Opinion
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Career as social media star may seem intriguing, but improbable Fletcher Haltom
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haltofle000@hsestudents.org
nline influencers such as Selena ome , ameron allas and Kylie enner have become prominent figures in society, both online and in the real world. They even occasionally make careers out of their online fame, utili ing social media, advertisements and business partnerships to earn revenue. However, a career as an influencer is not nearly as viable an option as it may seem. Simply having a career as an online influencer is not a bad thing. If someone can support themselves financially by using their online fame, they absolutely should. The problem arises when influencer careers are advertised as completely practical, get-rich- uick career options for any ordinary person. In reality, becoming an online influencer is, in many cases, not at all an achievable career option. Therefore, it should stop being marketed as such. ne of the main issues with becoming an influencer is that the chances of successfully becoming a full-time online influencer, a user who can fully support themselves financially by using their online presence, are exceedingly low. ouTube reports over hours of content uploads to the site every minute. This makes it very difficult for aspiring influencers to succeed, due to the high levels of competition. rofessional athletic careers rarely get treated as legitimately viable career options for children, so influencer careers should not be treated differently. hildren can dream of being an online influencer, and it can actually be beneficial for children to experiment with trying to become one. onetheless, it must be recogni ed that their dream has a low probability of working out. Every month, over a billion people use the Instagram app. lick reports that only , Instagram users have over 1 , followers, the mark that traditionally defines a user as a micro-influencer. This means that only . of Instagram users ualify as micro-influencers. These users typically earn between 2 and per Instagram post, according to Mediakix. hile this is no small sum, a living cannot be
made off of it. onsidering that influencers do not always post fre uently, and their posts are not always sponsored, it would be very difficult to live off of. Mega-influencers, users with over a million followers, make around 1 , to 1 , per sponsored post, which one can make a living off of, but very few people have even close to enough followers to make that much money. dditionally, many online influencers use their social media platforms as extensions of their career, and not ust as their sole career. or example, riana rande, one of the most followed Instagram users, does not ust influence online. She originally rose to fame as a singer and actress, and she gained enough popularity to also become a social media star. She did not ust pursue that career, she pursued another career and became an influencer because of it. However, many aspiring influencers choose to take a different path. They only try to become a popular influencer, which they are unlikely to succeed in doing. It is possible to rise to online fame without previously being a celebrity, as social media star ach King has shown, but King is an exception to the overall trend. Influencers’ careers mainly rely on sponsored advertisements, where businesses pay them to advertise their product or service. espite this, many businesses are beginning to use their own accounts to advertise themselves on social media. rands such as etflix, endy’s and Target all have millions of followers on social media, meaning they have a large audience that they can advertise to, and may not need to invest as much in influencer advertising. This trend could cause influencers to make less money off of sponsored posts and cause their career to become even less profitable. Similar to how we do not treat professional athletic careers as realistic career options for children, we should do the same with influencer careers. eing a social media star is unrealistic, unsustainable, and not all that profitable. Therefore, the influencer career should stop being marketed and promoted as a completely viable career option for an ordinary person.
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