For beauty and skincare brands
Your creators make the routine videos. The songs come back to you.
GRWM videos, tutorials, before-and-afters and affiliate reviews all lean on trending songs. We check your posts, your creators' videos and your ads, and tell you which are fine and which need a fix. Know every post is safe before your boss or a record label asks.
✓ No logins, just your handles✓ Results in 5 business days✓ Every flag confirmed by a person
Why beauty has more music risk than most
Beauty marketing is built on video made by other people. Creators film get-ready-with-me clips, skin routines, honest reviews and before-and-afters. Affiliates on TikTok Shop post their own versions every day. Your social team reposts the best ones and your media buyer boosts the winners. Almost every one of those videos has a song under it, and the song is usually whatever was trending that week.
That is exactly the mix record labels look for. The songs in the main TikTok and Instagram libraries are licensed for people making personal videos. A routine that features your serum, tags your brand and links to your shop is not personal. It is advertising, and the brand being promoted is the obvious party to send a claim to.
This isn't theoretical for beauty. In late 2023 Sony Music sued OFRA Cosmetics, alleging that videos promoting the brand, including influencer videos, used Sony recordings without a license. The complaint listed hundreds of recordings. The pattern it describes, creators posting with hit songs and the brand amplifying them, is how most beauty brands operate today.
Where the risk actually sits
Most beauty teams assume the risk is on their own account, so they check their own posts and stop there. In practice, the brand account is often the cleanest place. The bigger exposure is everywhere else your product shows up:
- Gifted and paid creator videos. PR boxes go out, creators post, and nobody asks which song they used.
- Affiliate videos. Hundreds of TikTok Shop affiliates selling your products with whatever sound is hot.
- Boosted posts. Spark Ads and Instagram partnership ads turn an organic creator video into a paid ad with your name on it.
- Reposts and stitches. Your team shares a creator's routine to the brand account and the song comes along.
A launch week, start to finish
Here's a pattern we see often. A skincare brand launches a new vitamin C serum. It sends 200 PR boxes, books 15 paid creators and opens the product to TikTok Shop affiliates. In the first week there are 340 videos. The paid creators were briefed on claims and disclosures, but not on music. Twelve of them use the same trending pop song. Six of those videos perform well, so the media buyer turns them into Spark Ads and puts real budget behind them.
Nobody did anything unusual. That is the problem. Each of those six boosted videos is now a paid ad, run by the brand, using a major-label song without a commercial license. If the label's monitoring team finds them, the claim lands on the brand, not on the creators. And damages are counted per song, which is why one song across six ads is one problem, while twelve different songs across a launch is twelve.
The fix in that story costs almost nothing if it happens before the boost: swap the audio for a cleared track, or ask the creator to re-cut with a licensed one. After a letter arrives, it costs a lawyer, a settlement and a very uncomfortable meeting.
What we check for beauty brands
You send us your TikTok and Instagram handles. We find your posts, the creator and affiliate videos that mention your products, and the ads running in your name. For each video we work out what song is really playing, including songs hidden under a label like "original sound", and whether your use is likely covered. Then we check whether any creator videos you're running have outlived the usage rights you agreed with the creator.
Every video comes back green, yellow or red:
- Green: OK to run. Original audio, cleared library music, or a licensed track.
- Yellow: check it soon. Library music you should confirm your plan covers, or creator rights ending shortly.
- Red: fix now. A commercial song in a boosted post, a song named in a label lawsuit, or a creator video running past its rights.
Every red and yellow comes with a specific fix and is confirmed by a trained reviewer before it reaches you. You get a list your social team can work through in an afternoon, and a dated record your legal team can keep.
Fix it before launch, not after
The cheapest moment to fix music is before a video gets money behind it. Add one line to your creator brief: no chart songs on sponsored content, use the Commercial Music Library or original audio. Check creator videos before you boost them. And run a full check of the last 90 days so you know where you stand today, including the affiliate videos you never saw.
The first check starts at $500 and is free if we find nothing to fix. Beauty brands with active affiliate programs almost always find something, usually in boosted creator content.
Check your beauty content
Common questions
Can beauty creators use trending songs in sponsored videos?
Not safely. The songs in TikTok's and Instagram's main music libraries are licensed for personal videos. A sponsored routine that shows your product is marketing, so the brand generally needs a commercial license or a cleared track.
Was a beauty brand really sued over influencer videos?
Yes. In late 2023 Sony Music sued OFRA Cosmetics, alleging that influencer and brand videos promoting its products used Sony recordings without a license. It's one of several cases where the brand was named for creators' posts.
Does it matter if the creator posted it, not us?
It can. Courts and labels look at who the video promotes and who paid for it. Sony's case against Bang Energy is the clearest example: the brand was held responsible for its influencers' videos.
What if the video is a duet or stitch of a creator's routine?
Reposting, stitching or duetting a video brings its audio with it. If the original used a chart song, your version carries the same problem.
Is this legal advice?
No. We tell you what's in your content and how to fix it. For a specific claim or letter, talk to a lawyer.
Related
General information, not legal advice. Platform rules and licenses change; check the current terms or ask your lawyer about your situation. Lawsuit figures are as reported and represent claims, not findings, unless noted.