The Power Brokers Behind the Creator Economy: The Reps Who Made 2026 Happen
Behind every viral video, sold-out live show and multi-million-dollar brand deal is an often invisible army of representatives. In 2026, the creator economy has become one of the most powerful forces in media, politics and pop culture, and the agents, managers and attorneys guiding its biggest stars have become just as essential as the talent themselves. From Twitch streamers to children’s entertainers, from sports figures to AI-generated personalities, these are the dealmakers who turned online fame into real-world empires.
UTA / Digital Brand Architects
Ali Berman, Raina Penchansky, Oren Rosenbaum and Hilary Williams lead a formidable roster at UTA Creators and Digital Brand Architects, representing names like Markiplier, Kareem Rahma, Colin and Samir, and Olandria Carthen. This year, the team filled Netflix’s new video podcast slate with projects such as The Rotten Files With Stephanie Soo, brokered the unexpected MrBeast–James Patterson novel collaboration, expanded Emma Chamberlain’s Chamberlain Coffee brand with a new Abbot Kinney location, and helped Alix Earle land the Netflix series Earle Meets World.
Gersh
At Gersh, Keith Bielory, Melissa DeMarco and Jade Sherman continue to push digital talent into mainstream entertainment. Their work helped reality stars Ariana Madix, Whitney Leavitt and Mark Ballas drive record-breaking ticket sales for Broadway’s Chicago. They also guided online health expert Doctor Mike past 30 million followers and secured a book deal for Eli Rallo that became a New York Times best-seller.
Sixteenth
Sixteenth has become a major force across multiple verticals. Alexis Ramos built the company’s sports division from scratch, now representing top athletes in the NFL, WNBA and track and field. Skye Petrie brought a large U.K. roster to the firm, helping British stars like Maddie Borge reach global audiences. Payton Booker, meanwhile, locked in major partnerships, including a $90,000 brand campaign for Charles Brockman III.
Manatt Phelps & Phillips
Christopher Chatham and Ellie Heisler represent some of the most visible names on the internet. As Alan Chikin Chow continues delivering Alan’s Universe to more than 100 million YouTube subscribers, the pair expanded his reach through distribution deals with the Roku Channel and Tubi. Chatham also represents Logan Paul and brokered deals for his Impaulsive podcast, as well as for streamer IShowSpeed, who has 61 million YouTube subscribers. Heisler works closely with Jordan and Salish Matter and structured Salish’s partnership with Chipotle, making her the youngest person to launch a digital menu item with the brand.
Palette
Founded during the 2020 TikTok boom, Palette has built a diverse roster spanning comedy, lifestyle and infotainment. Daniel Daks and Josh DeAngelis represent Spanish news creator Carlos Eduardo Espina, whose Creator Cup event twice sold out Houston Dynamo’s stadium, and Roblox star Lana Rae, whose consumer product line has generated more than $20 million at retail in just five months.
Odd Projects
Arjun Das joined Odd Projects after being recruited by managing partners Brian Sokolik and Nate Ruff, and he has quickly made a name for himself representing social impact creators. For storyteller and interviewer Hunter Prosper, Das closed a book deal and helped launch a series with Barack Obama’s production company Higher Ground. He also helped Jesus Morales, a creator telling Latinx stories in Los Angeles, start a nonprofit that has already raised six figures in donations.
WME
Ben Davis and Jad Dayeh co-head WME’s digital department and have had a landmark year. Davis closed a reported $100 million first-of-its-kind pact for Jay Shetty and his On Purpose podcast, giving Netflix and Spotify joint exclusive rights. The duo also helped reality stars Paige DeSorbo and Hannah Berner secure major brand partnerships, including Berner’s multiyear ambassadorship with Lululemon.
Entertainment 360
Alexandra Devlin joined Entertainment 360 this year to help expand its creator business. Previously at WME, she brokered Paige DeSorbo’s Super Bowl commercial with Kinder Bueno and negotiated finance guru Vivian Tu’s ambassadorship with SoFi Bank.
Greenberg Glusker
Matt Dysart and Eric Perlmutter-Gumbiner provide corporate and strategic advice to some of the biggest names in the digital space. Perlmutter-Gumbiner works with creator-led companies including Palette Media Talent Management, Jake Rosen Entertainment, Get Engaged Media, Underscore Talent Agency, Made by All and Dhar Mann Studios. Dysart is equally embedded in the ecosystem, representing Slow Ventures, Kynetic Content, UnderCurrent, Palette Media and Creator Society.
Parker
Parker Management began the year by acquiring Estate Five, expanding its footprint in fashion and beauty. The firm signed Alex Bennett, Abigail Erb and Dan and Samantha Matthews, adding to a deep bench of lifestyle, family and home creators, as well as Bachelor Nation talent. Parker secured campaigns with Google Pixel, Abercrombie & Fitch, Tuckernuck and Lincoln.
Select
Select continues to bridge Hollywood and the creator economy. Lisa Filipelli, Brittany Maxwell and Caroline Nardilla delivered new seasons of The Secret Lives of Mormon Wives and expanded the franchise with TSLOMW: Orange County, both populated with Select clients. The agency also launched Select Sports, reimagining athlete representation for the social media era, and landed Super Bowl campaigns with Meta x Oakley glasses and Toyota for athletes Sky Brown and Oksana Masters.
Underscore Talent
Mallory Llewellyn placed four clients on Netflix’s Calabasas Confidential, where she also serves as consulting producer. Kyle Stevens helped Kareem Rahma turn SubwayTakes into an Emmy-nominated series while also launching his second show, Keep the Meter Running. Dylan Flinn has become the go-to manager for top AI creators, landing one of the first celebrity likeness deals with HiggsfieldAI and securing a studio development deal for AI content creator Chloe vs History.
CAA
CAA has signed some of the biggest creators in the world over the past year, including Rhett + Link, Valkyrae, Stokes Twins, Deestroying, Rebecca Zamolo, Nara Smith, Jack Goldburg, Reckless Ben, Max Klymenko and Reece Feldman. Arleta Fowler, Andrew Graham, Brent Weinstein and Sophie Wiener have helped lead those efforts. In June, CAA and Integrated Media Co. launched a $250 million venture called Compound Creative Holdings, aimed at acquiring and growing companies in the creator economy.
Loaded
Brandon Freytag and Yoni Ginsberg have spent nearly a decade brokering livestreaming’s biggest deals. Loaded represents the largest share of Twitch livestreamers by watch time, including TheBurntPeanut, Cinna, Maya Higa and Shroud. Recent partnerships with Google, EA, Epic Games and Tencent include a “Protect the Peanut” campaign with Battlefield, one of EA’s most successful creator campaigns to date.
Jackoway Austen
Andy Galker and Eric Weissler represent Mark Rober, the former NASA engineer and inventor with nearly 82 million YouTube subscribers, as well as late-night host Jimmy Kimmel. The pair closed the deal that put Rober’s CrunchLabs and Kimmel’s Kimmelot together on Netflix’s upcoming competition series Schooled, in which Rober hosts and executive produces a show pitting student teams against each other in creative science challenges.
THE·TEAM
Marcela Woessner inked gymnast and Instagram star Livvy Dunne’s partnership with Miller Lite and turned a viral embarrassing moment into a deodorant campaign with Secret. The company also acquired Provisions, a golf creator agency founded by Joe Gilliland and Josh Morgan. The duo developed the Creator Classic, a tournament featuring 12 of YouTube’s top golf creators, and built Your Golf Tour, a YouTube series starring the sport’s biggest creators and pros.
Yorn Levine
Alix Earle has evolved from creator to entrepreneur under Todd Rubenstein and Kevin Yorn, who helped launch her skin care brand Reale Actives and negotiated her Netflix series Earle Meets World. Yorn advised Hailey Bieber on her 2026 Gap collection and many other brand deals, while Rubenstein represented Charli D’Amelio across her expanding portfolio. Ryan Goodell represents chef Nick DiGiovanni, who has more than 75 million followers and served as Fox Sports’ official chef for the FIFA World Cup.
Night
Night has had another blockbuster year, acquiring IRL marketing firm Experiential Supply Co. John Nelson brokered deals for Twitch star Kai Cenat’s record-breaking Streamer University, with partners including Red Bull, Dell and Fortnite. David Huntzinger expanded progressive influencer Hasan Piker’s merch line amid his skyrocketing fame and brokered Sam & Colby’s Netflix partnership. Michael Gordon oversaw the eight-figure sale of true-crime YouTube channel Dr. Insanity to an investment company.
Weintraub Tobin
Shaun Gordon has guided Alex Cooper as Call Her Daddy evolved into a media empire, now including the Unwell Network, a growing film slate, live events, touring and a distribution relationship with SiriusXM. Unwell raised its first outside capital at a reported $500 million pre-money valuation. Jessica Marlow represents Claudia and Jackie Oshry of The Toast, Remi Parsons, whose podcast Basically Unfiltered debuted at No. 1 on Spotify and Apple, and TikTok comedian Chris Olsen.
Loeb & Loeb
Melanie Howard works with Kansas City Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes and his wife Brittany, advising them on endorsements and business decisions tied to their personal brands. She also counsels gamer Andre Rebelo, better known as Typical Gamer, Karl Jacobs, and Chicago Bears quarterback Caleb Williams. On the brand side, she represented Gap in its Hailey Bieber collaboration.
Fixated
Derek Howe’s acquisition of Studio71 created a combined global network of more than 1,000 creators, operating a 25,000-person clipper network and generating 3 billion monthly impressions on owned social pages. Howe brokered deals for children’s gaming expert Mackenzie Turner with Disney and Nickelodeon and led the launch of her Roblox experience, which drew 100 million visits in its first 30 days.
Brillstein Entertainment Partners
Seth Jacobs helped true-crime show Morbid sell out Radio City Music Hall on a live tour and launched Unbiased Politics, a daily video show with lawyer influencer Jordan Berman. Brittny Turner helped Tana Mongeau launch her podcast Brand Safe and secured partnerships with SeatGeek, DraftKings, Skims and Celsius.
Goodman Genow
Will Jacobson closed deals for beauty vlogger Bretman Rock to front a global Kate Spade New York campaign and to become the face of K-beauty brand Dr. Groot in the U.S. Matt Rosen’s client Noah Beck has become a fixture in Tubi’s Sideline rom-com franchise, with Rosen negotiating the second and third films and helping Beck get cast on Fox’s Baywatch reboot.
Outshine Talent
Barbara Jones has significantly expanded Outshine’s sports business, representing internet-famous baseball stars like the Savannah Bananas’ Kyle “KJ” Jackson and RobertAnthony Cruz, who launched a custom product line with Under Armour. Jones also helped comedian Tyler Gaca develop a horror film and comedy creator Lala Sadii secure a scripted Disney Channel project.
Hansen Jacobson
Adam Kaller and Ryan Pastorek were by Markiplier’s side as his self-funded $3 million film Iron Lung earned $50 million worldwide after fans pushed theaters to screen it. The pair also represent SmartLess, Crooked Media, The Bulwark, Smosh, Mythical Entertainment, Emma Chamberlain, Liza Koshy, Lilly Singh and Valkyrae. Lauren Partipilo Schwartz helped seal Hannah Berner and Paige DeSorbo’s Giggly Squad multiyear deal with SiriusXM and negotiated for RHOSLC star Bronwyn Newport to appear on The Traitors.
Smooth Media
Founded by former Morning Brew executives, Smooth Media has become one of the fastest-growing management firms for knowledge creators. Josh Kaplan and Jenny Rothenberg have executed campaigns for Anthropic, Notion, Microsoft, Ramp, Canva and Google. They partnered with Colin and Samir on The Publish Press, and creator Cat Goetze, known online as CatGPT, recently took an equity stake in the company and joined as a strategic adviser.
Gang Tyre
Annie Lee and Cheryl Snow represent beloved children’s creator Ms. Rachel, who gained 10 billion views worldwide. They negotiated her Netflix series Ms. Rachel, one of the most-watched children’s shows on the service with 53.4 million views, and her debut album I’m So Happy. They also represent Whitney Leavitt, whose run in Chicago grossed more than $8 million in its first six weeks.
Reed Smith
Eric Marder helped 23-year-old Brooke Monk launch her Doting Beauty brand while handling all of her legal and endorsement work. He also represents social media star and U.S. Navy veteran Bella Poarch, who has 91.6 million followers on TikTok alone.
3 Arts Entertainment
Dunia McNeily closed a podcast deal for horror creator Heidi Wong and put scripted adaptations of Tinx’s best-selling books The Shift and Hotter in the Hamptons into development at Amazon and Hulu. She also secured a major luxury partnership between Kérastase and tastemaker Stassi Schroeder.
Range Media Partners
Eman Redwan oversees 25 executives who have closed more than $100 million in deals over the past year, with clients including Nara Smith. Mariam Rastegar Ross brokered Chris Appleton’s seven-figure deal with Schwarzkopf, while Worthy Patterson built influencer Beca Michie into a top fashion creator, placing her at major shows and closing seven figures’ worth of deals.
Made by All
Leanne Perice launched a studio this year focused on turning creators into Hollywood talent and original IP owners. She works with comedy heavyweights like Adam W, Hannah Stocking and Josh Peck, as well as internet-native artists like Devon Rodriguez, and has helped foster partnerships with Kevin Hart, Tom Holland and Jennifer Lopez.
Rakugo Media
Douglas Pinsky and Jake Williams have ridden the wave of AI creator deals, surpassing $50 million in gross partnership revenue in 2026. Their clients include gadget guru Carterpcs, tech and robotics creator Rowan Cheung, deep-tech explainer Natalie Fratto, and comedian Austin Nasso. They sold Roberto Nickson’s Life With Claude series to Anthropic and negotiated millions in partnerships with OpenAI, Google, Meta, Nvidia, AMD and SpaceXAI.
Greenberg Traurig
Paige Kaplan Randolph advised Lala Sadii on the development of Lala IRL, a live-action scripted Disney Channel and Disney+ series inspired by her rise as a social media star. Randolph also represents Olympic track and field couple Tara and Hunter Woodhall, best-selling author Erin McGoff, and The Lipstick Lesbians, who have partnered with Clinique, Marc Jacobs Beauty, Tatcha, NYX, Morphe, Estée Lauder, Fenty, Milk and Goop.
Sloane Offer
Jonathan Sauer represents Colin and Samir, who have interviewed everyone from Mark Zuckerberg to MrBeast. Sauer negotiated the duo’s partnerships with Google Gemini, Adobe and LinkedIn. He also represents Ryan Trahan, known for his charity fundraisers and viral challenges like the Penny Series, in which he attempts to travel across the United States starting with just one penny.
Weinstein Senior
Tara Senior and Todd Weinstein serve as lead counsel for MrBeast, the first individual creator to reach 500 million YouTube subscribers. They structured the deals behind Amazon Prime Video’s Beast Games seasons two and three, each budgeted at more than $100 million. They are also lead counsel to Dhar Mann Studios, the largest scripted creator-led studio in the business, which pulls nearly 300 million views a week while Mann retains full creative ownership.
In an industry built on attention, these representatives are the ones ensuring that attention turns into lasting value. They may stay behind the scenes, but the world they have built is impossible to ignore.
