Dog Instagram… You Actually Make Money On That?

Have you ever been told that it’s “rude to talk about money”? I know I have! And I’m not usually one to be rude, but I feel compelled to share this information to help contribute to the conversation around influencer marketing and paid brand collaborations. When I decided to start monetizing my account and earn money as a social media influencer in 2021, I knew absolutely nothing and felt totally lost. I learned a lot along the way, and I’m hoping that by sharing some of my learnings, I can make things easier for others who are in the early stages of their Instagram side hustle. So I hope you don’t mind, but I’m about to get super rude and talk all about MONEY – how much of it I earned as a content creator in 2021, and how I made it happen.

I’m Victoria – dog mom and social media manager for @justbeingfarley. In last week’s post, I talked about my top 3 mindset tips that I believe have contributed to my success on social media. I received a lot of great feedback on that post, and I’m really happy to hear that the topic resonated with so many of you! I ended up expanding even further on this topic during an Instagram Live with my friend Kristen from @apollothelilaussie, you can catch the replay of our discussion here if you’re interested in learning more about that topic.

When talking about Instagram growth, the conversation almost always turns toward monetization. And it makes sense, influencer marketing has become a profitable side-hustle or even full-time job for many people, myself included! I feel like a lot of people are curious about how it works and how to get into it themselves, so I’m going to share my experience and advice here!

For the purpose of this blog post I’m going to break this down into two main topics: how much money I earned as a part-time social media pet influencer in 2021, and my advice to others who are looking to get started with monetizing their social media accounts.

My 2021 Earnings as a Part-Time Instagram Pet Influencer

OK, let’s start by getting right to the juicy stuff, the numbers!! For reference, 2021 was my first year monetizing my social media following. I do this work in my spare time, while working full-time as an engineer. My main social media platform during 2021 was Instagram, and my follower count ranged from 50k at the beginning of the year to 80k at the end of the year. I should also mention that as a Canadian resident, the various incentives that come directly from Instagram (such as lives and reels bonuses) have not been made available to me. My total income for 2021 as a part-time social media pet influencer was just over $17k CAD. The chart below shows how my social media income varied month-to-month throughout the year.

The next natural question that normally follows this is… how?? If I’m not paid directly by Instagram, how exactly did I use my social media following to make an income?? I did this in 3 main ways – sponsored posts, content creation, and affiliate marketing. The chart below shows a breakdown of my income across those 3 categories, and I will describe each in more detail below.

As you can probably tell, partnering with brands is huge for me, and helps support the time and energy I spend maintaining my social media accounts!! But finding brand partners that are a good fit, and are willing to invest in your work, takes time. If you’ve read this far, and you’re wondering how to start finding brand partnerships to earn money from your social media following, keep reading because this next section is for you!!

My Top 5 Tips On Getting Started With Brand Partnerships

1. Include an Email Address in your Instagram Bio

Wow, groundbreaking advice right?? This may seem like an obvious tip, but stick with me here… I’m not just talking about having an email address connected to that “contact” button on your Instagram profile. Believe it or not, when someone is viewing your profile from a computer, that “contact” button isn’t visible. Check out the images below to see what my Instagram profile looks like on mobile versus desktop. If you add your email address directly into your bio, that makes it super easy for anyone (potential brand partners?), to contact you whether they are on mobile or desktop.

IG profile viewed from phone

IG profile viewed from computer

2. Build a Media Kit

A media kit is like a resume for content creators. It provides a quick and easy visual overview of who you are and what you do. It’s a good idea to include a media kit when pitching yourself to potential brand partners, so they have a quick visual that they can easily refer to. Think about from the perspective of the person working for that brand. They may receive hundreds of requests from social media influencers every month looking to work with them. That person may not have the time to click through to each social media account and search around to find their best and most relevant work. By providing a media kit in your pitch, you are putting your best foot forward and making that person’s job easier, and in turn making it easier for them to say “yes” to working with you.

The main things that should be included in a good media kit are:

• Your name and contact information
• A brief description of your account
• Links to your social media accounts
• Audience demographics
• Examples of previous work

I have found that the easiest way to get started with a media kit is to use a pre-built template from Canva (affiliate link). Canva is free to use, however some pro features require a paid subscription. Using a Canva media kit template you can replace the images, change the colours to match your branding, and tons of other customizations to make it look all your own.

3. Figure Out Your Rates

Setting your rates for brand partnerships as a social media influencer is the hardest part, because there is no standard for this stuff! Many people who are starting out believe that rates are directly proportional to follower count, but there is so much more to it than that. Factors such as a creator’s skill level, experience, content type, engagement rate, content usage and licensing, industry, company size and so much more can factor into pricing.

I always recommend this amazing blog post from Through The Lyns as a starting point for setting rates for paid brand partnerships on Instagram. She even includes a super easy rate calculator that you can download for free!! This helps provide you with a rough idea on what rates you should be charging, and then you can adjust from there. For example, if brands are consistently saying “yes” to working with you at your current rates and you are becoming too busy to keep up with it all, then that’s a good sign that it’s time to increase your rates. And vice versa.

4. Join Influencer Platforms

A great way to find brand partners to work with is through influencer platforms. These platforms allow you to create a profile, connect your social media accounts, browse available campaigns, and apply for partnership opportunities. These platforms are especially good for influencers who are just starting out, working on building their portfolios, unsure how to pitch directly to brands, or even experienced influencers who are looking for new opportunities that they wouldn’t have considered on their own.

A few of my favourite influencer platforms are linked below:

• Hashtag Paid
• Aspire
• Activate
• Mavrck
• The Shelf
• Sway
• Fohr
• Creator.co
• Pupfluence

5. Talk to your Peers

I cannot emphasize this one enough!! When it comes to being a social media influencer, your peers are going to be your biggest source of support, knowledge, and inspiration. Being active within the dog Instagram community and forming genuine relationships with my peers has given me so much insight into how this all works, and has made my experience on social media a lot more fun too!!

A few ways you can start to do this:

• Follow and engage with other accounts in your niche
• Join group chats with your peers
• Join Facebook for groups related to your niche (Working Dog Momma is a great one for dog influencers)

If you’re still here, thanks for reading this post all the way through!! I hope you learned something new from this blog post – whether it’s just gaining a better understanding of how social media influencers like me make money, or some new ideas on how you can monetize your own social media accounts! I love feedback and questions, so please if you learned something from this post or have further questions about certain topics, let me know!!