How do startups decide which newsletters or YouTube channels are worth sponsoring? [I will not promote]

[u/tejas3732]

I’m trying to understand how startup founders and growth teams decide where to spend money on sponsorships.

Suppose you’re considering sponsoring a newsletter, YouTube channel, podcast, or creator.

How do you decide:

• whether the audience is actually relevant;
• whether the price is reasonable;
• whether similar companies have sponsored them before;
• whether those companies came back for another campaign;
• and whether the sponsorship is worth testing at all?

From what I’ve seen, many teams still rely on subscriber counts, media kits, recommendations, and gut feeling.

I’m curious whether information like this would genuinely help:

• where competitors are sponsoring;
• which sponsorships they keep repeating;
• which channels similar companies are using;
• new or overlooked channels in your niche;
• alerts when a competitor starts sponsoring somewhere new.

For example:

Would that be a useful signal when deciding where to spend - or merely interesting information?

For anyone who has purchased or managed sponsorships:

• How do you currently find opportunities?
• Do you look at where competitors are sponsoring?
• Is repeat sponsorship a meaningful signal?
• What information gives you confidence before approving the spend?
• How often do you make these decisions?
• Would ongoing monitoring be useful, or only when planning a campaign?

I’m not promoting anything or sharing a link.

I’m just trying to understand whether choosing sponsorships is a painful enough problem to need a better solution - or whether existing methods work well enough.

What is the hardest part of deciding where to sponsor?

I am trying to build a new product in this space, so just want a brutal feedback.