Creators is for the people who send you clients by talking about you: a stylist whose followers ask where she gets her color done, a TikTok creator selling your shampoo, a local photographer. Each creator gets codes and links of their own; whatever those bring in is credited to them as it is paid, and their plan says what they are owed for it. What they are owed is held for your return window, then paid as a bill in your payment runs, the way every bill is paid.
Creators is off until you switch it on, under Admin, Modules. While it is off nothing is kept for anyone: no visits, no credit, no earnings, and the clock does nothing for it. It sits after Marketing in the menu.
Who sees it
What a creator is owed and how to reach them is private, so the section shows only on a login with the Creators switch, under Settings, Team, Logins. Owners and admins start with it. Making or undoing a payout also takes The books, the same switch payment runs take, because a payout becomes a bill.
Adding a creator
Open Creators and choose New creator. Give their name (or their business's), their accounts on each platform with how many follow them, how to reach them, and their plan if you have one. A new creator is Invited: their codes already take their discount, and nothing is credited to them until they are Active. Tick Working with you from today to make them active at once, or let their agreement do it: once it is signed, they are active from that day.
A creator stands one of four ways, changed from the buttons at the top of their page:
- Invited: asked to join, nothing credited yet.
- Active: working with you; what their codes and links bring in is credited to them.
- Paused: on a break. Their codes still take their discount, and nothing is credited until they are active again.
- Ended: no longer working with you. What they earned before stays theirs.
A creator added by mistake, with nothing on record, can be taken away under Details. One who brought in visits or sales, earned anything, posted or was sent product is kept: end working with them instead.
A creator may be a client too. Link their client record under Details; what they buy themselves is never credited to them (see below).
Plans: what they are paid
Plans are made under Plans, and each creator is given one. A plan pays any mix of:
- A share of what they bring in: a percent of what their sales come to after discounts and refunds, before tax and tips.
- Steps that pay more: past an amount in a month, a higher share, up to five steps. The steps work like tax brackets over the creator's month: each part of what they brought in that month is paid at its own step's share, so one more sale never pays less.
- For each new client: a flat amount when a sale credited to them is a client's first paid sale, from a client who came to you within your window.
- For each sale: a flat amount for each sale or online order credited to them.
- For each post: earned when you record a post they made for you.
- Each month: earned once for each month they are active, by the app's daily clock.
- Product sent instead of money: what you send them, in words, for the plan to say.
A salon might give a stylist a code for 15% off a first visit and a plan that pays $20 for each new client. A brand might pay forty creators 10% of what they bring in, 15% past $1,000 in a month, with a monthly fee for the ones who post every week.
A change to a plan applies to what is earned from then on: what was earned keeps the plan it was earned under. A plan nobody is on can be removed; one in use can be put away, which keeps it for those on it and out of the list for new creators.
Codes
A creator's code is one of your coupon codes, with its own discount, rules and limits (see Offers, packages, gift cards and loyalty), marked as theirs. On their page, under Codes and Links, choose Give them a code: one of your codes that is nobody's yet, or A new code, made there and added to your coupons. A creator may have several codes; a code is never shared by two creators, and a code that applies itself is nobody's, since nobody types it.
Whoever types a creator's code, at the register or at the online checkout, credits the sale to them. Switch a code off for them to stop it being credited while it still takes its discount. A code that brought sales in stays theirs for good.
Links
A creator's link leads to your online store, to one product in it, or to your online booking, and carries their word at its end: ?via=maria. You may give it a short path too, an address on your website such as /maria, which is easy to say in a video; it leads on to the link. The word and the path are lowercase letters, numbers and dashes, and cannot be one of your website's own addresses or another creator's.
When someone opens a creator's link, the visit is kept in their browser for your window: 30 days to start, set under Program, from 1 to 365. An order they place in the store, or a booking they make online, within the window is credited to the creator; a booking is credited when its visit is paid for at the register. A link visits came through is kept: switch it off to stop it.
Whose sale it is
Each paid sale is looked at once, as it is paid, and credited to one creator at most:
- A creator's code on the sale credits it to that creator.
- Otherwise, a visit through a creator's link within the window credits it to them.
- Otherwise, a booking made through a link credits the sale for that visit.
A code wins over a link. When a sale has a creator's code and the buyer also came through a creator's link (the same creator's or another's), the code is what was typed at the sale, so the code's creator is credited and the link is not. This is the rule we chose: a code is the stronger sign of who sent the buyer, and one rule keeps two creators from ever being paid for the same sale.
Never credited:
- A creator's own purchase: a sale to their own client record, or one paid with their own email address. It is kept on their page as their own purchase, and earns nothing.
- A sale while they are not active: invited, paused or ended. It is kept, marked so, and earns nothing.
- A sale to a wholesale account, which is never a creator's.
An exchange follows the sale it came from: what was swapped stays credited where it was bought, and the exchange counts only what it adds, as a share alone, with no flat amounts and not as another order. Something added to an online order after it was placed follows the order the same way.
What they brought in
The board, the first tab of Creators, ranks every creator by what they brought in over the days you choose (7, 30 or 90 days, this month, last month, this year), with their visits, sales, new clients, what they earned and what is payable, and the totals above. Narrow it by where they stand, or find a creator by their name, a handle, a code or a tag.
A creator's page shows the same for them, day by day, week by week or month by month, and by each code and link. What a sale brought in is after its discounts and refunds, before tax and tips; a refund comes back off it.
What they earn, and when it is payable
What their plan pays is earned as it happens: a sale's share and flat amounts when the sale is paid, a post's fee when you record the post, and the month's fee once each month they are active. Each earning stands one way:
- Held: a sale's earnings are held for your return window, 30 days to start, set under Program from 0 to 180. A refund inside it takes back the share in proportion to what came back, and the flat amounts once all of it has; a void takes back everything the sale earned.
- Payable: past the return window, it is ready to pay, and a refund after that leaves it as it is. Fees for posts and months, and anything added by hand, are payable at once.
- On a payout: on a payout whose bill is not paid yet.
- Paid: its bill was paid.
Under Earnings and Payouts, Add or take off adds an amount by hand, a bonus for a launch, or takes some off, a correction, with a few words of why that the creator reads on their own page.
Paying a creator
- Open their page, Earnings and Payouts.
- Tick what is payable, or Choose all that is payable, and choose Pay what is chosen.
- Say the day it is due, and a note if you like, and choose Make the payout.
The payout becomes one bill, CR- and its number, to the creator's vendor under Books, Payables. Their vendor is made at their first payout, under their name, marked for a 1099; their W-9 is kept with the vendor, as for any vendor. Pay the bill the way every bill is paid (see The books): in a payment run, by hand, or matched from the bank feed. Nothing moves money from Creators itself. When the bill is paid, the payout and its earnings are Paid.
A payout made by mistake can be undone before it is paid, from its row under Payouts: its bill is voided and its earnings are payable again. One that is in a payment run is canceled from the run first, and one that is paid stands; add a correction by hand for anything paid by mistake.
Product sent
Under Product Sent, choose Send product for what you send a creator instead of money, or with it. Products from your stock are taken out of the stock free to go out, as samples, which the books count as a marketing cost, never from a lot on hold or past its date. What is not in stock, a gift card or a service, is said in words with what it cost. Sending from stock takes Stock on your login too.
Posts
Under Posts, choose Record a post for each post a creator makes for you, with where it went up, the day, its link and what it showed, and its reach and its likes and comments when you know them. Their plan's fee for a post is earned with it, when they are active. A post recorded by mistake is taken back, with its fee unless it was paid.
Their agreement
The agreement with each creator is a contract (see Contracts). Under Agreement, choose Draw up their agreement: it is drawn in Contracts from the app's Creator agreement starter, filled in from their record: what they post and how often, their codes and links, what they are paid, how long earnings are held, the use of their posts, the disclosure the FTC asks for, and how either side ends it. Read it, change it and send it from Contracts; they sign by link, and once it is signed they are active. A contract signed elsewhere can be brought into Contracts and made theirs with Use a contract you have; an invited creator is active once it is.
Disclosure: the FTC's rule
The FTC's Endorsement Guides ask that a creator say plainly, on every post about you, that you pay them, give them a code that pays them, or send them product. Their followers have a right to know the post is an ad. A hashtag such as #ad, or the platform's own paid-partnership label, said where it is seen without tapping, is how it is usually done; a disclosure lost among a dozen hashtags, or only in a profile, is not. The FTC expects the business to tell its creators this and to act when one does not, which is why the creator agreement says it, and why each creator's own page reminds them.
The app does not watch or check anyone's posts. Disclosure is between you and your creators, and this is not legal advice: have whoever advises the business read your agreement before you rely on it.
The use of their posts
What you may do with a creator's posts is kept on their record under Details, and written into their agreement when it is drawn up: share them as they posted them and nothing more; repost and feature them on your own accounts, website and emails, credited to them; that and use them in your paid ads; or any use, edited versions in ads and print included. Say until when, and anything more about it, such as being credited in every use.
Their own page
Each creator can have a private page of their own, with no sign-in, at a link you make under Codes and Links, Their Own Page, and send them yourself; nothing is sent from the app. It shows, in your business's color and language, their codes and links to copy, what they brought in month by month, what they earned and where it stands (held, payable, on a payout, paid), their plan, the payouts made and the product sent them, their posts, the use of their posts, and their agreement with its link to sign or read it. It never names a client of yours: only counts and amounts.
A new link stops the old one at once, and Take their page away stops it altogether.
Best practices
- One code a creator, easy to say. Their name and what it takes off (MARIA15) is easy to hear in a video and type at the checkout. Keep the coupon's own limits: once for each client for a first-visit offer, a last day for a launch.
- A short path for videos, a link for bios.
/mariais easy to say out loud; the full link with?via=belongs in a bio or a story's link, where nobody types it. - Match the return window to your refund policy. If you take returns for 30 days, hold earnings for 30 days, so a refund never takes back money already paid.
- Agree before they post. Draw up the agreement and have it signed before the first post, so the pay, the use of their posts and the disclosure are settled. Remind them of #ad the first time you see a post without it.
- Record each post with its link. Its reach and likes beside what their codes and links brought in show which creators and which posts work.
- Pay on a rhythm. Choose everything payable once a month and pay it in that month's payment run, so creators know when to expect it and the books stay tidy. Check their vendor has a W-9 before the first payment run.
- End, do not delete. A creator you stop working with is ended, so what they earned and brought in stays on record.
The assistant and the API
The assistant reads the creator program for someone with the Creators switch: which creator brought in the most this month, what one earns, how much is held and payable, whether a code is working. It never reads how to reach a creator, their private page, or their payouts.
Through the API (see Connections and the API), a program can read creators, their codes, links, attributions, earnings and payouts, add creators and their codes, links and posts, and hear three events: creator.joined when a creator becomes active, creator.earned when they earn something, and creator.paid when a payout's bill is paid. A payout made by a program or an AI always waits for a person to approve it, whatever the business sets.