I get emails from people about colloborations and sponsorships and I turn almost every single one of them down.
I work with En Femme, The Breast Form Store, and Xdress, and I have worked with Glamour Boutique in the past, so I am obviously open to working with others, but they have to align with my values. I like businesses that promote inclusivity and/or those who celebrate people who identify as non-binary.
People who ask if I want to be in, uh, certain videos get turned down. Some are very persistent and have offered me a lot of money. I’ve been asked if I wanted to review sex toys with accompanying videos and photos.
Obviously I am not going to do any of that, lol.
Not that there’s anything wrong with sex. I LIKE sex but I am not comfortable with sharing my intimate life on the internet.
There’s one company in particular that was very keen to work with me and I was also interested in working with them. They make cute outfits and thought it would be a lot of fun. When we started to chat about a partnership they provided me with their requirements and their expectations. Totally normal. When a small business enters a partnership with an influencer or whatever I am, there is the potential for them to get burned.
For example, they could send me a few pairs of stilettos to review but there’s the risk of me getting the shoes, keeping them, and then ghosting them.
The expectations were very strict. If they sent me something to review or whatever, they wanted a photos and a short video posted to my website and socials within 24 hours or whatever. That’s not a realistic turnaround for me. For others, sure, but when I am reviewing something I will include it in a future photo shoot. My photographer will need time to work on the pictures as well.
Some people have their own studio or dedicated space for photos and are absolutely able to do a tight turnaround, especially if being a social media star is their only job, but that’s not me. Sure, I could do my own pictures with an iPhone but they look terrible compared to professional pictures.
If I failed to meet their expectations, such as the 24 hour turnaround, they would then drag me on social media and put me on blast.
It felt overly aggresive and the talks fell apart. Good.
I mean, I get it. These businesses are risking losing money if they don’t get a return of investment or whatever, but their retaliation technique was very hostile. There was no way I felt comfortable committing to their expectations.
The strangest partnership I was ever offered was having a realistic, anatomically correct “sex doll” of me.
And yes, they were serious. The money was substantial (of course, your perspective on what a substantial amount of money is may be different than my own) but there’s probably not enough money in the world for me to agree to something like that.
None of this is meant to be a humble brag and none of these offers are particualrly flattering. I don’t want anyone reading this to think that I feel I am SO SEXY and EVERYONE wants me to endore a vibrator or nipple clamps or whatever. I imagine a lot of these offers are made to people who have a certain number of Twitter/Instagram followers and these companies are essentially casting a wide net to see who is interested in a colloboration.
I have had some criticism about selling out and associating myself with companies for my own benefit and for my own ego.
On one hand, I kinda get it? But hear me out. There are not a lot of businesses that specifically make products and clothes for the transgender and crossdressing community. I listed what is arguably the top four at the start of this post. If you frequent one of these businesses, there’s a chance you may find an article/review I wrote or an outfit I modeled for them. If you are a customer for even just two of these businesses, and again, you see me on their websites, it wouldn’t be unrealistic to think that I am willing to work with anyone and everyone.
On the other hand, I turn down more partnerships than you might think, as this post attempts to illustrate. If you think I am overexposed or an attention-seeking slut or whatever, well, I don’t know what to tell you if you’ve already made up your mind. I am not here to change your perspective if that’s how you feel, but like most things in life, there’s a lot more than goes on behind the scenes that most people don’t know.
Love, Hannah
Hannah McKnight 