Shoutout
Creator briefs, usage rights and escrow in one place
Shoutout is a sample brief. We imagined Indian brands running creator collaborations through DMs, drives and a group chat, and asked what one shared room for brand and creator would look like. The brands are imaginary. The platform isn't: we designed and engineered it, and you can approve a post, sign its rights and release the fee in the live build below.
A sample brief, a real product. We wrote this brief ourselves. The business is imaginary; the product is not: we designed and engineered it, and you can use it above. We publish results only for work a client has let us verify, so this page shows none.
The brief
We imagined the brands from our other sample briefs (Marlow & Finch, Mitti Studio, Waiting Room) hiring creators for reels. Briefs went out on WhatsApp, drafts came back on Drive, usage rights were a line in a DM, and reach was a screenshot.
The problem
Creator work breaks at the handoffs: who approved which cut, how long the brand can use it, and when the creator gets paid. When those live in chats, rights lapse unnoticed and payments become favours.
- Rights that are recorded, not implied
- Payment that follows approval automatically
- Performance pulled from Instagram, not screenshots
- One room for brand and creator
The approach
We modelled briefs, deliverables, rights windows and fees as records, and tied them together: approving a post signs its usage rights and releases the fee from escrow in the same event. Video review has frame-accurate comments, reach syncs from the Instagram Graph API, and fees sit with Razorpay Escrow until the work is approved.
What would change for a brand like this: every post goes live with signed rights, creators know when they'll be paid, and the campaign report builds itself.
- Instagram Graph API sync with webhooks
- Rights and licensing as first-class records
- Mux review with timecoded comments
- Fees held in Razorpay Escrow, released on approval
What shipped
- Status filters
- Timecoded comments
- Approve: rights signed and escrow released in one event
- Content calendar
- Creators, discovery and invites
- Budget and brief
- Escrow top-ups held with Razorpay Escrow
- Rights ledger CSV
- Contracts and escrow ledger
- Messages and reports
Under the surface
How it is built
NestJS on PostgreSQL models briefs, rights windows and payouts; the Instagram Graph API syncs performance on a schedule and by webhook, Razorpay Escrow holds fees until approval, Mux powers frame-accurate review, and reminders go out by email and WhatsApp.
- Graph API sync with webhook and backfill reconciler
- Usage rights modelled as first-class records
- Mux review player with timecoded comments
- Escrow released by the same event that signs the rights
Considered and turned down
Airtable and Zapier can run a pilot, but they break exactly where rights and payouts need guarantees.
Stack
The mechanism, working
The part of Shoutout that was hardest to get right, as a small model you can operate.
Rights-attached approvals
Approving a post signs its usage window. Payout escrow releases on the same event.