We all know creators can make full-time careers out of content, and some can pull a substantial income doing it. But substantial doesn’t necessarily mean steady: platforms can shift their policies or practices in ways that affect the reach of creators’ content, can decide they want a bigger cut of creators’ paychecks (ahem, Twitch), can be banned, or can unceremoniously exit entire countries, forcing thousands or millions of creators to rebuild their audiences from scratch on another platform (ahem, Twitch again). To mitigate their risk, creators often monetize their audiences in ways outside of direct-from-platform revenue–ways like affiliate marketing.
That’s where LTK comes in. The family-owned creator commerce platform is set to drive nearly $5 billion in sales this year from 300,000 creator partners and 8,000 brands.That’s almost double the $2.8 billion in sales the company saw leading into 2021, when LTK received a $300 million investment at a $2 billion valuation from SoftBank.
Those 300,000 creators use LTK as a sort of one-stop ecommerce shop, with tools for setting up their own affiliate commissions (including a recently launched commission comparison tool that’ll show them what the best deal is across affiliate marketing proposals), brand collaborations, and digital storefronts.
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At its 12th annual LTK Con this week, the platform–like every other platform these days–announced a new suite of AI features aimed at getting creators to make and post more content faster. But the more interesting tool it introduced is Power Gifting, a highway where creators can file requests for “strategic gifting and exclusive discount codes” from brands on LTK’s platform.
This is interesting because LTK floats it as a community-building initiative, going so far as to say modern social media platforms “are no longer built for community building, the foundation of their business, [so] LTK is making the platform truly designed for creators to reach, build and nurture communities.”
The idea with Power Gifting is that creators who are particularly interested in a brand in their niche, or who notice their audience is particularly interested, can approach that brand within the LTK app and get things like free items and promo codes for their viewers. Everyone loves free stuff, and giveaways are a time-honored practice in the creator industry.
And while more established creators may be able to get ahold of brands by cold-emailing or reaching out through a contact, up-and-coming creators can struggle to get companies to respond. LTK’s tool could help those up-and-comers get into brand deals–and thus build their off-platform income–earlier than they would be able to alone.
The buying power of creators’ fans has gone up 38%
These announcements come just before the holiday season, which LTK is expecting to be a major revenue driver this year. It recently released an internal study showing creators “are set to make a significant impact this holiday season,” because the buying power of viewers who purchase products from their affiliate links, brand deals, and digital storefronts is up 38% year-over-year, “while the buying power of the general population decreased 8% from last year,” the company said.
That’ll be a big deal for LTK, which makes half of its revenue from transaction fees on those creator-fan purchases. (The other half comes from SaaS fees and management fees for brand campaigns.)
Its survey also indicated that creators’ audiences are more likely to buy products that are pricier, and are more concerned about things like brand notoriety and availability of product than how much they’re splashing out.
“This year, the general population continues to prioritize price over brand and quality with more consumers planning to shop during Black Friday & Cyber Monday sales to save money than last year. However, for those that shop from LTK creators, availability and brand rank highest in priority,” the platform said. “While price is still important to these shoppers, the availability of products is more important, which indicates the need for retailers to keep items well stocked.”
We think that also indicates a hunger from creators’ audiences for limited-edition drops, and perhaps a smidge of FOMO. If creators offer items that are gone when they’re gone, viewers are probably more willing to spend whatever it takes to get that item, and consider snagging it a badge of fandom honor.
At LTK Con, the company said its plan is to keep building a central hub for creators to connect with their audiences (and, of course, with brands). That tracks with what Allison Yazdian, its SVP of Creator Growth and Success, told Business Insider back in July: “You see these platforms come and go. You need a place where regardless of where people are consuming your content, they know they can find you.”
