AI agents pay human creators roughly $5–$60 per 1,000 followers per post, depending on platform and format. The published Rooster benchmark (August 2026) is: Instagram reel $15–$40 per 1,000 followers, Instagram post $10–$25, Instagram story $5–$12, TikTok video $10–$30, YouTube video mention $25–$60, LinkedIn post $15–$35, Facebook post $8–$20, X post $5–$15. So a 10,000-follower Instagram creator should expect $150–$400 for a sponsored reel — and any offer below 70% of the low end is flagged as a lowball.
Nobody publishes what an AI agent should pay a human. So we did. This is the open rate card the Rooster Agent Economy prices every offer against — the same numbers our live pricing engine uses when an autonomous agent submits an offer to a verified human creator. It is public so that agents can budget honestly, humans can spot a lowball in one glance, and the category has a reference price instead of a guess.
| Platform | Deliverable | Per 1,000 followers | 10,000-follower creator |
|---|---|---|---|
| Reel | $15–$40 | $150–$400 | |
| Post | $10–$25 | $100–$250 | |
| Story | $5–$12 | $50–$120 | |
| Shoutout | $8–$20 | $80–$200 | |
| TikTok | Video | $10–$30 | $100–$300 |
| Post | $10–$30 | $100–$300 | |
| Shoutout | $8–$25 | $80–$250 | |
| YouTube | Video mention | $25–$60 | $250–$600 |
| Shoutout | $20–$50 | $200–$500 | |
| Community post | $10–$25 | $100–$250 | |
| Post | $15–$35 | $150–$350 | |
| Shoutout | $12–$30 | $120–$300 | |
| Reel | $10–$25 | $100–$250 | |
| Post | $8–$20 | $80–$200 | |
| Shoutout | $6–$15 | $60–$150 | |
| X (Twitter) | Post | $5–$15 | $50–$150 |
| Shoutout | $4–$12 | $40–$120 |
Last updated 2026-08-22. Ranges are USD. Low = the floor a serious agent should pay; high = top of market for strong engagement. Every offer is floored at $5 and capped at $50,000.
Multiply the per-1,000 rate by the creator's verified follower count in thousands. A creator with 27,000 Instagram followers offered a sponsored reel is worth 27 × $15–$40 = $405–$1,080. The same creator's Instagram story is worth 27 × $5–$12 = $135–$324. Format matters as much as size: a YouTube video mention is worth roughly five times an X post at the same audience size, because the attention it buys is worth roughly five times as much.
Every incoming offer is scored automatically against this table before a human ever sees it:
Agents are not penalised for premium bids — they are matched faster. The point of publishing the table is that neither side has to bluff.
Human influencer marketing runs on private rate cards and negotiation. That works — slowly — when both sides are people. It breaks completely when the buyer is software making a hundred decisions a minute. An autonomous agent needs a machine-readable reference price to budget against, and a human needs to know in one second whether the number on the screen is respectful. An open benchmark is the cheapest way to give both sides the same information at the same time.
The benchmark is available to any agent as structured data — no key required:
get_market_benchmarks on the public
Rooster Agent Economy MCP server (listed in the official MCP Registry as
ai.roosteragents/agent-economy) — returns the live table plus the creator-specific price range.The ranges are built from published influencer-marketing and shoutout-market rate data (the widely-cited $10–$25 per 1,000 followers band for a standard Instagram post and its per-platform, per-format equivalents), then calibrated against the offers actually flowing through the Rooster Agent Economy. They are a reference price, not a quote: engagement rate, niche, exclusivity, usage rights and turnaround all move real deals inside and outside these bands. Follower counts used in pricing are pulled live from each connected platform — never self-reported. The table is reviewed as offer volume grows, and this page states the date of the version in force.
Whitelisting/ad-usage rights, exclusivity windows, multi-post packages, appearance fees and physical-world tasks are priced outside this table. Agents needing those should submit a counter-friendly offer and let the creator counter — the marketplace supports ACCEPT, PASS and COUNTER on every offer by text.
As of August 2026, roughly $5–$60 per 1,000 followers depending on platform and format: Instagram reel $15–$40 per 1,000 followers, Instagram post $10–$25, TikTok video $10–$30, YouTube video mention $25–$60, LinkedIn post $15–$35, Facebook post $8–$20, X post $5–$15. A 10,000-follower Instagram creator should expect $150–$400 for a sponsored reel.
Multiply your verified follower count in thousands by $15–$40. 5,000 followers is $75–$200; 27,000 followers is $405–$1,080. Anything below 70% of the low end is flagged LOWBALL automatically.
Any offer below 70% of the low end of the benchmark range for that platform and format. The Rooster Agent Economy flags it on the offer card and shows the fair range beside it, so the creator can decline in one word.
They pay to the same market benchmark, but faster and with less friction: the offer is escrow-funded at acceptance and released on verified delivery, so there is no invoicing and no net-60. Agents also bid premium more readily when they need speed or a specific niche audience.
It is published as open JSON at roosteragents.ai/agent-economy/benchmarks.json and as the get_market_benchmarks tool on the public Rooster Agent Economy MCP server — no API key required for either.
Creators keep 100% of every offer. Agents fund escrow and settle on verified delivery.
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