UGC creator brand deals

The claim

“if i were absolutely broke and in high school or college, i would create ugc videos for platforms like whop

it’s honestly your perfect entry point to make money while building serious skills in content creation and marketing

this approach can net you a couple grand per month”

@masonrizz, 16 April 2025, 1,353 views¹

“UGC” means user-generated content: short product videos that look as if an ordinary customer filmed them. A brand pays a freelancer for one and uses it as an advert. Billo, one of the marketplaces (sites that list jobs and take a cut), says no social media presence is required²². The tweet above is the only one of our 4 that states an income¹. The page judges the scheme, not the people who tweeted.

The sums

We take “a couple grand” as $2,000 a month. The tweets give no rates; the figures below come from two marketplaces and Whop¹.

Collabstr does not say whether its $154 is before or after fees, hence the range⁸¹⁰. Whop’s $1 figure is from March 2025 and about clip reposters; its fee was not found². Whop pays for views on the creator’s own accounts, so that route needs reach²⁵.

Forty-two videos is more than one a day. The one survey we found, of over 1,000 UGC creators in late 2023, put the median (the middle value) at 10 posts a month for full-timers and 5 for part-timers¹⁸.

What happens to most people who try

In that survey, “the median annual earnings were $1,500”, which is $125 a month (our sum)¹⁸. The typical respondent was a beginner: 59% had done UGC for less than a year and almost two thirds were part-time¹⁸. The figures are creators’ own estimates, are three years old, and miss people who tried and stopped¹⁸.

Three marketplaces’ payout totals, divided by their own creator counts, give about $1,660 per creator at Billo to January 2024, about $1,000 at JoinBrands over 4.5 years, and about $80 at Insense since 2020⁷³⁷⁶⁷⁷. These are our estimates from round figures; the counts include people who never worked.

Getting hired is unpaid work. Billo advises 30 applications at the start, and another marketplace, Speekly, is reported to advise 50²¹³⁴.

The one first-person report we found from someone with nothing to sell was $540 for her first active month, July 2022, with no proof shown³³. Only $80 was for video, and she wrote that she had about 4,700 Instagram followers³³.

Competition is rising: Collabstr’s 2025 report said UGC creator numbers rose 93% in a year while asking prices fell by about 44%⁹.

The upside

Brands do pay, and a few creators on record reach the tweet’s figure.

• Billo’s three showcased creators. The best shows $162k for 2,452 videos since 2020²². Our estimate: about $2,000 to $2,300 a month over six to seven years. The other two, who joined in 2021, come to roughly $1,000 to $1,600 a month (our estimate), under the tweet’s figure²². Billo chose them; they are not independently checked²².
• Retainers (standing monthly orders). One creator says he makes $6,000 to $10,000 a month, including 8 videos a month for $1,500³⁵. He sells a $500 course³⁵.
• A viral month. One creator told the Wall Street Journal of earning $11,000 in July after several videos went viral⁴⁹. It is the best single month we found from someone not shown selling a course, self-reported and read only through a summary⁴⁹.

We found no payment proof for any individual. A realistic good result for a steady marketplace regular is several hundred dollars a month (our estimate).

What it takes to compete

• Volume, every month. The freelancers with records deliver about 18 to 35 videos a month²².
• Experience or contacts. The highest earners we found had advertising experience, results to show, or clients who came through contacts³⁵³⁶.
• Being an adult. The tweet speaks to high-school students, but Billo’s terms and Whop’s earnings terms say 18 or over⁶²³. Another Whop page says under-18s cannot earn until a guardian is verified and consents; we did not establish which applies⁷.

Costs are small: about $50 of equipment and a phone³. A course is not required; nothing we found shows course buyers earn more.

To tell early, we suggest three checks. Were you hired at all after 30 to 50 applications²¹³⁴? Has any brand ordered a second time³⁵? Has anyone offered a retainer or more than about $150? If every offer is near $50, the table shows the volume needed.

Who else makes money from it

The marketplaces earn on every deal. JoinBrands takes 15% to 20% from the creator¹⁴.

Course sellers earn too. Another tweet in our collection offers a course at $397¹⁴³. The seller’s site says: “Some students may not earn income during or after the program.”⁴⁴

Apart from that newspaper account, every first-person report above $2,000 a month we found came from someone selling a course or newsletter, recruiting for a programme, or from a course’s customer reviews^31353637. That is a pattern in a handful of sources, not proof about any one person.