The Vlog Celebrity Influencer

The Rise of Lilly Singh.

As video content becomes more and more mainstream for mobile watchers, the Millennial influencer is more and more likely to be a vlogger. A video blogger, that is. YouTube > vimeo. Instagram > Twitter. 

Toronto's own Lilly Singh, is one of my favorite personal examples. In the new age of media and the internet, Millennials respect peer to peer communications and video on demand. So YouTube can be a place for celebrities and of course musicians to break out. Have a psychology degree that is useless, no problem, so according to "Superwoman", who made it to the big leagues. 

Internet stardom, moving to L.A. This is the dream for a young Millennial woman and speaking about issues that so many young people can relate to. You want fans? Try over 1 billion views on YouTube. Lilly broke through in a way that's awesome and inspiring. 

This is looking like 8 Million subscribers. 

• Satire, comedy and real world issues
• Race, culture and parent-child relations 
• Entertainment while being able to talk about issues that are universally relevant 

It's not that this is just another YouTube sensation, it's how they do it that's impressive. This is a legit career choice of someone supported by her parents from a traditional background (living with her parents) who actually made it. 

Her high-energy sketches -- landed her many roles and speaks to the suburban youth demographic in a way that was fresh and not represented broadly in mainstream media. 

Even though they're all laughable things I'm talking about, the message is, 'Be whoever you want to be because you want to be that person, not because there's a line-up of people telling you to be that person

• Be funny
• Be Authentic
• Be Honest
• Be Relatable 
• Vlog often 
• Have a sidekick
• Do storytelling skits
• Get snippets of attention 
• Make a Vlog Calendar
• Do Collabs
• Brainstorm topics
• Hit the videography editing hard
• Use appropriate language to your audience

While it's a good idea for brands and companies to have a video content presence, you need individual influencers who are screen ready (and audience identifiable) and have "pop" potential to boost their individual brand. 

For someone like Lilly, Twitter (1.3 million) is nothing compared to a more Millennial channel Instagram (3 million). So the channels are changing, and the "youth advocate" influencers are rising. Move over GaryVee, you ain't got nothing on girl power. 

If "kids in their basement" can do it, I'm sure some of you out there can as well. Isn't it? Learn from the young, check out Millennial influencers on YouTube to figure out how it is done. Millennials and GenZ have more to teach us about the future of digital than even we imagined. Thanks Lilly!