When you're coordinating UGC across Russia and US simultaneously, where does creative control actually live?

DTC & UGC Dynamos
1

I’ve been managing a DTC brand’s expansion from Russia to the US for the past four months, and we’re hitting this weird friction point with UGC creators. We have Russian creators who absolutely nail our messaging at home, and we’ve connected with some solid US-based creators. But here’s the thing—when we brief both groups, the Russian creators interpret the brand voice differently than the US creators do. Neither is wrong, but the content feels… disconnected.

I tried creating a unified brief in both languages, but it felt like a rulebook. The authenticity suffers. Then I went the opposite direction—gave each team total creative freedom—and now we have two completely different brand narratives running in parallel. Neither approach feels sustainable.

The bilingual hub discussions I’ve been reading suggest this is actually a common bottleneck for cross-market campaigns, but most threads jump straight to “hire a bilingual project manager.” That’s one answer, but I’m curious what actually works at scale.

Has anyone figured out a process where creators retain their authentic voice while staying loosely aligned on brand positioning? And when you’re managing this across two markets, do you give the same feedback to both creator groups, or does it need to be localized differently?

2

This is such a real problem, and honestly, I think the issue is treating it like a control problem instead of a partnership problem. I’ve seen this work best when you bring creators into the positioning conversation early—not as executors, but as consultants.

With my international collaborations, I’ve found that when Russian and US creators understand why the brand positioning differs between markets (not just that it does), they actually self-correct. Give them market context, competitor insights, audience psychology—not just a brief.

One thing that’s helped: I do separate sync calls with regional creator groups, not unified briefs. In those calls, I ask them to articulate back to me what they think the brand actually stands for in their market. That conversation reveals the gaps way faster than any brief could.

The authenticity comes back when creators feel trusted to make smart decisions, not when they’re given rules. Worth trying?