By Michael Niehoff
Education Content Coordinator, iLEAD Schools
Social media is one of the many powerful new media literacy tools. People all over the world are launching and advancing their careers while also learning to monetize these platforms. And that’s just what SCVi sophomore Dominic Robinson has done.
As part of his 10th Grade Personal Project, Robinson asked the following driving question: “How can I grow my Instagram following, make money and teach others to do the same?”
Robinson, who has already launched his career in music production, created his Desire Beats Instagram account earlier this year and has watched both his followers and bank account grow.
Interested in entrepreneurism since elementary school, Robinson said he thought this 10th grade Personal Project was the perfect opportunity to pursue what he loves to do and advance his entrepreneurial skills.
“Even before this project started, I was looking up ways to make money without having to get a conventional job that most high schoolers would usually have,” Robinson said. “I realized this could be highly profitable, wouldn’t take a massive amount of time or effort and wasn’t risky because it required no startup costs.”
What Robinson began learning was that his project was really about social media analytics, or the gathering and analyzing of marketing and audience data upon which one will make business decisions.
Although it started slow, Robinson said he soon realized how to start optimizing his content. According to Robinson, he realized he had to grow his network of followers before he could have enough credibility as well as a large enough audience in which to convert to sales. Soon, this strategy paid off for Robinson.
“When I hit 10K followers, I knew this was an important milestone,” Robinson said. “I noticed through the analytics that I was getting more followers each and every day. It started opening up the moneymaking opportunities at that point.”
In addition to the growth in followers, Robinson’s account also reached over 3 million impressions in seven days and reached over 1.4 million accounts. An impression means content was delivered to someone’s feed whether they engaged with it or not.
“This was a huge achievement for me,” Robinson said. “It’s not only impressive compared to other accounts in my niche or space, but it shows that I can provide value to clients.”
Robinson said he has learned that growth on social media platforms is exponential, and he is interested to see where this all goes in the future. He said he also knows he could teach others how to replicate his success as well.
“Done right, the amount of money that can be generated from this is enough to be called a job or a career,” he said.
As of this writing, Robinson’s Desire Beats Instagram account has nearly 1,100 posts and 17,800 followers. Additionally, he has converted these efforts into over $500 in sales.
However, Robinson is quick to remind others that this project has been more of a learning experience than anything. He said he learned a tremendous amount about self- discipline, marketing, sales, technology and business.
“Throughout this project, I matured as a learner. I learned many different things about business that I would’ve put off learning if it hadn’t been for this,” Robinson said. “I became more disciplined in several different aspects of my life and truly learned how to have an entrepreneurial mindset.”
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