Start from views, not followers
Followers are a vanity number that a brand cannot spend. Views on your recent comparable posts are the thing they are buying. Take the median of your last ten posts of that format, not the average, because one outlier reel will flatter you into a rate you cannot repeat.
A workable starting point
Across Indian creator deals, rates tend to land somewhere between ₹0.50 and ₹2.00 per expected view, depending on the category. Finance, technology and beauty sit at the top because a converted viewer is worth more. Take your median view count, multiply, and you have a floor to negotiate from rather than a number you guessed.
Then charge for the things nobody counts
- Usage rights. If the brand wants to run your content as a paid advertisement, that is a separate licence, priced by duration. Three months of paid usage commonly adds 30% to 50%. Perpetual rights should cost considerably more, because you can never resell that work.
- Exclusivity. Agreeing not to work with competing brands for six months has a real cost. Price it or refuse it.
- Revisions. Two included, then charged. Without this line, a two day edit becomes a two week one.
- Production. A studio, a model, props, travel. These are costs, not creative fee, and should be listed separately so a discount conversation does not eat them.
When the budget is fixed
Reduce the scope, never the rate. Fewer deliverables, shorter usage, no exclusivity. A rate you drop once becomes your rate with that brand forever, and agencies talk to each other.
Put the number in writing first
Fee, deliverables, usage rights, revision count, payment date. Five lines in an email before you shoot anything. Almost every payment problem starts with something that was never agreed in writing.