Earned Podcast: Jen Cho, Chief Customer Officer at CreatorIQ hosts Gigi Robinson, Founder of Hosts of Influence
The creator economy has become a multibillion-dollar industry. The professional infrastructure surrounding creators is still taking shape.
On this episode of Earned, CreatorIQ Chief Customer Officer Jen Cho sits down with Gigi Robinson, founder of Hosts of Influence and Creator Etiquette, Penguin Random House author, keynote speaker, and longtime creator. Robinson has built a career spanning content, speaking, brand partnerships, and entrepreneurship, giving her a firsthand perspective on what creators need to build sustainable businesses.
At the center of the conversation is the professionalization of the creator economy. Robinson explores how brands can support creators as creative professionals, why long-term creator partnerships build trust, and how better education and measurement can create stronger relationships across the industry.
Watch the full episode
Creator marketing needs professional infrastructure
Robinson sees a gap between the rapid growth of creator marketing and the professional resources available to the people building careers within it.
Executive leaders regularly discuss the future of the creator economy at major industry events. Translating those ideas into practical guidance for influencer marketing managers, talent coordinators, and creators themselves remains an important part of moving the industry forward.
That is part of the motivation behind Robinson’s work with Creator Etiquette, which focuses on bringing professional development into the creator ecosystem.
For brands, she sees an opportunity to expand creator education beyond product demonstrations and feature training. Creators can benefit from understanding a company’s brand ethos, guidelines, business objectives, and expectations for the partnership.
That knowledge gives creators more context for the work they are producing and helps them operate as stronger creative partners.
As Robinson explains, creators increasingly function as extensions of a brand. Some partnerships even require creators to carry insurance, which she sees as another signal of how their role is evolving.
Her preferred framing captures the shift clearly: “Contract creatives.”
Long-term creator partnerships build trust over time
Robinson’s relationship with Adobe offers a useful example of how creator partnerships can grow.
She started using Adobe products when she was around 11 years old, teaching herself tools including Photoshop and Lightroom while developing her skills in photography and design. She continued using Adobe throughout high school, college, internships, and her professional work.
By 2021, she was naturally discussing Adobe as part of her workflows and content. That history eventually led to an invitation to Adobe’s brand ambassador community.
The relationship grew from there.
Robinson has participated in different parts of the Adobe ecosystem, from its creator community to speaking opportunities and events. The partnership works because the product already has a meaningful place in her creative life.
That kind of continuity can also strengthen audience trust. Repeated exposure gives an audience context for why a creator uses a product and why the partnership makes sense.
For brands developing an always-on creator marketing strategy, the lesson is valuable: creator selection can consider the relationship a creator can realistically build with the brand over months or years.
Creators are becoming strategic business partners
Robinson’s own career also demonstrates how expansive a creator’s role can become.
Her work spans more than 20 channels, a publishing deal with Penguin Random House, keynote appearances at events including Cannes Lions and the United Nations, brand partnerships, and her own businesses.
That breadth informs her view that creators can contribute far beyond individual social posts.
Creators can participate in speaking engagements, events, product feedback, community building, employee-generated content, and broader brand storytelling. Their proximity to audiences also gives them insight into how people communicate, what resonates, and where culture is moving.
For enterprise brands, that creates an opportunity to think more expansively about the role a creator can play across the organization.
It also requires creators to develop a much broader professional skill set.
Robinson describes many creators as solopreneurs who effectively have to serve as their own CEO, CMO, CFO, and COO. Building a sustainable creator business requires creative talent alongside financial literacy, negotiation skills, operations, relationship building, and strategic decision-making.
Better creator partnerships start with human relationships
Professionalization does not have to make creator marketing feel less personal.
Robinson places significant value on creators and executives spending meaningful time together. Industry conferences, dinners, workshops, and informal conversations give both groups opportunities to understand how the other operates.
She points to an Adobe dinner at Cannes where creators spent time with the SVP of Adobe Express. The conversation covered everyday life as well as product feedback, giving creators space to share their experience directly with a senior leader.
That access matters because creators may enter executive conversations feeling pressure to deliver the perfect pitch. Robinson sees value in creating environments where creators and executives can simply get to know each other and exchange ideas.
Her advice to brand executives in the episode is fittingly simple:
“Take them to lunch or to coffee and have a three-hour conversation.”
Those relationships can give brands a clearer understanding of creators as people and business owners. They can also give creators a better understanding of how decisions get made inside large organizations.
Creator compensation should reflect the business behind the content
The professionalization conversation becomes especially important when money enters the picture.
Robinson discusses findings from CreatorIQ’s State of Creators research and the financial realities facing creators. She points to the relatively small share of creators earning six figures and explains that gross creator income can quickly be reduced by taxes, business expenses, and the costs required to maintain the business.
Opportunity cost matters too.
A creator traveling for a brand event may lose several days they could otherwise spend producing content, serving other clients, or building their business. Robinson believes creators need to understand that value when evaluating opportunities and negotiating rates.
The industry currently lacks a universal standard for creator compensation and negotiation. Deals can flow through talent agents, managers, coordinators, platforms, or directly between brands and creators. Each route can produce a different process and pricing structure.
More transparency and education can help creators understand what they are agreeing to and give brands more context around the businesses they are hiring.
CreatorIQ’s creator marketing research and reports offer additional data for teams looking to understand creator compensation, measurement, and the wider state of the industry.
The future of creator marketing is partnership
Robinson’s vision for the creator economy comes back to a simple idea: creators are small businesses and creative professionals.
Building the next phase of the industry means giving those professionals the education, context, relationships, and resources required to grow sustainable careers.
For brands, the opportunity is equally significant. Long-term partnerships can deepen product knowledge, strengthen creator affinity, improve audience trust, and create room for the relationship to evolve as the creator grows.
The language already points in this direction. As Robinson notes, the industry calls these relationships paid partnerships.
Building them like true partnerships may be one of the most important steps brands and creators can take next.
Listen to the full episode
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