Unintentionally clicked: bloggers face losses due to dishonest advertisers

Every fifth Russian blogger faces losses due to unscrupulous advertisers who refuse to pay for the services rendered. To protect the authors, the Association of Bloggers and Agencies (ABA) has opened a special compensation fund. Now content creators will be able to return from 100 thousand rubles, and lawyers will deal with non-payers. According to various expert estimates, influencers lose hundreds of millions of rubles annually.

How will the payout mechanism work?

Every fifth blogger in Russia faces losses due to the fact that advertising agencies or direct advertisers do not fulfill financial obligations. To protect market participants, the ABA has opened a compensation fund and launched a special mechanism called "No Advance".

Upon confirmation of the debt (after submitting the contract), major bloggers will be able to receive compensation. Its size will vary from 100 thousand to several million rubles, depending on the amount of the contract. In the future, ABA lawyers will be responsible for debt collection from an unscrupulous agency.

Photo: Getty Images/BARTON

As explained by Maxim Perlin, the co—founder of the association and the author of the initiative, the system operates on the principle of a guarantee mechanism within the organization - this is the first such case in the Russian creative industry.

— The "No advance" mechanism creates the necessary financial safety cushion. It makes the market more transparent and allows agencies and bloggers to work on trust, without advance payments, but with a guarantee of receiving a fee," he said.

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The bill was passed immediately in the second and third readings.

Only ABA members have access to the fund. Decisions on payments are made after checking the documents and confirming the debt.

— The No Advance initiative is a response to a real, systemic demand from the industry. Agencies and bloggers have been working in conditions of inconsistencies for a long time: clients pay after the fact, and performers wait for money in advance. As a result, there are cash gaps," said Yulia Dolgova, ABA President and CEO of Jamie Lup agency.

Photo: IZVESTIA/Anna Selina

According to her, the fund solves several tasks at once: protects bloggers, reduces risks for agencies and promotes the maturation of the entire market, which has long needed responsibility, trust and guarantees.

How much money do bloggers lose?

According to various experts, bloggers annually lose hundreds of millions of rubles due to non-payments. About 80% of the influencer marketing market is occupied by large, bona fide players. The remaining 20% are small agencies, start—up teams and private customers, where disputes most often arise, Grigory Lapshakov, CEO of the Pochva agency, told Izvestia.

— If we try to estimate possible losses, we can proceed from the total market capacity, about 55 billion rubles in 2025, and assume that 1% of the remaining 20% of transactions have serious violations related to non-payment. It turns out that, approximately, 110 million can be lost annually by performers due to unscrupulous clients," he noted.

In addition, there is a black market — contracts with advertisers from prohibited or shadowy niches, such as cryptocurrencies or casinos. These transactions take place outside the legal framework and without contracts, so it is impossible to estimate the amount of losses here, he stressed.

Photo: IZVESTIA/Yulia Khramtsova

Yaroslav Meshalkin, an expert on digital communications, suggested that the cumulative losses of Russian bloggers from non-payments could reach hundreds of millions of rubles per year. We are talking not only about large channels, but also about the medium and small segment, where the amount of fees is lower and the risks are higher, and it is for them that such protection is especially important.

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What is the reason and will they be able to regain their audience?

According to him, the opening of the fund is an event for the Russian digital segment, which, despite multibillion—dollar turnover, has remained "wild" for a long time. The problem of non—payments is systemic and has a particularly acute effect on authors, for whom blogging is the main source of income.

— Brands have long perceived influencers as a full-fledged media channel. It is necessary to build civilized rules of the game, including the responsibility of the parties. Against the background of a general crisis of trust in the digital environment and turbulence in the advertising market, unfair practices began to multiply. One-day agencies, pseudo—brands, fictitious contractors - all this has become part of a toxic ecosystem that undermines trust between players and the audience," the expert said.

Photo: Global Look Press

According to him, the compensation fund solves several tasks at once: it not only insures authors from financial losses, but also creates a precedent for the legal protection of bloggers' work. In addition, it is an important element of the industry's self-regulation, which guarantees transparency and security of the partnership.

Yulia Zagitova, founder of Breaking Trends and secretary of the Russian Union of Journalists, believes that the initiative disciplines the market and forms new rules of the game.: Anyone who wants to work in digital advertising must comply with the agreements, otherwise the consequences will become tangible. She is sure that in the end everyone wins: both bloggers and honest advertisers.

Previously, bloggers were forced to negotiate on their own or make the situation public, which rarely led to a fair result. Now they have a clear and legally protected opportunity to return their honestly earned money, she concluded.