 truth about being an influencer the truth is welcome back to another video if you're new here my name is Cara do not forget to like comment and subscribe to this video so we are gonna be getting into a finance Q&A behind YouTube I know y'all are curious on what goes down when it comes to like taxes how do I budget and just stuff overall in general so I'm just gonna be answering y'all's questions and if you want to be a part of the next Q&A make sure you follow me on Instagram cuz that's where I post for y'all to ask me questions so yeah we're just gonna hop right into it cuz it's a lot so let's get into it so obviously I don't have on any makeup right now I want this video to be like real chill relax we just talking girl so I really want to do a face mask cuz I just got back from Canada and I'm breaking out a little bit on my chin so we're gonna be doing the Timmy detox mask if you watch my channel before you already know I use this all the time this is my literally my go-to clay mask it's a detox mask it has match in here a lemon grass so it basically just takes out all the impurities get all that gunk out of your pores and just making your skin look flawless and every time I use this mask I just get a flawless finish every single time my face feels so soft and smooth and my skin always looks bomb because of this mask I want to use this before we get started and tell me is sponsoring this video but I genuinely do use this mask like on a weekly basis like to do a face mask one or two times a week and like I said y'all you only need literally a thin layer then so I'm just gonna apply to my cheeks chin traveling will really have your skin going through it's crazy I feel like when people use clay mask they overdo it cuz they want more products on their face thinking the mask is gonna do more but it's really not like that less is more y'all less is more seriously and I get the best results when I do a thin layer so and also I'm going out tonight so I need a little well I'm not going out I'm going to dinner but I need I need a little you know when it's done you're gonna know because it's gonna change colors and also the blackheads are gonna come out of the mask so I'm just gonna wait a few minutes and then I'm just gonna wash this off and I just want you to see how beautiful my skin is and it doesn't take long it takes like 10 so girl I just took off the mask and my skin is so glowy and so soft and like I said y'all y'all really need this detox mask in your skincare routine so you can use it throughout the week and now I'm just gonna be applying the bite see from Timmy as well this has her biscuits and vitamin C in it so it's going to help brighten and even out my skin tone because I have dark areas around my mouth so I just like to use vitamin C on my skin to help with that and this also has hyaluronic acid so it's gonna give you that moisture your skin needs so you can look nice and glowy and hydrate it and when it comes to serums I really like to press in the products into my pores because I really want you know it to penetrate deep into my skin so it can really work this smells so good it's the skin for me like just off the mask and the vitamin C alone my skin looks so good and healthy and hydrated and just I just love it and it feels so good so you'll be able to get your own Timmy products the bite see and also the detox mask all you need to do is click the link down below and you'll be able to use my code Kyra 20 to save a 20% off on your order so y'all make sure y'all include these in your skincare routine like I said your skin is going to love you and if you're a girl who wants to really brighten up your skin and have an even out skin tone I definitely highly recommend the bike see I've been using it for a couple weeks now it's making my skin look so good so you check the description box below and do not forget to use my code Kyra 20 and thank you so much to me for sponsoring this video now that my skin is looking good we're just gonna hop right into the question and this is just a disclaimer this financial process of being a youtuber entrepreneur and everything like that when it comes to like taxes and stuff this is still a learning experience that we are going through and I mean we me and my mama we my mama helps me so much she does my taxes she why does this number keep calling me but yeah this has been a learning process and what I'm telling you that I do you necessarily do not have to do it whatsoever for your business I'm just telling y'all what I had to do like I said I'm not telling you you need to do this so I'm just letting you know now I know people have different opinions on things whatever but this is just mine so my experience so just throwing that out there okay so the first question is showing proof of income so obviously when you're trying to get an apartment or in a car you have to show proof of income to show that you can pay it so basically fine filing your taxes is basically showing your proof of income basically you show your form of the income you paid on taxes freeware is different so you know some people are starting to realize that being a youtuber is normal sometimes they may ask for additional paperwork filing your taxes is your proof of income in the form you fill it out with so a lot of people ask me how much do you set aside for taxes and it's roughly 30% y'all probably think I'm out here spending every single dollar I make no I actually set it aside for my taxes and it's normally 30% ever I make I take a 30% of that so each sponsorship every time I get paid from ads and from the links or anything like that when I get deposited that money I take a 30% of that and I put it to my savings account because your uncle Sam the IRS does not play and I'm not trying to get in trouble I'm not trying to you know get handcuffed or nothing like that so yeah I do not play when it comes to setting aside money or anything like that everything that I make they don't take taxes out I get exactly what it's agreed on say if you made like $3,000 from a sponsorship or whatever you would set aside $900 so yeah that's just how that works so 30% is what I do personally you don't have to do that but that's what I do in what my financial advisor does aka my mother am I building a retirement plan first of all of course my mom said that up being building my retirement plan since I was 20 years old you don't need to be an influencer or make all this crazy money to start a retirement plan you should definitely start a retirement plan early because you know that money can accumulate and you can retire early like good I'm good we're definitely get on that part so I do have a I have a traditional IRA also a Roth IRA somebody asked do I budget no I do not budget I'm trying though I really am not in no rush to start swiping LS I really need something my mom has helped me budget a lot y'all cuz she is in control of my all of my bank account my mom helps me keep track of like all my bills every single month LLC all that she sees all the numbers way before me I just know how much I'm making as far as like from like sponsorships and stuff but normally I don't look in my LLC because it's like out of sight out of mind so basically she'll put it like some money into my account my checking account which is like plenty of money but I normally don't spend all that money in a month but still she helps me like save cuz I'm really bad at that but I'm getting better I'm getting better so but yes she'll take my money and put it all in my LLC or in the savings account and it's basically out of sight out of mind so I don't be like oh yeah I have that amount of money I'm good I could spend whatever also it doesn't take money to make money I want to go buy something I just have to make sure it's beneficial for me and my business you know I'm saying so now that I'm older and I'm not swiping as much I like to make sure whatever I'm buying makes sense with my business and I was first making money y'all like I was like I got money I'm gonna get whatever I want but now it's just like no I want to make sure my money makes sense and also I do want to start you know investing and stuff like that how do you file your taxes I file my taxes with an accountant who e-files and my mom preps the taxes for the accountant you want to find an accountant who is very educated and knowledgeable when it comes to filing taxes for our entrepreneur or a social media content creator because there's so many different colds and like weird things you got to enter to make it make sense to the IRS on their end and somebody who can explain well too because taxes is so complicated y'all how that be my mom know what we are kind of getting ourselves into we try to prepare better than what we did in the past like the whole receipt thing and stuff like that my mama always is looking at these interviews but like Fat Joe and Steve Harvey like they had to pay so much money in taxes and they're like no it's sometimes it's the accountant because they're not explaining to you what you need to do during the tax process because they messing it up make sure you have a good account I know some people do their taxes on their own just we just don't do that if it's good for you kudos to you but we just use an account so do you pay your taxes yearly or quarterly pay estimated taxes quarterly so when I file my taxes my tax bill is either paid itself or it'll roll over if I have extra when should you start reporting income from YouTube on taxes when Google so Google pays me so Google AdSense so when they send me a 1099 sec that just means they reported to the IRS saying that they're starting to pay me so I need to go file the taxes on it and if you don't grow you're gonna be effed up so make sure you are up on the other forms Google is sending you make sure you're checking your email at what point should an influencer become a LLC um establish a LLC when you are making profit from your LLC because basically it separates the personal from business and that's just a whole situation you have to set up a whole business account from personal and it just sets you up for liabilities so it makes sense so how do you keep track of taxes I use QuickBooks and an Excel spreadsheet yeah it's getting serious we gotta break off the Excel QuickBooks will just tell you where you are where you're at with your taxes it's easier to pull up that and see what is what to make the business discussions more easier so yeah QuickBooks and an Excel spreadsheet when you do taxes from any purchase do you have to save the receipt the answer is yes I used to be so bad at this and y'all know my mom is a Virgo be like Cara you need to get it together you need to be on top of this this is just basically gonna help you write off your expenses on what you do and show for your business all my receipts are saved and I'm really good at it now cuz literally I just take my receipt I directly uploaded to my business account and it just links the transaction to the receipt it's so easy so much easier because I would use to like save my receipts and then the whole year later it'll be tax time and the receipt is fading you can barely see what is on a receipt or what is it from when saving the receipts it just helps me so I'm able to write it off from what I make so I just deduct so I don't have to pay that much back in taxes if that makes sense the receipts are so important how did you start managing your money when YouTube started paying you I really wasn't managing my money at all and like I said when that form came in that 1099 Nick my mama noticed that and she was like what is this because I told her I was like oh my god my day letting me monetize my videos I could start getting paid I think I wasn't really managing my money but what I did do I would save my sponsorship money and use that as spending money and I would use my Google AdSense for my savings like I wasn't even thinking I could do this full-time so it wasn't coming across my mind but until I see that form she was like oh no we got to get this situated because you gonna be owning the IRS you're gonna be paying all this money what is considered a tax write-off as a creator I write off anything that I use in my business to generate money I don't equal a deduction which is a expense of your business anything that y'all see me doing I may be writing that off as a deduction from my income now all the deductions are a hundred percent like everything isn't deducted you have to really sit down when I'm counting and he has to explain to you what you can and can write off so you understand so you separate the business from personal say if I make ten dollars I had an expense for five dollars so basically I would deduct five dollars from that ten and I would profit five that's just a easy that's the easiest way to put it how you write off your taxes so you don't owe so much so that's why those receipts are so important that's pretty much sums up like the taxes on what I do is I'm still learning but that's everything that we do so far I did get some like influencer questions as well the truth about being an influencer the truth is that it's not easy being an influencer it's not easy to have to find a balance between a personal life and work life because you do work from home and it could just be overwhelming because there's not anybody telling you like listen you need to get this done you got to get in the right state of mind see on all this stuff buying Mercedes going on all these trips and buying all these luxury items it's it's way more than that honestly it's way more than that it's hard work and dedication like dedication is basically what you do when you don't feel like doing it because sometimes I don't feel like filming but I have to get it done and that comes from my next question how do you stay motivated I stay motivated because y'all be like where the videos like what's going on like and after that day I love creating content I love getting the detail I love getting a good shot I don't know I just love like creating content is basically like making a movie and then at the end of day showing your personality being vulnerable with your subscribers and just showing them how you can relate to them being relatable is basically the number one like you have to be relatable you cannot feel like you just so top-notch and bougie and better than anybody know everybody goes to things and like we all go through battles in life and when you're ready to talk about I'm pretty sure somebody that's watching can relate to you and be like wow she really overcame that and I can too you know what I'm saying how I say motivated is really cuz y'all and I really genuinely like making content like I said I love looking at what I created I don't know it's just cool and this leads to my next question even though I just talked about how I like to be vulnerable how do you get past being vulnerable to people I am who I am I love to show my feelings because obviously I'm a Pisces it's just I don't care about what people think about me because I know whatever I'm expressing to y'all somebody can relate to being vulnerable doesn't bother me like at all I know who I am I love myself and if you have a problem with me being vulnerable that's on you like you should really question yourself on why you get so upset on how other people express their feelings or how other people just express themselves I love what I do I love my community of girls I love that I can talk to y'all and we can relate and we can chat it up y'all be DMing me and I love talking back to y'all I love replying to y'all in the comments nothing will stop me how do you plan a content sometimes I don't even plan content I go off what's in my head honestly or if I have like a sponsorship coming up I'll revolve around the sponsorship or also if a video just comes into mind I'll just hurry up and write it down and then go back to it just like this finance video one of my supporters left a comment and she was like hey can you talk about 401k plans and stuff like that being an influencer I was like yes bet I can do that I had like what can I make what haven't I made yet what did I make last year that I need to update y'all on and stuff like that so I really don't plan content it just comes with you know what's in front of me and then jot it down on my calendar and every girl needs a calendar to stay organized so yeah and basically I'm getting better I'm trying to get better with time management as well so yeah really don't plan content I just go with the vibes go with the flow go with the vibes so manager versus no manager I like not having a manager sometimes but I do not have a manager obviously you have benefits when you do have a manager because they can pitch different things and talk and negotiate and stuff like that basically my mom helps me she'll negotiate and send like the invoices and stuff and then I'll just overlook it cuz we're both looking in the email but for right now I don't have a manager I had different discussions with different managers but it wasn't just it wasn't my vibe and we go our vibes I'm developing relationships with brands as well so I really like that in general because they really like my content and that's why when I make content I just really want to make sure it's good cuz I don't have a manager and I want these brands to keep coming back and wanted to work with me so yeah I just make sure that when I do shoot their content I'm making it make sense when I do sponsorships and stuff I make sure it makes sense to what I'm doing in real time I don't like to do like the whole commercial break thing I don't like that it's not authentic or organic to me I don't like that at all I'm doing good on my own my mom like I said my mom helps me she doesn't get any income but she can get whatever she's access to all my accounts she can take whatever so we're we're good over here but if I do happen to go get an agency or management or whatever I wouldn't if it's my vibe I would definitely be like yes let's do this I don't know if I'm gonna be used to like somebody else telling me what to do like you need to do this you need to do this cuz my mama already be like okay this is do this is do this is do so we need we need to get a step in it okay and I was like oh my god please Lord please I'm grateful to have a mom to be able to help me you know like a good manager or agency I would definitely hop on it and you know get into it because it's not easy juggling all these sponsorships or talking to them negotiating and stuff like that so yeah what is your ultimate goal as an influencer obviously I want something up my own and that's just gonna come I don't really want to man I manifested of course and I manifested to God I really can't say any specific goals because I don't want to express that to y'all on camera just know whatever it is I'm going to to put my all into it to make sure it's the best thing the world has ever seen I just want to be the best influencer that I can be and taking it as far as the universe allows me to I just want to present to y'all something so good that y'all appreciate as well and this influencer journey is very unique it's not for everybody but if you put that work in if you really want to do this you will do you will be able to do this you'll make be able to make it a full income turn it into something more and it's just gonna blossom into something so beautiful so I just cannot wait to that moment of when I feel like it paid off I hope that answered all of your questions thank you so much for tuning in like always I love y'all so much and don't forget to shop at your Timmy products y'all all the links will be linked down below and don't forget you can use my code Cara 20 to save 20% off and yeah that's the end of this video I love y'all so much and I'll see y'all next one