Original Coverage & Source Attribution: www.storyboard18.com
India’s creator management business is becoming increasingly competitive, with agencies facing pressure not only to secure brand partnerships but also to retain talent in an industry where creators have more representation options than ever before.
While the standard commission for talent management continues to hover around 20%, established creators with strong inbound brand enquiries are increasingly negotiating lower rates, sometimes bringing commissions down to 15%.
According to Sanchit Bhatt, Founder of Here We Go Again Media, however, the bigger challenge for talent management agencies is not necessarily declining commissions. It is the growing competition to retain creators who are increasingly evaluating agencies on the opportunities they can unlock beyond conventional brand endorsements.
In an interview with Storyboard18, Bhatt discussed how the economics of creator management are evolving, why agencies are becoming more flexible with commercial arrangements and how talent poaching has emerged as a persistent challenge for the industry.
The traditional talent management model has largely operated on a commission structure in which agencies receive a percentage of the commercial deals secured for their creators.
Bhatt said the standard industry commission remains around 20%, although that figure is increasingly negotiable depending on a creator’s commercial strength and the nature of the agency’s contribution.
“I would give you a standard commission across all agencies for talent management of around 20%,” he said.
However, creators who already attract significant inbound interest from brands are beginning to question whether the same commission should apply to opportunities they generate independently.
According to Bhatt, such creators may seek to renegotiate their arrangements, particularly when an agency’s role is primarily limited to executing or managing an existing brand partnership rather than originating the opportunity.
In these situations, commissions can fall to approximately 15%, while emerging creators who depend more heavily on agencies for commercial opportunities may continue to pay around 20%.
The result is a more flexible commercial model in which the value delivered by an agency increasingly determines its earning potential.
Bhatt noted that while some agencies maintain strict commission structures, others are willing to renegotiate to preserve relationships with important talent.
Despite the pressure on commission structures, Bhatt does not believe that a five-percentage-point difference is the primary concern for creator management agencies.
Instead, he identified talent poaching and frequent movement between agencies as more significant challenges.
“The problem is the poaching and the people going around through agencies. Everyone is insecure with the roster as of now,” he said.
As India’s creator economy expands, competition between agencies is no longer limited to winning advertising mandates. Agencies are also competing to represent creators who already have established audiences, commercial relationships and strong brand recall.
Bhatt acknowledged that movement between talent management companies is a normal part of the business.
In some cases, competing agencies may offer creators more favourable commission structures. However, he argued that financial incentives alone rarely determine whether a creator changes representation.
“The deciding factor is what kind of work an agency can bring them,” he said.
Personal relationships also play an important role.
Unlike conventional advertising services, talent management depends heavily on the relationship between individual creators and their managers. The manager’s responsiveness, industry connections and ability to identify new opportunities can influence whether a creator stays with an agency.
Bhatt said retaining talent ultimately depends on the quality and proactiveness of the team managing the creator, rather than simply offering a lower commission.
One of the more significant changes in the creator management business, according to Bhatt, is the way creators evaluate the agencies representing them.
Previously, the ability to secure collaborations with large brands could serve as a major differentiator for talent management companies.
That proposition is becoming less distinctive as more agencies develop relationships with the same advertisers and brands increasingly identify creators they want to work with directly.
“A lot of creators now understand that any agency can bring them a brand name. If there’s a brand who’s interested in working with a certain talent, no one can stop it,” Bhatt said.
As a result, creators are beginning to assess agencies on their ability to build a larger career proposition rather than merely deliver a steady pipeline of sponsored campaigns.
Bhatt said creators increasingly want agencies that can help them differentiate themselves in a crowded market.
“If an agency, apart from the brand work they’re bringing in, is getting the creator to stand out among all other creators, that’s what a win is for a creator,” he said.
This shift places greater responsibility on talent managers to identify opportunities that can strengthen a creator’s positioning, visibility and long-term relevance.
For agencies, it also means that commercial deal-making alone may no longer be sufficient to build lasting relationships with talent.
Against this backdrop, Here We Go Again Media is focusing on strengthening its existing creator marketing business rather than pursuing acquisitions.
Bhatt said the company has no immediate plans to acquire other agencies, arguing that its priority is to establish a stronger position in influencer marketing before expanding into additional business areas.
“As of now, there’s no plan to acquire because we want to be the best in whatever we do right now,” he said.
The company is also not actively seeking external capital solely to fund its operations.
Bhatt explained that remaining bootstrapped allows the agency greater flexibility when selecting projects and negotiating commercial margins.
While cash-flow pressures remain a challenge for smaller agencies, he believes the absence of external investors enables the company to prioritise the creative and strategic value of assignments over their immediate contribution to revenue.
“Being a smaller agency, I have a few pros. While there’s always a money crunch in this industry, and because of the taxes and everything, cash flow is always a problem,” he said.
However, he added that the agency can accept smaller margins when it believes a project will strengthen its portfolio.
“I am flexible with smaller margins also if the project is good. I am not playing the game of the top line and the bottom line that an investor would look at. It’s my own thing,” Bhatt said.
For the company, this means prioritising campaigns that generate visibility and demonstrate creative capabilities rather than pursuing assignments solely to increase turnover.
That does not mean the agency has ruled out investment altogether.
Bhatt said he would consider strategic investors who could provide access to larger business opportunities, industry relationships or other advantages beyond capital.
“If apart from money I’m getting added value to my company, which is getting me to a bigger room, that is when I will take an investment,” he said.
He added that the company is keeping its options open but is not currently looking for funding simply for the sake of raising money.
Bhatt’s comments also point to a broader question confronting India’s creator management industry: whether building larger talent rosters necessarily translates into stronger businesses.
As competition intensifies, agencies must balance the commercial advantages of representing more creators against the resources required to manage those relationships effectively.
For creators, the quality of representation is becoming increasingly important as they seek opportunities beyond routine advertising campaigns.
For agencies, meanwhile, retaining valuable talent requires a combination of strong industry relationships, responsive management and a clearer understanding of how individual creators can build differentiated careers.
Bhatt believes the agencies that succeed will be those capable of delivering meaningful career opportunities rather than competing primarily on commission discounts.
The changing dynamics suggest that the next phase of competition in India’s creator economy may be defined less by the number of creators an agency represents and more by the value it can consistently deliver to each of them.
First Published on November 12, 2026, 09:40:32 IST
