Katie Plattner is the Founder of ABOVE&BEYOND, a talent management company committed to a tailored approach for each of its clients, developing talent identity, original IP, marketing solutions, and endorsements.

From a brand partnership perspective, campaigns originate from individual creator capabilities rather than existing brand briefs.

“Most of the deals that we do come from our ideas and are curated to a creator’s unique format,” explains Katie, who founded ABOVE&BEYOND in April 2024 after spending three and a half years at Open Influence, where she led talent relations. 

This selective approach contrasts with larger agencies that maintain databases of hundreds or thousands of creators to match against brand requests. “We’re not sending large lists of potential creators that fit the creative you’ve already come up with,” explains Katie. “We’re bringing an idea forward or working collaboratively side by side with a brand or brand agency to build a custom strategy. This yields results; this is how you put together deals that are five, six, even seven figures.”

The NYC-based company targets global brands like the NHL, Netflix, the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority, and Perfetti Van Melle – companies that have the budget and vision for custom campaigns. With experience managing millions in corporate creator marketing budgets for campaigns, Katie recognizes that brands still struggle to find original ways to integrate with digital talent, while creators are being asked to bend their style to fit predetermined campaign briefs. 

“Often still missing from talent collaborations is the ability to activate around a creator’s digital brand,” Katie says. “Embracing what they can do in an extremely unique way that maybe no other digital talent can.”

ABOVE&BEYOND positions itself as the solution: a hybrid creative-talent management company that develops bespoke strategies showcasing what makes each creator extraordinary in the creator economy.

“No matter how many creators we sign in the future, how we scale, how we grow, the approach for each creator will remain bespoke and intentional,” Katie states.

“A creator might have already mastered viral content, but there’s something about the content style that is limiting their monetization through brand partners,” she explains, adding that the company identifies creative solutions that enable more opportunities to partner, such as expansion from at-home formats to on-site activations.

This consultative approach elevates the traditional talent manager role from executor to strategic advisor. “This approach is really exciting because once a creator has sharpened their brand identity, they can start thinking about next steps. For example, consumer products, publishing, moving to long form, or even traditional media crossover.” 

The Las Vegas Campaign

To illustrate how ABOVE&BEYOND works in real life, Katie shares a campaign that won a Telly Award in partnership with client Gabriel DeSanti for his work with the Las Vegas Convention and Visitors Authority. DeSanti, known for building the World’s Longest Resume, brought a distinctive approach that became the foundation for the “Heart of Vegas” campaign.

“That entire campaign was built around Gabriel’s persona and content style,” Katie emphasizes. Rather than creating generic tourism content, the campaign leveraged DeSanti’s unique ability to celebrate the individual stories of Las Vegas residents, revealing the city’s character through personal narratives.

“The City of Las Vegas and our agency partners saw the vision, saw what Gabriel had to offer. His unique storytelling ability, how he could take a single individual and tell their story, and how they support a community, a city, to truly showcase what the ‘Heart of Vegas’ is all about,” Katie explains. The campaign required DeSanti to fly to Las Vegas multiple times, putting what Katie describes as “so much effort and heart” into the work.

Beyond Metrics

When it comes to talent acquisition, ABOVE&BEYOND prioritizes potential and purpose equally to performance metrics. “There’s no follower count cap,” Katie states. ABOVE&BEYOND’s clients include primarily midtier and macro creators, “maybe even a micro or two”. 

A primary focus is a creator’s “North Star” — their core mission on social media. “Believe it or not, if a creator knows their North Star, their mission, performance tends to follow if it’s not there already.”

Beyond mission clarity, the company evaluates creators’ ability to build layered relationships with their audiences. “If you check out their newsletter or their broadcast channel or their subs, maybe you get a deeper look into their personality,” Katie explains. “Ultimately, we’re seeing more and more creators learning how to convert (and move) their audiences. And you have to have that deeper connection in order to do so.” 

Professionalism represents the third critical factor. “I can’t tell you the number of times that I’ve walked into a platform meeting side by side with a client or brought them into a global brand’s office,” she says. “I could do that by myself, but I’d rather provide the opportunity to  a client who’s able to present and speak on their goals directly.”

Within five minutes of conversation, Katie says she can identify whether a creator views their work as a business or just content creation. “There are creators who are looking at this as their true business and acting on it as a professional. If you can come to the table with that mindset, that is where the conversation can begin about a creator’s growth and full potential.”

When it comes to the flood of new talent agencies entering the space and how creators should vet representation in 2025, Katie advises caution: “There are so many new companies out there. All the power to entrepreneurs, I am one myself. However, an independent manager or management company leader should have significant experience in the field, in marketing, at another talent company, etc. If a talent is approached by someone who has no stripes, why take the risk?”

The Business Reality

Building a custom strategy for individual creators requires a different timeline than traditional talent matching. “Seeing things that we thought about a year ago come to life today, that’s been the most rewarding thing, truly,” Katie reflects after a year and a half of operations.

The patience required extends to brand relationships. “What began as a proactive effort with contacts has now turned into a two-way street, a back and forth, a collaboration,” Katie observes. “Our partners see the vision, and they’ve bought in.” She’s also learned to interpret silence differently. When you’re met with silence, it’s usually not the right time, more than anything else. I’ve learned to live in that silence, take the bull by the horns, and turn it [into] opportunity.”

The boutique model also requires confronting uncomfortable realities about creator sustainability. Platform changes and shifting audience preferences can potentially make successful creators irrelevant, without adaptation. “A creator that you were really excited about or saw potential in is maybe not willing to adjust their strategy to stay up to speed with what the algorithms are pushing right now,” Katie explains.

She also notes that these conversations are particularly challenging given the intimate nature of talent management relationships. “You talk to clients on a weekly, even sometimes daily basis. And naturally, you have to have some tough conversations.”

Explaining the Vision

As ABOVE&BEYOND approaches its second year, Katie sees the company’s growth as validation of its model. “The most rewarding part has been seeing partners not only respond to us, but then start actively coming to us with opportunities.”

Despite the rise of AI and automated platforms in talent management, Katie emphasizes that ABOVE&BEYOND remains “committed to creativity backed by data,” noting that “I have yet to see an AI pricing tool that can capture the value of unique KPIs like B2B, on site vs at home content, etc, in a way that would ever replace human negotiation.”

The company’s future focuses on deepening the community aspect of its boutique approach. Having spent much of the first year building the business while embracing new motherhood, Katie is excited to expand in-person moments. “The future will be all about getting our clients together, building that ABOVE&BEYOND community that we’re so proud of, taking things off-screen and more in person for our clients.”

This community building reflects the company’s broader philosophy about sustainable creator careers. From an operational standpoint, “we try to clean up their shop,” Katie says. “We make sure that they’re running their day-to-day like a business and not just playing catch-up and posting content online.” 

ABOVE&BEYOND helps creators navigate the best ways to invest back into their business. “(How to) do that so that you can reach that next level in your career as a creator,” Katie advises. “We are getting into the nitty-gritty and helping these creators shape their careers for the long term in a sustainable way without burnout — that’s of huge importance to us.”

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