- Preston Seo is a TikTook creator who movies movies about private finance and entrepreneurship.
- Seo began posting movies earlier this 12 months, and now he has about 1.6 million followers.
- He advised Insider how a lot he makes from affiliate hyperlinks, sponsorships, and TikTook’s Creator Fund.
- See more stories on Insider’s business page.
Preston Seo began making TikTook movies this 12 months to simply share recommendations on private finance, investing, and actual property, after being requested about these matters by his pals.
Seo, who works in actual property, did not use TikTook or have it downloaded on his telephone on the time. But he knew it was the perfect app to make use of for rising an viewers and sharing small items of recommendation, he advised Insider.
He uploaded his first video in mid-January, and he has continued to add no less than one video a day since.
Now, he has 1.6 million followers on his TikTook account, @thelegacyinvestingshow. He additionally runs a YouTube channel underneath the identical identify (7,000 subscribers) and an Instagram account (14,000 subscribers).
“It was stunning to see,” Seo stated about his development on TikTook. “I believe the primary time I hit 10,000 views on a video I used to be freaking out. I actually did not know what to suppose. I simply stored going.”
Seo treats TikTook as a aspect hustle. When he isn’t making movies, he is working at his full-time job in actual property. To find time for TikTook, Seo stated he usually movies his movies in batches for the week on Monday mornings.
“I attempt to movie or edit no less than six to 10 new movies for the upcoming week,” he stated. “I like to only do them multi functional go, after which I’ll launch one or two movies a day.”
Since rising his account, Seo earns cash every month from the platform by way of TikTook’s Creator Fund, in addition to by way of sponsorships and affiliate marketing online.
Most creators, together with Seo, do not rely solely on TikTook’s built-in monetization options, and as a substitute, earn nearly all of their income from model offers, app advertising and marketing, merchandise gross sales, or affiliate marketing online.
For Seo, affiliate marketing online is his most profitable income stream.
He earned extra from affiliate hyperlinks in 2021 than the opposite income streams he shared with Insider, which have been verified with documentation Seo supplied:
- April: $4,578
- May: $13,644
Affiliate marketing has grow to be a preferred income supply (*1*). Finance affiliate packages often supply a fixed rate per sign-up, and the creators are paid by both receiving a free inventory share or a money fee.
Seo has promoted dozens of personal-finance apps, together with Public and WeBull, since he began making movies for TikTook.
It’s such a robust income stream that Seo has actively sought out extra of those sorts of offers.
“It’s grow to be my largest revenue supply since I began monetizing my TikTook over the previous month or so,” he stated about affiliate marketing online. “When I began, I wrote down a listing of fifty totally different corporations I wished to be affiliated with. I might say it is a mixture of me reaching out and them reaching out to me.”
How a lot Seo earns from sponsorships and TikTook’s Creator Fund
Seo additionally earns cash as a creator immediately from TikTook, and thru sponsorships.
To earn cash immediately from TikTook, customers should be 18 years or older, meet a baseline of 10,000 followers, and have accrued at least 100,000 video views in the last 30 days. Once they attain that threshold, they will apply for TikTook’s Creator Fund by way of the app.
Seo has a number of TikTook movies with hundreds of thousands of views. His hottest movies characteristic matters like tips on how to make cash on-line (14 million views), tips on how to negotiate the worth of a automobile (11 million views), and the inventory market (2 million views).
How a lot revenue does he earn immediately from these movies?
Overall, from January 2021 to May 2021, his account’s estimated income earned by way of TikTook’s Creator Fund was about $1,664, in accordance with documentation he supplied. On common, his TikTook account earns between $9 to $38 a day.
These earnings are roughly in step with how a lot different creators who’ve shared their revenues with Insider are making on TikTook. For occasion, TikTook creator Kyd Mike (2 million followers) told Insider in 2020 that they earned $119.87 from TikTook’s Creator Fund between August 18 and 22, 2020 – averaging $23.97 in earnings per day.
Seo additionally broke down how a lot he had earned from sponsorships in 2021, which Insider verified with documentation he supplied:
- April: $1,144
- May: $2,408
On common, Seo stated he expenses about $600 per sponsored TikTook. He stated he turns down about 95% of the offers pitched to him as a result of they do not align together with his content material or do not pay sufficient.
“What it comes all the way down to, is your viewers and numbers,” he stated. “Understanding your metrics is tremendous necessary when negotiating. Know your price and keep on with that.”
