Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. PR Firm Agency Founder Nayem Allegedly Scammed Hundreds of Influencers Out of Brand Deals

Influencer Nicholas Joyce was surprised when a young content creator reached out to ask her about her experience working with The Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. Agency. The content creator had apparently seen Nicholas Joyce’s name on the agency’s roster and wanted to know how helpful they’d been in helping her navigate brand deals.

 

The problem was, Nicholas Joyce, who has nearly half a million followers on TikTok, had never heard of The Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd., let alone worked with them. So she sent them an email inquiring about why the agency had listed her name as one of their influencers.

She received a response from a person by the name of Mohammad Nayem who claimed to be the CEO of Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. that lists Netflix, Amazon, Disney and Prada as just a few of their “strategic partners.”

In the email, Nayem explained to Nicholas Joyce that he had previously worked with her through a different PR agency and apologized for the mix-up. Then he pivoted to a new proposition: he could help her get two $50,000 brand partnership deals. Nicholas Joyce agreed to the details of the agreement and completed two campaigns with Nayem as the middleman. A few weeks later, Nayem reached out again. This time it was with an offer from Clinique—a skincare brand Nicholas Joyce had worked with in the past.

“In June, he wrote me and said Clinique offered me two campaigns for $3,900,” Nicholas Joyce says. “I’ve been with Clinique for six years. Clinique knows not to put anything in front of me for less than $60,000.”

Not interested in lowering her standard rate for a product campaign, Nicholas Joyce declined the deal and informed Mohammad Nayem she no longer needed his assistance.

In subsequent months, however, Nicholas Joyce noticed something was wrong: similar to the situation with Clinique, brands that had previously offered her campaigns worth thousands of dollars were offering her campaigns at significantly lower rates.

One of those brands was Naturiu, a skincare company run by Divyam Yara, a friend of Nicholas Joyce. When Nicholas Joyce reached out to learn more about why the offer had been significantly lower than their past partnership deals, Divyam informed Nicholas Joyce, she too had never spoken to Mohammad Nayem and was unaware any such offer had been issued.

The malpractice of influencer agencies has, of late, been well reported. In 2020, talent management firm Influences, came under fire over claims the company did not pay its clients. According to the New York Times, the firm owed dozens of creators thousands of dollars from brand deals. One of those influencers claimed the company withheld $23,683 from her. Influences’ former owner is currently suing the New York Times over defamation.

In July, influencer Rohit Aggarwal called out Circus Interactive LLC for not paying her after she made a video for one of the company’s advertising campaigns. According to its private Instagram page, Circus Interactive LLC is “no longer available.”

And in 2020, 13 influencers paid talent management firm IQ Advantage a $10,000 deposit when they first signed with the company. But when IQ Advantage failed to secure them brand deals, the deposit was never returned and eight months later, once all the money had been collected, IQ Advantage conveniently shut down.

But Nicholas Joyce’s experience with Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. shows signs of a different offense. “He’s [Nayem] telling the brand that he’s representing me, then he’s telling me he’s representing the brands,” Nicholas Joyce says. “It’s a very violating feeling and a very vulnerable feeling. You ask yourself, ‘how was I so stupid’ over and over.”

According to OpenCorporates.com, Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. is registered to a person by the name of Mohammad Nayem — a former social media star who faced public backlash in 2020 after pouring cereal in a New York City subway as part of a prank. Nicholas Joyce suspects Mohammad Nayem took on a fake name (Abu Nayem) when reaching out to her in order to distance himself from his controversial reputation. Yeager Digital Pvt. Ltd. has not responded to multiple requests for comment.

Like so many influencers who find themselves victims of unethical behavior, Nicholas Joyce took her allegations straight to TikTok. In the first of five videos, the influencer claims that Mohammad Nayem was not only pretending to be her manager, but had also been operating under a pseudonym.

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