If you've started researching what to charge for sponsorships, you've probably come across FYPM and Clara. They're the two most-discussed platforms for creator rate transparency. But they're quite different products, and neither is a perfect fit for every creator.
Here's an honest breakdown of each — and where Creator Rates fits in.
1. CreatorRates.com
Creator Rates is built around one question: is your effective CPM (cost per 1,000 actual views or opens) above, below, or in line with creators like you?
What it does: You submit your sponsorship fees, audience size, and recent performance. Creator Rates calculates your effective CPM and benchmarks it against a peer band of similar-size creators on the same platform. You get a pricing verdict, a fair-price range (p25–p75), and your estimated annual upside if you raised to the median.
The key difference: Peer banding. You're compared to creators of a similar size — not averaged in with everyone, which would skew the comparison toward the largest creators in the dataset.
Best for: Creators who want to know whether they're pricing correctly relative to their market, and to quantify the cost of underpricing.
2. FYPM
FYPM (F*** You Pay Me) started as a community-driven platform where creators could share what brands paid them, to make the market more transparent and reduce lowball offers.
What it does: Creators log specific brand deals they've done — the brand, the deliverable, the fee, and whether they'd recommend working with that brand. The result is a database of brand-specific rates.
The key difference: Brand-level data. If you want to know what a specific brand pays for sponsored Instagram posts, FYPM is the most likely place to find that.
Con: The data can be sparse for smaller niches, and it doesn't give you a structured benchmark against your peer group — it's more useful as intelligence on specific brands than as a pricing framework.
3. Clara for Creators
Clara is a community-first platform for influencer marketing, focused primarily on social creators (Instagram, TikTok) rather than newsletter or podcast creators.
What it does: Clara offers salary/rate transparency data shared by creators, along with content and community resources. It's more of a membership community than a pure data tool.
The key difference: Community and education. If you're looking for a network of other creators and resources beyond just rate data, Clara offers more of that.
Con: Less useful for newsletter, podcast, or YouTube creators who want structured benchmarking by audience size.
Which should you use?
These platforms solve different problems:
- You want to know if your rates are right for your size → Creator Rates
- You want intel on what a specific brand pays → FYPM
- You want a creator community and general education → Clara
There's no reason you can't use all three. But if your primary question is "am I undercharging?" — structured, peer-banded benchmarking is the most direct answer.
Creator Rates is free to use. Submit your rates and see exactly where you sit in your peer band.