal type
is a conversion campaign.
And this is where they're trying to drive
some sort of very specific outcome, right,
measurable outcome, right?
Sales, you know, app downloads,
trial signups for a software
program, and so on, okay?
And the reason it's so critical
that you need to ascertain
the campaign goal
is that your pricing should
change based on the goal.
The simple explanation is,
imagine if the brand is
trying to drive sales.
Well, they have what's
called a very specific CPA,
cost per acquisition metric
that they're adhering to.
So if they say, "Okay,
we're gonna hire Justin.
He gets 1000 views on average per video.
Of the 1000 people, maybe 10%
are gonna click on this link.
So that's 100 people, right?
Of the 100 people that are
gonna click on the link,
maybe 50 are gonna sign
up for a free trial.
Of the 50, maybe 20 are gonna
sign up for the paid version.
And each paying customer stays
with our company on average
for, let's say, 10 months.
And our software costs $10 a month.
So that's $100 is the lifetime
value of that customer.
So $100 times those 10 paying
customers is $1000 dollars.
That's the max we're gonna pay Justin
because this is a
conversion-focused campaign."
And by the way, they don't
just wanna break even.
That's the break even.
They wanna make a profit,
which is why they're doing
influencer marketing.
So it should be more
like 2, 3x that, right?
And so this is why sometimes
when the brand tells you,
sales, that's our primary metric
and they're trying to lowball you,
it's because they're beholden
to this napkin math that
they have internally.
Contrast that with an awareness campaign
where they're just trying
to spread the word, right?
What are the metrics there?
Views, likes, engagement,
comments, this type of thing.
It's squishier, right?
And so that contact's boss
isn't breathing down their neck
and being like, "How many
sales did you drive with that?
You know, a promotion with Justin."
They're not thinking that.
And so your ability to negotiate
in an awareness campaign goal
type is so, so much higher.
So this is ARC, okay?
And then the other
bucket of pricing levers
is what I call the DUE rule.
That's D-U-E, okay?
And this is about
actually scoping the deal.
D stands for deliverables.
What does the brand actually
want you to do for them, right?
Sometimes they'll reach out and be like,
"Oh, you know, we just wanna collaborate."
And you're like, "It'll
be a couple of posts."
This type of thing.
No, like is it two posts?
Is it three posts, right?
If it is an integrated video,
is it a dedicated video?
You need to know these things
'cause those are differing
levels of work, right?
You in the DUE rule
stands for usage rights.
Again, does this brand
want to repurpose it?
Do they wanna run paid
advertising with it?
If so, for how long?
That's something that you
need to price into the deal.
And then the E in the DUE
rule is the exclusivity.
So is this brand saying,
"Hey, you cannot work with our competitors
for a certain duration"?
Well, that represents a
direct opportunity costs.
So if you're exclusive
for six months and on,
you know, day on month five,
their competitor reaches out
and wants to pay you a bunch
of money, you can't do that
because you signed a deal
for the original brand
saying that you wouldn't.
And so, again, these are all factors
that you need to consider
with respect to your pricing.
- So what if we do all of that,
but the person that we're talking to
says that they don't
have the budget for it
or it's too expensive?
How do we navigate that?
- Okay, so first of all,
if a brand comes back to you
and says it's too expensive
or they just don't have
that kind of budget,
well that's because you didn't
provide a package to them
that fit within their zone
of budget feasibility.
And so prior to providing them pricing
or packages or anything like that,
you need to say something
very simple to them.
When you get on a call
and when you're kind
of scoping out the deal
and you ask them what
a win would look like,
all this type of thing,
and then at the very end,
you say this, almost verbatim, you say,
"Look, this was very useful.
I'm gonna go back and
put together a proposal.
And usually what I like
to do on these proposals
is put together a couple
different packages
to give you an understanding
of what a collaboration could look like.
Do you have a sense of what
those three tiers look like
from a budget feasibility perspective?"
And then you shut up,
you don't say anything,
you lean into the silence.
Okay, and what does this accomplish?
Well, now they're gonna say
something like 1, 2, 3K,
or 10, 15, 20K, or 50, 75, 100K, right?
You don't know, right?
And so it accomplishes a couple things.
One, it gives you a super
useful directional sense
of, like, what is even the ballpark?
What's their appetite
here for a partnership?
'Cause I bet you're gonna
spend a lot more time
on a 50K proposal than you do
on the 1, 2, 3K proposal, right?
But it also accomplishes another thing,
which is that, remember, when
you're negotiating with brand,
they're almost never just talking to you.
They're probably talking
with 10 other people, right?
And so what they're trying to do
is kind of Tetris their
overall budget together.
So let's say they have 100K
and they're talking with 10 people.
Everyone comes in at different rates.
And so what you do by providing them
several different packages is, now,
when they're going and trying
to fit everything together,
they're gonna pick and pull
from here and here and here and be like,
"Okay, oh yeah, so glad Justin
gave us that package two
or that package one 'cause we
still wanna work with them.
He is coming in a little higher
than all these other people,
but we really do wanna work with them,
so let's go with package two
or package one, or whatever," right?
And so that's one of the
reasons why they may come back
and say, "Oh, you're too expensive,"
or they don't have the budget
is because you just spit back one number.
You say, "Oh, it's gonna
be 5K to work with me,"
or, "Oh, it's gonna be 500 bucks," right?
And so now there's no wiggle room, right,
for them to try to fit
you into their plan.
And the other thing too
is that you should not
just come down on your rate
and concede nothing.
Oftentimes when they say that, you say,
"Oh, okay, it's too expensive?
Well, instead of 1500, I can do a 750."
For the same deliverables,
you literally have just came
down, you've conceded nothing,
and now you have completely eroded
your future pricing power.
Don't do that, okay?
And lastly, you should be
willing to walk away, right?
Accept that not every deal
you do is gonna work out.
And that is just part of the game.
- When it comes to brand deals,
what are some ways that
brands take advantage
of content creators?
So people that are just getting into this
they know things to look out for
or just things that they should avoid.
- Okay, so, you know, honestly,
some brands try to gaslight creators
by comparing them to other creators.
You know, for example, I came to a brand
proposing a very large, very
comprehensive collaboration.
And they said, "Well, you know,
all the other creators that we work with
have been fine doing it
for affiliate commissions.
Well, you would you be
willing to do that?"
They asked me, and I basically simply,
like very simply laid out for them
why what I am proposing is so different.
Number one, it's control.
I said, "Hey, do you have control
over what your affiliates are posting?
I don't think you do."
Number two, rights, right, usage rights.
Do you have the ability
to repurpose the content
that your affiliates are creating?
I don't think you do.
That's something that I specialize in.
Number three is unique
content formats, right?
What I was talking about is,
"Hey, I would love to do some webinars
with your brand, right, where..."
Like, look, brands are so desperate
to talk about anything other
than their product, right?
'Cause that's what they're
talking about all day long.
"Oh, a new feature,"
like blah, blah, blah.
It's like putting their
customers to sleep.
So imagine if they're able to say,
"Hey, we're doing this
awesome webinar with Justin,
the Creator Wizard.
He's gonna talk about X, Y, Z.
You gotta show up, right?"
And it positions their brand
as an advocate for the community, right?
And so here I am being able
to be an extension almost
of their marketing team, right?
And so these are very unique
things that I'm pitching.
And so you just have to be confident
in what your value proposition is
so that you don't let brands gaslight you.
- Is there a way for content creators
to get more out of a brand
deal or essentially upsell
the brands that they're working with?
- So the easiest way to upsell
is honestly to tie the packages
that you're providing in your proposal
to the brand's goals, a meaning.
So let's say you have a
conversation with the brand
and they list out all these
different objectives they have.
They have, yeah, awareness is a goal
and conversions is a goal.
And yeah, we'd love to get
the content to repurpose it
and all these things, right?
And so in your proposal, page
one better be what I heard.
Here's your goals. List it out.
One, two, three, four.
This type of idea, right?
And then your packages,
when you list them all out,
you say, "Okay, package one."
With package one, you are gonna
accomplish goal one, right?
You said awareness is important
or conversions, whatever,
like that's gonna be, you
know, what I'm proposing to you
in this package is gonna help you do that.
Then moving on to package two,
well, you're gonna accomplish goal,
you're gonna accomplish
everything in package one,
and in addition to that,
I'm gonna help you accomplish goal two,
which is the repurposing thing.
I'm gonna give you the rights
to use that for advertising
and yada, yada, yada, right?
And so what you start to see
is that the higher you
go in your packages,
the only way for them to
accomplish all of their goals
is to go for package five
or package six, right?
And so this is a really,
really critical, like, thing
that you have to consider
when you're putting
your proposals together,
because otherwise, like
the biggest mistake
that a lot of creators do
is they just make it linear, right?
"Package one is one YouTube video,
package two is two YouTube videos,
package three is, you know,
three YouTube videos," whatever.
And maybe they're getting
some sort of like price concession,
right, when they go higher.
Like, "If you go for package three,
I'll give you a 10%
discount or something."
It's just like pointless.
There's no reason for them to...
They'll just be like,
"Oh, we'll just come back,
and like if we wanna do it
again, we'll come back," right?
There's no incentive for
them to do that immediately.
But once you tie it to the
goals, everything changes.
- When you're working
with content creators
to get them brand deals and sponsorships
through your courses
over creatorwizard.com
or your one-on-one
services that you offer,
what's the number one thing
you hear the most from content creators?
- Yeah, I mean, you know,
one of the coolest things
about working with so many
different types of creators
is this tremendous breadth of
deal flow that I'm able to,
you know, glean insights from.
You know, so it's different
content verticals,
it's different platforms,
different types of creators, and so on.
And honestly, the number
one issue I hear the most
is that every deal they
do feels super different.
Which is 100% true.
I mean, if you are
approaching sponsorships
as kind of one-size-fits-all, right,
sending brands your media kit
with your standardized pricing,
your rate card, whatever,
yeah, you may make some money,
but you are leaving
thousands on the table.
Imagine if when you come to a brand,
right, you have a conversation,
you ask them about their success metrics,
their objectives, right, what
they're trying to achieve,
you help them understand
that you are invested
in the outcome of this partnership, right?
Even if you might be two or
three times more expensive
than other creators
that they're talking to,
they're probably gonna
choose to go with you
because it just seems like the campaign
is gonna go better, right?
I know firsthand, because again,
I ran an influencer agency for many years,
and we chose to go, like
move forward with partners
that we worked with before
over and over and over again
because we just knew it
was gonna go better, right?
They were super professional,
they were super communicative, right?
And like that is a very, very prized asset
when it comes to campaigns
that especially have very
quick turnaround times.
So man, so critical.
- From your experience, if
there was one piece of advice
that you would give to content creators
who are interested in working with brands
or getting sponsorships for their channel,
what would that be?
- Honestly, don't be a victim.
Sure, there are some companies out there
who purposefully prey on creators
who don't know any better,
but the majority of brands in
my experience are good people.
But they may just not
understand like what is fair
when it comes to compensation
or collaboration, right?
And it is part of your job as
a creator to educate brands.
And you have to realize
that there is, like, gonna be situations
where you have a bunch of
conversations with the brand,
it's gonna seem super promising,
and then nothing comes from it, right?
But that is business, that is life, right?
And so once you shift from a
mindset of just being passive
and waiting for brands
to make the next move
and you shift to one of being active
and taking control of the conversation,
everything is going to change.
If anyone is looking to make
more money working with brands,
I would highly recommend signing up
for my free weekly newsletter
at creatorwizard.com/join
where I send you paid
sponsorship opportunities,
as well as like, you
know, videos and articles
to help you create a
smarter brand deal strategy.
- Make sure you signed
up for his newsletter.
It is packed with value.
You are going to love it.
Now, if this is your first time
being introduced to Justin,
you can check out his
YouTube channel here,
and I'm gonna put a playlist right here
of other ways that you can
make money from your channel.
Go ahead and click into
either one of those now.
Thank you so much for watching.
I'll see you next time.