Compared

Six ways creators track brand deals. One of them is yours.

Last reviewed July 29, 2026

The short answer

There is no best brand deal tracker, only a best one for the problem you actually have. If you need more sponsors, Passionfroot is the only option here that brings them. If a signed contract is how your deals close, HoneyBook wins and nothing else on this list comes close. If your workflow is unusual enough that no product fits it, Airtable will model it and its automations will actually chase you. If you need the videos fulfilling your deals tracked next to the deals, HeyKero is the only one that links them.

And if you close about three deals a year, a spreadsheet beats every product on this page. We sell one of these tools and we would still tell you that.

What actually matters when you pick one

Feature lists are mostly noise here. Four things separate these tools in practice, and every one of them maps to money you either collect or lose.

Does it come to you, or do you go to it? A record you have to open is a different product from a system that surfaces an overdue invoice unprompted. This is the single largest split on this list, and it is what separates a spreadsheet or a Notion board from a purpose-built tracker.

Does it know what an invoice is? Numbering, a PDF, a payment due date and a status that turns overdue on its own. Notion and a spreadsheet have no concept of any of it.

Does the deal know about the content? A sponsorship has a deliverable deadline; the video fulfilling it has a production schedule. When those two live in different places, they drift apart quietly.

What does it cost when a deal is big? A percentage model and a flat subscription diverge sharply on a $10,000 deal. Neither is wrong; they suit different volumes.

Side by side

Every column loses at least one row. That is the point of the table.

Six brand deal tracking options compared across ten criteria
	HeyKero	Passionfroot	HoneyBook	Airtable	Notion	Sheets
Finds sponsors for you	No	Yes	No	No	No	No
Contracts with e-signature	No	No	Yes	No	No	No
Brand pays you inside the tool	No	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Bends to any deal structure you invent	No	No	No	Yes	Yes	Yes
Free with no account or subscription	No	No	No	No	No	Yes
Ready to use without building it	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Deal board with pipeline stages	Yes	Yes	No	Partial	Partial	No
Generates a numbered invoice	Yes	Yes	Yes	No	No	No
Flags an overdue invoice unprompted	Yes	Partial	Yes	Partial	No	No
Tracks the content that fulfils a deal	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Exclusivity conflict warnings	Yes	No	No	No	No	No
Entry cost	Free in beta	Free + 5–15%	$29/mo	Free–$20/user	Free	Free

HeyKero

We make this one — weigh the section accordingly.

HeyKero is a deal and content workspace for creators who already have sponsors and need to run them: a six-stage deal pipeline, a production board for the videos that fulfil those deals, and one-click invoices.

Strengths

Deal pipeline and content pipeline are linked — every sponsorship card shows what stage the video fulfilling it is at
Invoices generate from deal data already in the system, with automatic numbering and PDF export
Exclusivity tracking warns you before you sign a competitor in a category you are already locked into
A forwarding address per workspace: sponsor email is stored and threaded against the deal instead of living in Gmail
Payment-speed indicator per sponsor, calculated from how fast they have actually paid you
Chronological history on every deal — old value and new value on each change

Limitations

No sponsor marketplace and no discovery — HeyKero does not find brands for you
No public storefront or media kit for brands to book through
No payment processing; you invoice from HeyKero and get paid however you already get paid
Forwarded email is threaded and stored, but you link it to the right deal yourself — automatic extraction is built and currently switched off
No rate-card intelligence: HeyKero does not yet tell you what to charge next time based on your past deals
New product with a small user base, so there is no long track record to check

Pricing. Free while HeyKero is in beta. Paid pricing has not been announced yet.

Best for. Creators earning $10k–$100k a year from sponsorships who already get inbound, run 5–20 deals at once, and lose money to forgotten invoices and missed deadlines rather than to a shortage of brands.

Passionfroot

The only option here that also finds you sponsors.

Passionfroot is a storefront, booking and payments platform for creators, with an ad network that brings sponsor requests to you.

Strengths

A public storefront with live audience stats, rates and a booking form — brands can book you directly instead of emailing
A Partner Network of vetted brands including HubSpot, Notion and Intercom, with AI matching that surfaces campaigns fitting your profile
Invoicing and payments run through Stripe inside the platform, so getting paid is part of the product
No subscription at all — you pay nothing until a deal closes

Limitations

Reviewers report the CRM gets crowded past roughly ten concurrent deals, with no automated stage transitions or follow-up reminders and basic filtering
Sponsorship payments have to stay on the platform
The Partner Network skews heavily B2B, SaaS and productivity — lifestyle, gaming and entertainment creators find fewer matches
No tracking of the content that fulfils a deal: once a booking is confirmed, deliverables and production are your problem again

Pricing. Free for creators with no subscription. Passionfroot takes 5% on deals you source yourself — charged to the brand, so you keep 100% of your listed price — and 15% on deals sourced through its Partner Network, deducted from your payout.

Best for. Creators who want more inbound sponsor flow and want brands to book and pay them in one place, especially in B2B, SaaS and newsletter niches.

Full comparison with HeyKero →

HoneyBook

The one creators name most when a spreadsheet stops holding.

HoneyBook is client management software for service businesses: proposals, contracts with e-signature, invoicing, payments and a client portal in one place.

Strengths

Contracts with legally solid templates and e-signature, which no creator-specific tracker matches
Automatic payment reminders on overdue invoices — the feature freelancers credit with recovering the most money
A client portal where the brand signs, views invoices and pays without an account of their own
Proposals and lead forms, so an enquiry can turn into a signed contract without leaving the tool

Limitations

Thinks in clients and projects, not deals with stages — there is no board showing two deals in Negotiating and three in Invoice Sent
No per-deal deliverable checklist, so what you owe a brand is tracked in a description field
Nothing links a deal to the video or newsletter issue that fulfils it
Reddit threads consistently report shallow automations, no conditional logic in intake forms, and an unreliable QuickBooks sync that needs monthly cleanup
Restricted to the US, Canada, UK and Australia, so creators elsewhere cannot sign up at all

Pricing. Starter is $29/month billed yearly, Essentials $49/month billed yearly ($59 monthly). Payment processing fees apply on top. Available only to businesses in the US, Canada, UK and Australia.

Best for. Creators doing high-ticket deals where a formal contract and e-signature matter, who have already solved pipeline and deliverables somewhere else.

Full comparison with HeyKero →

Airtable

The build-it-yourself option that gets closest.

Airtable is a database that behaves like a spreadsheet, with real field types, linked records and automations that can fire on a date — the closest a build-it-yourself tool gets to a deal tracker.

Strengths

Automations that actually work on a schedule: it can email you every Monday with overdue invoices, or ping you when a payment due date passes
Proper field types and linked records, so a deals table and a deliverables table genuinely relate to each other
Multiple views over the same data — grid, kanban, calendar, gallery — without duplicating records
Scales to a team better than most options here, with per-collaborator permissions
A huge template and community ecosystem, so you are rarely starting from a blank base

Limitations

You are still the architect: the deal stages, the rollups, the automation logic and the maintenance are all yours
No concept of an invoice — no numbering, no PDF, no payment terms, so invoicing lives in another tool
The automations that make it powerful are metered, and the free plan runs out of them quickly
No link between a deal and the content that fulfils it unless you build and maintain that relation yourself
Setup for a proper brand deal system is measured in hours, and every change later is more building

Pricing. Free plan for individuals and very small teams. Team is $20 per user per month billed annually, Business is higher, Enterprise is quoted.

Best for. Creators with a team or a manager, who want a system shaped exactly to their workflow and have someone willing to build and maintain it.

Full comparison with HeyKero →

Notion

Most flexible, most maintenance.

Notion is a general-purpose database and document tool that creators turn into a brand deal tracker with a template or by building the system themselves.

Strengths

Genuinely unlimited flexibility — you can model deals, deliverables, contacts and invoices exactly how you think about them
Linked databases mean a deal can connect to a brand, a contract and a set of deliverables in one workspace
Mature template ecosystem: several well-built brand-deal CRM templates exist and get you started in an afternoon
Your notes, scripts and contracts can live next to the pipeline instead of in another tool

Limitations

Notion does not know what a brand deal is — you build every stage, formula and rollup yourself, then maintain it
No concept of an invoice: numbering, PDFs and payment status are things you fake with properties
No email integration, so sponsor threads stay in Gmail and the deal history depends on you pasting things in
The board view groups cards by a property but has no deal-value totals per column, no stage analytics and no pipeline history
Automations fire on property changes only — no follow-up sequences, no conditional logic, no reminder that an invoice is 12 days late

Pricing. Free for personal use. Paid plans start around $10–$12 per user per month. Community brand-deal templates typically cost $0–$49 once.

Best for. Creators who enjoy building systems, are running roughly five deals or fewer, and want one workspace that also holds their scripts, notes and contracts.

Full comparison with HeyKero →

Google Sheets

What most creators actually use today.

A spreadsheet is how most creators track brand deals today, and for a small number of deals it is genuinely the right answer.

Strengths

Free, universal, and already open in another tab — no migration, no new login, no learning curve
Total flexibility: add a column in two seconds without waiting for anyone to ship a feature
Easy to share with an editor, a manager or an accountant, and easy to export anywhere
Nothing to be locked into, and no company that can change the pricing or shut down

Limitations

A spreadsheet has no state: it never tells you an invoice is overdue, a deadline is in two days, or a deal has gone quiet — you have to remember to look
No link between a deal and the video that fulfils it, so a brand deadline and a publish date drift apart silently
Invoices are a separate manual job in a separate tool, and the numbering is on you
No history — when an amount changes from $5,000 to $6,500 the old number is simply gone
Exclusivity conflicts are invisible until a brand points one out

Pricing. Free with any Google account.

Best for. Creators doing a handful of deals a year, or anyone who wants a record of what happened rather than a system that chases things for them.

Full comparison with HeyKero →

Pick by the problem you have

“I don’t have enough sponsors.” Passionfroot. None of the others will bring you a single brand.
“Brands keep disputing what we agreed.” HoneyBook, for the contract templates and e-signature. Nothing else here does signed agreements.
“I don’t know if I’m charging enough.” None of these six, honestly. Your own closed deals are the only real answer, and today you have to work the average out yourself — Airtable or a spreadsheet will at least do the arithmetic.
“I forget to invoice and I chase money too late.” HeyKero or HoneyBook out of the box. Airtable too, once you build the automation.
“My video deadlines and my brand deadlines keep colliding.” HeyKero. This is the one thing on the list nobody else does.
“I want everything — scripts, contracts, deals — in one workspace.” Notion, and accept that you are the one maintaining it.
“My workflow is weird and I have a manager who likes building things.” Airtable. Its automations fire on a date, which is the one thing Notion cannot do.
“I do three deals a year and this all seems like a lot.” Keep the spreadsheet. Come back when it stops holding.

Questions people ask

What is the best brand deal tracker for creators?

It depends which problem you have. If you need more sponsors, Passionfroot is the strongest option because it comes with a storefront and a brand network. If contracts and e-signatures matter most, HoneyBook wins. If you want a system shaped to an unusual workflow, Airtable is the most capable build-it-yourself option. If you need deals tracked alongside the videos that fulfil them, HeyKero is the only one of the six that links the two. Under three deals a year, a spreadsheet beats all of them.

Do I need a brand deal tracker at all?

Not if you close a handful of deals a year. The case for a dedicated tool starts when several sponsorships overlap and each carries a deliverable deadline, an invoice and a payment date — roughly five concurrent deals is where creators report the spreadsheet stops holding.

Which brand deal trackers are free?

Google Sheets is free permanently and Notion is free for personal use. Airtable has a free plan, though its automation runs are metered. Passionfroot charges creators no subscription but takes 5% or 15% per deal depending on how it was sourced. HoneyBook has no free plan, starting at $29 per month billed yearly. HeyKero is free while it is in beta.

Which tool finds brand deals for me?

Only Passionfroot, through its storefront and Partner Network. Google Sheets, Notion, Airtable, HoneyBook and HeyKero all assume the deals already exist and help you manage them.

Which tool tracks the video I make for a sponsorship?

HeyKero is the only one of the six with a content production pipeline linked to the deal, so a deal card shows what stage its video is at. Passionfroot stops at the booking, HoneyBook thinks in projects rather than deliverables, and in Notion, Airtable or a spreadsheet the link is something you build and maintain yourself.

Which of these actually reminds me an invoice is overdue?

HoneyBook and HeyKero do it out of the box, and Airtable can once you build the automation — its automations fire on a date, which is why it beats Notion for this. Notion automations only run when a property changes, so nothing happens when a due date simply arrives, and a spreadsheet never tells you anything.

Can any of these tell me what to charge for a sponsorship?

No. None of the six analyses your past deals and recommends a rate today. In Airtable, Notion or a spreadsheet you can build the average yourself from closed deals, which is manual but workable.

How often is this comparison updated?

Every claim here was last checked on July 29, 2026, and we re-verify pricing and features quarterly or whenever a tool ships something significant.

Sources

If the deal-and-video problem is yours, try ours.

Free while we’re in beta. Add the two deals you are most worried about and see whether the board catches something your current setup doesn’t.

Put your deals on the boardno card · takes a minute