Creators Query Whether Platforms Punish Branded Content and Linking Out

Creators are finding that brand-sponsored content on platforms like Instagram and TikTok are not performing as well as organic posts, occurrences that are potentially spurred by algorithms suppressing certain content that does not directly benefit them. As well as general frustrations, this has the power to impact the relationship between creators and their brand partners. Kayla Cummings, a creator whose Instagram account @itshoneydone boasts 194,000 Instagram followers, posted an Instagram story in partnership with a brand, the main source of income for the DIY and home-focused creator, and received around 16,000 views. The next day, she posted a piece of organic content and received double the views. Abraxas Higgins, a creator with 16,000 Instagram followers, can get over 28,000 views for a reel of him playing the piano. For a partnership with fashion brand Ted Baker, he got less than a fifth of that. These experiences reflect a broader pattern where creators feel Instagram, and sometimes TikTok, suppress branded content and posts that encourage users to leave the platform via an outside link, five creator sources told Adweek. Some said it seems as though views for this type of content have been particularly low recently. In the past few years, tech companies have tried to court creators with perks and cash to ensure their platforms are populated with content that brings eyeballs. But the interests of creators and platforms are not always aligned; when a brand pays a creator directly for promotion, the platform is losing out on potential advertising revenue. When a creator posts a link, a way to earn money via affiliate marketing programs, they encourage users to leave the platform. Creators Don’t Know How to Access Instagram’s $1 Billion Fund The issue is not universal. Several creator economy sources told Adweek they didn't experience this kind of pattern, either saying the algorithm was fickle but not systemically so, or they are possible to game, or that views are dependent on the quality of creators' content and not the algorithm. But, if some creators feel the platforms are working against them, it makes it harder for Instagram and TikTok to woo creators at a time when the internet economy faces unprecedented headwinds. TikTok declined to comment on the record and referred to a blog post that said its algorithm is determined by user interactions, video information and device and account settings. Instagram did not respond to requests for comment. A system to game? An easy rebuttal to creators' accusations that Instagram and TikTok suppress their branded or linked content is that people are less interested in viewing it. Yet industry sources can point to patterns that don't make sense without algorithmic intervention. “Every [organic] story frame someone gets 35,000 [views], and then somehow the four frames that are sponsored go down to 15,000 [views] and up again,” said Lindsay Nead, CEO of Parker Management, a creator talent management company. “It’s hard to imagine that it can drop like that and go back up." Hypothetically, if users are aimlessly opening stories at the top of their feeds, they should be no less likely to open a branded story than an organic one unless suppression is involved. In another quirk of the system, Cummings said branded content performs much better if she is able to caption it with a hashtag of the name of the brand and "partner" instead of appending the more typical #ad or #sponsored. You don’t know if a brand is pissed off unless they say they don’t want to work with you again.Abraxas Higgins, creator The situation can be just as cryptic when creators append links to their stories and posts. Megan Frantz, talent manager at influencer agency Whalar, said when creators, especially on TikTok, post videos telling viewers to click a link in their bio, those videos tend not to perform as well, a trend she has seen especially in the second half of 2022. “Any version of 'link in bio, visit my profile,' you’ll notice [creators] get very creative to communicate that call to action,” she said, noting that sometimes creators get fans to post a comment with the advice to follow a link or try to change the punctuation they use to avoid detection by the algorithm. Joey Gagliardi, director of education at influencer agency G&B Digital Management, said platforms can be particularly punishing when creators link out to content on other competing platforms. “I've definitely noticed that platforms like TikTok or Instagram will direct less traffic toward a piece of content that displays links in general because those links will navigate audience traffic off-platform,” he said. Yet conversely, Scott Fisher, founder of Select Management Group, which owns a creator talent management business, said the platforms can actually reward creators on TikTok who link to their YouTube profiles and vice-versa, as that can bring new users to both platforms. Creators Can’t Count on Brands to Stick With Them Through Pregnancy But the acceptance that platform algorithms are block boxes is causing mounting frustrations. Despite making it tricky to plan out content, the lack of engagement from potentially suppressed posts might lead to shorter brand deals, said Higgins. "You don’t know if a brand is pissed off unless they say they don’t want to work with you again," he said. Nead added that at least three creators she works with have asked representatives from Meta about these inconsistencies and have been told the algorithms have no preferences. “I wish we would get some direct answers,” Nead said. “I wish it wasn’t such a mystery.” Abraxas Higgins is a member of Adweek's creator network.

Influencers & Creators

Creators Query Whether Platforms Punish Branded Content and Linking Out

Some creators feel the algorithms systematically push down the posts that make them money

Catherine Perloff

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Catherine Perloff