I forced myself to learn how to shoot and edit videos around March/April this year.
And I don’t mean pressing record on my hamster, slapping on a few words, and calling it video-making. It’s not that.
I mean actually sitting down and talking in front of and into the camera. Basically, yap! God knows this is a skill and a body of knowledge in and of itself.
Writing scripts that fit a video. Shooting B-roll. Adding voiceovers. Learning all sorts of editing just to make a video flow better and keep the audience watching for as long as possible.
So now that it’s been a couple of months, let’s do a quick check-in.
From not knowing how to make a video, taking over 12 hours to edit, and reshooting the same scene over 50 times because I couldn’t bear talking in front of the camera…
Now I know what I need to prep/record before the process even begins and I could get the entire production down to 4-5 hours.
1 week into starting this journey, I got my first brand collab. It was very low-paying but I was so excited! (I didn’t mind because I was going to practice anyway, and now I was getting paid to practice? I wish I got paid for practising my singing in the shower every day too.)
Fast forward to July 2026, I’ve made around 5,000 bucks in total.
Not much but not little too especially for someone who's starting from scratch. That’s my first taste of internet money. People are paying me to make videos with my face in them — and that’s face card money too!
While I was doing that, I took every bit of money I made through video-making and started buying stocks with it, slowly compounding it over time.
I just wanted to see how far I could push myself.
So now, that money has grown to nearly 9,000 bucks.
And that’s internet money in another form.
It took me 4–5 months of pushing myself to get here, and now I KNOW with conviction that I can make this work.
So, what did I learn from this?
1. Sometimes, you just need to be curious enough to start rather than setting insanely big goals.
I was literally like, “Let’s try and see where this goes.”
I didn’t need a 5-year plan. I just needed to start. Knowing myself, I would’ve given up on day 3 if I aimed too big.
2. I didn’t focus on making money at first, but I ended up making money WHILE having fun and unlocking a new skill.
And now, where am I at? Or where am I headed?
I decided to combine my years of behind-the-scenes experience in copywriting, storytelling, strategy, and branding, and now bring all of that to life in front of the camera.
I sell my skillset, not my follower count.
I don’t need to wait until I have “enough followers” to make money as an influencer.
Brands have more than enough influencers to choose from, but not everyone can be a creative strategist. That’s where I come in! I know what companies need by looking at their websites and social media content. I can tell them where their gaps are (some of them didn’t even know they had these gaps) and how I can fill them.
And last week, I got flown to Singapore by a company just to give their internal team advice on their website, social media, brand messaging, and positioning AFTER I made one video for them.
Honestly, I don’t even feel like it’s hard work. Because I'm doing something that I genuinely like.
And the best part is...
This
is
just
the
beginning!!
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