A Twitch streamer's audience primarily consists of viewers who use ad blockers. How should this affect their negotiation strategy for a brand deal that includes CPM-based compensation?

If a Twitch streamer's audience primarily uses ad blockers, their negotiation strategy for a brand deal involving CPM-based compensation (Cost Per Mille, or cost per thousand impressions) must significantly account for the reduced number of viewers who will actually see the brand's ads. The standard CPM model relies on impressions generated by ads played to viewers. Ad blockers prevent these ads from displaying, thereby lowering the potential number of impressions and reducing the value the streamer can offer based purely on ad views. Therefore, the streamer should shift the focus of the negotiation away from standard CPM metrics and towards alternative forms of compensation and deliverables. This includes negotiating a higher flat fee that reflects the value of integrating the brand into the stream content itself, such as product placement during gameplay, sponsored segments where the streamer directly talks about the product, or creating custom content featuring the brand. The streamer should also provide data on audience engagement, demonstrating the viewers' loyalty and interaction through metrics like chat participation, emote usage, and poll responses, as these metrics are unaffected by ad blockers and can still demonstrate the audience's value to the brand. Additionally, the streamer can propose performance-based compensation tied to specific actions, such as affiliate links with trackable sales or coupon codes used by viewers, which provide a more direct measure of the campaign's effectiveness despite ad blocker usage. In essence, the streamer needs to reframe the value proposition, highlighting aspects beyond ad impressions to justify the brand deal's cost in light of the ad blocker issue. Ignoring this factor would lead to an overvaluation of the ad inventory and potential underperformance, creating dissatisfaction for the brand and harming future negotiation opportunities.