the words brands and creators actually use.
influencer marketing & UGC glossary.
- Influencer marketing
- A form of marketing where a brand partners with creators (influencers) to promote a product to the creator's own audience. The creator posts the content on their channels, lending their credibility and reach to the brand.
- UGC (User-Generated Content)
- Content — usually video or photo — created by everyday creators that a brand owns and uses on its own channels and paid ads. Unlike influencer marketing, the creator doesn't necessarily post it; the brand pays for authentic, real-person content to run itself.
- UGC creator
- A creator who produces authentic, ad-style content for brands to use, rather than posting to a large personal following. UGC creators are hired for the relatability and quality of their content, not their audience size.
- Nano influencer
- A creator with roughly 1,000 to 10,000 followers. Nano influencers have small but highly engaged, trusting audiences and are often the most cost-effective for authentic, niche campaigns.
- Micro influencer
- A creator with roughly 10,000 to 100,000 followers. Micro influencers balance meaningful reach with strong engagement and niche relevance, which is why they're a core focus for performance-driven brand campaigns.
- Mid-tier influencer
- A creator with roughly 100,000 to 500,000 followers. Mid-tier influencers offer broader reach than micro creators while still maintaining a defined niche and decent engagement.
- Macro influencer
- A creator with roughly 500,000 to a few million followers. Macro influencers deliver large-scale reach and awareness, typically at a higher cost and with lower engagement rates than smaller creators.
- Engagement rate
- A measure of how actively an audience interacts with a creator's content, usually calculated as total engagements (likes, comments, shares, saves) divided by followers or reach, expressed as a percentage. It's a key signal of an audience's quality and attention.
- Reach
- The number of unique people who saw a piece of content. Reach measures audience size for a post or campaign, as opposed to impressions, which count total views including repeats.
- Impressions
- The total number of times a piece of content was displayed, including repeat views by the same person. Impressions are always equal to or higher than reach.
- CPM (cost per mille)
- The cost a brand pays per 1,000 impressions. CPM is a common way to compare the efficiency of different creators, content or channels in buying audience attention.
- Usage rights
- The terms that define how, where and for how long a brand can use a creator's content. Clear usage rights let a brand legally re-run creator content as paid ads or on its own channels beyond the original post.
- Whitelisting (creator licensing)
- When a creator grants a brand permission to run paid ads from the creator's own social handle. This lets the brand advertise through an authentic creator account, often improving ad performance over branded handles.
- Creator brief
- The document a brand or agency gives a creator outlining the campaign goals, key messages, do's and don'ts, deliverables and timelines. A good brief gives creative freedom while keeping content on-brand and compliant.
- Deliverables
- The specific pieces of content a creator agrees to produce in a campaign — for example, two Reels and three photos. Deliverables define exactly what a brand receives for its spend.
- D2C (direct-to-consumer)
- A business model where a brand sells directly to customers — usually online — instead of through retailers or marketplaces. D2C brands rely heavily on influencer marketing and UGC to build trust and drive online sales.