Why TikTok Creators Are Becoming Their Own Media Agencies

Lucas: So there's this thing happening in the creator economy that I think is actually a bigger structural shift than most people realize: top TikTok creators are quietly becoming their own media agencies. Luna: Meaning they're building in-house teams to handle brand deals instead of going through an external agency? Lucas: Exactly. And it's not just about having a manager anymore. We're talking about creators hiring dedicated media buyers, creative strategists, and even data analysts. Essentially replicating the full-service agency model inside their own operation. Luna: That sounds expensive. Who's actually doing this at scale? Lucas: The clearest example is Chriselle Lim. She has a team of about 12 people now, and it includes a head of brand partnerships, a creative director, and someone whose title is 'growth strategist' — that's basically a media buyer for her own TikTok ad campaigns. She's basically running a boutique agency, but the only client is herself. Luna: Right, because instead of paying a 20 percent commission to an external agency, she keeps that margin and invests it back into her own content. Smart. Lucas: That's the core math. And it's not just her. Addison Rae's team now includes a former agency executive who oversees all brand integrations. Even mid-tier creators — ones with, say, 500,000 followers — are hiring freelance creative directors on a retainer basis. A report from Influencer Marketing Hub last quarter found that creator-led media buying increased by 40 percent year-over-year in the first quarter of 2026. Luna: Forty percent is huge. What's driving that? Is it just about saving money? Lucas: Partly. But I think the bigger driver is control. Creators are realizing that when an agency pitches them to a brand, the agency is optimizing for its own commission, not necessarily for the creator's long-term brand equity. By bringing those functions in-house, the creator can align every deal with their actual audience and values. Luna: There's also a speed factor. If you have your own strategist, you can turn around a brand pitch in 48 hours instead of waiting two weeks for an agency to get back to you. Lucas: Exactly. And that speed matters in a platform like TikTok, where trends move weekly. So what we're seeing is a kind of professionalization of the creator role. It's not just making videos anymore — it's running a media business with p and l, hiring, and strategic planning. Luna: But there's a tension here, right? Because the reason many creators started making content was the creative freedom. Now they're becoming managers. Lucas: That's the paradox. The more successful you get, the less time you spend actually creating. And I think that's where a lot of creators are struggling. They want the control and the margin, but they don't necessarily want to run an agency. Luna: So what's the alternative? Some creators are doing a hybrid model — keeping a small in-house core and outsourcing specific functions like media buying to freelancers. Lucas: That's exactly what I'm seeing. A creator I spoke to recently, who has about 800,000 followers on TikTok, told me she has a full-time brand partnerships manager, but she uses a freelance creative director for campaign concepts. She said the key is knowing which parts of the process are truly strategic for her voice and which are just execution. Luna: Which parts are typically kept in-house? Lucas: Creative direction and audience insights tend to stay in-house because they require deep knowledge of the creator's personal brand. Media buying and analytics are more commonly outsourced — at least until the creator reaches a certain revenue threshold. One benchmark I've heard is that once you're making over $500,000 a year from brand deals, it starts to make financial sense to hire a full-time media buyer. Luna: That's a specific number. Is there data on how many creators are at that level? Lucas: It's still a small slice. I saw a stat from SignalFire that only about 2 percent of TikTok creators with over 100,000 followers earn more than $500,000 annually. But that 2 percent is growing — and they're the ones setting the norms for everyone else. Luna: So the trend might trickle down. As tools get cheaper and more creators hit that revenue level, we could see more of this in-house agency model. Lucas: And that's actually where I think the market is headed. There are already startups building software specifically for creators to manage their own brand deals — things like automated rate card generation, campaign tracking, and performance dashboards. It's basically making the agency function a software service that the creator runs themselves. Luna: So instead of hiring a person, they hire a platform. That could lower the barrier. Lucas: Exactly. And that's what's exciting to me — the democratization of the agency function. But it also raises a question: if every creator runs their own agency, who's left to do the cross-brand strategy that a real agency provides? The holistic view of a market? Luna: I think there will always be a role for the outside perspective. But the balance is shifting. And if these marketing conversations we've been having have sparked something you've actually used in your own work, that's exactly why we keep this show ad-free. We don't run ads, and we want to keep it that way. If you'd like to support that choice, the link is buy me a coffee dot com slash fexingo. No pressure, just an option. Lucas: Yeah, it's a small way to keep the show independent. We appreciate everyone who's chipped in. Luna: Alright, back to the creator agency model. One thing I'm curious about: are there risks to this approach beyond the obvious burnout? Lucas: There are. One big risk is loss of objectivity. When you're your own client, it's easy to fall in love with your own ideas and miss what's actually working in the market. External agencies bring a certain distance that can be valuable. Luna: There's also the brand conflict issue. If a creator's in-house team is negotiating with multiple brands in the same category, they might inadvertently create competition that hurts their own leverage. Lucas: Right. An external agency would normally manage that by having separate teams or firewalls. A solo creator doesn't have that luxury. I've seen cases where a creator ended up with two competing skincare brands in the same quarter, and both felt undervalued. Luna: So the in-house model works best for creators who have a very narrow niche, or who work with a limited number of long-term partners. Lucas: I think that's right. The sweet spot seems to be a creator who has three to five core brand partners and does deeper integrations with each. For creators who do lots of one-off deals, an external agency still makes more sense because they have the bandwidth to manage many relationships. Luna: So what's the takeaway for someone listening who's a creator considering this? What should they look at first? Lucas: I'd say start with the data. Look at your last 10 brand deals. How much time did you spend on negotiation versus creative? How much did you pay in commissions or fees? If the math shows you're losing a meaningful percentage to an agency, and you have the volume to justify a hire, it's worth exploring. But don't do it just to save money — do it because you want more control over your brand. Luna: And if they do decide to hire, what's the first role to fill? Lucas: Almost everyone I've talked to says the first hire should be a brand partnerships manager — someone who handles outreach, negotiation, and relationship management. That frees up the creator to focus on content. After that, a creative strategist or a data analyst, depending on whether the bottleneck is ideas or insights. Luna: It's fascinating to watch the creator economy mature this way. A few years ago, the conversation was all about how to go viral. Now it's about how to build a sustainable business infrastructure. Lucas: And that's a healthy sign. It means the industry is moving from a hit-driven model to a steady-state model. The creators who treat themselves as media companies — with or without an in-house agency — are the ones who'll still be around in five years. Luna: Alright, next episode we're going to look at something a bit different: how creators are using TikTok as a focus group for physical product design. Lucas: That's a good one. See you then.