Why Canadian Brands Should Take a Second Look at Snapchat Creators

Brands can now find and book Snapchat creators through Collabstr, the Vancouver-based influencer marketplace co-founded by Clayton Rannard and Kyle Dulay. The integration launched October 5, and it puts Snapchat on the platform alongside Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.

The platform reports 480,000 brands and 1 million creators, with more than 25% of those creators ready to take on Snapchat campaigns. There's no Canadian breakdown yet, and the company says that data will come as more creators are listed.

Why Snapchat deserves a second look

The Canadian audience is sizeable. Snap says it reaches more than 13 million monthly active users in Canada. It has also subscribed to Numeris' National Video Audience Measurement, which gives planners unduplicated reach and frequency across video platforms, so its audience can be compared directly with TV and other digital video. Juliet Merson, Snap's head of creator business partnerships, says nearly one in four Snapchatters is now 35 or older. Snap hasn't shared a Canadian breakdown of that figure.

How brands already work with creators on Snapchat

Even if you book through a marketplace, it helps to know the creator tools Snapchat runs itself. Creators who meet Snap's eligibility standards, which are based on authenticity, engagement and content quality, can opt into Brand Partnerships. That puts them in Snapchat's Creator Marketplace, where active advertisers can find them.

Sponsored posts carry a Paid Partnership label, and creators can post them organically. Brands can also put paid media behind a creator's post, using pre-approved access or ad codes from the creator to extend its reach. Separately, eligible Snap Stars earn revenue from ads shown in their public content.

Who's behind Collabstr

For brands that want to book outside Snap's own tools, there's Collabstr. The Vancouver company now covers Instagram, TikTok, UGC, YouTube, X, Twitch, Amazon and Snapchat in one marketplace. The brands it lists as clients include Canadian companies Wealthsimple and Hopper, alongside McDonald's and Orangetheory Fitness.

The platform is built to handle a creator campaign from start to finish. Brands can search creators by platform, niche, audience and budget, with verified engagement rates and demographics on each profile. Deliverables and usage rights are agreed before an order starts, and content performance is tracked in real time. Collabstr also offers free tools marketers can use without booking anything, including fake follower checkers for Instagram and TikTok and an influencer price calculator.

What brands can see before booking

For Snapchat specifically, the most useful change is what shows up on a creator's profile. Collabstr pulls in Snapchat's own analytics, so brands can compare creators on views, average view time, returning viewer rate and CPM before they book.

Collabstr dashboard

Returning viewer rate is the one to watch, according to Dulay. Follower count shows how many people found a creator at some point. Returning viewer rate shows how many keep coming back, which he says reflects real community loyalty and daily viewing habits. Brands that weigh it can back creators with steady audience trust over one-time viral reach.

For smaller Canadian brands, Dulay's advice is to look for predictable engagement and a local audience over sheer size. That means checking where a creator lives and where their audience is, alongside returning viewer rate and average views.

Pricing and payment

Pricing is published upfront. Creators set fixed rates, payment sits in escrow until deliverables are approved, and creators are paid in their local currency, with Collabstr handling invoicing and tax compliance. Brands pay the creator's listed rate plus a platform fee of 5% or 10%, depending on the option they choose, and Collabstr takes 15% of what creators earn. Brands can also bring creators they already work with onto the platform at no cost to the creator.

Where to start

For a brand that hasn't done creator work on Snapchat before, a single small campaign is a low-risk way in. Published rates let you price it before committing, and Snap's own metrics give you something more useful than follower counts to judge it by. Canadian creator data on Collabstr should fill in as more creators are listed, which will make it easier to find the local audiences Dulay recommends starting with.