Last reviewed: October 2026
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This free influencer campaign checklist is for marketing managers, brand teams and agencies that work with content creators. One run is one creator campaign, with one creator or several. It starts with the objectives, KPIs and budget, then the brief with its key messages, deliverables, dos and don’ts, timings and disclosure instructions. It covers finding and vetting creators (audience fit and location, past content, previous brand deals, signs of fake followers and brand safety), outreach and terms, and contracts covering usage rights, exclusivity, approval rights, payment and the obligation to label every post as an ad. Every draft is checked and approved before it goes live, every live post is checked for its label, and the campaign ends with results against the KPIs, payment and a wrap-up. The markets, gifted products, creators under 18, paid amplification, an agency and regulated products add the matching notes and tasks.
Working with creators puts your brand in someone else’s feed. The post is theirs, the audience is theirs and most of the words are theirs, but the brand shares responsibility for it. In the UK, the CMA and the ASA say both the brand and the creator are responsible for making clear that an ad is an ad. In the US, the FTC’s Endorsement Guides say an advertiser can be liable for an endorser’s undisclosed connection. That is why this checklist has a contract, a review of every draft and a check of every live post.
It sits beside two other templates. The quarterly Social Media Audit Checklist looks back across all the brand’s own accounts, including whether paid and creator posts were labelled. The Campaign Launch Checklist gets the brand’s own campaign live across its channels. This checklist runs one creator campaign, from the brief to the last payment.
Asks: who should we work with, on what terms, and is every post approved before it goes live and labelled once it is?
When: once per campaign, over about eight weeks from the brief to the wrap-up.
Output: vetted creators, signed contracts, approved content, labelled posts, results against the KPIs and paid invoices.
Asks: which accounts do we have, who can get into them, and were paid, gifted and creator posts labelled?
When: once a quarter, in the Social Media Audit Checklist.
Output: an account inventory, security fixes and an approved action plan.
Asks: is every asset for the brand’s own campaign ready, approved and tracked before it goes live?
When: once per campaign, in the Campaign Launch Checklist.
Output: a campaign live on the brand’s own channels with its tracking in place.
Nine phases follow one creator campaign from the objectives to the wrap-up. The first task records the markets, which add UK, US or other-country disclosure notes to the brief, the draft checks and the live checks. Gifted products, a creator under 18, an agency, paid amplification and a regulated product each add the tasks they need, and every vetting and content check records whether it found a concern. The content approver signs off each creator’s content before anything goes live.
Answer the questions in the first task before anything else: the markets the campaign runs in, how creators are rewarded, whether any creator could be under 18, whether you will run their posts as paid ads, whether an agency is involved and whether the product is regulated. They add the matching notes and tasks. Every due date counts in working days from the day planning starts, when you start the brief, not from the go-live date.
The brief is what each creator works from. Write the disclosure instructions into it from the start, so the ad label is part of the job rather than a correction after the post is live. A regulated product adds a task to get specialist sign-off before anything goes to creators.
Look past the follower count. A creator whose audience is in the wrong country, who has just worked with a competitor or who has left the ad label off before is a risk to the campaign and to the brand. Each check records No concerns or Concerns found.
Contact the shortlisted creators, agree what each one will make and for what, and share the brief and your disclosure policy before anything is signed. An agency adds a task to brief it, and gifted products add a task to send them with written labelling instructions.
Every creator gets a written agreement, including for gifted products. Put the disclosure obligation in it, with the brand’s right to ask for corrections. A creator who could be under 18 adds a task for the extra care that needs.
Every draft is checked against the brief before it goes live: the claims, the key messages, the ad label and the rights to anything shown. The content approver signs the content off, and nothing after that step can be completed until they do.
Check every post on the day it goes live, on a phone, as a follower would see it. A post without a clear ad label adds a task to have it corrected straight away. Paid amplification adds two tasks.
Report against the KPIs set in Phase 1, using the creators’ own insights for reach and views and your own figures for clicks, codes and sales. Pay each creator once their deliverables are live, labelled and checked. A gifted-only campaign has no payment task.
Close the campaign properly: record when each usage right ends, remind creators that the label still applies, and write down what to repeat and what to change next time.
The disclosure instructions in the brief, the clause in the contract and the checks in Phases 6 and 7 all come back to the same rules. These are the main points from the UK and US guidance for brands and creators. The table is a starting point, not legal advice.
| Topic | UK (ASA, CAP and CMA guidance) | US (FTC Endorsement Guides) |
|---|---|---|
| Who is responsible | Both the brand and the creator. The CMA says brands should check content that refers to them, act when it is not labelled, and make sure agencies and other intermediaries understand the rules too. | Advertisers can be liable for failing to disclose a material connection with an endorser, even when the endorser is not liable. Agencies and other intermediaries can be liable for their part (16 CFR 255.1(d) and (f)). |
| Gifts and other benefits | Any incentive counts as payment, including free products, discounts, trips, loans and commission, even when nothing is asked in return. Send gifts with written instructions to label any post about them. | Free or discounted products count, whether or not the advertiser asks for a post, and so can early access or the chance to win a prize (16 CFR 255.5(a)). The FTC asks companies that send unsolicited products to ask for the gift to be disclosed. |
| Words to use | Say what it is: “Ad”, “Advert”, “Advertising” or “Advertisement”. | Simple, clear words such as “Ad”, “Advertisement” or “Sponsored”, in the same language as the endorsement. |
| Words to avoid | “Gifted”, “Sponsored”, “Spon”, “Collab”, “Aff”, “In association with”, “In partnership with”, “Thank you”, or just tagging or naming the brand. | Vague terms such as “sp”, “spon” or “collab”. |
| Where the label goes | Clear, prominent and upfront, so people know it is an ad as soon as they see it: not only in the bio, behind “more”, buried among hashtags or poorly contrasted with the background. | Difficult to miss and, on social media, unavoidable (16 CFR 255.0(f)); not only behind a link labelled “more” (16 CFR 255.0, example 9). |
| Video, stories and live | At the start of a video or podcast, not part-way through. Label each item in a carousel or each story in a series that promotes the brand; each format needs its own label. | In the video itself, on screen and spoken, not only in the description; on a story, long enough to read; repeated during live streams. |
| Platform tools | A tool such as Instagram’s Paid partnership label may be enough if it is upfront, clear and prominent; if not, add “Ad”. | Do not assume a platform’s tool is enough: the FTC suggests adding your own disclosure too. A built-in label that is easy to miss is not clear and conspicuous (16 CFR 255.0, example 9). |
| Claims | Creators should not say they have used a product they have not, or make claims they cannot support. | Endorsers and advertisers can both be liable for misleading or unsubstantiated claims in an endorsement (16 CFR 255.1(d) and (e)). |
| Younger audiences | Advertising to children needs enhanced disclosure and particular care with the content, such as not asking them directly to buy. | Endorsements aimed at children may be of special concern (16 CFR 255.6). The FTC notes that a disclosure that works for adults may not work for younger audiences. |
| After the campaign, and abroad | Creators are expected to disclose throughout the relationship and in relevant content for 12 months after it. | US law applies when it is reasonably foreseeable that a post will affect US consumers, even if the creator posts from abroad. |
Sources. UK: the ASA and CMA’s Influencers’ guide to making clear that ads are ads (third edition, March 2023), and the CMA’s Social media endorsements guidance for brands (updated August 2025) and for content creators (updated September 2025). The ASA says the influencer guide will be updated for the Digital Markets, Competition and Consumers Act 2024, whose unfair commercial practices provisions replaced the Consumer Protection Regulations, and that its advice remains broadly correct. US: the FTC’s Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising (16 CFR Part 255, revised in July 2023), Disclosures 101 for Social Media Influencers and the Endorsement Guides FAQs.
Regulated products. Alcohol, gambling, financial promotions, medicines and other age-restricted products have their own advertising rules on top of these. The checklist adds a specialist sign-off when you say the product is regulated.
Other countries. Rules on advertising disclosure differ by country. Check the rules where your audience is, and each platform’s branded content policy, with an adviser.
Enter the day planning starts and every task falls due a set number of working days after it. Tasks are assigned from the four people named in the first task, overdue alerts go to the assignees, and campaigns in progress show on the Reports Grid. Tables keep each creator’s terms, drafts, post links and payments in one place.
The markets add UK, US or other-country disclosure notes where the label is written and checked. Gifted products add a task to send them with labelling instructions, and a gifted-only campaign drops the payment task. An agency, a creator under 18, paid amplification, a regulated product or a post without its label each add a task. Every check records No concerns or Concerns found.
The content approver reviews each creator’s final draft against the brief, the claims and the disclosure rules, and records the decision. Nothing after that approval step can be completed until it is recorded, so the go-live checks, reporting and payments all wait for a decision on record.
CheckFlow does not find creators, connect to social media platforms or pay invoices. Your team uses its own tools for those. CheckFlow makes sure every creator is vetted, contracted, approved and checked the same way, and that the approval is on record. Workflow software shows how hand-offs like these run across a team.
Shape the brief with the Creative Brief Intake Checklist, take the creator contract through the Contract Review & Approval Checklist, keep logos and product shots in order with the Brand Asset Management Checklist and check the page creators link to with the Landing Page QA Checklist. Each quarter, the Social Media Audit Checklist checks every account the brand runs.
Describe the process in a sentence and the AI checklist generator drafts the phases and tasks for you.
Objectives, KPIs and a budget; a brief with the key messages, deliverables, dos and don’ts, timings and disclosure instructions; vetting each creator’s audience, past content, previous brand deals, signs of fake followers and brand safety; outreach and terms; a contract covering deliverables, usage rights, exclusivity, approval rights, payment terms and the obligation to label every post as an ad; a review and approval of every draft before it goes live; a check of each live post’s label; paid amplification if you use it; reporting against the KPIs; paying creators; and a wrap-up.
Ask for screenshots of their own insights to see where their audience is and how old it is, then read the last few months of their content for tone and topics. Look at their previous brand deals, especially with competitors, and whether those posts were labelled as ads. Look for signs of fake followers, such as sudden jumps in followers or generic, repeated comments, and check for anything in their past that could embarrass the brand.
The deliverables and dates; usage rights (where the brand may reuse the content, in which markets and for how long); any exclusivity; the brand’s right to review drafts and ask for changes; the fee, when it is paid and what triggers payment; what happens if a deliverable is missed or a post comes down early; and the creator’s obligation to label every piece of content as an ad and correct a missing label when asked. For a creator who could be under 18, agree the terms with a parent or guardian and take advice. The Contract Review & Approval Checklist runs the review itself.
Yes. The CMA’s guidance says any incentive, including a gift of any product, counts as payment, so posts about it must be labelled as ads even when nothing was asked in return, and brands should send gifts with clear instructions to label them. In the US, the FTC’s Endorsement Guides treat free or discounted products as a material connection whether or not the advertiser asks for a post.
In the UK, the ASA and CMA guide advises a clear “Ad” or “Advert” label at the very start, and advises against “Gifted”, “Sponsored”, “Spon”, “Collab” or just tagging the brand. In the US, the FTC says the disclosure should be hard to miss and, on social media, unavoidable, using words such as “Ad”, “Advertisement” or “Sponsored”, in the video itself and repeated in live streams. For a campaign seen in both, “Ad” at the start works for both. The table above sets out the details.
Both the brand and the creator. The CMA says brands should check content that refers to them, should not ignore posts that are not labelled, and should work with the creator and any agency to correct them promptly; it also warns that brands are at risk if they keep working with a creator who repeatedly fails to label ads. The FTC’s Guides say advertisers should give endorsers guidance, monitor their posts and act on problems, and that advertisers can be liable even when the endorser is not.
It is the easiest point to catch a missing label or an unsupported claim: the FTC notes that reviewing posts before they go up is much easier than finding them afterwards. In the UK, be aware that when a brand pays a creator and has control over the content, including final approval, the ASA can treat it as an ad under the CAP Code, so the Code’s other rules apply to it as well as the label.
It is when the brand runs a creator’s post as a paid ad, often under the creator’s name with their permission through the platform’s partnership tools. Before you do it, check the contract’s usage rights cover paid ads in those markets and for that long, keep the creator’s ad label in the ad, target only audiences the product may be advertised to, and stop the ads when the rights end.
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