An Irish TikTok star with over 50,000 followers has shared advice on how to become a successful social media content creator.
Cork woman Aimee Wills was made redundant from her job in customer care last November but she has since become a TikTok star with more than 53,000 followers and she makes money out of it.
What made the difference and changed her life was her sharing a random video of an alpaca which had nothing to do with her usual morning routine and makeup videos. The innocuous video went viral and was viewed by 16 million people. Since then, Aimee has become a full-time influencer, striking deals with brands and making enough money to support herself.
The 26-year-old mum, who has a second baby boy on the way, told Dublin Live that while ideally she’d like to still be working a job, “there’s not a struggle” financially. She said: “The money is good, and I have been really fortunate to work with some brands who have seen what I can do and trust in my work as well.”
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The content creator has shared some tips for those who also want to try their hand at social media content creation.
Don't be afraid to post something
Aimee said: “If they have something in their head and then it doesn't look half as great as they thought it was going to be, I'd be posting it anyway because you don't know what's going to take off and you really don’t know what people are actually paying attention to at that moment in time where it comes up. So just post everything.
“Just bite the bullet and try not to care what people think about it. If they [content creators] are getting into that industry, it's not something that you can think about because it will hold you back if you do care too much about what people are going to say.”
You really need to develop thick skin
Aimee says it’s essential for content creators to avoid getting too emotionally involved with the negative comments they might see in their comment section. She said: “I’m an empathetic person but I find I do have thick skin, I can deal with a lot of stuff as well.
“If I don’t know you, it'll just go over my head. Like, I won't really pay attention to a negative opinion if I don't even know who you are.”
Up-and-coming TikTokers and Instagram influencers also really need to differentiate between constructive criticism and people being mean for the sake of it. The 26-year-old added: “I can take criticism on board but there comes a lane then where it just gets nasty.
“...And if there's comments or DMs or anything like that from people that are obviously unwanted, it's up to you to kind of go, ‘okay, is this really going matter in five years what they just said to me or not’?”
Know your value
Aimee said: “Obviously, at the beginning, a lot of the time you're going to probably just take whatever is given to you to try get yourself places that you want to be. But in the long run, or even at the beginning, if you could just start saying ‘no’ to something, if you know your worth, then you're going to stay on the right track and you’re going to get to where you want.”
Keep an eye out for trends
Aimee's advice is to be on the lookout for new trends and try to incorporate that into your own content as well. She said: "You just have to be very creative but just be yourself online as well. Originality is everything – that's one of the most important things I've learned from doing it so far.”
Don’t try to be perfect
People value authenticity. The creator said: “Nothing is always just a highlight, so in your whole life, in anyone's life, nothing is perfect. So I took that and just went with it, and I literally do show the highlights and then all my reality as well. People like knowing what is going on, they like content that they can relate to."
Prepare for a lot of admin work
Aimee usually has a very busy schedule. Between caring for her son and recording the videos she thought up herself or PR that came in, she does a lot of administrative work as well, such as reaching out to brands or replying to brands. She said: “People don't see that side of it.
"It's a lot of behind-the-scenes - you're sitting behind your phone recording or being in contact with brands back and forth to try work together and see what's going to work for you and if it can work with my sort of content.”
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The Cork woman thinks it’s easier to make it big on TikTok than on Instagram where’s she’s just shy of 10,000 followers. She said: “I definitely found it is harder to get your reach [on Instagram] on the exact same videos that you post on TikTok.
"Most of my videos I post on both platforms and it would only do well on TikTok, which is bizarre because it’s the same thing, it's the same people on these two apps.” Aimee thinks it's an algorithm issue.
In the future, the TikTok star plans to develop the beauty product business she put up during lockdown - it’s called "Aimee by Aimee Wills". She also wants to be involved in podcasts.
Follow Aimee on TikTok here and Instagram here.
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