I’m at the point where I want to move beyond subcontracting individual creators or running campaigns through one-off freelancers. I want actual partners—agencies, consultants, producer networks—I can refer clients to and collaborate with on bigger stuff.
The problem is, how do you vet someone before you’re already committed? I don’t want to run a paid pilot with every potential partner just to figure out if they’re reliable. That gets expensive and wastes time.
I’m thinking there’s got to be a better signal than a portfolio or LinkedIn endorsements. Are you looking at their client testimonials? Past campaign performance? Do you actually check references, or does that feel outdated? And how deep do you go before you decide to formally partner with someone?
For those of you who’ve built a solid partner ecosystem: what questions are you actually asking, and how do you separate the genuinely capable partners from the ones who just present well?
First thing: ask for case studies with specific metrics. Not “we helped a brand grow,” but “we generated $2.5M in revenue with a 4.2x ROAS over 90 days in this specific category.”
People who don’t have specific metrics either:
- Don’t track them (red flag for how they run campaigns),
- Don’t want to share because results were mediocre (red flag),
- Are new to the space (which might be fine depending on your situation).
Second: ask about their worst campaigns. The honest partners will tell you where they’ve failed and what they learned. The ones who paint everything as wins are either lying or they don’t analyze their work. Either way, next.
Third: ask for three specific references—people who’ve terminated partnerships with them. Yes, terminated. If they can’t name even one client they’ve parted ways with professionally, something’s off. Everyone has disagreements sometimes.
Also, take a look at their actual process documentation. Do they have a brief template? A kickoff workflow? How do they handle feedback and revisions? If they can’t articulate their process clearly, they probably don’t have one, which means every project is a mini-negotiation. That gets exhausting at scale.
Honest story: I partnered with someone once based on strong recommendations from peers. Seemed solid. But when we actually worked together, their communication style was so different from ours that every project felt like friction. We parted ways after three months.
What I do now: have a working conversation before you formalize anything. Not a sales call—an actual working session. Give them a hypothetical brief, let them ask questions, see how they think through problems. You’ll learn way more about how they operate in 90 minutes than from a portfolio.
Also, small thing: if they’re hard to reach or slow to respond during the vetting phase, that’s how they’ll be as a partner. Don’t rationalize it.
I ask people in the community directly. Like, if I see someone’s work I like, I ask them who they collaborate with and who they trust. Community referrals are so much warmer than cold outreach, and you get honest feedback because your peers know their reputation is on the line.
Then I do a small test project—nothing expensive, just something that lets me see how we work together. Maybe it’s consulting, not a full campaign. The goal is to understand their work style, communication cadence, and whether they actually deliver what they say.
The partners I work with now? All came through warm introductions in communities like this. It just works better.
Here’s my vetting framework: credentials, capacity, and chemistry.
Credentials: Have they worked in this specific space? Not just “influencer marketing”—have they actually done multilingual campaigns, UGC at scale, whatever your specific need is? Experience matters.
Capacity: Can they actually take on your workload without getting stretched? Ask about their current clients, team size, bandwidth. If they say “yes” to everything, they’re either lying or about to disappoint you.
Chemistry: Can you actually work together? Values alignment, communication style, speed of decision-making. You’re going to spend hundreds of hours with this person. Vibe check matters more than people admit.
I usually do all three assessments in parallel. If someone checks two out of three boxes, they’re not a fit. You need all three.
From my side—how do they treat creators? Do they actually communicate clearly about deliverables, payment terms, usage rights? Or is everything vague until you’re mid-project?
If a potential partner can’t clearly explain creator logistics to you, imagine how they explain it to actual creators. That’s going to hurt your reputation too.
I trust agencies that have creator testimonials way more than brand testimonials. Because creators are brutal about bad experiences and they’ll tell other creators. If a partner has positive creator feedback, they’re probably solid in execution.