Onboarding Instagram Influencers: Why Onboarding Calls Beat Tools

Molly Cole, creator program manager at Epic Gardening with nearly five years in influencer marketing, walks through the personal vetting process she uses to evaluate every creator before they join her program. Rather than relying on an Instagram fake followers checker or purely data-driven screening, Molly argues that a structured onboarding call reveals fit faster than any tool.

Her process starts with a branded welcome email that covers commission timelines and program expectations, followed by a one-on-one call where she asks creators about their gardening origin story, where they grew up, and what they want to get out of social media long-term. She says fit is almost always obvious within minutes of that first conversation. Creators who are lukewarm tend to self-select out before the call even happens by sending short replies or simply not responding.

Watch to see how Molly turns a casual conversation into a reliable filter that has produced zero bad hires across her entire tenure at Epic Gardening.