Did This 16.5K YouTuber's Boundary Cost Her The Deal?

People ask me all the time:

"Aren't BIG sponsorship deals only for creators with AT LEAST 100K+ followers? Like... who would wanna sponsor ME?"

Well lemme introduce you to Liz...

She has 16.5K YouTube subscribers, works full-time as a data scientist at Intel, and recently pitched Scribe on a sponsorship... potentially her biggest one!

(Btw she literally pitched them by COPY-PASTING the frameworks from my book, Sponsor Magnet lol)

Today I wanna break down how Liz negotiated with Scribe and what happened when the brand pushed back.

(Click here to view the full episode on YouTube and see what happened 😉)

The Backstory

Here's what happened...

2 years ago, Liz made a free YouTube tutorial about Scribe.

She wasn't even PAID for it.

Liz just loved the software and wanted to share how she used it in her creator business.

(She had maybe 2K-5K YouTube subs at the time and figured it would get at least SOME views)

Fast forward to recently...

Scribe emailed Liz asking if she wanted to join their new affiliate program. Pretty typical ngl.

But Liz had ANOTHER idea lol:

"Hey, wanna do some sponsored content?"

Even though Scribe had never worked with a creator before, they were curious about what a partnership could look like.

So they basically replied:

Uhhhh... we don't REALLY know what we're doing. You tell us?

But before Liz even THOUGHT about sending a proposal, she insisted they get on a discovery call first.

And here's why:

Several years ago, Liz was involved in a sponsorship deal that she got absolutely BURNED on.

She did everything over email, never met with the brand once... just jumped straight into the deal.

She filmed the video.

She edited it.

Then her worst nightmare happened:

The brand wanted to go a completely different direction (which meant everything Liz created was USELESS 🫠).

It was a total disaster.

That's why when Scribe came asking about a partnership, Liz made sure they chatted through the specifics first.

On that discovery call, Liz learned that Scribe wanted conversions (which btw is one of the HARDEST goals to negotiate because brands want guaranteed results).

She also got to vet them to make sure they weren't gonna be nightmare clients.

By the end of the call, Liz knew EXACTLY what she needed to pitch.

And now the work begins 😏

The Proposal

Immediately after the call, Liz grabbed my book off her desk and started building her proposal.

(She literally had Sponsor Magnet sitting there with tabs EVERYWHERE lol)

Inside the proposal Liz included:

✅ Her 16.5K subscriber count and audience demographics

✅ 3 package tiers(straight fromStep 2: Negotiate in my book, Sponsor Magnet)

✅ Paid usage rights(a concept she wasn't familiar with until reading my book)

✅ Performance review meetings(to track results and optimize future collaborations)

✅ Clear deliverables for each tier(so there's ZERO confusion about what's expected)

Then Liz did what I call a "sniff test":

She asked herself if the investment she came up with FELT right to her.

Once Liz's partnership proposal was set, she polished it off (with Scribe's colors!) and sent it to the brand.

The Big Negotiation

Turns out, Scribe pushed back.

This is where 99% of creators panic and immediately drop their rate because "well, at least I'll get SOMETHING."​

Seems fair, right?

Or... does it?

Even though Liz felt a bit nervous about losing the deal, she decided to trust the frameworks and set a BOUNDARY.

Here's what Liz told Scribe:

"Look, this is the absolute lowest I can go. I try to partner with very few brands as it's a core part of my business. I need less than 72 hours response time on concepts and scripts, and regular meetings to review performance."

And then... she waited.

So what happened?

Did the brand walk away?

Did they accept her terms?

Did Liz end up regretting drawing that line in the sand?

Watch the full episode to find out!