 We have a quick interruption as a reminder that this video is brought to you by Brandman Network.com, a space for artists to develop their brand and build out their marketing infrastructure with ongoing mentorship to actually grow their fan base. And if you're specifically interested in TikTok consultation and guidance, then you can check out brandmannetwork.com slash TikTok. Let's get back into it. Wow, what's up everybody? Once again is Brandman Sean and I am back with Trey Little. You guys might remember Trey Little as the artist who went from zero to 100k followers on TikTok in one month. And I did him as my very first interview with an artist as a part of the How to Get Famous on TikTok series that I have, right? And he's had a lot of interesting things that he's happened not only in that interview but since then because that interview has seemingly been so long ago because so much can happen in one week on TikTok, let alone three and four weeks. So about a month later from that first time we talk, he has some other things that we can talk about. I'll just update on your life in general when I let you kind of share what that's been like on TikTok. But then also we're talking about how to get paid on TikTok because Trey is already getting paid on TikTok. I want you guys to get an idea of what that experience is like, how you can possibly look to monetize TikTok and just how big and easy the opportunity might be in comparison and comparison to other platforms. So hey, without further ado, we're back Trey. I appreciate you hopping on again. Sure man. Hey man, tell me man, give me an idea. We were already talking about this before a little bit, but how has your life changed? What has it been like? You touched on being recognized more than usual and things like that. What's it been like? So the crazy thing is when I go places now, I feel like I'm almost expecting or looking for some high schooler or middle schooler to notice me from TikTok and then their parents to be like, wait, you know this guy? You know what went for me? Having the little amount of recognition that I have from year after year after year of touring and playing so many shows, TikTok is almost like put me in front of people's phones every day because of the page called the For You page, which is TikTok's Discover page. So everywhere I go now in public, like if I see a high schooler or a middle schooler, they're almost like, and then I stand out because of my hair, because of what I wear. They're like, oh, I've seen you on the For You page before. So that's been like one of the biggest things, actually having people recognize me and then when I go do events now, like if I play a built-in crowd with like two to 400 people or whatever, a lot of people will be like, okay, who's this guy? Like hurry up and try to impress us. But now it's like, oh my gosh, we've seen this guy before. Like the last event I did, it was like 400 kids, like middle schoolers. And when I stepped on stage, people were like, oh, that's the guy from TikTok. That's the guy from TikTok. And for me, it kind of caught me off guard because I was like, oh my gosh, man, this platform has really impacted my career on a practical level. So, yeah, man, I love what you said in terms of the career impacting you on a practical level. I mean, even from the standpoint of it sounds like it's making shows easier. Because when you think about the fact that, look, like when you don't have to introduce yourself, right, people already recognize you and you don't have to get over that hump of who is this guy. And there's somebody, even if I don't know who you are and there's other people like, yo, this person is here and you see other people shocked and happy to see you, that's going to make me more receptive to understanding like, yo, maybe this is somebody I need to get to know. So it's cool to see that you keep having these encounters because I remember seeing some of your videos as well, like our IG, like running into like fans and stuff like that. Yeah, yeah, it's cool to see the rise. Yeah, sweet man. Thank you. So tell me about the money. Let's get to that part, right? I think you were on for how long before you made money? So I think once you hit like your first thousand followers, that's when you can actually go live and monetize. So before I really made anything, I think it was like a month or something like that. So it was a month of me being on before people actually was able to start like really donating. And because like the first thousand followers, they're not really going to donate that much, you know what I mean? Because there's not enough people. But once I think I hit like 20K or something like that, the donation's like picked up, you know? What is that like? What do you do to get donations? So what I try to do is I try not to monetize like right away. I try to do things that are organic and stuff like that to make people want to give, but I'll go live. And I'll like basically start talking on live and just start like telling my story or one of the most impactful things that I've seen is when I start playing my music like live in a studio or if I'm making music and I set up my phone and go live. And I just start freestyling or something like that. Like people love those kind of videos when they get to see you in action and recording where they get to see you actually rapping live and they get to see it. They get to see it like for themselves and it's like happening in real time, you know, so that's what make people want to donate to whether you like dance or you talk or even if I'm down like motivational like, yo, man, let me tell you my story and encourage people and ask me questions. And then or sometimes I'll put it in the caption like send gifts, you know, like when you go live, you can kind of put the title of the video and I'll do like a quotation, saying gifts or something like that. And then people just start donating these little coins and then the coins translate to actual money. Man, I mean, the beauty of what you just said, right? That's so much we can unpack from that. But just the behind the scenes part and you're getting paid to show people behind the scenes of your music. Yeah, we already talk about that from a branding standpoint and what that can do. But in the same way, we might say, hey, you need to get some subscribers and an email list and all these things so that you can monetize and show this package or do a Patreon or any of these things. You are essentially able to do that by just going live, right? And once you go live, you're telling me that they're interested and appreciate you being in the studio and just doing that stuff enough that they're they're donated. So that's that's cool, bro. What was that even like when you first realized that went through that? So the cool thing it was like seeing that people start donating and one of the most exciting things for me is like when people donate like some of the biggest prizes. So some of the biggest prizes goes up. So whenever people donate like the you are rich or something like that, you are very rich. I think it's like $20 or something like that or $10. And I've seen that before. I thought that was just like a weird spammer saying something like that in the comments. Yeah. And it's like when they donate like big prizes and then it does cool stuff like you can donate concert and you've got the little things like panda and different little small like little packages they can donate. But once they donate like the big ones, it does something cool on the screen. So like if they do concert, there's these little characters that roll across the screen with the tires and start playing. And then a whole screen start lighting up and it makes you feel kind of like, whoa, this is pretty dope, you know? So it's like the feeling, man, because it's like me being a full time artist, man, like year after year, it's like I have to sell merch. I have to do shows and the pressure is on, you know what I mean? So like anytime I can get any extra donation, like it makes me feel really like encouraged, like, OK, this is working because it's scary. You know what I mean? When you step out and you got bills to pay, especially me having a family, like it's like, OK, I have to make sure I'm being strategic and meeting my deadline of X amount of dollars I need to make. So TikTok is starting to finally convert into like, OK, if I need to make X amount of dollars per month to pay rent or whatever, like it goes towards it, you know what I mean? It's like big chunks that I can actually put towards it that I don't have to go out and do somewhere else. Like, you know what I mean? Like driving Uber or something like that, like it helps I can stay at my house and like do what I love to do, you know? Dope, man, especially when you think about it as with that replacement of income where you were talking about extra money on the side and stuff like that, I hadn't even thought about it like that yet. But the first check back when you sent me, right? Money, right, or showing me like how much you had made was $50. Right. What was what was it like when you when you see people are paying? Right, because this is interesting. It sounds very similar to Twitch and how the things pop up. I haven't even experienced that part because I don't get on people's lives just yet. I haven't had the time. But did you feel like you had to do anything super extra? Like, were you nervous when it came to asking for donations? Initially, what was that? What did I feel like? I was nervous at first because I realized that some people actually have money like saved up on their account just to like give to some people that they want to support, especially when I start telling a story of like why I do what I do. Like when I start telling people my story, hey, you know, I stay at home with my son and like, you know, I dived head first into music. And this is what I do. This is how I pay the bills. Like and I don't ask for anything. I'm just like telling my story. Like this is this is how long I've been doing it. People want to feel like they're supporting you. So like I have one person who consistently donates, like, you know, like one of my followers Madeline, like she always jumps on my life and she's just like, donate, donate, donate, donate, donate. And there's like all these coins. And I'm like, man, why do you donate so much? And she's just like, I really believe in what you do. And I just want to be like, I'm glad I get to be a part of it by donating. She's from Sweden. She literally lives in Sweden. You know what I mean? You got a super fan, a legit super fan. Yeah. And the thing is like, once you make that connection with the people, they feel inclined to donate. And the crazy thing is like it is coins. So when people donate coins, it can be like five dollars. And then because TikTok take half, it can go down the two. So when you see people donating a lot and then they do those big donations, that's when they start converting. Like, like I think I got on live a couple more times and hit like seventy five dollars. And it like jumped up from fifty to like seventy five just by going live, like another once or twice. And then one of the best things is like when I get a video that really starts trending like my video that hit a million and one point seven million views. My followers literally just started going crazy, right? That's when I went from fifty thousand followers to a hundred thousand. They literally just one viral video. And then I went on live and I literally had a hundred and sixty people at a time jumping on and off. And then when I finished up the live video, it was like they said it was fifty four hundred people in that live. It was over five thousand people total and me being alive in a span of like three hours. And I was just like, this is crazy. So I think the more that like you get like a video that's gone viral. And once you see it going viral, you jump on live. And then people just start donating because you have so many more people in front of you. And once you start telling your story, that's when it just, you know. Interesting, man. And I think it's important to know I've said this in one of my first TikTok tutorial videos, but yeah, TikTok does take half, right? It's fifty percent. But I don't know. I want to get your opinion as the artist, because I know so many people when it comes to so many things that people do in the industry, whether it's a manager or whatever company, the percentage, the percentage of giving, you know, splitting that percentage with anybody you want to own everything. What is your perception of this? So you think about this the same or is this more? It's like, yo, this is dope that I can even make this. Yeah, because one of the biggest things is like, I know I wouldn't be making that money either way. Like if it wasn't for TikTok providing a platform, it's like like a lot of times, yeah, half of it seems like a big cut. But when you think about I wouldn't be making this either way. That's when it gets better, you know what I mean? So it's like, yeah, I can make a hundred dollars from going live. And they might have took a hundred from that. But that's another hundred dollars that I get to make just from sitting in my house telling my story, you know? And that happened in a month's time, right? Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a huge echo where you're at right now. I'm not bad, I'm bad. I'm not bad, man. Let me move because I was trying to go somewhere quiet. But it's their rebirth. All right, can you hear me better now or is it still? I'm about to say. All right, let me see. Let me go somewhere else. My bad, I didn't have those, my air pods went out, so. Yeah, I got you. Yeah, that's better. I'll say something again. OK, check, do you hear me? Yeah, it's not as bad as the place you just left. It's a little bit, but not as bad. OK, you know what? Let me go outside, I'm a bad one. All right. All right, let me just step out here. All right. All right, say something. All right, what's good, do you hear me? Yeah. Let me see what we just talked about. All right, cool. So obviously, money is a real thing on this platform. There's been a lot of interesting opportunities as far as how it's actually converted over into real life. Have you gotten to a point where you've pushed it over to streams and work to do that yet? OK, that's another big thing that's really helped a lot because what I've noticed is I've heard other people that I've followed on TikTok go online and they talk about, yo, my YouTube has went up in my Spotify, but my numbers really didn't peak when I hit like 20k. Like, I still was kind of going steady. But once I started getting a couple viral videos, things started to spike on other platforms. So for instance, I finally hit the requirement to monetize on YouTube. Once I monetize on YouTube, any video I basically monetize gets a certain amount of money coming in. And then on Spotify, I get paid for the streams. So because of going live on TikTok and then getting paid from the Spotify revenue and YouTube, it all kind of comes together. So I've seen all my other social media platforms like Spike and Numbers and my monthly listeners are going up on Spotify. So because of that, I'm able to make more money from YouTube ads, Spotify checks, and then through the live videos. So you're seeing it all around. I have to say this again and again. This has been the shocker for me since all the artists that I've been working with personally on TikTok, I haven't, I've yet to see a platform that's been this transferable to other platforms. It's like, you don't even have to work to bring people on other platforms and they'll go, let alone anything you do on top of that intentionally. So that's your experience? Yeah, it's pretty wild, man. Like, and like I said before, like coming from an artist who literally sent, you know, started rapping at age nine and then started really like touring professionally like five years ago, playing like massive like festivals, you know, featuring with headlining artists, you know, in front of 10,000 people, 20,000, 30,000 people. I've seen a lot of different things in the industry, a lot of groundwork and really trying to get like, whenever I get at it, like I played this event called Winter Jump and it was 10,000 people this year in Michigan. And like it's so hard because when I played it, it wasn't my set. So people wasn't there to see me. I featured on the headlining set. 10,000 people, but then they shouted me out and everything, but then I had to go on Instagram. I had to go through all the hashtags of hashtag Winter Jump and I had to comment on hundreds of people's posts. Hey, thanks for coming out tonight. We enjoyed you, you know, kind of like in the comments and then even that conversion. So that conversion was so low. So when I say I've been doing so much groundwork to like when I first started going out to schools or malls and past the CDs out, it's like I've never really seen anything convert as quick as like the TikTok is, you know what I mean? And it's like, I feel like it's a perfect platform right now why so early where if artists already have a catalog and they've already been doing a, you know what I mean? If they've already been doing a groundwork, this is just something to kind of help expose and elevate that to where like, it'll just help expose that versus like, cause for a minute I was kind of jaded like, man, I've been doing music all my life. Now this little app come on and it's like giving me everything that I wish I had. And I'm saying like 13 year olds, 14 year olds literally make a boom in music career out of this. And I'm like, I've been doing this all my life. But I'm like, you know what though, if I didn't have the catalog, if I didn't have all the tour vlogs on YouTube, if I didn't have all of the experience, now when I get booked to go do a show, TikTok goes hand in hand with all of the work I've been doing for like five plus years. You know, it kind of ties in together, you know? Yo man, that's, I really appreciate that perspective. I think that's gonna put things in perspective for a lot of artists in general cause that's, it's, it's real. You were prepared to take advantage of the opportunity. Yes, there are some other people who are blowing up, but the way you'll be able to flip it is different than a kid who just started popping off of that alone and didn't have any of that other stuff established, right? They have to go another way to continue to capitalize where all your infrastructure is now just elevating that once you have a whole tide that's rising. You know what I mean? That's so true. And that's the way I try to look at it, you know? Is there anything else, right? Just in this talk where since last time we've spoken where there's just been like something real interesting that's happened with the platform or something interesting you've noticed, right? As far as how to continue to be successful on a platform or I'll even leave it at this, right? Now that you're on another level, right? You've climbed some part of the mountain. Can you see something from up where you are that you didn't even understand at the beginning? Yeah, so one of the big things is like, like really instead of trying to, like you have to follow trends in a way but the thing is that set us apart is our unique story. So I did a video about, you know how I was born in the street wars of Detroit and like how my mom was a teenager when she had me and I was like my raw and honest self and like how I lost my dad at four. And then I talked about this is why I do music and why it's so impactful. And I did all that in the 15 second video and that video hit almost 2 million views. And when I realized that like, man if I keep telling my story, which sets me apart from all these other guys that's trying to blow up on here, all these other people that's trying to go viral the only thing that sets me apart is my unique story. So like that's like been a big thing. And I think the more followers you have the easier it is to grow. So like when I was at 1,000 followers if I got a video that hit 600 views if I got a video that hit 600 views I was like, oh man, this is awesome. But now I'm like man, I'm like, I'm trying to hit 10K minimum for each video I post. So it's like knowing that the more you grow, the faster you're gonna start growing. It's like you start projecting faster. So it might be hard. I see a lot of people getting on there and then they get on there for a week and they don't go viral and they get discouraged. Like you gotta be on there. It took me 300 and something videos to finally figure it out. But I've seen, I've helped other people get on there and they post one video, boom, instant fame like overnight. And that didn't happen with me. I don't feel like, I don't feel like I've been lucky ever in my life. So like that encouraged me to know that my process is the work until I make it process. And if people stay consistent and figure out what works like, you know what I mean? Like basically putting out as much content as you can and then you see what works. You know what I mean? And then whatever works you like double down on that. And that's been like what I've learned. Like the videos where I'm showing people Detroit, like I'll be like in Detroit. Yo, like I'm walking up to this abandoned house. This is what it looks like. And then people like, oh my gosh, like, thanks for taking us there, you know what I mean? Wow. Yeah, man. That's dope. And that perspective is humbling and it's dope to hear you say that and speak that way because there are a lot of people who don't blow up fast enough in their minds. And look, and a lot of people will say they don't wanna post five videos a day, six videos a day. I'm not saying you have to do any kind of number, but just understand no matter what you're doing. Right? Whether it's learning to play basketball, how to hit a ball with a baseball bat, how to be good at math or blow up on TikTok or YouTube, whatever. To figure it out, the more that you do, right? The better you're gonna get at it and the more you do in the short period of time, right? Six videos a day is gonna help you learn more than one video a day is or one video a week is. That's just the reality. Let alone the possibility, right? The numbers and at best, it might take to blow up. Just literally doing it more is going to help you get better at it faster. And you gotta understand how fast do you wanna learn and get good at it because there's a window of opportunity and do you wanna take advantage of that window or not? Like that's how I see it. Yeah. And you said to Ann, like, can you hear me good? Can I hear you? Okay, yeah. And to say that too, the big thing is I don't wanna get used to all of the attention that I've been getting because I know this thing could disappear quick and it can go back to what I'm used to. So like you said, while I have the opportunity, I'm trying to capitalize off of it as much as I can. To throw in another thing, I got SuperPhone, which helps convert some of my followers to get their phone number to be able to text them. I'm trying to get them to follow me on Instagram and I'm trying to really collect and connect with them as much as I can to where they're gonna be, I'm trying to cast my net as much as I can to where if TikTok disappeared tomorrow, I've gained something from it. You know what I mean? So, because it can disappear tomorrow and like I'm trying to get prepared for that, you know what I mean? Just in case that happened. Hey, I love to hear you man, spoken like somebody who's been doing this for a minute and understands the value of the opportunity versus, you know, somebody who just started popping and they literally just started rapping yesterday. So, I see it man, I already see the grind and I appreciate the grind that you've been on for so long and thanks for doing this video again and having another talk. Y'all make sure y'all follow Trey Little. It will be in the description below. It'll be on the video itself, T-R-A-Y Little. Of course at Brain Man, Sean, as always, this video is brought to you by Brain Man Network.com. If you like this video, go ahead and like button. If you like it, you might as well share it and if you're not subscribed, you know what to do, hit that subscribe button.