A message lands. "Hello, we would love to work with you on our new range, what are your rates?" There is no product named, no date, no volume, no use. And the temptation is to answer with a number, because that is the only question asked.
This is where a lot of orders get lost, in both directions: the ones priced too low because the need was guessed, and the ones scared off by an amount with no context. Answering an incoming enquiry is its own exercise, different from outreach and different from negotiation.
What a first enquiry never says
Five pieces of information are almost always missing, and they are exactly the five the price depends on.
What the brand wants filmed, precisely, product and angle. How many videos, and in how many formats. Where they will run, and in particular whether they will go into paid distribution. For how long. And for what delivery date.
None of those gaps is a bad sign: the person writing often has not decided yet. The creator's job is not to guess on their behalf, it is to hand them the grid that helps them settle it.
The questions to send back, and in what order
Order matters, because the first question already separates a serious enquiry from a vague intention.
- Which product is it, and what should the video make clear above all?
- How many videos, in which formats, and are variants needed?
- Where will they run, and is paid distribution planned?
- For how long does the brand want to use them, and in which markets?
- What delivery date are you aiming for, and who approves on your side?
Five questions, one message, no mention of price. An enquiry that does not answer this message would not have answered a quote either. An enquiry that answers point by point is, in the vast majority of cases, an order.
The fifth question is the one creators delete, and the most profitable. Knowing who approves tells you how many rounds await you, and therefore how much time the job will really cost.
Knowing who is writing to you
The answer changes with the sender, and the sender is recognisable in two lines.
The brand directly
The contact talks about the product, not the setup. They decide fast, they change their mind fast too, and they often ignore usage rights because nobody has raised them. This is where your grid of questions adds the most.
The agency
The vocabulary changes: brief, setup, deliverable, client approval. An agency knows what it is buying, it has a budget already framed and a tight calendar. Working with agencies has its own rules, covered in working with UGC agencies in France. What matters here is simpler: spotting that there is a client behind, therefore one more approval.
The third party whose role is unclear
An intermediary writes on behalf of a brand without saying in what capacity. That is not suspicious in itself, but it is worth asking from the first message, before investing time in pricing.
Moving from a message to a quote
In France, a written quote is only compulsory for a specific list of activities, and content production is not on it. Nobody will demand one from you.
That is exactly why sending one sets you apart. A quote turns a conversation into a dated, priced, bounded proposal that your contact can circulate internally without rewriting it. A chat message does not circulate.
What the quote carries
Your identity and business number, the subject described in the brand's own terms, the quantity and formats, the intended usage window, the delivery deadline, the price, a validity period, and the VAT wording that matches your situation, explained in the VAT exemption guide.
The validity period is the most useful detail and the most often left out. Thirty days is plenty. Without it, a quote priced in February comes back signed in September, at a price you no longer charge.
A quote accepted in writing binds both parties to what it describes. That does not make it a contract: anything touching assignment of rights, image, penalties or exclusivity needs proper drafting, and rights and contracts for UGC creators in France covers that ground. The quote frames the order, the contract frames the rights.
Enquiries you do not answer straight away
Three profiles deserve a pause before any priced reply.
The offer of the product alone. It is not absurd for a creator starting out who wants a portfolio piece, but it is a decision, not something to absorb. The usual objection is that refusing closes the door: in practice, a brand with a budget finds it when the reply explains what it gets for paying.
Urgency with no brief. "We would need this the day after tomorrow" with no document is rarely a real calendar, it is a badly prepared project. Accepting means absorbing that disorganisation into your nights.
And the enquiry demanding a detailed quote before any exchange, sometimes to play competitors off against each other on a job that does not exist yet. Pricing gets given, but after the five questions, not before.
Response time, and what it costs
An incoming enquiry has a short shelf life. The person writing usually contacts several profiles the same day, and the first structured reply steers the decision, sometimes before the others have even been read.
Replying within the working day is a real advantage, and it requires neither permanent availability nor a complete answer. A short message acknowledging receipt, asking the five questions and announcing when you will come back fits in three lines and holds the ground.
What costs dearly is not replying late, it is replying late with a perfect answer.
Sources
Checked on 11 September 2026. This guide is not legal advice. Where this guide and the official source disagree, the source prevails.
