My Top Highlights from My First Year as a Full-Time Content Creator
Happy New Year, everyone! Since January is not over yet, I thought I would rip the bandaid off of my mini-goal to start blogging again at least once a month. In order to ensure that I write posts regularly, I will be attempting to write shorter posts more frequently. However, knowing my long-winded self, this will be a difficult task to accomplish!
To start things off, I thought I would go over the top highlights of my first year as a full-time content creator. If you don’t occasionally look back and reflect on your past accomplishments (both big and small), I highly recommend that you start as it really helps you realize how much you’ve grown over a certain period of time!
Writing out a list of my top 2021 accomplishments had a big impact on me as it became clear that this was a year of many “firsts.” While not all of these were positive experiences, I am very proud of how I pushed myself out of my comfort zone to grow both as an individual and in my career.
My Top 2021 Highlights As A Full-Time Content Creator
1. My First Year Earnings:
In 2021, I set a minimum goal of earning $35,000 with content creation. However, I managed to exceed my stretch goal and earn just under $51,000. In addition to those brand partnership earnings, I started to create other sources of income by investing smarter (stocks, ETFs, index funds), helping to manage the Hemlock and Oak social media account, and starting a social media mentorship program.
In 2022, I have reasonable expectations to greatly exceed last year’s earnings as I’ve already secured $15,500 in brand partnerships for Quarter 1 (January - March)— which is more triple the amount what I earned in Q1 of 2021 ($3,300+).
2. Growth For Hemlock and Oak:
As many of you might know, I’ve had the pleasure of helping build Hemlock and Oak’s social media presence for my bestie Tia over the past year and a bit. Since I started working on their Instagram account back in September 2020, it’s grown from about 500 followers to over 7,500 followers! Even more importantly, the community we’ve built on there is super engaged and supportive of our brand— we see it everyday from the kind emails, reviews, DMs, story tags, and comments we receive from our lovely customers.
We are so thankful to every single customer for kindly supporting our efforts to create high-quality, sustainable, and Canadian-made stationery. For our wonderful #hemlockandoakers, stay tuned for more exciting developments and new products coming your way in 2022!
3. First Magazine Feature (Refinery29):
As someone who used to regularly read Refinery29, it was a surreal moment to be featured in one of their style features during the summer of 2021! Since the main theme of the feature was about how our style had changed in lockdown, I was happy to share about how I decided to stop buying fast fashion and commit to a more sustainable lifestyle.
As we were asked to provide our favourite summer outfit, I decided to choose a pretty set from Canadian designer Genia Evelina in order to illustrate my commitment to supporting small businesses with ethical and sustainable practices. It doesn’t hurt that her designs are so darn cute! Read the article here.
4. First IG Live (Poshmark):
One of my main goals for 2021 was pushing myself out of my comfort zone to do new things that help me to grow and experience new things— even if they make me feel nervous. Therefore, while I would usually say no to such opportunities, I ended up doing an IG Live with Poshmark despite my fears of being judged by an unknown audience. In the end, it turned to be a really fun experience and I greatly enjoyed myself. As well, I was able to work with Poshmark Canada to share more about my love for sustainable style!
5. First Paid Video & Photoshoot (Amazon Canada x Peau de Loup):
In 2021, I also had the chance to work with several well-known brands— including Amazon Canada. For me, the main draw of this opportunity wasn’t working with Amazon; instead, I was excited to support a Vancouver-based slow fashion brand called Peau de Loup that was being featured in a campaign called the Amazon Fashion Video Series. This particular clothing company practices sustainability with upcycled designs that are size-inclusive and gender-fluid— which all are values that I greatly support. In this campaign, I was asked to complete an hour-long photoshoot and video shoot session, as well as create two rounds of content.
6. First Paid Campaign that Featured Me on a Bus Stop and Billboard (IKEA):
When I first received this campaign, I felt extremely excited to be working with a major company such as IKEA. While I initially thought I was being fairly paid for the campaign, I later realized how big their budget was (and how much I had undercharged for my content) when I learned that they were using my content not only for whitelisting purposes, but also on bus stop ads and billboards in the busiest parts of Toronto.
It was this campaign in particular that became my main motivation for educating myself on properly valuing my work— especially for usage rights! Following this learning experience, I started to negotiate much higher-paying campaigns after I realized that I should be charging for various usage rights and exclusivity.
7. First Paid Campaign For A Major Home Appliance (Samsung Home):
Although this opportunity might seem amazing, it was truly a nightmare at many different stages! At first, I thought I was signing up for a wireless vacuum cleaner, which should have been relatively easy to shoot. However, since Canada was no longer selling such products, the team asked me to choose a refrigerator instead! While we had our misgivings about such a big change in direction, Peter and I decided to go ahead with this new product. Unfortunately, we were not experienced with measuring for a new appliance and underestimated how much room we would need for the new smart fridge. In the end, the fridge wasn’t able to fit into both our apartment and my parent’s much larger home!
As a result, I went back-and-forth with the team and ended up ordering a new smart stove instead. After the stove was successfully installed (after much stress and anxiety), I was finally able to take some photos (which weren’t the nicest in our dark and small kitchen) that happily were quickly approved by the team. As well, I honestly didn’t get paid that much for this campaign (as the product was considered to be part of the compensation) and now would REALLY have second thoughts about working on another home appliance campaign. Nevertheless, it was a good learning experience about what I did NOT like in a brand partnership.
8. #Paid: My Highest Paying Collaborations of 2021:
While I’ve been registered on #paid for several years now, I only started getting lucrative brand deals from this influencer platform in late 2021. After learning how to charge properly for usage rights, I managed to obtain a campaign from a very large brand paying me about $5000 for TWO pieces of content (one feed post and one reel). Following that, I obtained THREE more campaigns from #paid— including one that paid me $6000 for a feed post and reel! So far, I’ve had very positive experiences with this influencer platform and hope that I will obtain more high-paying campaigns from them in 2022.
9. The Mentorship Program Begins:
Since I am blessed with a strong, engaged community, I’ve been asked on multiple occasions to begin a coaching or mentorship program for those who wish to grow their account, engagement, and attract high-quality brand partnerships. As a result, in the fall of 2021, I finally decided to give it a try!
After putting out the feelers on Instagram, I registered ten lovely mentees and began mentoring them in late September through October. While I thoroughly enjoyed the experience and getting to know these wonderful individuals on a deeper level, the amount I charged for the time I spent on the program (auditing accounts, writing up social media strategy documents, follow-up sessions, etc.) was unfortunately not adequate. Therefore, when I finished mentorship those ten creators, I decided to focus instead of paid partnerships (which pays me much more for my time).
While I may perhaps reopen the program in the future, I would probably take on half the amount of clients and at least double the price of the mentorship.
Looking Ahead: My Top 2022 Goals
Now that it’s almost the end of January, I’ve formulated a few goals for my upcoming year in relation to my career as a content creator.
To name just a few, I plan to:
1) keep educating myself on brand negotiations.
2) push myself to create valuable content that may be outside of my comfort zone to create (i.e. outfit reels and various reel trends).
3) set a higher monetary goal for my brand partnership earnings.
4) continue informally mentoring creators with my reel series and blog posts.
5) try to write at least one blog post a month on relevant content creator topics.
6) continue building my audience on TikTok and Pinterest.
7) upgrade my photography and videography techniques by educating myself and learning from others.
To my fellow creators, what were the highlights of your year? As well, what are some your top goals for the year ahead?
A big thanks as always for taking the time to read my posts— without your kind support, this career would not be possible!