Write a creator brief
By Starcovery. Updated .
Describe what the creators post in one sentence, name the platform, home country, and follower size in words, and refine the results in a Thread.
To write a creator brief, describe in one sentence what the creators post and who your audience is, then name the platform, the creators' home country, and the follower size in words. Starcovery sets those three filters from your words, ranks creators for the brief, and lets you refine the results in a Thread on /app.
This page covers the steps, four example briefs with the filters each one yields, what each step costs, and the questions marketers ask.
Steps
Describe what the creators post
Name the niche and the content, such as "creators who film espresso recipes at home", and add the audience your business sells to when it matters, such as "for hobbyist baristas". A brief is up to 200 characters. On /app, a first message that is longer becomes one brief of one sentence under 200 characters.
Describe what a video shows. Words about views, engagement, rates, or audience demographics are not checked as filters. Narrow on views and engagement after the first search, as Refine in the Thread describes.
Name the platform, country, and follower size
Starcovery reads three filters from a first brief:
| Filter | Words that set it | Values |
|---|---|---|
| Platform | "on Instagram", "TikTok creators" | Instagram, TikTok |
| Country | The creators' home country, or a city in it: "UK based", "Korean creators", "creators in Indonesia", "in Los Angeles" | Every country |
| Followers | A tier name, a follower count, or an open-ended count at a tier bound | Nano 1K to 10K, Micro 10K to 50K, Mid 50K to 250K, Macro 250K to 1M, Mega 1M+ |
A follower count sets the tier that contains it: "around 100K followers" is Mid. An open-ended count at a tier bound sets every tier on that side: "more than 10K followers" is Micro+ 10K+, and "under 50K followers" is Up to 49,999 followers. Any other open-ended count, such as "over 100K followers", sets no follower filter.
Country means where the creators live. Words about the audience, such as "for a US audience" or "targeting UK fans", set no country, because no filter checks where an audience lives. A place where the creators do not sell, such as "not selling products in Korea", sets no country either; write "skincare creators in Korea not selling products" for creators who live there.
A brief that asks for another platform, such as YouTube or Twitch, sets no platform, and the reply says that Starcovery has only Instagram and TikTok creators. The Brief row leaves the words that asked for that platform out, as it does for Instagram or TikTok.
Leave out what you do not want
Start the part to leave out with exclude, excluding, except, or without, such as "home cafe creators, excluding coffee shops and sponsored posts". Starcovery reads each creator's profile and sample videos and drops the creators that part names. When without names how the content is made, as in "baking without sugar", it stays part of what you want.
Ask for real people, indie creators, or individual creators to leave out brand, business, and organization accounts, and creators whose sample videos are mostly sponsored posts or ads.
Only exclude, excluding, except, and without start a part to leave out. A brief that says "not" keeps those words in the description of the creators you want.
Run the brief
Type the brief in the composer on /app and choose Send. To start from your company website instead, paste its address, and the Thread drafts a brief from the site.
The Thread shows a Search plan card with the Brief, Platform, Country, and Followers it searches, and a chip in the composer for each filter the search has. The Brief row holds the words that describe the creators, without the words that set the platform, the country, or the follower size, such as "coffee creators" for "UK based coffee creators around 100k followers on Instagram", because the other rows state those filters. Instagram and TikTok, Anywhere, and Any size mean the search has no platform, country, or follower filter, so they get no chip. To drop a filter the brief set by mistake, remove its chip once the turn finishes, and the results reload without it and keep every other filter and narrowing the Thread holds.
When the search has no country filter, the composer shows a Country button beside the filter chips. It opens a searchable list of every country with its flag. Typing matches country names, codes, and other names, and tolerates near misses, so "korea" finds Korea, "uk" finds United Kingdom, and "indo" finds Indonesia. Choose a country to set the country filter: the Thread adds the line "Set the country filter to Indonesia." with a Search plan card, and the results reload with the filter, the same way removing a chip reloads them without it.
Refine in the Thread
Send the next message in the Thread composer, Refine or paste a site:
- A message that narrows, with words such as only, of these, above, or below, keeps a subset of the creators on screen. It narrows on follower tier, average views, engagement on views, platform, home country, verified accounts, or the best-fit few. Average views and engagement come from up to 6 of each creator's newest posts with a video, fewer when the creator has fewer such posts.
- A message that leaves a kind of creator out, such as "not brand accounts", reads the creators on screen and drops that kind. The Search plan Brief keeps its earlier words and gains the exclusion at its end, such as ", excluding brand accounts". With no creators on screen there is nothing to leave out, so the reply says so and the search stays as it is.
- A message that asks for more creators, or for another kind as well, runs a new search and adds its creators to the ones on screen, and when the two sets together pass 50 creators, each keeps an equal share of its best fit creators. The reply states how many creators the search added, says so when it added none, and states how many creators that were on screen the new list leaves out. A message that asks for more creators like the ones on screen, such as "more creators like these", and names no new kind, keeps the search the Thread already holds. A message that asks only to add a platform the search already covers, and nothing else, such as "also TikTok creators" on a search on Instagram and TikTok, or on TikTok alone, runs no search and changes nothing: the reply says that the search already covers TikTok, and the creators on screen, the Search plan, and the count line stay as they are. A message that narrows to that platform, such as "only TikTok creators", still narrows the creators on screen, and one that asks for more creators on it, such as "more TikTok creators like these", still runs a search.
- A message that replaces the search starts over. A message that asks for a new search and asks for no more creators and no other kind as well, such as "run a new search for coffee creators in Mexico", replaces the search, and the new search takes its platform, country, and follower tier only from the message, except that a switch to the other platform or a follower tier replacement keeps the other filters of the running search.
A message that narrows, leaves a kind out of the creators on screen, or runs a new search adds a Search plan card that states the search the Thread holds after that message: the brief, the filters, and a row for each narrowing on average views, engagement, verified accounts, or the best-fit few. A message that only narrows the creators on screen runs no search and still adds a card, also when it keeps none of them: the card shows the new value when the message sets one, and repeats the earlier values when it does not. Later messages keep those narrowings: removing a chip, switching the platform, replacing the follower tier, or asking for more creators like these keeps them on every creator the new search adds. A message that the reply alone answers adds no card. Neither does a message that leaves a kind out when no creators are on screen: the search did not change, so there is no new search to state.
A message that narrows the creators on screen to a home country, such as "only creators based in Mexico", filters them on that country. The results keep the creators who live there, and the list is empty when none of them does, such as "only creators based in the UK" over a Brazil search; the reply says that none of the creators on screen lives there. The Search plan card that message adds reads that country, and the composer shows its chip. The card of a later message that narrows those creators again without naming a country reads it too. A message that switches to the other platform of a search that has one, such as "only TikTok creators" after an Instagram search, replaces the search with one on the new platform that keeps the brief and the other filters. A message that adds the other platform, such as "also TikTok creators", keeps the creators on screen and adds the new platform's creators to them, and when the two sets together pass 50 creators, each keeps an equal share of its best fit creators. Its card reads Instagram and TikTok. A later "only Instagram creators" narrows the creators on screen back to Instagram, and its card reads Instagram beside the same brief. A message that asks for a new search in a country, such as "run a new search for coffee creators in Mexico", runs the search with that country as its country filter, and the composer shows the Mexico chip.
Followers narrow by tier only. For a count that is no tier bound, such as "over 100K", the reply names the nearest tier. A tier that shares no follower count with the tier of the Search plan, such as "only micro creators" over Mid 50K to 250K results, narrows nothing, so the Thread runs a new search for that tier and keeps the brief, the platform, and the country. When no filter or search can check what you ask, such as follower age, the reply says so and the results stay as they are. New Thread starts another Thread for a new brief.
Save the creators
Select creators, then choose Hire These Creators to start a campaign with them, or Save as List. Signed out, Hire These Creators asks you to sign in. See Campaigns and Pay creators and handle disclosure.
Example briefs
The first three briefs set every filter they name. The Search plan card shows these values, and its Brief row reads the brief's other words, such as "coffee creators" for the first one:
| Brief | Platform | Country | Followers |
|---|---|---|---|
| UK based coffee creators around 100k followers on Instagram | United Kingdom | Mid 50K to 250K | |
| nano creators in France posting street food | Instagram and TikTok | France | Nano 1K to 10K |
| fitness creators on TikTok in the United States with under 50k followers | TikTok | United States | Up to 49,999 followers |
The fourth brief loses what it asks for:
| Brief | Platform | Country | Followers |
|---|---|---|---|
| skincare creators with a US audience | Instagram and TikTok | Anywhere | Any size |
"With a US audience" names where the audience lives, which no filter checks, so the search covers creators in every country. When the creators should live in the United States, write "US based skincare creators".
Live example
Each example brief builds on the brief of a published search page. coffee creators is the published search page for the brief "coffee creators", with no filter. It lists the ranked creators with each one's platform, followers, average views, and engagement on views. Each creator name opens the creator page, such as @jameshoffmanncoffee. Run This Search runs the brief on /app, where a follow-up such as "only Instagram creators based in the UK" narrows it.
The other examples start from street food, fitness creators, and skincare creators.
Prices
Each step spends uses of the daily grant: 100 per rolling 24 hours per IP without an account, and 200 per user signed in. Signed in, each use past the grant spends one credit, and a credit costs $0.05.
| Step | Price |
|---|---|
| Run a first brief on /app, or as the first message to the assistant on another page | 1 use for the Thread turn, plus 1 search, or up to 2 searches when the brief names a platform, country, or follower size |
| Narrow the creators on screen | 1 use for the turn, and no search |
| Leave a kind of creator out | 1 use for the turn, plus 1 for the exclusion. With no creators on screen nothing is left out, so no exclusion runs or spends and the brief stays as it was |
| Ask for more creators, or replace the search | 1 use for the turn, plus each search it runs, up to 3 |
| Remove a filter chip | 1 search when the results reload, or the price of a repeat in the next row when you already searched the brief with the filters that remain |
| Choose a country with Country | 1 search when the results reload, or the price of a repeat in the next row when you already searched the brief with that country filter |
| Repeat a brief and filters you already searched | 1 use for the turn. The search is free while the first one is in your search history, or for 24 hours from the same IP without an account |
A search past the grant, a contact reveal, and a private campaign each spend 1 credit. Prepaid credit packs are on Pricing. See Pay for API calls without a subscription for the full cost table.
Frequently asked questions
What should a creator brief include?
What the creators post, who your audience is, and, when they matter, the platform, the creators' home country, and the follower size. One sentence of up to 200 characters.
Is this the brief I send to creators?
No. In Starcovery, a brief describes the creators you want to find. Creators read the proposal: what they post, the pay per creator, the creator posting date, and the disclosure statement. See Pay creators and handle disclosure.
How do I find creators in a specific country?
Name the creators' home country or a city in it, such as "UK based", "creators in Indonesia", or "in Seoul", and the brief sets that country's filter. Once the Thread has a search with no country filter, choose Country in the composer and pick the country, or send a follow-up such as "only creators based in Mexico", which narrows the creators on screen by home country.
Can I search for creators whose audience is in the US?
No. No filter checks where an audience lives. Words such as "for a US audience" stay in the brief and set no country.
How do I search by follower count?
Write a tier name, such as "micro creators", or a follower count, such as "around 100K followers". "More than 10K" and "under 50K" set every tier on that side of the bound. A count that is no tier bound, such as "over 100K", sets no follower filter.
Can I filter creators by engagement rate or views?
Yes, after the first search. Send a follow-up such as "only those above 100K average views" in the Thread. The brief itself does not check views or engagement.
How do I exclude brand accounts?
Ask for real people, indie creators, or individual creators in the brief, or send "not brand accounts" in the Thread.
Can I search YouTube creators?
No. Starcovery has only Instagram and TikTok creators, and a brief that asks for another platform searches both.
Can I write a brief in another language?
Yes. The brief runs as typed. Exclude, excluding, except, without, real people, indie creators, and individual creators work in English only.
What does a creator brief cost?
A first brief on /app, or sent to the assistant on another page, is one Thread turn: 1 use for the turn plus 1 or 2 searches, from the daily grant and then 1 credit each. See Prices.