This story is part of CNBC Make It’s Six-Figure Side Hustle series, where people with lucrative side hustles break down the routines and habits they’ve used to make money on top of their full-time jobs. Got a story to tell? Let us know! Email us at [email protected].
The idea behind Morgan Eckroth’s social media business is simple: Create the “warmness and comfort of a coffee shop” online.
She’s pulling it off, if her six million TikTok followers are any indication.
Eckroth launched her account, MorganDrinksCoffee, as an experiment to hone her social media marketing skills in June 2019. She never intended to make a living from it — but now, her videos recreating orders and reenacting coffee shops earn her up to $9,000 per month, according to documents reviewed by CNBC Make It.
The 24-year-old’s side hustle involves posting on TikTok, Instagram and YouTube. Her revenue comes from ads, branding deals and merchandise sales. It only takes her about eight hours per week, and it’s far more lucrative than her other time-consuming jobs, she says.
Eckroth is also a competitive barista and marketing strategist for coffee brand Onyx Labs, where she makes $45,000 per year. Last year, her total income was $141,000. But turning what you love into work can be dangerous.
“I’ve had to put boundaries in place so I don’t burn out,” she says.
Here, Eckroth details how she built her six-figure side hustle, what those boundaries look like and what you should know before trying to make money on social media.
CNBC Make It: How did you learn how to create content that would attract an audience of more than six million followers?
Eckroth: My high school experience was very shaped by being on Tumblr, so I’ve always been pretty aware of the social landscape and things that trend online.
While I was getting my degree [at Oregon State University], I always knew I wanted to go into media marketing and digital advertising. I started making TikToks as practice, and it was a very natural…
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