How payouts work.
Every rule that decides whether a post gets paid, written down before you commit rather than after something goes wrong. If a rule isn't on this page or on the campaign page, it isn't a rule.
What counts as a valid post.
Five conditions. All five have to be true, and all five are visible to you before you spend a minute editing.
- The campaign audio You attach the campaign's sound, not a re-upload of the same song. A re-upload gives the artist none of the credit on the platform, which is the entire point of the campaign, so it does not count.
- A registered account You post from an account you've registered at your accounts. If we can't match the post to a registered account we can't match the views to you, and the payout has nowhere to go.
- Public, and up for 30 days The post stays public and stays up for at least 30 days. Taking it private or deleting it early voids the payout, including one already calculated.
- The campaign's own rules Each campaign page lists its rules — footage type, no background music under the track, whatever the artist asked for. Those are part of this list too.
- Real views No pods, no bought traffic, no engagement rings. If a post is flagged you get a reason and a chance to reply, not silence.
How the number is reached.
| Step | What happens | When |
|---|---|---|
| Submitted | You send the link at submit a post. | Day 0 |
| Checked | We confirm the sound, the account and the campaign rules. | 1–2 days |
| Counted | Views are read from the platform itself. That reading is the number your payout is calculated on. | Day 7 |
| Paid | Views ÷ 1,000 × the campaign rate, up to the per-post cap. | 14 days after verifying |
Views are counted once, at 7 days. A post that keeps growing after that is great for you and great for the artist, but it does not change the payout — a number that never settles is a number nobody can be paid against.
One post can't take the budget
Every campaign sets a maximum any single post can earn. If your views put you over it, you're paid the cap and the difference goes back on the board for the next creator. The cap is on the campaign page before you post, so the ceiling is never a surprise.
See the caps on live campaigns →What you're committing to.
- The budget is a ceiling You cannot be charged more than the budget you set, whatever the campaign does. Every dollar of it goes to a creator. We take no percentage of it.
- Unspent budget stays as credit Stop a campaign at any point. Posts already cleared get paid; the rest stays as credit on your account. We don't keep unspent money.
- Rights are confirmed before it lists You confirm you control the recording and the writing, features and producers included. Nothing goes on the board until you have. This is the one thing that turns a promo campaign into a legal mess later.
- Ghost work transfers on delivery On a Ghost campaign the finished video becomes yours outright when it's delivered, in writing, before the editor is paid. You post it as your own.
- You approve the rules, not each post On an open campaign creators don't wait for approval — that's what makes it fast. Your control is the brief, the rules and the cap, all set before it goes live.
Rejections and disputes.
If your post is rejected
You get a reason, not silence
Every rejection names which of the five conditions failed. A platform that flags posts without saying why is a platform that can flag anything, and we'd rather be held to a written list.
You can reply, once
If you think a call is wrong, reply to the rejection with the post link and what you think we got wrong. A human looks again. If we were wrong, it's paid at the original rate with no argument about it.
Fixing and reposting
If the problem is the audio, you can repost correctly and submit the new link — but the 7-day count starts again from the new post. Views on the wrong-audio version don't carry over.
The boring but important part
Tax
Creators file their details once at signup. US creators paid over the $600 threshold in a year get a 1099. Nothing to scramble for in January.
Do creators ever pay anything?
No, and they never will. No fee to join, no fee to be seen first, no cut taken out of what you earn. Plans are for artists and labels only.
What if a campaign runs out mid-post?
The board shows what's left of every budget in real time. If the budget empties while your post is live, posts already submitted are honoured in the order they came in. That's why early posts take the best of a campaign.
Can these terms change?
They can, but never retroactively. A campaign runs on the terms that were published when you posted, and the rules on a live campaign page don't move once it's open.
Cratelo is early, and this page will get longer as real situations come up that it doesn't cover yet. What it will not do is get vaguer. Anything added here will be as specific as what's already on it.
Something here unclear, or a case this doesn't cover? Ask before you commit →