Welcome to this week’s Influencer Dashboard newsletter!
As always, this is Amanda Perelli, and I’ll be briefing you on what’s new in the business of influencers and creators.
First up, my colleague Dan Whateley and I highlighted 21 top social-media influencers who live and create content around the Greater New York City area.
Los Angeles often takes center stage when it comes to the influencer world, with headline-making creators like David Dobrik and Tana Mongeau sharing popular vlogs in the city, but New York is its own hub for some of the internet’s most prominent creators.
These leading digital stars, like the lifestyle and fashion Instagram influencer Courtney Quinn, run successful digital businesses in podcasting and on platforms like YouTube, Instagram, and TikTok.
“You have really great access to brands and organizations here, so even if you’re just starting out, you can go out and network and meet people,” Quinn said of New York. “There’s always a way to get your foot in the door if you’re willing to put yourself out there.”
We chose the 21 creators based on factors like audience size, creativity, and their impact on the influencer industry as a whole.
Check out the full list of leading digital creators in New York, here.
You can read most of the articles here by subscribing to BI Prime. And if this is your first time reading Influencer Dashboard, subscribe to the newsletter here.
Inside the world of cannabis influencers on Instagram and YouTube, who can make over $1,000 for a sponsored post but often get their accounts shut down
Teresa Garibyan/Trippy Treez
Did you know there’s a community of popular cannabis influencers who are dominating social media?
Dan spoke to four creators who post cannabis-related content on platforms like YouTube and Instagram, all of whom said they’d had their accounts shut down at various points, likely due to shifting laws and regulations.
When their accounts aren’t deactivated, however, these influencers are well-compensated for sponsored posts and affiliate sales.
Teresa Garibyan, who runs the popular cannabis Instagram account Trippy Treez (223,000 followers), told Dan that she earns between $1,000 and $1,500 for a single sponsored post on her Instagram account.
Read the full post on what it’s like to be a Cannabis influencer, here.
The metrics that brands use to measure the success of an influencer-marketing campaign are changing, as ‘likes’ and ‘followers’ fall out of favor
Tomi Obebe
With only a few dollars, anyone can go online and purchase fake followers, comments, or likes on an Instagram post as a way to boost their social-media engagement.
And sometimes it can be hard for brands to separate the real from the fake, which is why some are turning to different metrics to judge the success of their influencer-marketing campaigns.
I spoke with two influencer-marketing experts about some of the metrics they expected brands to pay attention to in 2020 and dove into a recent report from the influencer-marketing agency Collectively.
With new Instagram features rolling out, like the ability to shop directly on the platform, brands will place emphasis on metrics like comment sentiment (such as if followers are name-dropping the brand), post saves, brand mentions in DMs, tags in shopping posts, and story replies, Collectively said.
Read the full post on the metrics brands are paying attention to in 2020, here.
What else happened this week on BI Prime:
- How Cash App went viral on TikTok by leveraging an original song and hiring influencers who it advised to make fun of ‘how broke you are’: Dan spoke to insiders who worked on the Cash App campaign to learn how it came together. He also published a leaked Cash App campaign brief, which shows the video ideas Cash App pitched to TikTok influencers.
- How much YouTube pays for a video with 100,000 views, according to a personal-finance creator: I spoke to Marko Zlatic, a personal-finance YouTube creator, on how much money YouTube pays him per view. Talking about money on YouTube can be a lucrative video subject: he also shared why he earns four times what the average creator does, here.
- A ‘twinfluencer’ with millions of followers says he’s leaning into TikTok for brand sponsorships and getting ‘low 5-figure deals’: Dan spoke to the Stokes twins on their wild TikTok growth and on working with brands like Chipotle and Amazon on sponsorships.
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VIDEO: A YouTube influencer with 260,000 subscribers gives a crash course on how to make money on the platform and shares how much she earns: Natalie Barbu came by Business Insider and shared a crash course on how she earns money as a YouTube creator and her strategy for maximizing her earnings on the platform.
- 2 of MrBeast’s childhood friends explain what it’s like to work on the YouTube star’s team, from dropping $60,000 on a video to going on ‘travel sprees’: Chris Tyson and Chandler Hallow work full time for YouTube star Jimmy Donaldson, known online as MrBeast (with 30 million subscribers). I spoke to them about what it’s like working for Donaldson.
YouTube video of the week: Losing a Best Friend
Screenshot from Ethan Dolan/Twitter.
The popular twin influencers Ethan and Grayson Dolan recently shared a long-form documentary project with their 10 million YouTube subscribers, which follows the story behind losing their dad to cancer, and I am highlighting this video as our YouTube video of the week.
In the video, they share a link to the charity Love From Sean, which they set up to honor their father. The proceeds will go toward supporting research, treatments, and support services for families and patients affected by cancer — and in 24 hours, the charity had already raised almost $200,000, Grayson said on Twitter.
The documentary was written, produced, and directed by the duo. You can check out the full video, here.
Send tips or feedback to me at aperelli@businessinsider.com.
Here’s what else we’re reading:
- YouTuber Jake Paul is trying to cash in on teaching fans how to become influencers — two years after his first project failed: Paige Leskin from Business Insider reported on Paul’s new online platform designed to teach “young adults” practical skills outside of a typical education, and its similarities to a project he attempted two years ago.
- TikTok Star Dixie D’Amelio Cast in Brat TV Series: Natalie Jarvey from The Hollywood Reporter wrote that D’Amelio had been cast in new series with the three-year-old digital studio, Brat.
- Behind that teenage TikTok star, there’s probably a very confused parent: Kaya Yurieff from CNN Business spoke to parents on what it’s like when your teen becomes TikTok famous.
- The Original Renegade: A 14-year-old in Atlanta created one of the biggest dances on the internet. But nobody really knows that: Taylor Lorenz from The New York Times wrote about Jalaiah Harmon, a 14-year-old dancer who created the viral TikTok dance, Renegade.
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