Brands want to work with influencers. Influencers want to work with brands. Between them sits an enormous amount of wasted time: DMs that go unanswered, media kits that don't exist, follower counts that mean nothing without engagement.
The agencies that solve this charge thousands. Most small brands can't justify that for a single campaign.
The idea is an influencer contact list in Google Sheets, sorted by niche, size, and engagement, with the calculations a brand needs already built in. It's number 37 on my list of 100 business ideas in Google Sheets.
The idea
Create a valuable tool for brands or businesses looking to connect with social media influencers. The sheet gets categorized by industry, niche, follower count, and engagement rate, so a business can find the right influencers for their needs without scrolling through Instagram for three hours.
This idea is ideal for someone with experience in social media marketing and analytics who can curate and manage the list. You know how to spot a bought audience. You know that a small account with strong engagement often beats a huge account with almost none. Brands don't always know that, and you can sell them the difference.
You can collaborate directly with businesses that need access to influencers in their niche, providing contact information and engagement data. That's the service version. The product version is the sheet itself.
Just like you can build a financial model, with enough signals you can build an influencer model inside a Google Sheet. Create the calculations for the users. Engagement rate, estimated reach, cost per thousand impressions, cost per engagement. Give a brand a budget cell and let the sheet rank the list by expected value.
What could put this over the top is custom functions via Apps Script built specifically for this world. Something like a CPM function or an AverageVideoViews function that takes a handful of inputs and returns the number a brand would otherwise calculate by hand. Make the functions unique to influencers and to the brands who want to work with them, and the sheet stops being a list and starts being a tool.
Then create templates for outreach and let companies go crazy. A first-touch DM, a follow-up email, a rate negotiation reply, a campaign brief. The list gets them to the right person. The templates get them a yes.
How to build it in Google Sheets
- Influencers. Columns: Name, Handle, Platform, Industry, Niche, Followers, Average Likes, Average Comments, Average Video Views, Engagement Rate, Contact Email, Manager, Location, Typical Rate, Last Updated, Notes.
- Finder. Dropdowns for Industry, Niche, and Platform, plus a minimum engagement rate. A FILTER below shows the matches, sorted by engagement.
- Campaign Model. Budget, target impressions, and a table that pulls in selected influencers and estimates cost and reach. Your custom functions live here.
- Outreach Templates. Five to ten templates with placeholder fields.
- Pipeline. A buyer-side tracker: Influencer, Status (Contacted, Replied, Negotiating, Booked, Posted), Agreed Rate, Post Date, Result.
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ARRAYFORMULA to compute Engagement Rate down the whole column at once:
=ARRAYFORMULA(IF(F2:F="","",(G2:G+H2:H)/F2:F)). - FILTER and SORT on the Finder tab, so choosing a niche and a minimum engagement rate produces a ranked shortlist instantly.
- Custom functions in Apps Script for CPM and average video views, so brands get numbers by typing a function name.
- Data validation dropdowns for Industry, Niche, Platform, and Status. Consistent tags are what make the Finder work.
- Conditional formatting on Last Updated, so anything older than 90 days is flagged for you to re-check before the next release.
Who pays for it, and how to sell it
The buyer is a small to mid-sized brand, an ecommerce store, or a marketing freelancer running campaigns for clients. They pay for the curation, the engagement data that isn't public, and the calculations that turn a list into a plan.
Contact data goes stale fast, which makes this a natural subscription. Sell a one-time version for a single niche if you want a lower-priced entry point, and a subscription for the full, updated list. The service on top is obvious: run the outreach for them.
Gumroad is fine for the one-time niche lists. For the subscription, OnlySheets shares the Google Sheet automatically when someone pays and keeps everyone looking at your one master copy, so an update you make on Monday is in every buyer's hands on Monday.
First 10 customers: pick one niche you know well and build a list of 50 influencers in it. Then find ten brands in that niche who are already tagging influencers in their posts. They're spending on this already. Message them with three influencers from your list they haven't worked with, plus the engagement rates. That's the pitch.
Related ideas from the list
- Influencer Brand Deals List, the same market seen from the influencer's side of the table.
- Startup Contact List, the same curated contact list mechanic for a different buyer.
- Niche Instagram Regram Account List, a narrower list of accounts that brands want to reach.
Want the other 99? This is one idea from my list of 100 business ideas you can build in Google Sheets. Get all 100 business ideas as a free Google Sheet.
And if you want to learn how to package and sell spreadsheets, my course Selling Spreadsheets walks through exactly that.
