Influencer Rachel Passarelli filming content videos for a matte lipstick brand in her Toronto home, on Nov. 8.Jennifer Roberts/The Globe and Mail
Rachel Passarelli, 29, often finds herself stressing over the weather. As a digital content creator, lighting is a game-changer and overcast skies can cost her hours of extra editing work or lost productivity. Every picture and every video has to look right – hundreds, sometimes thousands of dollars are at stake.
“In Toronto, the weather is insane – if it’s a sunny day, I’m like, okay, I need to capitalize,” she said.
Ms. Passarelli is part of the digital creator economy – an industry worth more than US$250-billion, according to Goldman Sachs estimates – where nearly 50 per cent of consumers say they rely on influencer recommendations to make a purchase.
And Ms. Passarelli’s influence is lucrative. Each photo and video she shares with her 14,000 Instagram followers and 2,500 TikTok followers gives exposure to the products she promotes. She can reel in up to $30,000 on a good month and between $10,000 to $12,000 on a slower one, while saving hundreds of dollars through gifted products. But behind the camera, she juggles two jobs, works 50- to 80-hour weeks and her income is often subject to the whims of algorithms, viral trends and even weather.
While more brands are investing in influencer marketing than ever – 85 per cent today versus 37 per cent in 2017, according to Influencer Marketing Hub – most creators work several jobs, invest thousands back into their business, and often deal with companies eager to take advantage of people working in an unconventional industry where there is little transparency.
Ms. Passarelli, a beauty influencer who splits her focus between her own social media and her creator consulting service, Mood for Thought, said she feels guilty if she skips a day of posting. “I have to be constantly plugged in – if you go for fun things like dinner, you’re shooting content there, it’s still work,” she said.
She also spends a lot on the business: two phones with maximum storage and $3,000 a month on personal care and travel to events – though she can write off a lot on her taxes as a business expense.
The savings aren’t insignificant either. Since monetizing her social media in 2017, Ms. Passarelli rarely buys any skincare or holiday presents—”I give a lot of products away, it’s impossible to get through them all.”
But not all influencers get freebies. Food influencer Robin Radomski is flooded with invites and requests from restaurants to create content, but she’s often expected to pay for her meal and transportation. That’s on top of other costs that go into the business.
On a particularly bad month, Ms. Radomski takes home $2,400 from both her food content account, Blondeats, and her social consulting services. On a good month, she can make more than 10 times that amount, she said.
What frustrates her the most is that many brands still underestimate the amount of work that goes into creating a single piece of content.
“I had a client that said to me, ‘well, a video takes five seconds to edit anyway, so it should be easy for you,’” she said. “That’s the biggest red flag – when a client doesn’t understand the value of social media.”
In the absence of any industry standards, influencers’ value depends on their ability to self-advocate more than their metrics. Two people with very similar audience size and engagement rates can be earning vastly different salaries, said Gary Lipovetsky, a creator business consultant and co-founder of Valeria Inc., an influencer media company.
“If you have 10K followers, you could be getting between $300 for a post or $3,000,” said Mr. Lipovetsky. “It comes down to a creator’s ability to negotiate for themselves … to illustrate value to the brand based on their strengths.”
Agencies, consultancies, and apps connecting influencers to brands have proliferated to tackle this. INF Agency is one of the biggest, with talent averaging six-figure yearly earnings and some in the seven-range.
“Our goal for creators is to make it their full-time job,” said Jessica Thomas Cooke, a partner at INF. She’s seen creators making six figures a year just from affiliate links – a type of partnership where creators get a commission for linking to a product or service.
Still, for most creators, social media remains a side hustle. And platforms like Heylist – which focuses on influencers with 10K followers or fewer – are making it possible for creators with even the smallest followings to monetize their content.
“We do kind of matchmaking for brands and influencers,” said Heylist CEO Vicky Boudreau. “Let’s say a brand needs to find vegan cowboys in Calgary. We know our influencers who are vegan lactose intolerant – they give this information on a voluntary basis – so we’re able to provide a very curated list for marketers looking to tackle very specific audiences.”
Montreal-based Chrislène Jean Baptiste, a “nano-influencer,” with a modest 4,000 followers on her fashion and lifestyle Instagram, earns between $300-$1,800 for a single brand campaign (one to five posts) through the platform. She also saves hundreds on gifted skin-care products, makeup and clothes.
But even those working part-time can find it hard to strike a balance. “I work way more than I’ve ever worked at like a full-time desk job,” said 29-year-old Marina Santarossa. “It’s really fun but I think people don’t realize that it takes up so much energy.”
The clock never stops as algorithms punish inconsistency. “If I miss out on a post, I might have missed out on going viral and gaining more followers and adding to my business,” she said.
Unlike most jobs where labour revolves around office hours, shiftwork, or client volume, the creator space largely revolves around our insatiable hunger for content; the more creators create, the more they’re rewarded. And hitting the brakes can feel like saying “no to money.
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