Ask any child these days what they want to be when they grow up, and you’ll get a good proportion talking about being a YouTuber or an influencer.
It’s easy to dismiss those with huge social media followings as ‘talentless’, but many of them work incredibly hard to build successful brands based around themselves in a saturated market. And some of them earn more in a day than you or I do in a year. The biggest of them all – gaming YouTuber Mr Beast – earned $54m last year and has 155m Youtube subscribers.
Here in Northamptonshire we’ve got our own crop of talented influencers on TikTok, Instagram and Facebook who have enjoyed huge success after managing to break through the noise and become famous in their own right.
Here are some of those who’ve managed to find fame on socials.
1. Leonie Holland
Leonie Holland's gorgeous mid-size fashion and lifestyle content is totally relatable. She has an insta channel with more than 14k followers and lots of her images is shot in and around Kettering, where she lives with her family. She's a photographer by day. Photo: Leonie Holland / Instagram
2. Toby Randall
Toby Randall from Northampton first started recording covers in his room when he was 14. After being flown stateside by NBC to perform on a hit show, his performance of John Legends 'All of Me' was watched by more than 11 million. His talent was spotted by Rihanna and he signed a worldwide record deal with Jay-Z’s label Roc-Nation. He has 5.3m TikTok likes and a huge 1.22m YouTube subscribers. Photo: Toby Randall / Chronicle and Echo
3. Emily Canham
Former Southfield School pupil Emily Canham, from Kettering, started her YouTube channel back in 2012 detailing her daily life, times and outfits. She was an early adopter of Instagram and has amassed 675k followers who watch her glamorous, jet-setting lifestyle. She has 1.35m YouTube subscribers, 968k TikTok followers and a clutch of brand deals. She's dating James Bourne from Busted. Photo: Emily Canham
4. Dan TDM
A YouTube behemoth, Daniel Middleton worked in Welingborough Tesco before he turned his hand to making gaming videos. While perhaps most famous for his Minecraft playalong videos, he's also made videos for most other computer games you can think of. He still lives in Wellingborough and has a gobsmacking 27m YouTube subscribers as well as 3.5k TikTok followers. Photo: Dan Middleton