How to find influencers and UGC creators, by industry

What every guide covers

Searching the category name finds the biggest accounts and nothing else. Each guide instead lists the words creators in that niche put in their own bios and captions, because those are written for their audience rather than for brands, and searching them surfaces the smaller accounts that hashtag search buries. Then, platform by platform, how to search there: keyword search and the accounts tab on Instagram, the users filter and last-ten-video views on TikTok, upload-date filtering on YouTube, and so on for the platforms that matter in that category.

The vetting section is specific to the industry, because a bought audience looks different in fitness than in legal services. Three checks appear in every guide: follower growth that arrives as a vertical line matching no post, comments that are generic and arrive within minutes from the same small cluster of accounts, and an audience geography screenshot from the creator's own analytics, because no platform lets you pull another account's demographics. Each guide ends with what to put in the first message and when the work stops being worth doing yourself.

Finding UGC creators is a different search

An influencer sells access to an audience, so you search for the audience. A UGC creator sells the ability to make video that performs in your ad account, so you search for the work. Follower count is close to irrelevant; what matters is on-camera delivery, lighting, pacing and whether they can hit a hook in the first three seconds. Look for portfolio links in bios, search bio terms such as "UGC creator" alongside your category, and ask for one sample piece in your category before discussing rates. UGC versus influencer marketing explains what each one buys and how the pricing and rights differ.

Do it yourself, or brief us

Sourcing is the small part. Contracting, briefing, approvals and chasing are the job, and they are the part we do as principal: we commission the creators, we pay them, and you receive finished assets. How we work sets out what you receive at each step, and a plan with named creators costs nothing.

Before you search

Three things settle most of the work before it starts. Decide whether you want posts or content, because the search is different. Set a budget band, because it decides the tier you are looking in and it is the single biggest difference between a reply and silence when you message someone. And read how to find micro-influencers, which is the general method these industry guides specialise. The engagement rate calculator is the first filter on anyone you find; the nine checks we run are the rest.