With 790K+ YouTube subscribers and 275K+ Instagram followers, Chloe Ting is another success story coming out of Australia when it comes to digital lifestyle content creation. Launching her YouTube just 2 years ago, Chloe has quickly made a name for herself on the platform – with her most popular video notching up an impressive 4.7 million views.
While predominantly creating fitness content for YouTube, Instagram sees more of Chloe’s enviable travel itinerary – with recent posts showcasing trips to places including Japan, Portugal, Turkey, and Italy (a far cry from her previous desk job as an actuarial analyst).
Ahead of her appearance at VidCon AU in Melbourne, we pulled Chloe aside to chat everything from what a usual day in her life looks like to where she’s taking her channels.
Are you a full-time influencer?
Yes, I’ve been doing this full-time for a few years and it’s been an amazing ride so far.
Can you talk me through a usual day in your life?
I start my mornings with a morning walk, getting through emails, or a gym session. My afternoon varies throughout the week, but it typically involves image processing or video scripting, scheduling, filming and editing. I publish 2 videos a week on Youtube and post on Instagram 5 times a week – so there’s quite a bit of work that needs to get done. I try to knock off work by dinner time, but my publish times for my content is around 9pm as that’s the best time for my audience worldwide – so I spend about an hour publishing my content and engaging with my audience.
What would you say is your work/life balance?
Honestly, I would say it’s not very balanced! It gets really hard to switch off when there’s so much to get done and it’s a constant hustle. However, whenever there’s a setback, for example weather issues that disrupt my filming plans, then I’ll take that day off to give myself some me-time. I do a bit of travel campaign work so when I’m on location, I always extend my stay for an extra day to get some rest and relaxation whenever I can.
What type of commercial work do you do?
I’m an athlete ambassador for a fitness brand, Gymshark, so I produce content for them on an ongoing basis. I also work closely with electronic brands like Panasonic and DJI as I strive to produce high quality video content – they’ve been a supportive partner to work with. I take up several travel campaigns in the year and have mostly work with tourism boards or travel organisations.
Can you talk me through your career history?
I use to work as an actuarial analyst but didn’t feel it was right for me and the work environment was a little toxic. I only had a blog then and Instagram was still new at the time. I took the plunge to try working for myself and creating content that I love and I started creating videos on YouTube after I quit my job. I also started getting into fitness then due to health issues and I guess my content has evolved along the way with me.
From your feed, it looks like you travel a lot. Is that true?
Yes, I do travel pretty often – but it’s mostly for campaign work or events.
Do you enjoy the travel?
I definitely do as I always find it fascinating to explore new places, meet new people, and get inspiration along the way.
Any part of it you don’t enjoy?
Whenever I’m traveling, I’m usually there to do a job so I won’t have time to film, edit and publish videos and I need to keep my YouTube channel going. This means if I’m gone for 2 weeks, there’s 2 weeks of video content I need filmed, edited and ready to go while I’m away – so it can get pretty stressful before I leave. Consistency is key on YouTube and it’s a constant goal to keep publishing quality content.
Does your partner usually get to come with you when you travel?
The work that I do has definitely become more than a one person job, so he does travel with me and we work on the video production together.
I feel like your feed use to be more about travel, but it seems to have shifted towards fitness. Do you feel this is true?
Fitness and health is now a big part of me and my content, so it made its way into my Instagram feed. It has evolved with me. It’s not ideal for Instagram at the moment to have two categories of content, so I just started building up a second account for fitness content to separate the two eventually.
Do you prefer creating travel content or fitness content?
I honestly enjoy creating any kind of video content from fashion to lifestyle to travel and fitness. But fitness content probably gives me a better sense of fulfillment because it’s more engaging and reaches out to a lot more people – it can actually help them in a positive way. I get direct messages from people sharing before/after photos or images of their progress, or families doing my workouts in their living rooms. It’s a different kind of satisfaction level knowing that my content’s helped and inspired others that way.
You have a super successful YouTube as well as Instagram. What do you prefer creating content for and why?
Definitely YouTube because the audience is way more engaged and brand integration work is more seamless and organic. Brands seem to give more creative control for YouTube campaigns. On Instagram, the attention span is a lot shorter and I think it’s a less sustainable platform from a business perspective.
How do you feel about the launch of IGTV?
I think it’s the right move for Instagram, but I’ll be waiting to learn more about their monetisation model for creators as there’s now so many more platforms and content formats to create, so creators need an incentive to publish their content there. It’s definitely going to make content creation more video-focused in the future.
You’re involved with the upcoming VidCon. Why is this event something you like being a part of?
I’m really excited about VidCon and last year’s event was so much fun. It’s the one event where the community gets together and you meet like-minded individuals as well as industry experts. I also get the chance to meet people that watch my channel and connect with them. There’s a lot of people to meet, lots to learn, and lots of fun to have.
Where are you hoping to develop your channels in the next few years?
I definitely need to grow a team in the next few years and start with bringing in a video editor with the end goal of publishing more content. At the moment my channel reaches a bottleneck because there’s only so much I can do to produce content and battling time constraints can affect content quality.
Chloe will be meeting fans at VidCon AU at the Melbourne Convention and Exhibition Centre from August 31-September 2. Click here for more information about the event.
All images: Chloe Ting
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Rolled pizza, where have you been all my life!