# Where does Cheerful find creators?

> Where Cheerful’s creator discovery gets its creators on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, how a plain-English brief becomes a vetted list, which filters are enforced, how lookalike search works, and how creator emails are found.

Cheerful finds creators on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube by combining four sources: its own index of creators it has already screened, live profile lookups on each platform, web and hashtag search for accounts talking about your topic, and a third-party creator database of 350M+ profiles. You describe who you want in plain English, and Deep Search turns that brief into a list of creators who have each been checked against your follower range, location and topic before they reach you.

The part worth understanding before you compare tools is the checking. A large database is easy to query and full of accounts that are private, inactive, the wrong size, a brand rather than a person, or in the wrong country. Most of what Cheerful does between the brief and the list is removing those.

Cheerful finds creators on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube from its own screened creator index, live profile lookups, web and hashtag search and a third-party database of 350M+ creator profiles, then checks every candidate against the brief’s follower band, location and topic before delivering it.

## How to set it up

1. **Write the brief the way you would brief a person** — Product, audience, the kind of creator you want, follower range, market. Plain English is the input; there is no filter form to fill in first.
2. **Swipe the first deck** — Deep Search shows a first deck of about 20 creators, usually within a minute. Keeping or passing on them tells the run what you meant better than a longer brief does.
3. **Let the run finish** — The full run then searches, screens and verifies creators until it reaches your target number. It takes 15 to 60 minutes, and results appear as they are verified.
4. **Send the list to a campaign** — Delivered creators land in the run’s own list, which works like any Cheerful list: share it, vote on it, or add it to a campaign. Emails are looked up when the campaign launches.

## Which platforms can Cheerful search for creators?

Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. Each has its own live data path: Instagram and TikTok profiles are looked up on the platform, and YouTube channels are read through the official YouTube Data API first. Lookalike search, hashtag discovery and post-age checks are not identical on every platform, because the platforms do not expose the same data.

## Where does the creator data come from?

| Source | What it contributes |
| --- | --- |
| Cheerful’s own creator index | Creators already screened for follower band, stored with a searchable summary of name, bio, category and links. A brief is matched against it by meaning and by keyword in about a second. |
| Live profile lookups | Current follower counts, bios, recent posts and links, fetched from the platform when a candidate is considered, so nothing is delivered on stale numbers. |
| Web and hashtag search | Accounts found through Google results and through Instagram and TikTok posts on your topic, which catches creators who are not in any database yet. |
| A third-party creator database | Keyword and similar-creator search with structured filters such as engagement rate, gender and language. |

Deep Search also walks the communities around brands you name as your audience’s brands: who tags them and who is on their roster. Those brand accounts are never delivered as creators themselves, and brands you name as competitors are excluded.

## How does Cheerful check creators against the brief?

- Follower band. The run enforces the range you set, allowing 5% either side. The floor is 1,000 followers even when you ask for any size, because smaller accounts crowd out real candidates.
- Location. You can name one or several countries and a city. A strict location drops creators confirmed to be elsewhere; the default keeps creators whose location is unknown, labelled as such, behind confirmed matches.
- Account quality. Private accounts, accounts with too few posts, brand and business accounts, venues, repost pages and accounts that are not a person are removed.
- Topic. An AI judge reads each candidate’s own content against the brief, an image check looks at their actual posts, and a second verifier re-checks finalists for things like out-of-date captions.
- Already known. Anyone you have already listed, blocked, passed on or contacted, including creators a teammate contacted or saved to a shared list, is never shown again.

Engagement rate is used to screen out dead accounts, not to rank. A run aims for 50 creators by default and can be set as high as 200.

## Can Cheerful find creators similar to one I already like?

Yes. Name example creators in the brief, up to 100 of them, and the run uses them as seeds for lookalike discovery alongside the written description. There is also a direct "similar to @handle" search. Seeds work best when they share the thing you care about, such as the niche, audience or format, rather than just the follower count.

## How does Cheerful find a creator’s email address?

Any public email found while searching is kept. For creators without one, Cheerful runs a lookup when they are added to a live campaign, or when a draft campaign launches. It works through the profile’s business email, the bio link and the site it points to, platform-specific sources, and domain-based lookups, stopping at the first address it finds. Every candidate address is checked with an email verification service before it is accepted.

When nothing is found the creator is marked as having no email, and you can type one in by hand. Most creators have no public address, so a search result without emails has not failed.

## What this does not do

- Deep Search is not instant. The first deck takes seconds to a minute; a full run takes 15 to 60 minutes.
- Discovery covers Instagram, TikTok and YouTube. Other platforms are not generally available.
- Location is verified at country level. A city requirement relies on the creator saying where they live in their own content, so treat it as evidence-based rather than guaranteed.
- There are no audience-age or audience-gender filters in a Deep Search brief. Structured gender and language filters exist only in the classic keyword and lookalike search.
- Email lookup cannot find an address a creator has never published anywhere. Those creators stay in the list without an email.
- Searches spend credits from your plan’s balance.

## Frequently asked questions

**Where does Cheerful get its creator data?**

From four places combined: Cheerful’s own index of already-screened creators, live profile lookups on Instagram, TikTok and YouTube, web and hashtag search for accounts discussing your topic, and a third-party database of 350M+ creator profiles. Every delivered creator is checked against live data rather than a stored snapshot.

**Which platforms does Cheerful search?**

Instagram, TikTok and YouTube.

**Can I filter creators by follower count and country?**

Yes. Set a follower range and one or more countries in the brief. The follower band is enforced within 5% either side, and a strict location drops creators confirmed to be elsewhere.

**Does Cheerful do lookalike search?**

Yes. Add up to 100 example creators to a brief as seeds, or run a direct "similar to @handle" search.

**Does Cheerful find influencer email addresses?**

Yes. Public emails found during search are kept, and creators without one are looked up when they join a live campaign. Each address is verified before it is used, and you can add one manually when none is found.

**Will Cheerful show me creators I have already contacted?**

No. Creators you or a teammate have already contacted, listed, blocked or passed on are excluded from new results.

## Keep reading

- [Creator discovery](https://www.cheerful.ai/features/discovery)
- [How to find micro-influencers with AI](https://www.cheerful.ai/blog/how-to-find-micro-influencers-with-ai)
- [How Cheerful handles creator replies](https://www.cheerful.ai/docs/guides/how-cheerful-handles-creator-replies)
- [Which tools does Cheerful integrate with?](https://www.cheerful.ai/docs/guides/which-tools-does-cheerful-integrate-with)

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