Billion Dollar Boy and LinkedIn Start Pricing B2B Creators Like Media

On October 15, LinkedIn said it's testing In-Stream Ads, pre-roll video ads that pay creators when they run before the creators' videos. The test starts with select US creators and advertisers. Creators reach the program through a new dashboard that LinkedIn is rolling out globally.

The same announcement put Advice Sessions, paid one-to-one consultations booked from a profile, back in front of US Business Premium subscribers. That feature isn't new, since LinkedIn first announced it on May 12. LinkedIn didn't disclose what share of ad revenue creators get, or whether it keeps any part of a paid session.

A day earlier, Billion Dollar Boy Group said it had acquired Creator Authority, a B2B creator agency and LinkedIn Marketing Partner. Business Insider reported an all-cash, multimillion-dollar deal with an earnout. It's the group's first acquisition, and BDB plans to grow Creator Authority's team from about 15 people to between 30 and 40.

Put a feature test next to a small agency deal and you can see how a media channel gets a price. Our earlier piece on LinkedIn's Creator Discovery search argued that making creators searchable by audience would push B2B sponsorships toward a rate card. The two moves bring the forces that set the actual numbers. A platform is paying creators directly, and an agency group is buying its way into the brokering.

LinkedIn's pre-roll test lets brands buy creator video without a deal

Paying creators for video isn't new at LinkedIn either. In May 2025, it began sharing ad revenue with an initial group of 30 business creators through BrandLink, its pre-roll program. In March, it started paying BrandLink creators through Stripe and made BrandLink's publisher campaigns self-serve in Campaign Manager for select customers.

October 15 changed the route in. LinkedIn says eligible creators will find and join In-Stream Ads from their dashboard, although the test itself is limited to invited US creators.

The buying side matters more to a marketer. In LinkedIn's own setup guide for advertisers, a brand switches on In-Stream Ads inside a Campaign Manager video campaign and sets an audience and a budget. It then picks a content category such as Finance or Tech & AI, and LinkedIn decides where the ads run.

At no point does the brand negotiate with a creator, so attention next to creator video gets bought the way LinkedIn sells every other ad. For most B2B creators that's new, since the only way to buy their audience used to be a deal with them or a slot in BrandLink's hand-picked group. A sponsored post is still priced deal by deal. Favikon's 2026 pricing guide puts the transacted median LinkedIn post at $798 across 135 of its client deals.

LinkedIn's own revenue helps explain the push. LinkedIn Marketing Solutions revenue grew 16% year over year in the quarter that ended June 30. Video is the inventory an ad business needs more of to hold that pace, and paying creators is how a platform gets more video without producing it. Advice Sessions serve the other line, Premium, which LinkedIn says also grew at a double-digit rate.

Meta shows how large creator ads get once a platform sells them through its own ad tools. On Meta's October 21 earnings call, chief financial officer Susan Li said partnership ads, which run a creator's post as a paid ad, grew more than 97% year over year and passed a $15 billion annual revenue run rate, per the call transcript. Li said Meta had rolled out Creator Marketing Hub, which it announced in June to put creator discovery and partnership-ad buying in one place, to all advertisers, with more than 10 million creators discoverable.

A run rate annualizes recent revenue and Meta doesn't report the line separately, but the figure puts a size on the route LinkedIn's In-Stream test opens for B2B, where a brand buys creator attention without negotiating a deal. We looked at what Meta's partnership ads mean for B2B creator contracts in a separate piece.

Billion Dollar Boy is buying the broker between brands and LinkedIn creators

Billion Dollar Boy built its name on consumer influencer campaigns, and it now puts numbers on its growth. The group told Business Insider its global revenue grew 24% over the past 12 months and that it expects 2027 revenue above $100 million. Neither figure is audited.

In the release, founder and CEO Ed East pointed to the group's scale and technology, including its Companion creator-intelligence business. He said combining them with Creator Authority is a chance to build "the leading B2B creator tech platform.”

BDB bought a full-service broker. Creator Authority's site says it vets creators on more than 25 criteria and handles outreach and contracts. It also plans and buys paid media on LinkedIn and benchmarks every creator and post against category norms.

The agency joined LinkedIn's Marketing Partner Program in April, with a client list that includes SAP, HubSpot and Notion. That puts it on two lines of the same campaign, the creator program and the LinkedIn spend that amplifies it.

The deal fits a run of consolidation. Quartermast Advisors, which advised Creator Authority on the sale, counted 70 creator-economy deals in the first half of 2026. That was up 23% year over year, and agencies made up 21.4% of the deals.

The same report values agencies at 3.5 to 10.1 times EBITDA, with the top of the range going to firms whose revenue is mostly recurring. The gap gives an agency group its reason to buy. An agency that turns one-off creator posts into retainers and packaged programs can sit near the top of that range, and a package needs a price list that makes it look fair.

Platform pricing could cheapen generalists and lift narrow creators

Price is the obvious objection. In-Stream Ads let a brand reach a Tech & AI creator's viewers without paying that creator anything directly. A substitute usually lowers prices. If pre-roll next to a finance creator's video is cheap and measurable, a CMO can fairly ask why a sponsored post is still worth $798.

For many creators, the objection holds. Pre-roll pays on views, which favors broad audiences, and it buys placement next to a creator rather than the creator's endorsement. Generalists whose value was reach will see that reach priced by the platform.

The creator a finance team actually listens to sells a different product, their own words. Each new income line gives that creator more room to turn a brand down, from In-Stream payouts and Advice Sessions to agency representation.

There's no clean evidence yet that B2B creator rates are rising. The benchmarks come from vendors and agencies, each with its own sample. BDB's own survey, run by Censuswide in September, found 20% of more than 1,000 US and UK marketers had invested in B2B creator marketing this year.

Reaction has been thin so far, with no creators or buyers publicly weighing in on either move.

LinkedIn prices the reach. Endorsement still sells deal by deal.

Once a platform sells attention next to creator video through its own ad tools, reach gets a platform price. That binds every generalist B2B creator whose value was audience size, because pre-roll pays on views and buys placement next to a creator rather than the creator's endorsement. Meta's partnership ads show how large that side can grow, at more than a $15 billion annual run rate.

Endorsement stays with brokers like Creator Authority, which BDB plans to grow from about 15 people to between 30 and 40. That side has one public benchmark, Favikon's transacted median of $798 for a LinkedIn post.

A creator who can't beat placement on results will end up priced like placement.

The next step for LinkedIn's In-Stream test, now limited to invited US creators, will put a platform price on B2B creator reach beside Favikon's $798 median post.

By Business of GTM