A rate card is the most basic tool in your business toolkit, and most creators either don't have one or have one that's hurting them. A good rate card does three things: it anchors the negotiation in your favor, it signals professionalism to brands, and it saves you from making up numbers on the spot.
A bad rate card — or no rate card — means you're quoting different prices to different brands, forgetting to charge for add-ons, and accepting whatever number the brand throws out first because you have nothing to reference.
What a rate card needs to include
At minimum, your rate card should cover every content type you offer with a specific price for each one. Not a range — a price. Ranges signal uncertainty. A brand seeing "$2,000 – $5,000" will anchor on $2,000 every time. A brand seeing "$4,000" knows that's the starting point.
Core content rates
These are the deliverables brands ask for most. Every rate card should have a price for each one you're willing to create:
Example rate card — mid-tier creator (80K followers)
Notice the TikTok rate is higher than Instagram Reel. TikTok's algorithm gives brands more unpredictable upside — a video can reach far beyond your follower count. That's worth a premium. UGC is lower because you're selling production value, not your audience.
The add-ons that make you real money
This is where most creators leave thousands on the table. Base content rates are just the starting point. The add-ons below are industry standard — brands expect to see them and expect to pay for them.
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Add-on pricing (whitelisting, exclusivity, rush), bundle strategy, when to update, and the complete example rate card.
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Add-on rates — same mid-tier creator
Whitelisting
When a brand runs your content as a paid ad — either from their account or yours — that's whitelisting. Your content is being used as advertising, reaching people who don't follow you, and making the brand money beyond the organic reach. That's a separate line item, always. $1,000–$2,000 per 30-day period is standard for mid-tier creators.
Exclusivity
If the brand wants you to avoid their competitors for a period of time, that directly costs you potential income. Charge for every month. $1,500–$2,500/month for mid-tier. And always negotiate the category as narrowly as possible — "competing protein powder brands" not "health and fitness."
Rush fees
A 48-hour turnaround instead of a 2-week timeline means you're rearranging your entire schedule. A 25–50% rush surcharge is standard and expected. If a brand balks at a rush fee, they can give you more time.
Holiday premium
November and December are peak season for brand campaigns. Demand is high, your calendar is tight, and the content is more valuable because consumers are in buying mode. A 20–30% premium during Q4 is common and justified.
Bundle pricing
Brands almost always want content across multiple platforms. Offering a bundle discount (15–25% off the individual rates) is smart because it increases your total deal size while giving the brand a reason to consolidate with you instead of splitting across multiple creators.
Example bundle — IG Reel + TikTok + Story Set
The brand feels like they got a deal. You just made $8,800 instead of $4,000 for a single Reel. Always lead with bundles when a brand is budget-constrained — it reframes the conversation from "can we afford you?" to "which package makes sense?"
When to update your rate card
Review your rates every quarter. Update them when your follower count crosses a tier threshold (10K, 50K, 100K), when your engagement rate improves meaningfully, when you've completed several successful campaigns at your current rate (proof of value), or when demand for your time exceeds your availability.
Most creators wait too long to raise their rates. If every brand is saying yes to your first quote, your rates are too low. You should be getting pushback on roughly 20–30% of your quotes — that means you're priced at the top of what the market will bear, which is exactly where you want to be.
Build your rate card in Tally.
Set your rates once. Tally's AI uses them in every negotiation, pitch, and contract review — automatically benchmarked against real market data.
Try Tally Free →The bottom line
A rate card takes 30 minutes to build and saves you thousands of dollars a year. It eliminates the anxiety of pricing on the fly, prevents you from undercharging, and makes you look like a professional who knows their worth.
If you don't have one, build one today. If you have one but it only lists content rates, add the add-ons. If you haven't updated it in 6 months, it's out of date. Your rates should grow as you do.