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Welcome to the pilot episode of the Creator Spotlight podcast. Today's episode is with Hannah Williams, the creator of Salary Transparent Street.

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Her project blew up on TikTok overnight back in April twenty twenty-two, literally gaining fifty thousand followers in the first night alone.

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And now Hannah's brand has over one point three million followers on TikTok alone, not to mention their followings on all the other platforms.

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It's a full-fledged media business that brought in one million dollars in revenue last year. I hope you enjoy this pilot episode of the Creator Spotlight podcast.

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And if you have any feedback, please send it to editor@creatorspotlight.com. To start, you know- Mm-hmm... for our readers, listeners, subscribers, give me the quick overview. Who is Hannah Williams?

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What is Salary Transparent Street? Yeah. So hi, I'm Hannah Williams from Salary Transparent Street. Salary Transparent Street is a page I started with my husband in April of twenty twenty-two.

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Basically, what we do is we ask people what they do for a living and how much they make. Um, the whole point of the page was I found out I was underpaid. I used to be a senior data analyst in the DC metro area.

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Found out I was making about twenty to twenty-five thousand dollars less than people in the same role doing the same thing as me in my market.

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And you know, I just encountered so much pay secrecy in my career that I realized it was something that needs more of a platform, and I took to my, my phone to the streets and my husband and, you know, here we are.

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[chuckles] Yeah. No, that's amazing. I, I, I feel like I'm, I'm, I'm starting to find that the best, most successful, let's say, projects come from like people like you who like see...

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You know, they're looking for something and they see a gap. Like you were looking for more information on like what- Mm-hmm... you should be paid, couldn't really find it, um, or it was like hidden, so you know- Yeah...

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you decided to make this thing, and I, I think I'm seeing that with a lot of other people. Uh, but- Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm...

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before Salary Transparent Street, you had another TikTok account that I believe was called like- Mm-hmm... Stocks and Squats. Now, it still exists- Yes. [chuckles]... but it's just your name.

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Um, and I was looking at it, and I see that you started it in twenty twenty. You posted like three times, uh- Mm-hmm...

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in like the preceding like year and a half or so, and then January twenty twenty-two, you started doing these like, you know, front-facing camera, like talking about employment and recruiting and like salary negotiation, the kind of things that, you know, you'd go on to do.

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Um, and then- Mm-hmm... like I believe you got forty thousand followers in four months- Yeah... and then start... which is already also crazy, and then started- [chuckles]... um, Salary Transparent Street.

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So tell me like- Yeah... why you started like TikTok-ing on that account, and then why- Mm-hmm... you decided to like spin off this whole separate project. Yeah.

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I love that you did your research because nobody ever brings up Stocks and Squats, and I think it's such an important part of my story, right? Like, like you mentioned, I posted three times in twenty twenty.

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Uh, it was the first time I got a TikTok account.

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You know, everybody else and their mother over the p- panini, you know, we all got TikTok, and they were just like fun videos, like comple-- I, I'd made a puzzle in one, like the... I had no...

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I've never had a desire to be a creator. I don't really have much of a digital footprint. That desire to be a YouTuber or an influencer was never something that I wanted or thought that I could do.

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Um, so it's never something that I basically sought after until January of twenty twenty-two, and even then, I don't even think I, I would say that I was seeking, you know, being an influencer.

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I started creating those videos because that was right when I accepted my new job as a senior data analyst after I had found out I was underpaid.

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So I got an offer after finding out I was underpaid for a hundred fifteen K, tried to negotiate it.

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Basically, I bumped up my salary twenty-five thousand dollars, the amount I knew I was underpaid, overnight it felt like.

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And I, I in that moment realized I need to talk about this because like this experience is crazy, and I resolved it, but this doesn't solve the, the problem.

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You know, the systemic issue is still pervasive and a- affecting people every single day. So I just realized, you know, there is value in starting to talk about it, so I was like, "Okay, let me dip my toe in TikTok."

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And as I made more videos, one of my most popular ones is where I shared every salary I had at all of my jobs, and I was...

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You know, the feedback on that video was such a light bulb that I was like, I knew this was an issue, but the feedback confirms that this is also an issue for other people, and it's not just something that I'm complaining about, you know?

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And that inspired me so much to start Salary Transparent Street. Like people that were following me there were hearing me say, "I have an idea," like, "I'm gonna go on the street."

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And I feel kinda bad because I, you know, like I said, I, I don't consider myself like I never wanted to be a creator, and running two accounts full-time is incredibly difficult.

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So almost as soon as Salary Transparent Street started, I like abandoned that account because I've just kinda been following the mission. I don't wanna be the person, you know, selling stuff on TikTok Shop.

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I just love that I can use my phone to have social impact. Mm-hmm. Yeah. No, that's great. Y- I... So you still post on it sometimes, though. I, I was looking. Sometimes. Yeah.

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I've tried to get back into it, but I'm just more so using it as like a break. You know, like- Mm-hmm...

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I create content that I think is fun and like just about my life, you know, things that make me laugh versus like hard-hitting education. [chuckles] Yeah. No.

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Well, I think that's really interesting 'cause like I obviously for a living write this newsletter, Creator Spotlight. Mm-hmm.

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Um, but then I have another one that's like just for fun that like the twenty friends follow that is just like a- Yeah... a creative outlet for me to like write a few hundred words every week. Um, so- Yeah...

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I'm interested, like what, what does that do for you having that other... 'Cause I think it's important personally. So like- Mm-hmm... is it important to you to have that as a creative outlet, or why? Absolutely. Mm.

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It's so important to have that as a creative outlet because it-- the burnout is real. Like what I tell people the best way to give an example of what our work is, is it's constantly being on a hamster wheel.

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The internet is not a nine-to-five.

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It is twenty-four hours a day, seven days a week, and it's very exhausting to constantly be focused on this one thing and then just likeSometimes you have these ideas for your content and they don't perform, you know, and it's-- you just-- it's constantly just like shooting s- uh, dice or, um, you know, arrows at the, at the, at the wall and hoping-- or spaghetti at the wall and hoping it sticks.

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So having a creative outlet, like a profile where I'm like, "There's no pressure here for me to perform. There's no pressure for analytics. I don't care if this video gets two views. I don't care if it gets a thousand."

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I don't even think-- look at the comments. Like, to me, that helps me stay grounded in my joy of creating content and what I love about the internet. Yeah. No, I love that.

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I think that's really important and, like, people, people would do well to remember that. Yeah.

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So this same article I read, which was written about two months after you launched, uh, Salad Transparency, it said that you- Mm-hmm... had about six hundred thousand followers on TikTok already. Mm-hmm.

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And that's crazy to me 'cause now you have about one point three million, which is, you know, only twice as much. Huge number- Yeah... but only twice as much.

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So I'm curious about, like, the audience growth journey, um- Mm-hmm... and, you know, um, just TikTok for now and then maybe getting into the other platforms. But was it really just- Mm-hmm...

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so meteoric and then it kind of steadied after that, or how did that happen? Meteoric is an understatement.

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Like, I think I went to bed the first night, like April sixteenth, twenty twenty-two, zero followers, like a completely blank slate. First video, no followers.

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When I woke up the next morning, I think we had like fifty k. And you know, like you said, it took me four months to get forty k on my personal account. So like, that is so...

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I-i it was in that moment that I realized, you know, I've definitely got something here. Like, this is, this is crazy.

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And as it kept growing, you know, the six hundred k in the first few months, it was definitely a con-confirmation that we could create a business out of it and, you know, actually continue doing this.

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But it was also a little scary. Um, and I kind of-- I wouldn't recommend it.

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I, I almost wish that we had had the slow burn because when we grew so fast, it almost felt like we didn't know who our audience was, 'cause there were so many different types of people.

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Like on TikTok, we're not just popular in the United States, we have an audience like in India, in, in Nigeria, in Australia and Canada, and I'm like, I don't...

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You know, how do I make sure that I'm catering to their needs as well? And Americans and-- it was very difficult to kind of understand who our community and our audience was.

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But, you know, over time, we're almost two years old, we've definitely m- defined who our audience is and what they want, and that really just comes down to being very engaged with them.

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Um, you can't create a platform like this and have a meteoric rise and immediately start getting an ego. I encourage our audience to give us critical feedback. Whenever we have meetups, I'm like, "What am I doing wrong?

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What do you wanna see? What are we not doing?" And I take that feedback incredibly to heart because that's who I'm creating content for.

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You know, I started this as a little hobby, but at the end of the day, the impact is with them, and if I'm not meeting their needs, they're gonna unfollow me, you know? And that's murder in this industry.

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So I really need to make sure that I understand them. So having that meteoric rise was difficult to have an understanding of them. But as long as you're engaged, which is what we did, I think we've figured it out. Yeah.

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No, that's amazing. Thank you for that. You get this huge audience and you're like, great. But yeah, it's like, what do you do with it?

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Which I think so many people starting out, like people I hear from, uh, writing this newsletter, like they don't even have an audience in mind and like a specific audience.

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And I think like that's so crucial, which looking at your work, it-- you know, my impression was at the beginning, the audience is just like people who live in America and have a job and like- Mm-hmm...

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maybe have anxiety about how much they're paid or like wanna make more money, which is- Mm-hmm... you know, you could say that's like the entire adult population- [laughs] Yeah... of this country.

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Um, so was, was that like, basically, it was just simple as that at the beginning? And how has that changed over time? Like what has it developed to now? Yeah. It was definitely a general overview when we started.

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We were like, people that are looking for jobs, you know [chuckles] that's all we knew.

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And now, you know, reading the comments, reading the DMs, and talking to people, we've been able to really break out our audience into specific groups, and they're all different, right?

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There's the younger Gen Z demographic, and they're usually looking for opportunities. And in that same vein, we have Gen X, believe it or not.

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People think that our biggest, uh, community or followers are Gen Z, but actually our audience skews largely older millennial and Gen X because a lot of them will comment and say, "I sent this to my nephew.

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I s- I share these videos with my daughter." Like, they're looking out for these opportunities as well.

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So that younger generation, it's really like, okay, let's give them the information that we didn't get as students, you know, to learn about these different careers. And then there's the actual workers.

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There's the ones that are in their career that are looking to transition 'cause they're unhappy, they're underpaid. They're looking for careers that they can break into. Entry-- not entry-level, but easy to transition.

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What kind of skills do they need to do that? And then there's the people that just wanna make a lot of money, like the ones that are looking for the opportunities to advance, the ones that are looking to grow.

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It's interesting how these conversations can really go in so many different areas, but I think it's incredibly valuable that our audience meets so many di-- or our content meets so many different needs. Yeah.

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No, that's amazing. Um, you also-- you mentioned a couple minutes ago about like how you learn from and engage with the audience.

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I'd love to hear more about how you do that and how you've built these like, specific profiles.

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Um, yeah, how-- what are your like best avenues for engaging with your audience, and how have you gathered these learnings that you were just talking about?Yeah, I definitely lend a lot of that back to my previous career as a data analyst.

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Like, data is everything to me, and I'm constantly analyzing and, you know, why is it this way? What are the numbers? And I think that's a valuable thing.

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It's, it's definitely helped me, um, because when I'm talking to people, you know, I'm, I'm learning about what their needs are from the comments. I'm trying to see if there's any trends.

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You know, have many people asked for this? I always jot notes. Like, I've gone through so many notebooks of just constantly being...

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Because then if I don't write it down, I'll forget it, you know, and, and just trying to see what those trends are, reading emails, responding to emails, um, responding to DMs.

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People will reach out and say, "Hey, have you interviewed these people yet? I haven't seen it." And I'm like, "Okay, let me make sure that I go look at conferences or events in the area that might have those people."

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Um, and I definitely look into it if I hear it more than once, which if one person says it, a lot of people usually want it. And th- what I love about TikTok especially is the likes.

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You know, you can see people will like a, a suggestion, and if you look at our videos, people will say, like, "You should ask this question."

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Like, that is almost the most important thing, is people's feedback on the questions.

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They wanna know, one thing that I, I know in the back of my head now that I need to start asking, is people wanna know how much debt people have. Like, how much did your student loans cost?

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You know, 'cause it's great that you're making $200,000 as a interventional radiologist, but, like, how many years of school and how much debt did you go into, and are you still in debt?

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You know, that gives the full picture. I think that's really, uh, the name of the game and, and our page is Transparent Street. Mm. They want that full picture. They don't want just the high level information.

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And, you know, when I look at the fact that we now have competitors in this space, you know, other people doing the same thing, I wanna make sure that my audience trusts me and doesn't see my content and think, "Cap, I hate this page.

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It makes me feel like crap." I want them to see my content and be like, "Hannah's here. Like, I-- this is gonna be a good interview. I'm gonna learn something." And that's just by listening to them. No, that's amazing.

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I love the, uh, like, the, the questions about debt too. Like, obviously that's so important. Um, I was gonna ask, like, how you... Like, if you ever worry about, like,

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uh, not running out of ideas 'cause, like, you know, you can- [laughs]... you can go to any city. Oh, yeah. You can go to- Once a month. [laughs] Yeah.

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Well, the, you know, it's the existential, uh, problem of, of being a creator. But, um- Uh-huh... yeah, how, like, h- I know, like, initially you were just in DC. Mm.

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Pretty quickly you expanded and started traveling to other cities. Um, and now it sounds like you're, like, constantly developing the suite of questions you're asking. Like, how has the, the structure of how you do...

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'Cause you, you l- you go back, you look at one of the first videos, it's, like, maybe slightly less polished, but, like, much the same- Oh, it's-... as what you're doing now... significantly less polished.

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[laughs] But, um- Like, it, it hurts me to watch our first video. [laughs] But it's still good. I'm like, "How did we get here?" [laughs] I mean, uh, well, it, it...

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b- by that video, getting you 50,000, uh, followers, right? Yeah. But, no, so my question is, like, how have you changed the editorial strategy, um, over time, and how has it evolved?

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Just on the TikTok for now before we get into the other platforms. Yeah.

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And TikTok was where we first launched, and I, I really do wanna touch on what you said about the fact that it was slightly less polished, and I, a- I wanna stress that to me it feels significantly less polished because we edited in app, like, for, for at least the first four months.

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You know, and we were very, like, harsh cuts. Like, I was doing it. I'm not an editor. I have no experience in this.

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And, but, but I think that what that experience taught me, that I hope it teaches other creators as well, is that you're right. That video that I look back on now and I cringe, and I'm like, "How did people watch this?"

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It gained us 50,000 followers. Those videos gained us 600,000 followers. Because at the end of the day, it's not entirely about the finished product and how good the camera is and how good the editing is.

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You have to give people what they want. And in that moment, there was a complete lack of pay transparency in the country. Our page was one of the catalysts to normalizing these conversations.

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So if you can be the first in the market or bring something new and exciting to the table or deliver on a need that people have, don't worry about it being picture perfect.

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You can do something that's not fully polished and still have that impact. But definitely that content has changed over time. We've gone through a couple editors, um, you know, trying to make it better.

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At this point, I edit all our content, and it's because we've really figured out our style.

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Um, you know, not just with the formatting and where the text goes and our colors, but, like, what are the questions that matter?

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You know, there's a lot of fluff in the interviews as well, and, you know, on TikTok now we have 10 minutes, but for a long time we only had the 90-second limit.

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And so it was important to make sure that we were delivering within that short amount of time, which is difficult.

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Um, but, you know, it's been a journey, and I think that we're constantly learning, and we're never set on any final style. Um, in the beginning, all our interviews were really quick compilations.

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You know, it would be multiple people within one interview.

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And then we started transitioning to individual interviews where it's one person per interview because we wanted to, you know, dive down deep into what is this person's career versus you don't get that if you just ask them, "What do you do and how much do you make?"

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and then go to the next person. The- what's im- what's really interesting there is we've started doing compilations more this year and trying them back out, and they've performed really well. Mm.

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And so we're learning that, you know, you don't always have to stay married to one style, and they also have different value adds in different situations.

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Like, when we shared our highest revenues of 2023, that made perfect sense for a compilation.

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But if I interview someone making, you know, 200K on the street, people definitely wanna hear more about that story, and we leverage different platforms like YouTube to deliver on those longer style interviews.

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But style is something that's constantly evolving, and I think that as a creator, if you don't evolve your style over time or try new things, the c- your audience might leave you behind as well because things are constantly changing.

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Yeah. That's very astute. You have to always be... If you just stay the same, like you said, you've got these competitors rising up. One of them is gonna come up and come up with, like, a new angle on it and move on.

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Exactly. So I wanna talk about, like-What the, the act of like the, the woman on the street interview, right? Like, I, I actually a couple of years ago in 2022- Mm-hmm...

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at an old job, I had to do some of those for TikTok, and like- [laughs]... we ended up abandoning it. But, you know, I was going to Washington Square Park- It's hard... and it's really hard.

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And like, in some ways it's like it's so simple. You go up to somebody, you get them to talk to you, and you do it. But it's also really hard. So I wanna ask- Really hard [laughs]... about like the art of doing that.

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Like, what, what does it mean to you? How do you do it? How do you make sure that you get- Yeah... a good interview when you go up to somebody and, like, ask them to talk to you?

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Street interviews are so difficult, and I, I wish we got more credit because they are so difficult to do right and to do well. Um, and most of the time you cannot plan ahead. Like, we actually do interview 99% strangers.

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Only a small percentage, like probably less than 10 people we've interviewed on our page, are people who have reached out to us and been like, "Hey, I'd love to do an interview with you.

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I'm in DC, can we meet at this time?" And we coordinate. A lot of times I get kind of freaked out by people that wanna coordinate 'cause I'm like, "Are you looking for fame?" You know?

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And I try to look them up on their digital footprint, and if I've seen them on a competitor's page, I'm like, "No. [laughs] I'm not interviewing you. This is not the page."

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Um, so we have to rely on strangers, and that can go so many different directions.

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Um, we do largely interview in the DC metro area, but you know, we travel nationwide, and so w- when we're in new areas, it's incredibly hard to figure out where to stand, where to go, where is the foot traffic.

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And a lot of people will tell us, "You know, why don't you come to small town, you know, Idaho?" And I'm like, "I would, but y'all do not have foot traffic." Like, this is...

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I need a city 'cause, you know, our statistic is, I think, within an hour, if we ask, like, 10 or 20 people, we'll probably get three to five to say yes, and that's a good day.

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[laughs] So, you know, think about the time that you have to put into it, the weather. If it's cold outside, that impacts whether or not people wanna interview.

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You know, and I, I think we do have it pretty well down to a science in the sense that I approach people who seem friendly.

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[laughs] If they seem nice, if they make eye contact with me, I'll approach them, and sometimes I'll let several hordes of people go by because I'm like, "I don't know if they're a right fit."

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And it's not always a perfect n- formula, right? Like, people would not guess that I'm actually kinda shy and introverted. So doing that can be very difficult.

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Sometimes people will walk by and I'm like, "Oh, they were so great. Why didn't I ask?" But that's the g- name of the game. You really have to have a certain level of courage to go up to strangers.

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And my pitch to them that I think has been very helpful, in addition to having branding, that we wear our logo so people take us seriously, because now there's so many street interviewers that you don't wanna be the one that looks unprepared, that wastes people time, or that weirds people out.

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You have to be professional about it to be taken seriously. So I go up to people and I say, my pitch is, "Sorry to bother you. We're doing interviews for Salary Transparency.

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We ask people what they do for a living and how much they make to promote pay transparency. Can I interview you really quickly?"

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And I wish I could get it shorter than that because honestly, you have, like, two seconds before a person makes their decision on whether or not they will talk to you.

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And I think it's important to be respectful, to get to the point, to not waste their time, and if they say, "I've got two minutes," you get right to it. So you have to be prepared. Camera rolling, mic on, you know?

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And I think that m- showing them, telling them what our mission is, why we're doing it, and the impact, has elicited a positive response. People will say, "Oh, my colleague was underpaid and I helped them get a raise.

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Absolutely I'll share my salary." Or people are like, "Yeah, you know, this is important. I'll, I'll talk about it." You know? And so I think it's important to talk about why you're doing it- Mm-hmm...

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not just like, "What do you do for a living?" 'Cause then people are like, "What's, what's the point here?" You know? And you won't get the right response.

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'Cause telling them, "Hey, we're doing this for pay transparency," you get the people that are like, "Let me tell you my story. I think this is important." And that's what we need on our page. Yeah. No, that's amazing.

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And like, it's... Like you said, it's so, it's so complex and, like, the weather thing I think people wouldn't realize- [laughs]... and like the ratio. Oh, weather. [laughs] Yeah.

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The ratio, you said like three to five per hour. Um, I'm curious, like, how many hours are you spending per week doing this? Is it like once a month- Mm-hmm... you go out? How do you actually...

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Like, what's the, the harvest schedule, as it were- Yes... to like go out and create the raw content?

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When we first started, we were going out every day, and that's kinda why we stop- stopped doing the compilations because, you know, you go out and you do three to five hours on the street, and that's your video, and then you gotta go out again and do it all over again.

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And very quickly that became, you know, not realistic. We could not support it. Thankfully, we don't have children living with us, like, full time.

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But I have pets, you know, we, we have a life here, and so it's important to balance that and not try to, you know, change things up too much.

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Um, but you know, when we first started, we were interviewing probably like 10 to 20 hours a week, uh, in addition to... or not counting, you know, the travel and the editing and all the work that we did on the side.

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Now it's a lot less. We usually go out once a week. We'll go out on a weekend, or we'll go out whenever we're traveling.

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So like, you know, we were in New York City last weekend for a conference, and if we have time, we'll do some street interviews, like, in between our travel and our hustle bustle.

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So we just try to take advantage of the opportunities that present themselves. But we do a lot less on the ground 'cause it's just- Mm-hmm...

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now also being recognized, I am a little bit more hesitant about, you know, making myself widely accessible 'cause I'm like, "I don't wanna get mugged."

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[laughs] You know, I talk about money, and so there's the safety aspect of that too to not make yourself so widely accessible. Yeah. No, that's, that's very complicated.

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Um, one more question about this before we move on to the next thing. Mm-hmm. What i- just a quick fire. What's the hardest place you've ever had to do this, and what's the- Mm-hmm...

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easiest place to do this?No question, hardest place to interview is New York City. Hands down, the hardest place. And it's so frustrating because it is the place with the best foot traffic.

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But people in New York are very, like, nose to the ground. They are on a mission. They have places to be. They will look you in your soul while you're doing your pitch and keep walking right by you.

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It's incredibly humbling. Every time I go out there, I'm like, "All right. Suit up, boys." Like [laughs] you really need, like, that confidence and that emotional armor and not take, not...

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and to not take people's responses too seriously or to heart. Um, because, you know, at the end of the day, they don't owe you anything, and you are taking- Mm-hmm... asking for their time. So it's hard.

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Um, but the easiest place to interview, I would say was probably Eugene, Oregon. That was the most bizarre experience.

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It's a small, beautiful little town in Oregon, and that was the only place where in an, in an entire day of interviews and walking around the city, which was probably about four or five hours, we didn't have a single person say no.

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Like, we ended that day, we went there on a trip, and we were like, "We need 30 interviews." We ended that day with like 15, and we had, like, multiple more days. And I was like, [laughs] "Are we done?

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Do we get to go home?" Like, it was so wonderful. I think that people were just really open and excited to talk about their careers. They also had different careers that we hadn't encountered before- Mm-hmm...

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like wireland, wild, uh, wildland firefighters, you know, who wanted to talk about what they do because they need more people to help them and so, you know, they get good benefits. They wanted to talk about it.

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Um, tattoo artists, like just really cool people that understood that, you know, transparency isn't personal. We're not looking to make fun of you or use that information to harm you.

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It's to make awareness of your career and the possibilities within it. Yeah. That's, that's awesome. I really, I didn't expect either of those answers. I thought like a New York or a DC might be the easiest, um- Yeah.

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That's... Wow. Now DC is becoming a lot easier because we get recognized a lot. Yeah.

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So it becomes easier in the sense that people know what I am looking for, and they'll be like, "I'll do it," you know, and so I don't have to give them the pitch and stuff. Mm-hmm. That makes it a lot easier.

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[laughs] You've got a groove there, yeah. Yes. Okay, moving on, and then maybe we'll come back to this, uh- Mm-hmm... which we're gonna talk about here. Platforms. So you started- Mm-hmm...

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with TikTok, and now I believe you've got the TikTok, which is your, your biggest audience, 1.3 million. Yeah. Instagram, which is like 875,000 or something. Mm-hmm. Twitter is tiny. I think that's only like 3,000.

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[laughs] And then there's the- It's like 1,000. [laughs] No. No, you're at 3,000. I checked it. [laughs] It's just under 3,000. Um, so then you've got- Just under...

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the, the newsletter, which I don't know how many subscribers you have there. I'd love to hear. Mm-hmm. Uh, and then there's also the salary database. I- Mm-hmm. Is there a jobs board, or is, am I mixing that up?

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We're working on it, actually. Okay. Yep. So there's- That is in the works. [laughs] All these things. So tell me, um, I guess th- this, this might be meandering, but start from like- Mm-hmm... you launched the TikTok.

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When is the next thing you launch? And then like- Mm-hmm... how does this keep developing up until today? Yeah. So we have six social platforms. So we're on TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, YouTube, LinkedIn, and Twitter.

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Um, and I think that nailing down those platforms and getting into a groove, you know, of posting consistently and just feeling more comfortable with them, that was the first step.

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Um, and then as soon as stuff took off, we got a lot of people reaching out and saying, you know, "Hey, I'm not...

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Like, I can't be interviewed by you 'cause I'm not in the same state, but can I share my salary in some way?"

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And we started doing these What Do You Do Wednesdays on Instagram stories, where I would ask people like, "Hey, can you share how much you make?" And we...

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I didn't expect that we would get so many people, but it would be like, you know, scrolling for minutes through the responses, and I was like, "Okay. [laughs] What do, what do I do?"

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Like, obviously we need to take this a step further. So we started a Google sheet. It was a Google form that, and you could view it as a publicly viewable sheet that you couldn't edit, but it was accessible to everyone.

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So ugly, very like bare bones, you know, nothing, no frills about it.

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And, um, we did that for a little bit because I had previously, like when I was in business school, well, uh, for my undergrad, I had been involved in entrepreneurship and like I learned a lot about it, and the number one thing that I took from that was that you have to validate your idea first before you put money or time into it.

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And so I wanted to make sure like, hey, do we have enough of a demand for this? And that was proven very quickly 'cause we got thousands of responses for, in that ugly Google sheet.

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So I was like, if we actually create this into a beautiful product, you know, not only is it a better user experience which delivers the value that we're hoping to have, but, you know, now we also have a product.

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Like, this is something that's valuable. We're not just a media company. We are a tech startup of types, you know? And I'm always thinking long term.

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I have a business background, and I would like to do this for a long time, so I don't wanna be, you know, the one hit wonder making content on the internet.

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I wanna make sure that I have the exit, and I've built something that will last. So the database really was that.

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It was our way of not only creating something that was off the platforms, that if we ever lost access to our TikTok, if TikTok were ever banned or what have you, we have this place for people to still be with us and have access to our product and our values.

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Um, the job board is the most recent one because our database is now built, it is beautiful, it is operating, fully functional. Um, so our job board is not even up there yet. It is still in its beta stages.

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Um, but we're really excited about it 'cause it is coming out this year.

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And that was taking it to the next step because what I've always, um, done with managing the business isKind of looking at what I call my three Cs, and they're my-- how I look at our goals and, and what we wanna do with the business.

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So community, corporate, and Congress, and they're the three groups that have the most impact with pay transparency. Community is obviously people, and so, you know, our content delivers that value, that transparency.

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Um, Congress is legislation, which is what we've started getting involved in in the past few months, is working with states and, and just last week I testified in support of Maryland's Pay Transparency bill.

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So, like, really that is full force ahead. We're getting involved with helping states pass the bills. The next part of the puzzle is corporate, getting companies on board because they kind of hold the keys to the castle.

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We can protest and be angry and complain all we want, and legislation can say, "You need to do this," but companies need to actually buy into this to be successful. So...

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And no surprise, they've been the hardest nut to crack in this, in this fight. So for me, I was like, how do I push this? And the transparent job board was a perfect solution.

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Not only do we get to platform and highlight jobs that are transparent and show you the jobs that they're hiring for, it normalizes the job search process of including transparent jo- uh, ranges within, within that.

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Mm-hmm. So I think that that's really-- we're just looking at making sure that our-- everything we create delivers to those three Cs in one-- some shape or form. That's amazing.

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Um, and I love, like, the, the social mission.

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You said something about, uh, like a couple minutes ago when, when you were s- when you were answering that about, like, you don't wanna just be a media business, which obviously Salary Transparent Street starts as a TikTok account.

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It's, it's a creator-driven thing. Now it's like you could really say it's a full media business. Um, but yeah. Mm-hmm. I see it becoming something else.

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Like, is, you know, does, does, like, does the jo- does the, uh, salary transparency database, like, overtake Glassdoor as a thing, and then it's fully a tech startup, et cetera. Yeah.

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So my question is, like, what, like, what kind of business is it now, and, like, what is- Mm-hmm... your five-year plan, if you're willing to share it? Right now the business is very solidly a media company.

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Like, that is the foundation of our business.

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But with that comes our community and the community trust we've built, and using that, we've built our tech product, which is our salary database, and ultimately just our website, which is also has a resource hub that has tons of articles within it.

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We have a tra- pay transparency map that you can navigate to see where pay is within your state. Um, so it's really at that point kinda like a worker resource.

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And I wouldn't-- I don't know if I'd go so far as to say it's software, um, but technically it is something that we built from the ground up that is not a Squarespace or Wix. It is our own IP. We own everything.

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And that, I guess, is software. So in a way, it's also employee helpful tech. [laughs] I should probably figure out a good name for it. EHT. [laughs] I love it. EHT, employee helpful tech.

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But really, like, that's, that's what it is, is resources to help workers make more and earn more in their jobs and in their careers. So it's media, and then we've got the tech product to deliver that value.

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Let's say five years from now, what's your dream? Oh, yeah. Like, not necessarily- My five-year, five-year plan... not necessarily plan, but even just a dream, you know?

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My five-year plan, I definitely would like us to not exit, because I don't wanna give up what we've built or hand over the keys. I, I-- It's my baby. It's my husband's and I-- It's our work.

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Um, it's-- We've put so much blood, sweat and tears into it, and I think that the value or the reason that we've grown so much is that we haven't sold out. We still are not even represented by an agency officially.

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Like, we're all in-house, and so I think our audience really trusts us 'cause they've watched us grow.

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They've been there with us each step of the way, and I think to exit and leave them behind would be a disservice to them.

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So I never see-- I don't ever see in the future myself stepping away from Salary Transparent Street.

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But, you know, I would like a vacation [laughs] and so I think that our, in the future, in the next five years, we would, uh, be expanding our interview cast.

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You know, so we would def- we- we're definitely planning on hiring, you know, representatives of STS in different states and different countries as well, expanding internationally.

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And I'd like to take more of a backseat to the business operations and also the legislative action, because that is very time intensive and something that really needs boots on the ground.

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So I wonder if I can get more involved in that sense.

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Um, but yeah, I definitely see some type of a acquisition in the future where Glassdoor, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, one of these companies does recognize that we are a force in the space and, you know, not just for looking for jobs, like, as a job board, but a salary database as well.

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Yeah. Uh, something you touched on there about, like, r- hiring more representatives of the brand.

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Like, I think with any creator brand, it's like this is built on, like, your specific charisma and subjectivity and, like, way of speaking to people and making people comfortable enough to share their, their salaries, right?

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So it's like f- it's very difficult sometimes to scale that kind of thing when it is just about one person and how they move through the world, and, like, that's what the audience- Yeah... connects with. Mm-hmm.

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So, like, I don't know. A- and you, you're already starting to do this. Like the newsletter, I believe, is not written by you, but it's like- Mm-hmm... it's very much like...

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Like the way I, I sometimes think about this is like, let's say you're painting, you know, and you've got, like, you've got the watercolors, you've got the palette right here.

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You can just take the color right out and paint, and that's, and that's you. But then you water it- Mm... down and then, like, you get...

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The further you get from, from you at the core of the brand, the harder- The more diluted it is... the more diluted and, like, the less appe- the less- Yeah... like, the audience relates to it.

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Um, so now I'm rambling a bit, but my question is just like, how are you thinking about... 'Cause it's a worry, I'm sure.

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How are you thinking about scaling this without losing the appeal that you have placed personally at the center of it? How do you navigate- Yeah...

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that?That is a huge concern, and I think it's the direct reason it's taken us so long to do that. Um, when we first started, we were inundated with messages from people saying, "I can do this for you in Miami.

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I'll do this for you in New York." And we seriously considered it at first because, you know, we were like, "Well, we can't be everywhere at once," you know, and of c- we'd get more content.

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Like, it made sense at the time, but the more we thought about it, we realized, like, it's not just the charisma, but also the brand, and I wasn't sure that I trusted strangers with representing our brand when we were still kind of figuring out what that was.

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Um, now, almost two years later, we've got a really strong brand identity, and I think that that's gonna help us better cast these interviewers who above all have got to have the social activism piece down.

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They have to understand that we are not doing this for clout. [laughs] We are not doing this for views. We're doing this for impact and social change.

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So incredibly hard to find those people, incredibly hard to cast, and I think it's the reason it's [laughs] taken us so long.

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Um, I'm definitely worried about it, especially with, you know, it's a complex action to coordinate to get them the mic, to make sure they have a cameraman because, you know, people don't know this, but my husband doesn't film on a tripod- a tripod.

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He holds the camera. So, like, it's very much a, a dynamic between him and I that he, you know, can direct me where, uh, where he needs me to stand, you know, and we're very in sync about that. Mm-hmm.

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You need to make sure that you're not just hiring a good interviewer but a good cameraman. You know, there's so many logistics that go into it that freak me out. [laughs] So- Yeah...

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I think that's why I'm more comfortable, like, just doing it ourselves, even if it means that we are trading, you know, possibly good content in different states we can't access yet. But- Yeah... I think that's okay.

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So your husband, James, right? He's- Yeah... he's the cameraman. Um, and- Mm-hmm... originally it was just you two, and now- Mm-hmm... I think you have a few other people. Um- Mm-hmm...

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what, who, like, what are the roles you've brought in? How many people- Yeah... uh, work for Salary Transparent Street?

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My first hire was my accountant, and she is about, like, $1750 a month, but God, I would pay her double, and I wish I had hired her earlier because she has been m- sort of a mentor to me.

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Um, I, I found a really good accountant, and I strongly recommend that if you h- if you need people on your team, the most important people to hire that you have strong, you know, dynamic with, that you vibe with, that you trust is your accountant and your lawyer.

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Those are people that you need to be on the same page with, and I'm so lucky that I have Stephanie and Financial Design 'cause they're my accountants, and every month we meet, and she tells me, you know, "This is where we're at.

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This is what we need to do." She does my taxes, and in the creator economy, y- your own finances is incredibly complicated because you're, you know, W-9s, and you're, uh, it's just all over the place.

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So that was my first hire, and I strongly recommend as soon as you're start- starting to make over, like, $50,000 as a creator, find a good accountant because they are worth the money.

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They will guide you in the right direction and make sure that you will not get, you know, in trouble with the IRS, [laughs] which none of us want. Um, the next people I hired was, um, a lawyer.

251
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I started working on a trademark for Salary Transparent Street, which is just now has, has been approved, like, last month, and that was over a year-long effort.

252
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Did not happen overnight, and we had bumps along the way, a very expensive venture as well.

253
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So unless you, like, are in it for the long term, I would not recommend looking for a trademark, um, unless you're certain that, you know, that's something you wanna trademark 'cause it is expensive to the tune of, like, I think I spent $15,000 on it, um, not counting my lawyer.

254
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So, [laughs] um, just a little tidbit. The other people on our team are our newsletter. We did our newsletter, um, I wrote it myself, and then I, I hired an, an assistant who's no longer with us.

255
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We, we did not need an assistant it turned out. Um, but I was doing the newsletter for myself or by myself for a couple months, and it was not my strong suit. It was taking a lot of time. It was...

256
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What I realized was doing that, I felt like our newsletter was important. I didn't wanna stop doing it, but it was sucking the life out of me.

257
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Like, it was not the creative that I liked to do, and I didn't want it to die because I wasn't utilizing my strengths. Mm-hmm. And so that's when we brought in Smooth, which is our newsletter production team.

258
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Phenomenal team. They write our newsletter every week. We talk about, you know, this is what we wanna cover, this is what we wanna highlight. I'm very involved in it.

259
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Even though they are writing it, you know, I'm collaborating with them in the notes. I edit, review everything.

260
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So it's not hands-off, but hands-off enough that I'm not dedicating the hours that I was before, and I think as a creator, if you're doing this full time, it's very important to w- figure out within the week what are you allocating your time to, how much, how much energy is it taking from you?

261
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'Cause time is only one factor, but certain work can be more brain intensive than others, and it can really drain you.

262
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The sooner you burn out, the sooner you exit the creator economy, and if you wanna do this long term, you need to figure out how to hand off the tasks that don't bring you joy or that are too time intensive and not important to other people that are smarter than you.

263
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[laughs] Mm-hmm. That is the name of the game. Finding those people is cr- incredibly hard, but when you doPaying them well and bringing them on the team and making them a part of the family is a recipe for success.

264
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Um, other people that we work with are, I have a part-time social media manager, but she doesn't manage per se.

265
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She's, she has a full-time job, so she helps me with, you know, trends and figuring out what's going on out there, because one of the things I don't have time for is scrolling TikTok endlessly and figuring out what is the funny sound of the week, you know?

266
00:43:13.624 --> 00:43:23.064
And so she helps me out with that. Um, other things that we hire for, I'm trying to think. I have a blog writer that is... As you can tell, there's a trend here. I don't like to write.

267
00:43:23.254 --> 00:43:28.704
[laughs] It's too time intensive for me. So I hired an amazing blog writer, um, Daniela.

268
00:43:29.064 --> 00:43:46.354
They are, um, uh, they have a, an account called I Like to Dabble, and they create content about, you know, remote work and such, but an incredibly ta- talented writer that I reached out to as a peer and said, "Hey, you know, can you write a blog for me, for my website once a month, you know, something that's helpful?"

269
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And they deliver on that every month, and it's money well spent. Mm-hmm. I think that's it. Yeah, I'm interested. [laughs] That's, I mean, quite the team. That's like five people. And my husband, of course. Yeah, duh.

270
00:43:55.524 --> 00:44:06.944
I feel like I forgot my husband. My husband is... Oh gosh, I wouldn't, none of this would even be possible without him. He takes a very much backseat, you know, to, to this whole thing.

271
00:44:07.024 --> 00:44:18.734
He doesn't like to be c- on the camera. He is very humble about it, but really, like, the work that he does just being there, just constantly like, "Okay, we're going to New York. Let's go. I'm filming.

272
00:44:18.784 --> 00:44:31.204
Okay, let's start." You need people in, in this if you wanna do this. The support system you have and the team that surrounds you is what will make you successful. It's not you. It's not your talent or your brain.

273
00:44:31.284 --> 00:44:38.764
It's the people that uplift you and tell you that your ideas are good and help you execute on them. Yeah. That's really what you need to focus on. Yeah.

274
00:44:38.944 --> 00:44:48.274
Which is, you know, people think being a creator is just a, just, just a you, just a one-person thing, which it can be- Yeah... but I think the, the more you grow, it's not. Um, I wanna touch- Yeah...

275
00:44:48.274 --> 00:44:57.864
just for one more second on the writing aspects, both the newsletter- Uh-huh... and the blog, um, and like what those, what those do for you, um, 'cause you clearly they do something for you. I think you started...

276
00:44:57.964 --> 00:45:05.873
I, I read that you started a newsletter when you were using Stan, again- Mm-hmm... just a couple months after you started the TikTok account, and then now you've been on Beehiiv- Mm-hmm... uh- Mm-hmm...

277
00:45:05.944 --> 00:45:14.843
since April of last year, so- Yeah. Sounds about right... um, what are, yeah, what do they, what do, what do these, the news- what does the newsletter do for you and what does the blog do for you? And like- Mm-hmm...

278
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are you converting, you know, your, your, your followers to newsletter subscribers at a rate that you feel good about? Yeah. That's a really good question because actually I don't think so.

279
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[laughs] I don't believe that, you know, the newsletter is... It, it's been hard to ration because I think it's such a major product and something that we put a lot of effort into- Mm-hmm... and money into each week.

280
00:45:37.784 --> 00:45:45.944
It's actually like our biggest ad spend technically of the month, and my accountant is always like, "Hannah, you know, what is the outcome of this? What's the value?"

281
00:45:46.424 --> 00:45:58.884
Um, and it's really been a slow burn, and I think that's why I am not so freaked out about it because we've experienced that astronomical growth with our followers, but we haven't seen that with the newsletter.

282
00:45:58.914 --> 00:46:14.504
And I'm like, "Okay, this is more personal. I like this." And so to me, I think it's also the ability of marketing something, you know, to get those signups is an art form [laughs] and incredibly difficult.

283
00:46:14.564 --> 00:46:24.944
And what I've seen has been more successful for people to build those email lists is utilizing like chat funnels and like the DM me this word, you know, and they'll send, they'll get an automatic link.

284
00:46:25.324 --> 00:46:35.524
I've been testing out that, the chat funnel strategy, and it has been incredibly amazing. Like, the, the feedback and the amount of signups we get on stuff is huge.

285
00:46:35.904 --> 00:46:46.424
So I think it's more so having access now to better tools to promote the newsletter will help it grow. Um, but for now it's been a slow growth and I, I don't see that as a bad thing.

286
00:46:46.824 --> 00:46:56.404
Um, I think the people that will subscribe to your newsletter are the ones that are not gonna, are less likely to unsubscribe in this day and age, 'cause everybody is subscribed to newsletters.

287
00:46:56.764 --> 00:47:07.344
So if you have the ones that are reading, you really need to deliver on what they want and you have that more personal connection with them. I think that that will help us grow in the long run.

288
00:47:07.604 --> 00:47:21.464
But, you know, ask me a year from now if we're still, you know, going slow, maybe we'll re- reanalyze it. But there, with everything moving so fast, I'm okay with certain things moving slow. Yeah. No, that makes sense.

289
00:47:21.704 --> 00:47:31.404
Um, so you're talking about outspend. Let's talk about in-spend for, or in... Let's talk about revenue for a second. Um- Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I know I wrote down that you made what?

290
00:47:31.444 --> 00:47:41.284
You, you made $1 million last year in revenue, um, and $458,000- Mm-hmm... the previous year in only eight months, which is crazy from starting to- Mm-hmm... half a million in, in just that first year. Mm-hmm.

291
00:47:41.304 --> 00:47:51.754
And now your goal is $2 million, uh, for the next year. Mm-hmm. And I also, the one more detail I know is that last year, um, about 97% of your revenue was brand deals, which is huge. Yeah.

292
00:47:51.764 --> 00:47:59.064
And then just $30,000 from the, from like the creator, platform creator fees. Mm-hmm. So, um, first let's start with brand deals.

293
00:47:59.184 --> 00:48:07.824
I know you started getting them basically as soon as you started making Salary Transparent Street, because as you said, you like, you know, the meteoric rise. So talk to me- Yeah...

294
00:48:07.904 --> 00:48:18.304
about brand deals and how you, how you, how you navigate securing them and then also making sure that you get to like, you know, renew them. Yeah. Brand deals are, are bread and butter.

295
00:48:18.384 --> 00:48:24.384
Um, I think that they're important. You know, a lot of people are like, "You need to diversify your income streams." I don't disagree with that.

296
00:48:24.464 --> 00:48:35.568
I am actively trying to do that, but I'm not mad that-I can deliver content for free and resources for free to my audience in exchange for a partnership.

297
00:48:35.628 --> 00:48:45.848
Like, our partnerships with Indeed and Capital One have been so wonderful, and the reason they're so large is because we have that buy-in. We have long-term buy-in from them.

298
00:48:45.968 --> 00:48:57.888
So, you know, in terms of finding partnerships, uh, it can happen so many different ways. Indeed was one that we had a connection through a connection, so networking is everything.

299
00:48:57.988 --> 00:49:07.008
Asking around, telling people who you wanna partner with, even though that can be scary 'cause you're like, uh, you know, what if they steal my idea or what if they don't wanna work with me?

300
00:49:07.168 --> 00:49:12.288
I feel like taking the risk has been better than not taking the risk because people are willing to help you.

301
00:49:12.388 --> 00:49:25.368
I think a lot of us have a, a negative view of the world, that everyone's gonna try to steal your idea, and yeah, I mean, be careful who you talk to, but, like, m- the majority of people are willing to help you, and so many people have so many connections.

302
00:49:25.408 --> 00:49:33.747
So just talking about who you wanna partner with can open doors, and it's as simple as getting an email at that brand, somebody that works in their marketing department.

303
00:49:33.908 --> 00:49:43.958
In particular, if you can get somebody that works in influencer marketing or collaborations or partnerships, you're in the right department. You're in the right office. [laughs] You're, you're definitely getting close.

304
00:49:44.088 --> 00:49:52.388
And so it, it's as simple as having those email conversations with them. I've actually found that, um... because let me, let me back up.

305
00:49:52.428 --> 00:50:03.428
You can also work with agencies to get partnerships, and I think a lot of creators, especially the larger they are, they have agents. And my experience with agents has been abysmal.

306
00:50:03.588 --> 00:50:08.908
[laughs] They have not been as great as what everybody has told me.

307
00:50:08.988 --> 00:50:19.868
Um, and what my experience has been is that my partnerships have de- decreased in value by working with agencies because you're working with people that are trying to...

308
00:50:20.008 --> 00:50:27.548
They only make money if you make money, and so there's definitely an incentive for you to work with brands that don't align with your values.

309
00:50:27.988 --> 00:50:38.248
And as Salary Transparency, our audience holds us accountable, as they should, to, you know, demonstrating those values in who we get money from.

310
00:50:38.568 --> 00:50:50.928
So for example, we partnered with SoFi, I believe it was either earlier this year or late last year, and some people were upset about it because of the, the lawsuit with the student loan pause.

311
00:50:51.268 --> 00:50:55.668
And, you know, we had to come back and tell them the lawsuit was dropped. You know, we talked to SoFi.

312
00:50:55.728 --> 00:51:03.008
The reason we had avoided working with them for so long was because of that, but, you know, in a sense, that still wasn't enough for our audience.

313
00:51:03.048 --> 00:51:15.108
And so I think it's important to, before you sign, you know, partnerships, is making sure that your audience isn't gonna react negatively to this. Does, does the brand live the values that you are living by on your page?

314
00:51:15.188 --> 00:51:26.307
If they don't or if there's any type of, you know, head-on, uh, issue there, it's not gonna be a successful partnership. And so if you work with agents, sometimes they don't see that.

315
00:51:26.488 --> 00:51:36.148
They just see a big brand that has a huge budget, and when you tell them this isn't gonna work, they're like, "Well, let's just try it," you know? And then it doesn't work, and here we are.

316
00:51:36.248 --> 00:51:41.208
Um, that's been my experience, but I know some creators love the agents that they work with.

317
00:51:41.308 --> 00:51:53.368
So my caution is just make sure that you work with agents that understand your values and your page's values and don't take that for granted, um, and that they don't take that for granted.

318
00:51:53.768 --> 00:52:03.968
But, um, yeah, I mean, it's still incredibly difficult to work with brands, but I prefer to work with them personally because you get a better sense of what they're trying to accomplish.

319
00:52:04.028 --> 00:52:14.868
You can figure out, you know, the issues right then and there instead of having somebody in between that you don't... You know, if you don't have contact with the brand, it's less likely to, I believe, perform well.

320
00:52:15.268 --> 00:52:22.328
Um, the more in, in personal and, like, close connection I've had with the brand, the more, um, the better performance it had.

321
00:52:22.568 --> 00:52:28.688
So actually one thing that you touched on that I found really interesting is this idea of, you know, y- you are so accountable to your audience. Mm-hmm. And I usually...

322
00:52:28.728 --> 00:52:36.988
Like, I like to ask people, like, "Oh, do you think you have, um, a responsibility to your audience, or what is that?" Whereas for you, it's so clear and so baked in.

323
00:52:37.468 --> 00:52:46.268
Uh, so I wanna ask about, like, the pros and cons of that. Like, you are such a values-driven brand, as you were just touching on with the SoFi thing. Mm-hmm. Like, what, what are the, what are the...

324
00:52:46.288 --> 00:52:56.068
Is that a double-edged sword? What's the pros and cons of- Yeah... being such an audience-accountable creator? Yeah. It's definitely a double-edged sword to have so much accountability.

325
00:52:56.508 --> 00:53:06.168
Um, but you know it's a good thing, right? Like, you have accountability because you've created something that people value, and you can't turn your back on that.

326
00:53:06.268 --> 00:53:16.547
You can't turn into somebody completely different, say this, and do something else. That is the reason that we exist is 'cause we hate those people. We hate those companies. We're not gonna be that.

327
00:53:16.948 --> 00:53:25.668
Um, and so it is a double-edged sword though because it limits who we can partner with because we cannot partner with the bad apples of the, the industry.

328
00:53:25.748 --> 00:53:43.748
Like, I have been trying to work with Amazon for months now because they have an amazing certificates pro- uh, program, but just the other day it was a headline that Amazon is trying to remove the National Labor Relations Act as a protection that workers can talk about their pay.

329
00:53:44.258 --> 00:53:55.988
What did I do? I told the agent that I have working on it, "Stop conversations." I posted about it on our Instagram story that Amazon is a bad actor, and I put a link that said, "Amazon sucks."

330
00:53:56.508 --> 00:54:12.948
That is being accountable to your audience because if I hadn't acknowledged that and then gone and turned around and did a partnership with Amazon so close to the certifi- this, this announcement happening, I would've been torn to shreds, and I would've lost all that trust that I've built with my audience.

331
00:54:12.968 --> 00:54:27.228
It's not something that I wanna gamble with, and I definitely don't wanna lose it. So- Mm-hmm... yeah, I will have to turn down $30,000, $50,000 here and there, but, like, gosh, isn't that a crazy thing to say out loud?

332
00:54:27.268 --> 00:54:32.568
Like, the privilege to be able- Mm-hmm... to say, "I can turn down that money." You know?

333
00:54:32.608 --> 00:54:44.144
Like, I, I'm notIn a desperate situation, thankfully, because we partnered with the right brands that we work with long term that we really trust and that deliver on those values.

334
00:54:44.224 --> 00:54:55.234
Having them and having the support of our audience that we know we can fall back on if we lost all our partnerships is so inherent to giving us confidence to make those tough decisions. Yeah.

335
00:54:55.244 --> 00:55:06.544
And it's been the right decision every single time. Anytime we've gone against it, we've felt the heat, and it's been valid. That's amazing. Um, and major kudos to you for, like, having such strong principles.

336
00:55:06.573 --> 00:55:18.473
That's, that's rare. I'm not a hero. [laughs] Yeah. Well, so- But- No. So next, next thing, um, I... Speaking of not being a hero, uh, another thing you... Uh, an interview I read with Elite Daily, you said- Mm-hmm...

337
00:55:18.664 --> 00:55:30.054
um, when people ask you, ask, "What are you, an influencer or a content creator?" You said, "I consider us social activists." Um, and so I've been thinking a lot about, like, well, what is a creator? Um, and- Mm-hmm...

338
00:55:30.124 --> 00:55:37.854
you know, I... Now you've been, throughout this conversation, referring to yourself as a creator. You said that when you started making TikToks, you didn't think of yourself as a creator. So- Mm-hmm...

339
00:55:37.854 --> 00:55:47.464
my question is, like, what is a creator? Which I... Now you've built up such a relationship with being this, and you've probably interviewed- Yeah... plenty of people who are creators. What does it mean to be a creator?

340
00:55:47.584 --> 00:55:50.984
What is a creator? That's a really good question.

341
00:55:51.044 --> 00:56:02.004
There's a really interesting conversation happening now that I've seen on LinkedIn about creators versus influencers, what is the difference, where do they align, where, where do they fall, you know, to the sidelines?

342
00:56:02.484 --> 00:56:16.724
And it's a very clear distinction to me that a creator, in my mind, is somebody that creates. You know, you have an idea and you turn it into something tangible. In my sense, I'm an internet creator.

343
00:56:16.904 --> 00:56:29.104
I create content from ideas that people put in the comments. You know, "You should ask this." Great. I go on the street, I film it, and I make a video that I post on TikTok. That to me is being a creator.

344
00:56:29.144 --> 00:56:43.864
But why I don't align with being an influencer is because I'm not... And, and it's kinda tough because I do also see the alignment of being an influencer because our work influences societal change. You know?

345
00:56:43.944 --> 00:56:58.883
It does have positive impact on the paid transparency movement, on workers earning more, on workers having more knowledge about their rights. But I'm also not influencing, you know, people to buy things or- Mm-hmm...

346
00:56:58.924 --> 00:57:09.884
you know, vlogging, and I, I just think that there's a distinction there between the type of creator that you are. 'Cause we're all creators- Yeah... but some creators are influencers.

347
00:57:10.384 --> 00:57:24.644
I'm a creator who's a social activist. My ethos at the end of the day is to have social change, to impact social change, not to sell things on TikTok Shop. And I, I... That's where I see the distinction. Yeah. No.

348
00:57:25.584 --> 00:57:31.103
I, uh, um, I know we're running out of time, but I w- I wanna share my definition too, just 'cause I think it does kinda- Yes. Would love to hear it... meld with yours pretty well.

349
00:57:31.164 --> 00:57:37.964
I've been, I've been defining it as, like, number one is you're consistently creating content and publishing it online. Um, that's- Mm-hmm... hard rule.

350
00:57:38.104 --> 00:57:48.853
Number two is you have an unmediated relationship with your audience, um- Mm... which, you know, nobody... there's no editor or no, like, you know, b- brand telling you exactly what, what to do. And then number- Yeah...

351
00:57:48.884 --> 00:57:57.954
three is, like, monetizing somehow, whether it's directly with a brand deal, or whether it's, like, long tail where it's like, "This is, like, for my career, and I'm trying to, like, build a presence online for my career."

352
00:57:58.374 --> 00:58:09.084
Mm. But then I think where an influencer, an influencer is a subset of creator where, like, they're, they are not necessarily, um, unmediated. They are mediated by the brand or something like that. Yes. Great point.

353
00:58:09.344 --> 00:58:16.244
I love that. What is one very tactical piece of advice you would give to other creators that they could apply today?

354
00:58:16.254 --> 00:58:24.164
And whether that's just, like, more general or, um, specifically for video or, like, growing on TikTok or something, but just one tactical piece of advice you would share.

355
00:58:25.144 --> 00:58:29.164
The, the number one, if you're making over $50,000 a year, get an accountant.

356
00:58:29.404 --> 00:58:40.504
Like, that is by far the biggest help, just because it'll help you not make stupid financial decisions, and it's incredibly helpful to help you grow as well. Um, the...

357
00:58:40.684 --> 00:58:52.804
I mean, it's kind of generic advice, but I think it is very important, is consistency. Mm-hmm. And I know that that's such a boring answer, but it's what you mentioned about the definition of being a creator.

358
00:58:53.324 --> 00:59:05.184
You cannot be a creator and show up once a week. Y- it's not the way that the internet works anymore. Being a creator is kind of taking on this responsibility of showing up in people's lives.

359
00:59:05.244 --> 00:59:16.484
If people follow you, it's because they want to hear from you, and showing up daily or every other day is the best way to do that. It's also the best way to grow. You have to commit to it.

360
00:59:16.514 --> 00:59:31.144
And so if you're not in the place to make that commitment, I suggest, you know, not going all in unless you're ready. But, you know, at the same time, I would say if you have an idea, try it. Like- Mm-hmm...

361
00:59:31.164 --> 00:59:36.964
like going back to what I said about, you know, our content being unpolished, you know, in those first few videos.

362
00:59:37.524 --> 00:59:45.004
I wouldn't have known that I wanted to do that full time or that I wanted to commit to it if I hadn't tried it. So I think it goes hand in hand.

363
00:59:45.084 --> 00:59:54.064
You know, if you're inspired and you wanna do something, commit to creating it. Commit to actually taking the plunge instead of sitting on your ideas and wondering, what if?

364
00:59:54.424 --> 01:00:05.524
If I had wondered what if, I wouldn't be here today, and there'd be tons of copycats, and I'd be like, "Man, I had that idea." Mm. You know? And I'm still in my 9:00 to 5:00. Use that as fuel. You know, try things.

365
01:00:05.584 --> 01:00:15.204
And it's also okay to fail. There's been so many content ideas that we've tried on the page that have performed terribly, but they were fun, and they kept, they kept the spark alive. You know?

366
01:00:15.244 --> 01:00:23.284
And somebody got value from it. So just don't be afraid to try, but also remember that consistency is the only way to grow. Yeah. I couldn't agree more.

367
01:00:23.344 --> 01:00:28.524
I, the more I, like, think about this stuff, it's like, it's literally, it's literally just the Nike slogan, "Just do it."

368
01:00:28.564 --> 01:00:37.592
And that's like, that's- Just do itSo pretty lofty goal to go from one million revenue last year to two million this year. Mm-hmm. How are you gonna pull that off? Good question.

369
01:00:37.932 --> 01:00:47.352
It's gonna be a mix of our brand partnerships, which is already about ninety-seven percent of our earnings. But my goal is to diversify our income streams this year. So it's...

370
01:00:47.452 --> 01:00:51.212
I don't think it'll be more in terms of double the brand partnerships.

371
01:00:51.332 --> 01:01:04.112
I think it's probably gonna look like the same amount of brand partnerships, continuing what we've already started with the, the existing brands that we work with, um, maybe building on and exploring other partnerships, but that's probably gonna stay about the same.

372
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What we are gonna start introducing is our job board, which in hand-in-hand comes with a job referral, um, monetization strategy that we are gonna work with companies to fill the slots that they are hiring for.

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And, you know, there's a couple ways that we're gonna charge for that and work with recruiters to, you know, get a payout for that.

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But those partnerships I think can be incredibly lucrative, and they deliver on our ethos of helping people get jobs in a way that is transparent. Um, so I'm excited about that.

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Other ways is, um, directly through our content. So thir- like, we made like less than thirty thousand dollars last year from actual... like our actual content.

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You know, this is money that we made from the YouTube Ad Revenue program, Creator Fund, all of that.

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My goal is to create better content this year and even better, more viral, you know, really delivering on our audience's wants and needs, but having more fun as well and exploring other financial transparent questions like, how much did your tickets cost, you know, at the Super Bowl?

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Um, I think that that is helping us, you know, avoid the burnout, keep the spark alive, but also bring, bring in more money from the actual platforms that we're placing them on. We're also working on new shows.

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Um, we have one coming out this Friday, which is March first, depending on when this will air. Um, so March first, our new show, The Breakroom, is airing on YouTube.

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It's something we've been working on for like the last six months, and we're hoping that that is really gonna help us grow even further on YouTube and in turn increase our ad revenue there.