By Kimeko McCoy • May 28, 2024 •
This article is part of a special Digiday Podcast series that covers how content creators are building their brands and earning revenue from various major social media platforms. More from the series →
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What started as a part-time, pandemic-induced pregnancy journey vlog has turned into a family business for social media creators Ben and Lazara Martin, and their three boys.
Since 2020, the couple has racked up nearly 8 million followers across social media, boasting family-friendly content to strike deals with brands like Huggies, Flexcar and Applebee’s. But even as the influencer and content creator landscape continues to grow, changes in platform algorithms, the looming TikTok ban and more put pressure on creators.
In the second episode of the Digiday Podcast Creators series, the Martin family talks being full time content creators, navigating said ban and more.
Here are a few highlights from the conversation, which have been lightly edited for length and clarity.
Brand safety
Lazara: We really had to learn how to brand ourselves. We had to know that we are a family page. We can’t just do anything or put anything out there. We can’t use all audios because we know brands are watching, kids are watching, families are watching and we want our content to be something that’s lighthearted comedy. [Something for] everyone to enjoy, not [where] somebody’d watch a video and get a bad taste in their mouth because of our content. We also include our kids a lot. So we really keep it PG while putting a spin to comedy with it. It’s really just about branding ourselves and how we want everyone to see us and our family.
TikTok ban
Lazara: The TikTok ban itself is very scary. I will say it is very scary for any creator, but that’s why we cross post. We post on Instagram, YouTube and all of that. We encourage our followers that wherever we’re at, [if] they love us, that they’ll go there, they’ll follow you. Another way that we have really been talking about is just creating an email chain, telling them ‘Hey, we have an email. Subscribe here. Put your email in and anywhere that we go anywhere that we post, you will be notified, whether that’s by email or phone.’
Ben: It really just makes us work a lot harder on every other platform.
Working with kids
Lazara: With our boys, we really do think about their futures so much. So what we have set out for them is a separate savings account that every month — birthdays or anything like that or social media income — they always get part of it. They are part of our business as well. Anything that we get is absolutely theirs.
Ben: We feel like that’s automatic. When you have kids and you’re on social media, you set out some for them as well.
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