Brands leaving money on the table by overlooking Muslim and minority creators, SoSher Media founder says

Brands are still under-investing in Muslim and minority creators despite clear audience demand and spending power around moments such as Ramadan and Eid, the founder of creator management agency SoSher Media has said.

Shereen Patel said that too many campaigns aimed at diverse audiences are built around familiar faces and surface-level representation, rather than creator communities with genuine trust and cultural credibility.

“There is so much spending power on Muslims around Ramadan and Eid… so why are brands not investing now?” she said, speaking to The Daily Influence. Patel added that progress across the industry remains “very, very slow” and agencies and brands need to treat inclusion as a commercial and creative standard, not a seasonal add-on.

Patel set up Manchester-based SoSher Media to address what she sees as a structural gap caused by decision-makers being disconnected from the audiences they are trying to reach.

“In leadership teams and higher up, a lot of these agencies are predominantly white,” she said. “There’s a lot of unconscious bias… They don’t know that we have two Eids.”

Patel’s background in finance, combined with her experience working directly with creators while scaling an online business during the pandemic, shaped her move into creator management after she saw stark inequalities in pay and opportunity. SoSher Media now works across management, events and consultancy, with a focus on creators whose influence is rooted in community trust rather than viral reach.

Like other industry voices who have questioned the obsession with scale and follower counts, Patel pointed to the influencer marketing sector’s growing emphasis on micro creators and engaged audiences, a shift she said should in theory create more space for diverse talent.

But she said that only works if brands build campaigns that reflect culture with credibility and intent.

She pointed to a recent series of Diwali events in the UK, which prompted criticism from creators and audiences alike, for repeating the same guest lists and offering little cultural or educational context. “There was no educational aspect to these events,” Patel said.

What good should look like

Instead, Patel said brands serious about reaching Muslim and minority audiences should rethink how they approach creator partnerships, starting with access.

“We don’t want the same faces every year,” she said. “Follower count alone shouldn’t decide who represents a community.”

She also urged brands to move beyond London-centric events, particularly during Ramadan, when travel and late-night schedules can limit participation. “There are creators across the UK who never get considered simply because everything happens in one place,” she said.

Patel said she plans to expand SoSher Media’s consultancy work, applying principles she has tested through her own creator-led events, which prioritise new voices and shared learning over aesthetics alone.

Earlier this year, SoSher Media published a survey of Muslim creators highlighting gaps in brand investment and campaign access, which Patel said reinforced the need for change across the industry.

For Patel, successful campaigns should offer creators and audiences something beyond visuals.

“There has to be value,” she said. “Not just turning up, taking photos and leaving.”

She added that brands willing to invest in education and wider talent pools are likely to see stronger returns over time. “If you’ve got a demographic spending billions… it doesn’t make sense to keep treating them as an afterthought.”