Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - The Ambitions of a Teenage TikTok Star

00:00:00.000 Hey, all. Joe here, and you're listening to Under the Influence. Have you ever wondered

00:00:06.780 what it's like to be a 16-year-old TikTok star? I weirdly have. Of course I have. I

00:00:13.620 actually think it might sound terrible. I do. I do. But recently, one of these young

00:00:19.020 women reached out to me. I got an email from Sloan Price a couple of months ago asking

00:00:24.860 to be on my show. Yes, an email from Sloan, not from her parents, not from a momager,

00:00:32.140 not from a publicist or an agent. I got the email from Sloan herself. And here's what she said.

00:00:39.020 I'm a 16-year-old TikTok creator with 800,000 followers and expertise in all things influencer

00:00:46.980 marketing and the future of teen girls in the business digital space. My goal is to turn teenage

00:00:53.360 influencers into business owners through my Hacker House agency, ensuring that the next

00:00:58.940 20 billionaires are females under 25. I wrote her back right away and said,

00:01:05.940 come on my show. So she did, during a break in her high school classes.

00:01:12.840 Sloan's goal is for influencers to be their own business owners. And I love that. But I also had

00:01:19.500 a lot of other questions that I wanted to ask her. I'm so curious about how brands, agents,

00:01:25.000 and managers take advantage of teenage influencers. And after our conversation,

00:01:29.560 I realized that they absolutely do. I also wanted to know about what guardrails are actually in

00:01:35.960 place to protect young influencers on social media. What we're going to find out today is

00:01:42.140 that there aren't that many. Sloan truly believes that the teenage influencers today are the future

00:01:48.500 of celebrity marketing, and I don't think she's wrong. This episode is different than anything

00:01:54.660 that we've ever done before, and I'm really excited about it. I'm dying for parents to tune

00:01:59.580 in to hear a teenage perspective on this world, but it's also for anyone who wants to understand

00:02:04.160 how a whole new generation is both viewing and taking advantage of social media.

00:02:10.200 my name is sloan price i'm 16 years old and i am an influencer on tiktok i have been

00:02:20.220 doing content creation for a little over two years now and i'm currently working on what i believe is

00:02:28.100 the next phase of my social media career and that is creating a startup incubator for fellow teen

00:02:35.140 influencers. So I love all things social media marketing, all things content creation. And I

00:02:41.460 have the belief and the vision that teen girls are the future of business. I think that they

00:02:48.200 absolutely are. You know, my perspective on young people and influencing continues to change every

00:02:55.340 day. My son the other day, who is seven, there's very few things we allow him to watch on YouTube.

00:03:03.220 one of them is mark rober he does the crunch labs videos with all like physics content and stuff

00:03:10.860 i mean mark rober is just a god god among men i love him so much and he does a lot of physics

00:03:17.680 content around dominoes and we we are getting my son like one of those massive domino sets

00:03:24.460 and the other day he said oh i'm gonna i can create a whole youtube channel of this i'll

00:03:30.500 I'll create a channel. And I was like, all right, OK, this is this is what the future is going to

00:03:36.120 look like. Yeah, no, it's crazy. And I think that a lot of parents are rightfully pretty hesitant

00:03:42.240 about getting their kids online. But I think that the really important distinction and that you can

00:03:46.860 see through your son is the difference between being a consumer and a creator. Like, I totally

00:03:52.200 agree that spending your time scrolling through TikTok or through YouTube or Instagram Reels

00:03:57.460 isn't always the best use of your time but i think that if you are putting content out there and

00:04:02.920 you're really finding your place and you have this amazing space where teens are able to connect with

00:04:07.860 one another i mean everyone is in ways that we haven't been able to in any previous years i think

00:04:14.340 that it is really special and it opens so many doors and teens are kind of randomly finding

00:04:19.580 themselves thrust into the spotlight um like accidentally and that's the craziest part because

00:04:24.480 We have all of these teenage girls like me who have no experience in marketing, no experience in business.

00:04:31.020 And suddenly they're being offered brand deals.

00:04:33.640 Suddenly they are getting invited to events.

00:04:36.140 And I think that it's a scary space, but it's a really exciting space and opportunity.

00:04:42.560 Totally, totally.

00:04:43.620 So I want to back up just a little bit.

00:04:45.660 You might be the youngest person we've ever had on Under the Influence.

00:04:48.460 Oh, really?

00:04:49.320 I think so.

00:04:50.260 I think so, yeah.

00:04:52.080 So you are 16 years old.

00:04:54.180 You have 800,000 followers on TikTok. How did this happen? How did how did how did you even

00:05:00.680 get to this point? So a lot of people will say that they kind of blew up on accident or started

00:05:08.500 doing TikTok for fun and then it eventually worked out. But I had a pretty different approach.

00:05:13.340 Whenever I started out my account, I was dead set on going viral and becoming a influencer.

00:05:18.480 And I really came into it with that. Not only that intention, but kind of that mindset and

00:05:23.880 the way that I posted. I posted like I already had an audience. I already cared about only putting

00:05:29.060 out higher quality content and posting consistently in the way that an influencer does. I've been

00:05:35.960 obsessed with social media since I was way too little. I had all sorts of fun accounts. I did

00:05:40.700 an account whenever I did ballet. I did an account whenever I was big on writing a book. I've had all

00:05:46.080 sorts of things and I wanted something that was kind of just for me. And I quickly realized what

00:05:51.460 I still would consider the easiest way to go viral and to get engagement. And that is to

00:05:58.520 encourage people to comment. And the way that you do that, I always used to say either controversy

00:06:05.600 or cringe. And that was kind of the mindset that I started out my social media career with. I

00:06:12.120 noticed that whenever you do certain things or post certain things, if it doesn't get people

00:06:18.800 common. If it doesn't get people engaged, it's not going to go anywhere. And I think that one

00:06:23.720 of the reasons that I might have blew up a little bit accidentally is because of my hair. I had

00:06:31.920 suffered for about two years prior to starting TikTok with an anxiety-related disorder called

00:06:37.620 trichotillomania that causes you to blow out your hair whenever you're stressed. People

00:06:41.260 kind of tore me apart for it, honestly, online. Oh my God, stop it. No, they didn't. Why are

00:06:46.740 people so terrible online. They totally did. I, the search next to my name for like two months

00:06:52.480 was like Sloan hair problems, Sloan hair ugly, some pretty terrible things. And it was really

00:06:57.980 hard for me, especially because the hair pulling is triggered by anxiety and the people being mean

00:07:03.860 about it was only making all that worse. And honestly, looking back now, like I was 14 years

00:07:09.280 old, I'm surprised that I didn't quit. Like I'm surprised that I was able to keep going with it.

00:07:13.940 but in like a sea of negativity that social media so often has there are just a few people like a

00:07:22.040 few messages that you'll get of girls saying hey I have this too and I've never seen someone talk

00:07:27.200 about it and you made me feel more confident you made me like feel okay going to school today

00:07:32.060 those really were worth it for me like those small comments and those small interactions and now

00:07:38.440 i'm luckily having a much more positive experience online i'm getting a lot less backlash and yeah i

00:07:46.180 currently i currently have 980 000 oh my gosh it was 800 when you wrote to me the first time okay

00:07:52.520 real fast and i'm on track to um get a million followers soon which is so exciting for me but

00:07:59.300 really the best part i think even as my content has evolved but like the way that i empath people

00:08:06.580 and my goal of reaching an audience

00:08:08.860 of young teen girls like I am

00:08:10.800 and instilling in them the confidence

00:08:12.200 that I wish I hadn't instilled in me at that time,

00:08:15.960 that still is my main focus.

00:08:17.820 And so oftentimes whenever I'll get recognized in public

00:08:21.320 and girls will be able to talk to me

00:08:23.080 about the ways that they've been inspired

00:08:25.060 and they feel better about themselves.

00:08:27.100 And it's just very exciting to me

00:08:29.960 and very healing to me

00:08:31.300 because of the bullying that I got initially

00:08:34.720 and to see that,

00:08:36.580 kind of what I went through and what I suffered through ended up helping a lot of others. And

00:08:41.100 like, that is so exciting to me. And like, that is what I continue to aim for as I gain followers

00:08:45.900 to reach as many people as possible. And I think that the very best part ultimately has been

00:08:51.680 the connections I've gotten to make with other influencers that are my age as well.

00:09:01.060 And how were your parents involved in all of this? Did they know what you were doing on social

00:09:06.180 media? Were they nervous about it? Are they excited about it? Well, I think that at first

00:09:12.940 they were a little bit nervous about it. That's for sure. I don't even know if they knew that I

00:09:18.140 had TikTok, but they have always been pretty supportive of whatever I do. And as long as I

00:09:24.580 take independence in it and I take control of it. So, you know, all the different sports I've did,

00:09:29.760 the different activities I've had in speech and debate, they let me do it as long as I'm the one

00:09:34.040 reaching out to the adults and I'm the one scheduling my coaching and I'm the one making

00:09:38.040 it happen so that I'm not being forced into anything, but I'm doing it like out of my own

00:09:42.620 passion and because I really want to. And so I think that they saw that it was something that

00:09:45.960 I was passionate about and let me go from there. But definitely during those periods of time where

00:09:51.680 I was struggling a little bit because of the like hate I was receiving, I remember my mom

00:09:59.520 sitting me down and saying like you don't have to do this you know like if this is if this is

00:10:04.340 something that's this hard on you then you should stop but you know I couldn't and I didn't and I'm

00:10:10.940 glad that I didn't now but yeah I've luckily had them be pretty supportive with this and I think

00:10:15.160 that like them supporting me instead of trying to force it away is really helpful because I do have

00:10:20.840 a lot of friends that are creators and their parents don't know about it or their parents

00:10:25.680 very recently found out and are mad at them and i think that like the parents need to be just as

00:10:31.200 involved in like a teen social media journey because you know your teen is suddenly going

00:10:36.640 to be offered things like contracts to join agencies that will take a percentage of your

00:10:41.260 kids brand deals and just as much as the kids aren't experts in business like the parents aren't

00:10:48.840 experts in the you know how social media marketing and business works as well like it's a totally

00:10:55.300 foreign thing for so many people. And so it is definitely hard because even when parents are

00:11:00.660 supportive, oftentimes the inexperience can get parents and their teens into pretty unfortunate

00:11:08.060 situations with different brand deals and agencies that I definitely found myself in a few times

00:11:13.140 throughout the years. Yeah. And I want to hear a little bit about that. When did you start getting

00:11:18.080 offered money to do things and how did you navigate that? I mean, I find that hard to navigate

00:11:24.220 as a 44-year-old woman. How did you navigate it as a teenager?

00:11:30.140 Yeah, I think I had around 40 or 50,000 followers whenever I first started getting

00:11:38.100 reached out just by brands privately. And I remember that I did a deal with a phone case

00:11:44.480 app, and I'm pretty transparent about these numbers. And I remember that I got like a few

00:11:48.980 thousand dollars to make one or two posts and that was wild to me obviously that's wild to anyone

00:11:55.500 that is a lot of money and I was so shocked that I was worth so much like my content and my ability

00:12:03.280 to reach people was very confusing and shortly after that I got reached out to by one of these

00:12:08.880 talent agencies is what they're called that help coordinate brand deals and so I signed with them

00:12:15.400 it was a year-long contract and I immediately was in contact with them I was on a like a private

00:12:22.840 group chat without my mom in it that would just like two of the people that worked at the agency

00:12:27.860 and myself and they would offer me brand deals and I would you know send the deliverables and

00:12:34.640 I would do it but honestly I think I very quickly realized that it was not my thing it really wasn't

00:12:41.260 I was given scripts by these brands and really strict requirements for the videos from the

00:12:48.260 agency and they wouldn't be satisfied with certain ways that I did it and kind of took

00:12:53.480 away what I think is like the most fun and exciting part of social media.

00:12:56.540 And that is like the authentic relationship and trust that you have with your audience.

00:13:01.900 And I remember the first time I got a comment that was saying, hey, didn't she just promote

00:13:07.180 um a different lipstick thing like last week like she said that one was the best now she's saying

00:13:15.880 this one was the best and that really alarmed me because I was like influencers entire job is built

00:13:22.440 on the trust that they have with their followers and the more you throw products at them and the

00:13:29.180 more you promise them things that you might you don't even believe in the less they trust you and

00:13:33.860 the less you have and that was super alarming to me and I not only that but the agency was very

00:13:39.560 unprofessional with me they would shame me if I wasn't willing to do brand deals with apps or

00:13:44.980 brands that were not quality and compare me to other girls in the agency on things that I did

00:13:51.420 my god but you're a kid I know and I I think that another aspect of it is like there's there's

00:13:58.080 actually so many like strict guidelines and like legal rules around how you have to classify ads

00:14:03.640 online and all the rules were completely disregarded by the agency. There are multiple

00:14:08.420 times where I posted that they didn't even tell me to market as a paid promotion, which is

00:14:14.160 literally illegal. And I was just like very alarmed by all of this. And it made me stop

00:14:20.560 and eventually rescind the contract and just begin doing it for fun. And it was so unfortunate

00:14:28.220 because I'd heard so many similar stories from other girls that were going through that same

00:14:32.080 thing and i just think that it's pretty unfortunate that you get given this opportunity to reach

00:14:37.400 people reach people at a scale that so many like business owners would pay so much money to do as

00:14:44.300 so much money to do oh my gosh we have all this worth and all this value and

00:14:49.640 these adult agencies come in and they exploit that and they limit your opportunities and

00:14:56.500 They restrict you from working with people outside of them. And that is a why I have stopped recently doing brand deals with an agency and why I'm trying to start an incubator that kind of handles teams differently, not with this approach of like short term money and working inconsistently with all sorts of brands, but rather developing a message of your own so that you don't lose that influence and you become a permanent owner in the business space.

00:15:24.440 And so my kind of goal is to help other teen creators, specifically girls, find what they're passionate about and really turn that influence into ownership because without ownership, it's temporary.

00:15:39.240 and I and that's why I'm so excited about what I'm doing because I feel like I'm getting to

00:15:45.260 help girls that are going through the exact same thing that I did and show them from a teen's

00:15:50.400 perspective not from someone who was just trying to exploit them or limit their opportunities what

00:15:55.080 they are capable of and what they can make out of this awesome opportunity that they have through

00:16:00.540 the form of yeah absolutely absolutely

00:16:02.980 Totally. All right. I want us to take a quick break. And when we get back, I want you to tell

00:16:09.960 me a little bit about your big idea, about your goal to ensure that the next 20 billionaires

00:16:17.440 are females under 25. Yes.

00:16:32.980 okay we are back you have big goals and big dreams which i freaking love like this makes me so happy

00:16:39.840 and i also love that you saw a true hole and a problem in the market which is that i think too

00:16:49.140 many young influencers much like young celebrities have for years have been exploited by you know

00:16:58.060 hugely capitalistic agencies who do not have these young people's best interests at heart.

00:17:05.260 And so, you know, having an agency created by a young woman for young women makes so much sense

00:17:12.960 to me. How did you get, how did you come to this idea? Well, I actually was working on a business

00:17:20.200 of my own. I was thinking, hey, if I'm really worth this much, why am I only getting a 20%

00:17:27.180 cut of it. This should all be going towards something that I create. I should have this

00:17:31.460 message of my own. I totally had the mindset and I was applying it myself. I was going to need to

00:17:36.140 work on creating a hair-related company. Whenever I took a step back and realized that me, one person

00:17:44.360 making a brand as a teen influencer, was only going to get us one step closer to this goal of

00:17:51.920 kind of teen girl domination in the business world and i figured that since i kind of had

00:17:58.420 this clarity and this ability to focus on long-term achievement instead of the short-term gain

00:18:04.600 that a lot of other influencers haven't been haven't been exposed to or haven't like gotten

00:18:10.000 the opportunity to hear about that um the better move for me to make would be to help others and to

00:18:18.340 get a whole group together in the way that we are able to band together and create influence

00:18:24.300 and have all sorts of businesses created and really work towards this vision that I wanted

00:18:30.420 to see because I realized that, well, you know, me doing myself, it would have been exciting.

00:18:35.940 I was excited about the idea of a business. I can reach so many more people and help so many

00:18:41.200 more creators by really investing in them and really giving them the help rather than just

00:18:47.680 doing it and hoping they follow an example. And so I have all sorts of different friends that I've

00:18:54.060 been reaching out with and really getting to see not only if this is something that they're

00:19:00.740 interested in and something that they're wanting to do, and they really do have a vision for a

00:19:06.220 different product that they could create, but also that they have the work ethic and that they have

00:19:11.780 the mindset and time to really put in a lot of work and make it happen because starting a business

00:19:18.260 isn't easy for anyone but for you know girls and teens that are in school and have other

00:19:24.680 commitments and have this platform that they're focusing on building it's really difficult and so

00:19:29.120 i'm hoping to find these people that are really inspired and i already have um five girls that

00:19:36.280 I'm working really closely with and my goal when eventually is to have 10 or 15 but I'm hoping to

00:19:44.320 kind of take that weight off of their shoulders and provide them investment through the form of

00:19:49.480 resources like app teams product teams and all the stuff that they need to navigate this business

00:19:57.020 world that is so unfamiliar to a lot of them and kind of help make that happen because ultimately

00:20:03.280 when it comes to marketing when it comes to promoting a product that is their time to shine

00:20:07.780 and i'm really investing in communities rather than products and then helping them build the

00:20:13.160 product from there and so i think that well it has definitely been a difficult process right now

00:20:17.520 whenever we're working on forming ideas and i'm working on raising money for this i think that

00:20:22.860 in kind of the second half of the business journey where you have the app or the product created and

00:20:28.280 you're able to market it that is where they are going to step in and show that they are worth this

00:20:32.800 investment because they know how to market lawlessly unlike any businessman is able to do

00:20:37.600 they know how to connect with teens and make them want this and so i'm just really excited to get

00:20:41.920 there because i think it's going to be incredibly rewarding for all of them to kind of see where all

00:20:46.720 this hard work um allows their skill set to shine i have i have a question that might be a dumb

00:20:54.480 question but you know when brands and agents are reaching out to young people do they have to loop

00:21:02.400 been parents i know that parents are required to sign like the official contracts that bind you

00:21:11.800 into the agency but other than that no i i've worked closely with three different agencies

00:21:19.020 um the latter two i of which i decided not to sign with and my parents really weren't involved

00:21:26.540 until that end and that's another thing that i'm trying pretty carefully to work on is that

00:21:31.840 I don't I'm working on creating a contract right now with my lawyer but this contract isn't going

00:21:37.460 to be binding them away from opportunities I always thought it was so ridiculous because some 0.97

00:21:41.320 of the girls that I'm I'm trying to work with they're signed with these different agencies and 0.98

00:21:45.720 the contracts will be non-compete to where they aren't allowed to be a part of another group even

00:21:51.160 though starting a business is a totally different thing than promoting other products and I just

00:21:56.620 think that it's kind of funny that these brands that are allegedly taking on creators and helping

00:22:03.220 them reach the next level are limiting them from any opportunities. And I think that if you're

00:22:07.180 doing that, then you're really not here for the kids and you're not here for their futures. And

00:22:12.360 so while my contract does not bind them exclusively to what I'm doing, I'm hoping that once they start

00:22:20.200 see the positive effects of what they're doing, that they will be personally inclined not to

00:22:26.940 focus so much on these agencies and these brand deals. But yes, I think it is unfortunate that

00:22:33.280 the parents are kept out of the loop and that's what allows kids to sign themselves into pretty

00:22:38.520 restricting situations. Yeah, yeah, of course it does. Like I said, contracts are confusing

00:22:45.380 at any age, and particularly when you're a young person, what kinds of guardrails have you set up,

00:22:54.220 or have you set up any, to protect yourself online? I mean, we know that there are a lot

00:22:58.680 of online predators. There's a lot of concerns about imagery being stolen and used for nefarious

00:23:05.000 purposes. Do you set up ways to protect yourself from those kinds of people? Yeah, I think there's

00:23:12.960 luckily a lot of guidelines within the app of tiktok that restrict these things that i'm able

00:23:19.740 to access like being able to filter my comments to get rid of um like any words that are inappropriate

00:23:25.840 or even words that are like rude and harmful i often filter and i and i always think that

00:23:30.920 sometimes oh wait i didn't know you could i didn't know you could do that yeah you can take any word

00:23:35.400 you want and get rid of it and for me um i i know that sometimes people will be like oh this person's

00:23:40.680 filtering comments but at the end of the day like it's your social media page and if people

00:23:45.200 are saying something that you do not want to see you can get rid of it and for me I remember that

00:23:51.680 there was one particular video I posted and for some reason I guess it was not my best angle

00:23:57.140 because I got so many comments saying like making fun of the size of my forehead and this is like

00:24:03.280 such a totally random thing that oh my god again people are terrible yeah it was pretty brutal and

00:24:09.240 And I remember that like there were literally hundreds of comments that were comparing me to Megamind, which again, so mean, so crazy.

00:24:17.600 But now that is one of the many filtered words from my comments, because I think that ultimately I used to read every comment.

00:24:25.560 I used to allow any comment to go by and that's what would make me feel really insecure about myself.

00:24:29.740 but now I use things like filtering and also TikTok automatically filters a lot of the messages

00:24:36.260 you get to ensure that you aren't going to receive any inappropriate messages but I think that again

00:24:43.520 I agree it is an unsafe space and I think that there requires like a level of discernment that

00:24:49.000 you have to have as a teen and it's hard because you get so many emails you get so many dms

00:24:54.140 and you get weird stuff one of my friends that is an influencer she is 15 years old and someone

00:25:03.500 uploaded her home address on to google maps and they registered it as a business and it's her

00:25:09.640 name like and then house so she can't get rid of it because it's registered as a business and so

00:25:16.400 literally her mom has been trying her legal team has been trying but this minor's home address is

00:25:22.780 forever publicly available on Google Maps, which is terrible.

00:25:27.260 Wow. Yes, absolutely terrible.

00:25:30.340 It is really unfortunate.

00:25:31.480 And so I think that there is definitely a level of risk that can be hard to avoid.

00:25:36.040 So you really have to be careful with who you trust and smart with the choices that you make.

00:25:40.640 And I think that hopefully that's another thing that these girls will be able to gain

00:25:47.000 from kind of the community aspect of what I'm doing.

00:25:49.640 Like us, us kind of almost being like a girl group or a hype house, but focused on creating businesses because we'll be able to, you know, help each other through these circumstances and have support from different adults to ensure that we are as safe as possible.

00:26:06.040 But yes, I definitely agree.

00:26:07.940 It is definitely a risky and scary place for teens.

00:26:14.300 I want to take one more quick break.

00:26:16.200 and when we get back, I want to talk about how you see the future of influencing. What do you

00:26:21.780 think is next? Okay, we're back. What do you see as the future of influencing? And do you think

00:26:37.120 that influencers are are on track to really replace celebrities as we know them 100 i i think

00:26:47.000 that already we are starting to see um influencers having a larger impact like on sales and trends

00:26:57.800 like that compared to celebrities um i write a study that said that micro influencers so creators

00:27:06.180 with like, you know, 50k or less were able to generate a higher return on investment for brand

00:27:15.080 deals than really large celebrities on Instagram. And this was crazy to me because I think that it

00:27:22.220 shows that people trust these figures that they can relate to more, even the smaller ones compared

00:27:28.080 to the big influencers, because you start to lose your influence. And so I think that that's what

00:27:32.480 makes it really risky because we're seeing social media influencers taking over. 90% of people trust

00:27:40.500 their peers on social media, whereas only 15% of people trust brands on social media. And so I think

00:27:46.560 that brands now seeing that are taking advantage of influencers. And in turn, the influencer trust

00:27:53.480 rate is going down. And so I think that it's kind of unfortunate because we saw, oh, wow, influencers

00:27:59.580 which is so great. And so we started taking advantage of that. And now it's going right

00:28:04.020 back down because of how that's working. And so that's why I think that if influencers continue

00:28:11.320 to do what they are doing now, we are going to lose relevance and we are going to die out and

00:28:15.560 something new is going to come in and be the next future of marketing. And that is why I think that

00:28:21.780 the only way that influencers will be able to maintain permanence is by having some sort of

00:28:30.000 business or product of their own. And I think that we've seen a lot of influencers that have

00:28:34.200 stayed really relevant for a while or like a YouTuber like Mr. Beast having businesses of his

00:28:39.460 own. And I think that my eventual goal would be for influencers to be business owners and for all

00:28:51.500 people that are starting a business to recognize that you kind of have to have like a face behind

00:28:57.300 it. We've seen that work time and time again. It's such an oversaturated market, especially

00:29:01.300 like in the beauty industry that, you know, unless you are someone with a preexisting audience and a

00:29:08.180 personality that people really care about and connect to, it's hard to just put another product

00:29:12.060 on the shelves or another app on the app store. And so I think that influencers can avoid this

00:29:17.400 whole trend of losing our trust and dying out, but only if we are really strategic with our next step

00:29:22.120 and ensure that we are consolidating our message to be a consistent one that our followers will

00:29:28.160 care about and really stay engaged with throughout time. Well, I love what you're doing in terms of

00:29:35.280 longevity, in terms of creating a career as opposed to an opportunity. I mean, I think it

00:29:41.820 really does mirror what we see with young celebrities it's like okay do you want to do

00:29:47.400 this one really popular tv show which then might make it kind of difficult for you to move forward

00:29:54.160 with a long acting career or do you want to think about what your career looks like even though

00:29:58.840 that's a hard weird scary thing to do as a teenager for sure it's a hard balance that we

00:30:07.380 have to navigate and I think I have so many friends that have like massive audiences of like

00:30:13.080 two million and above and I asked them what's next I asked them what do the next five years

00:30:17.820 look like and they're not sure they say oh maybe I'll move to LA maybe maybe I'll move to New York

00:30:22.760 and keep going but I just think that is such a risk and we saw all creators in that were teens

00:30:28.480 and kind of the 2020 hype house era they you know didn't go to college and they pursued these

00:30:35.220 opportunities and now are kind of lost and scrambling for how they can regain relevance

00:30:41.300 and what's next for them. And I just would hate to see the generation of influencers today, which,

00:30:46.140 you know, including me, to follow a similar path like that. And so I think that we definitely need

00:30:52.480 to be focused on longevity because we have this like billion dollar opportunity in our hands and

00:30:58.240 it would just be a shame to see it go by. It would, it would. What do you want to do next?

00:31:04.280 I mean, how do you want to ensure that you have longevity?

00:31:08.260 Do you want to go to college?

00:31:09.660 And if so, what do you want to study?

00:31:11.700 Yeah, I would love to go to college.

00:31:15.200 I am huge.

00:31:16.860 I'm like a really passionate student.

00:31:19.300 Like I work really hard on my grades and my scores and things like that.

00:31:23.840 And so, yes, ideally, I'd want to go to a college.

00:31:26.680 My dream schools are Stanford and USC and California.

00:31:30.580 not to contribute to the stereotype of influencers moving to LA. But I think that for a school like

00:31:37.280 that, it might be a little bit different. But I'm hoping that I will be able to find success

00:31:42.400 in this incubator. And considering that I'll have a 10% stake of a lot of these businesses

00:31:49.480 and really get to be involved with helping them, that it will be a huge part of my future. And I'm

00:31:55.000 not sure what will come next like when these companies will want to sell that ownership or

00:32:00.900 when these companies will get bought by someone else but it really is a field that i'm super

00:32:05.620 interested in so the idea of studying business or marketing at um college is very exciting to me

00:32:11.900 but also you know everything is risky on social media you never know if tiktok is going to get

00:32:19.100 bans every day whenever you never you never know if tiktok's going to get banned i mean probably

00:32:23.360 not anymore but like I hope not I hope not um but it is a risky thing but luckily I think that I've

00:32:30.560 I have like more to my life I have other skills I have other passions I do pageants I do public

00:32:36.240 speaking I would love to get into broadcast journalism I would love to continue doing

00:32:43.140 pageants um whenever I'm an adult doing systems like Miss America Miss USA and I think that no

00:32:49.720 matter what I end up doing even maybe if it is being you know a a content creator whenever I'm

00:32:55.960 an adult making content as a mom or or with my family I think that what I'm doing now and this

00:33:02.540 kind of journey I'm taking on really learning about influencers and learning about business

00:33:06.400 will hopefully be a great help to me whatever I end up doing and I just I know that I love

00:33:11.960 marketing I know that I love business and I think that so many of those fields are really opening up

00:33:17.780 thanks to ai and i'm just super excited to be involved and to kind of get started into it now

00:33:23.440 even though i'm only 16 kind of give myself somewhere to work for and a purpose for college

00:33:29.640 yeah which i which i think is great i mean too many kids go into college without a purpose

00:33:34.880 in mind i certainly did um i think everything you're doing is fascinating and i love hearing

00:33:42.720 someone that is so passionate about this world because influencing frankly is the future of

00:33:48.020 celebrity it's the future of marketing and it's the future of business what are some things that

00:33:52.500 you would want to tell parents of teenagers who don't really understand that i would tell them

00:33:59.380 that your teenage girl that is sitting in her room um you know playing with makeup products

00:34:06.380 or your teenage boy who is spending all day gaming

00:34:09.300 is more powerful than any business man

00:34:13.640 they've ever met in their jobs.

00:34:15.120 And I know that this is unbelievable

00:34:16.720 because it is so different and it is so new,

00:34:19.840 but it is the changing landscape of the world,

00:34:21.940 like you're saying.

00:34:22.580 And I think that you have to allow your kids

00:34:24.400 to embrace these opportunities

00:34:25.660 and to take advantage of the future

00:34:27.300 because that's the world that they're going to be living in

00:34:30.060 and that's the world they're going to grow up into.

00:34:32.020 And I think that, again,

00:34:33.460 prioritizing the culture of creating

00:34:35.840 rather than consuming and allowing your kid to take advantage of the influence that they might

00:34:41.800 be able to have and and helping them turn that into an impact that will really set them up for

00:34:46.520 life is so important but yeah i i completely believe in the idea of kids using social media

00:34:52.920 if they're using it responsibly and if they're using it carefully because

00:34:57.780 i agree with you i think that social media is our future and the next generation of

00:35:03.320 billionaires are going to come straight out of it. So if you want your kid to be included in

00:35:07.120 that statement, you have to let them pursue this crazy new field and really just let them embrace

00:35:13.400 it. Sloane, thank you so much for coming on today. Will you tell everyone where they can

00:35:17.940 find you on the social medias? Yeah, on TikTok and Instagram and YouTube. I'm at Sloane Alex

00:35:25.540 underscore s-o-o-a-n-e-a-l-e-x underscore and i would love for you guys to follow along on my

00:35:33.120 life and everything i'm doing thank you so much for coming on today this was such a delight

00:35:38.460 thank you so much for having me i really appreciate it and that is all we have for today

00:35:44.220 i found sloan remarkable and i think as parents we have a lot of agita around this whole world

00:35:52.080 because frankly when we were growing up influencer was I mean it didn't exist right

00:35:57.980 so it definitely wasn't a career to be aspired to and now we live in this world where it does

00:36:05.440 feel like everyone has to be some kind of brand online and influencer is absolutely a job it's a

00:36:11.800 job in pretty much every industry that I can think of at this point so I think Sloan is smart I think

00:36:19.400 her business idea is really smart. And I love the fact that she's thinking about what doesn't work

00:36:23.540 for her, trying to solve the problem, and then also building that into a business to try to solve

00:36:28.400 the problem for other people. She's going places. Maybe we should all invest in this company that 0.90

00:36:33.840 she's building. Thank you so much for being here today. I appreciate you. As always, I hope that

00:36:39.640 you are checking out a little bit. This holiday season, I'm kind of quietly quitting the holidays.

00:36:45.380 I'm just trying to chill a little bit more.

00:36:48.680 It's going okay.

00:36:50.120 It is.

00:36:51.580 If you haven't yet, grab three copies of The Sicilian Inheritance for friends and family

00:36:55.440 for the holiday season.

00:36:57.080 It's the gift that keeps on giving, my friends.

00:36:59.320 It really is.

00:37:00.960 Now go do something nice for yourself.

00:37:02.860 You deserve it.

00:37:15.380 Thank you.

00:37:45.380 You

Under the Influence (with Jo Piazza) - December 17, 2024

The Ambitions of a Teenage TikTok Star

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