Last week, Her Campus hosted a great event about social media branding. A panel of social media influencers in the BU community and throughout Boston provided advice for building a personal brand or growing a business through social media.
One of the panelists was Arlin Moore, a junior at BU and YouTuber with over 55k subscribers. Arlin told us about his inspiration for starting his channel, the struggles that come with being both a full-time student and a social media influencer, and more!
Q: What inspired you to start your YouTube channel?
Arlin: I have always enjoyed creating videos, really ever since I can remember. One of my earliest memories is of my dad and I making a stop-motion film of legos and my dinosaur toys. I have always spent a lot of time watching YouTube videos, but it wasn’t until the summer going into my sophomore year that I found out about vlogging. I was watching a few different channels at the time, Casey Neistat (the face of YouTube vlogging), Justin Escalona (a 20-year-old USC film student whose channel was the ultimate-“wait a second… I can do that!” ) and, of course, one of my best friends now, Gretchen Geraghty. I saw how much fun creators were having telling their daily life stories in their own unique style, and on top of the fun of creating content, they were getting paid for it. While my initial reason for starting a channel, and my main driver through today was the fun of filming, editing, and storytelling, I also saw a very clear entrepreneurial path to financial independence.
Q: How do you separate your personal life from your videos?
Arlin: Many people think that sharing videos about my life on the Internet can feel like an invasion of privacy. However, my average vlog is about 10 minutes long and so, if you think about it, that’s only 10 minutes out of my entire 24-hour day. In choosing what story to tell, that requires leaving out most of what happens during my day, so while some days I try to basically sum up everything I did, my best videos are usually just a snapshot story of a particular part of my day. I would also say there is a line about what I choose not to share. For example, I generally don’t talk about my school grades, relationships, or family life too much, but at the same time, it’s almost a fact that talking about what’s most personal gets views.
Q: How do you manage your time between your school work and building your brand?
Arlin: I think a lot of people are unaware of the amount of time creators put into YouTube behind the scenes. Aside from filming throughout the day, it takes me anywhere between 4 to even 8 hours to create one video… Add that up for everyday vlogging and it’s about the same, if not more work than a full-time job. That being said, there is definitely still time for school work, but because I have less time during the day, I have to budget my school work time efficiently and usually ahead of schedule. As I have started to grow my channel and thus the business side of things, it has become increasingly difficult to focus on school work. I actually dropped a class this semester that I otherwise would have been very interested in had I not entered a period of rapid growth. It is really crazy how in just one year’s time, you can create a career on YouTube by, in my case, doing exactly what I love to do, and doing it every day.
Q: How has your BU experience helped you along the way?
Arlin: From the start of my freshman year at BU, I have felt extremely welcome to be myself. I have made so many interesting and awesome friends from all around the world and overall, BU is a very supportive community.
Q: What do you plan to do after college?
Arlin: I don’t have any specific plans, but I imagine it will involve a lot of travel vlogging.
Q: What has been the coolest opportunity you’ve been given since becoming well-known on YouTube?
Arlin: During the summer, I was invited to NYC to a sushi popup event for these BU students who founded a sushi restaurant called the 803 out of their dorm room. In November, I covered the Napa Valley Film Festival and met all these movie stars, which was pretty awesome. I also recently signed on with a brand management company, and this winter break I am planning to go out to LA and Hawaii with a bunch of other influencers. The best opportunity that YouTube has given me overall, however, is a platform to create and share my videos with people every single day.
Arlin is just at the beginning of his career, and his followers are growing daily! All photos from @arlinmoore. Check out Arlin’s YouTube channel here!
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