Amouranth: How This OnlyFans Model Built A $40 Million Business Empire
I think you've made something like— is this— do I have this number right? $30 million through like OnlyFans and like your other kind of platforms where people subscribe to you?
What is the— do you have like a total number that's even more impressive?
All right, what's up? We just had, um, Kate, also known as Amouranth, on the podcast. She is, I think, the number one creator on OnlyFans. She has made over $30 million on OnlyFans into like 2 years. So it's kind of insane what she's done, building up a following and then turning that into like— I don't know, she's probably one of the top earners on social media, period. And most people don't know about her or ever heard of her. So I thought that was pretty, pretty cool. Uh, Sam, what'd you think?
Did any of the stats that she said surprise you or shock you?
Well, I heard the money part out, like, before this, which is why I was, like, interested. She reached out to us to be like, hey, can I come on the pod? And, uh, and so, you know, I was down for it for that. But that's the most shocking number. Uh, the other part that was shocking was just that she was pretty nonchalant about it.
I was pretty surprised at how sophisticated her empire is. You know, she talks about how she's now offering the serv— she basically built this media empire and now she's offering it as an agency to other women., and she kind of dismissed it as like, yeah, it's just this small thing. And I have a feeling it's significantly bigger than she kind of like the energy that she was giving out. And I find that to be incredibly fascinating.
Yeah, I think she's kind of a killer in terms of like how she's like, how she's done it, right? How she built her brand. I mean, she's basically like, okay, Kim Kardashian built like a mega brand kind of doing this stuff and like, you know, has turned it into a TV show and all kinds of other things. But like in the social media world, she's kind of like on that level, right? She's like pretty A-list in the world of social media in terms of how many social media people can pull in tens of millions of dollars a year. There's very, very few.
With like a 5-person staff.
With like, yeah, with like, you know, a small team behind them and not even in a category where you're getting like, you know, mainstream brand deals from like whoever, you know, like Coca-Cola or whatever.
Yeah, it was, it was really fascinating. So hope you guys enjoy it.
Hi, Caitlin.
Hello. Welcome. Welcome to the show. Um, you are one of the most interesting potential guests that I've wanted on the show. We've had people who've made money in different ways. We've had poker players, we've had business people, we've had athletes, we've had comedians, but we've never had somebody who is a sort of like a social media entertainer slash OnlyFans star. And the hook, I would say, for people who want to be interested in this episode is, uh, I think you've made something like— is this— do I have this number right? $30 million through like OnlyFans and like your other kind of platforms where people subscribe to you?
What is the— do you have like a total number that's even more impressive?
Oh God, I haven't really looked in a while.
But maybe like 40 million or something like that.
Um, potentially. Well, find out. OnlyFans is like way more lucrative than every other platform because even the OnlyFans competitors are either like too new or in Patreon's case like driving away the girls.
Um, I was for a while. I'm not really sure what it is right now. I haven't looked since I was. I just put it like, oh, I'm gonna put that on my Linktree that I could just I stopped looking at it. But maybe. It's been growing a lot lately.
What's customer churn like? Will they stay for— do you measure churn by years or months?
I think just by month. We don't really look at the whole year because people's lives, you know, some people get girlfriends, some people will just like not have a job anymore. So it's hard to do like a year because hardly anyone stays on for a year, a very small percentage.
And one of the things that's cool about you is, A, you're open about, uh, the business side of things, which is cool. You don't have to be. You chose to be. So I'm curious, uh, why do you— why do you— why did you decide, all right, I'm gonna be able to— I'm gonna share this? Because I think it brings a lot of attention, good and bad. Probably bring some haters out there who are outraged that somebody's making over a million dollars a month on OnlyFans. Uh, why'd you decide to go public with your, your income and your earnings?
Well, it's going to sound kind of weird, I guess, to most people because I didn't do it for like pride or anything like that. It's, it's really because my Instagram that had like 5 million followers, over that a little bit, got banned from mass reports. And I needed a way for people to still write about me because that was my biggest reach. And so everything else was not nearly as much reach. So I just started writing about the business stuff, knowing that people would write about it if it comes from a pretty girl talking about business. Suddenly, oh, she's a genius. But if it's a guy saying the same thing, no one would care.
So that's true.
Okay.
I like that. That's a, uh, that's, I think, a fair call out. So you basically published that and then other people started like news outlets and stuff started reaggregating the story and then that drove new subscribers basically. So it was like, it was a growth channel for you.
Yeah. It was like, you know, a new form of earned media.
Wow. Uh, okay. That's great. And so I have a bunch of questions, Sam. I want you to jump in before I just sort of, uh,, you know, go down my, my list of like things I've probably wanted to ask you. Cause I've seen you, I worked at Twitch. My company got acquired by Twitch. I was at Twitch and I was like, all right, so who's, who's killing it? Who's doing great? And you were always at the top of the list and nobody inside the company would really like talk about it that much. Whereas they give like, you know, they get really excited about certain things because it's like really good feel-good stories or, um, you know, it's a game that they play that they're really excited about. And I was like, well, what about her? She's doing great.
Like, what is this over here?
I'm doing great.
But do, do, And how do you like to be— do you like— your name, do you like being— how do you pronounce it? I don't even know. I read it, but I've never heard you say it.
Amaranth.
And that's how you like— in this setting, that's how you like to be addressed?
You can just call me Kate.
Or addressed as? Kate is fine. Kate, okay. Much easier. Yeah, I didn't know what you preferred. So when you are going to these like meetings, because I imagine like at YouTube and Twitch and all these places, I imagine they have an account manager or something that like courts you and says, hey Kate, you you know, we love what you're doing. Do you want to come to the office if you happen to be in town and we can like tell you some best practices? I mean, that's what they do for like a Casey Neistat or whoever on YouTube when they do things like that for you. Or first of all, do they even do that? But if they do and you go to the office, is that like a— are these like people, these corporate people, like comfortable having conversations about this type of shit? I mean, that's just like it because it's just like a— it's such a unique— I don't know, it's just like unique. I don't often talk to people who are making a living this way.
Oh man, I don't get any of that. So nobody's Wait, really? To the office?
No. Really?
How many? Do you know the owner of OnlyFans is a big fan of the podcast? And so he's going to listen to this. And so maybe, maybe he can invite you to the office and start giving you the white glove treatment that like probably a Twitch or a YouTube or whoever is maybe a little more hesitant to do.
Yeah, maybe.
Like 6 million.
And they don't like reach out to you and be like, hey, we just want to say thank you for like being part of our platform. Like here's a t-shirt or like, like you don't get anything like, hey, please make this, please make your skirt 2 inches longer to comply with the latest, uh, terms and conditions.
That would be nice. Really, they just ban people and they don't tell you why, so you don't know what to change. They'll just suspend you.
Sam doesn't watch Twitch, so let me just describe this. You're kind of like an innovator on Twitch, and I say that laughingly because like it's Twitch and like let's not take it all too seriously. But like, uh, there's this trend where, um, I think they call it hot tub streaming basically, where it's like, yeah, I saw that. It's like, what's an excuse to kind of like wear like a bikini and be on stream, which is like, you know, going to get you a bunch of viewers and like subscriptions on Twitch, but also in your case, like get you a bunch of people who want to go down the funnel and go to your, maybe your OnlyFans or whatever. And I don't know if you were the first. Were you like kind of the first to start doing that or did you just like make it more popular?
Well, it's complicated because I started doing pool streams outside, you know, like a year or two before that. And then, um, then girls started doing hot tub blow-up, like inflatable hot tubs. I think I was the first one to bring it inside my room, and I really popularized that one.
And then there's like this like outrage, and people are like, you got to shut this down. And it's usually like people on the platform who feel like, oh, it's taking away views from me, uh, which I think is kind of silly because it's like, those people weren't, weren't going to watch you, uh, you know, like it's not like, right, you know, people come to get the type of entertainment they want, and they may not want to watch you, uh, you know, in your basement playing like, you know, Dragon Ball Z or whatever. So it's like, it's a different— it's a different thing. But there is this like, um, outrage around it. What, what do you, uh, I guess like, do you respond to that, or how do you, how do you think about that?
Uh, you know, I think it's just people being like jealous of others having success, and it's just placing blame on them instead of looking inward and being like, what could I improve to make my stream more appealing to people? And so they just want to point fingers like, you're why I'm not successful, when really We're— if we're not taking away views from gamers, certainly not. If anything, we're taking away views from Pornhub, but that's about it.
And how big of a— how big of a game changer was OnlyFans for you? So I'm looking at your OnlyFans. I think you started— I think you posted— you started April 2020, so only 2 years ago. And the first month you did $74,000 in— on OnlyFans. Then you did $31,000, $16,000, $6,000, something like that. So you started off with a big spike because you get a bunch of people to come over, and then, you know,, but you did really well right off the bat. A, were you expecting that? And B, had you like kind of already made it? Was that like not that big of a deal compared to what you were already doing at Twitch, or was that a game changer?
I think it was probably somewhere in the middle. It was kind of what I expected just because like that's, you know, how platforms happen. I already had Patreon before, which was similar, but Patreon was kind of pissing people off and changing what they allowed on their platform. So OnlyFans was like becoming the Patreon replacement. For a lot of people. So I just kind of like acquired that as well. I didn't jump ship because I still have my Patreon. So I just have both now and I even have a Fansly. But it wasn't really like that shocking, I guess, at first because I was already seeing those kinds of numbers on Patreon and a pretty decent amount on Twitch at that time.
What were— how big is your team? Or is it just you?
I mean, no.
How do you—
I have an entire staff of mixture of like personal assistants, video editors, photographers, et cetera. So right now in the office, I have like 5 main people. And then I also have my extended staff that I kind of bounce back and forth between here and the office 'cause they work also with me on Real Work, my agency for like OF creators and fans, et cetera. Like different girls and guys, there's some guys on there too. So yeah, I have like an extended staff and I have like my immediate at my house is usually 4 to 5 people always.
Do you consider yourself like the CEO of the business or do you have like a straight person, like a, like a by-the-book person who's like making sure everything's running on time, or are you that person?
Um, I guess I'm, I could technically be called the CEO, but I don't manage it as much day to day as like my, uh, my head staff that I have, my managing directors for it.
And we, uh, so we got to know MrBeast recently. We went to, we like had an event and, uh, like a kind of like a basketball camp or whatever. He came and, and we had him on the pod and he's obviously a super impressive guy and he gets this like kind of amazing coverage in the news. Everything is like MrBeast and he's a good dude, but like the coverage is like pretty much exclusively good. Obviously there's some haters, you know, always, but like people think he's amazing. Business people really respect him for his like business acumen. And he's, you know, seen as one of the biggest content creators. But, um, I would say you're like, your franchise is right up there with him. If you just took, if you just took the sort of like the face off the business, if I just showed you the P&L of both businesses, I think you would be like, well, I want her P&L, right? Because you're making almost as much money with way less expenses, with way less staff and overhead, probably with more valuable customers, more loyal customers. And, um, and then on top of that, you're like, the moves you're making off your streams or off your, off your platforms where you've got the agency, um, and then you've got the, you know, all your investments and stuff like that. It's just like what he's doing with his agency and his investments and all that. But I feel like you don't get that same coverage, or if you do, it's like, could you believe this? Uh, you know, she's doing, she's doing like, you know, real business things. Like, how does, uh, I guess, like, do you agree with my assessment there, and how do you feel about that?
Um, yeah, I guess the main difference is the platform that I'm doing it on, because, uh, you know, OF is already gonna have like a bias behind it. People don't want to admit that they pay attention to it, even if they do. And then Twitch also is a smaller, much smaller platform than YouTube, so it just doesn't have the same amount of reach. Even if it's like the same model and the same like type of stuff, it just doesn't reach nearly as many people as like his YouTube channel would.
How big do you think this gets? So like, I don't know what you're doing annually now, but maybe it's like, I don't know, $15 million or something like that. How big do you think that this can get? And how big do you want it to get?
I don't know, because if I can successfully grow Real Work, we like, you know, manage other girls' accounts, it can potentially grow like a huge network. And that's kind of like in my extended empire. But me by myself, I don't know. I never even thought I'd get you this far. So it kind of just happens really quickly, especially once pandemic started and everyone was just online all the time.
So I'm not really sure. When you're laying in bed at night and you're like, I mean, when I go to bed at night, I'm like, man, like that was, I had a good day, whatever. It's really inspiring. I dream of, I think I could do this. I think I could like do this one thing that's like crazy. And I just think like, well, in 10 years, maybe this little thing could be this, this, and this. What do you imagine? Like, what's your dream? Even if it's outlandish to say sometimes, or maybe it's not, I don't know. But like, what's your dream on where you want to take your career?
Well, hopefully, uh, the dream would be to not grind as much for the next, like, year to 3 years and just, uh, kind of stream part-time, like a few days a week maybe. And then, uh, just have my empire for Real Work have grown so much. Maybe we have like 50 to 100 OF creators that we just kind of provide virtual assistants for. And then I, my legacy kind of lives on through that. And then I don't feel like I have to grind every day and can just work with animals on stream a few days a week. It's really fun.
And explain what Real Work is. So this is like an agency you started. It's not, from what I understand, it's not a talent agency. It's like a, uh, we can, like the system you built with your back office, with your assistants and those people, you offer that as a service basically to other OnlyFans creators who don't have that back office. But like, I guess describe it in your words.
Yeah, I guess it would be like virtual assistants, like, like a team put together that other creators can have access to where they'll help like edit your content, post your content, market it, like write up descriptions and push sales on your platforms and stuff. And then occasionally, like I do events where I have girls from the agency come over and we stream together, we collab, et cetera. So it's kind of like helping others grow and then managing that growth to provide like more efficient sales across their platforms.
Let's say that like I couldn't afford to hire your team and I just said, but is there like just like a handful of bullet points that you could tell me on how to have a successful page like you do? Like what are the, what are the like 1, 5, 10 bullet points that you would say, well, do this, do this, do this, do this, do this?
Well, I think if you want to grow, you really do need help, whether that's just like your friends, maybe if you have like a really cool sibling family, someone close enough to you where they can physically come over and help you with shoots, help you get your content out there, like edited, posted, etc. Because if you want to grow, you also have to be putting out, um, like content on public, non-shadowbanned platforms like Twitter, YouTube. TikTok is huge right now. TikTok is really easy to grow on compared to the other ones right now. Twitch actually isn't that great for growth unless you have other platforms already. I would Save Twitch for last if you're even contemplating it, 'cause it has no discovery system that makes any sense. It's all just recommended. And what gets recommended? People who already have viewers. How do you get viewers? You have to have an audience from somewhere. So Twitch is actually like the least, I would say, lucrative for new people. Time will be better spent on like YouTube Shorts, Instagram Reels, TikToks, and you kind of just share that content with all three of them and make it very efficient, but just kind of grow your audience from there. If that makes sense.
What do you, um, for the agency, uh, what do you charge? How do you, how do you charge money for it? And, uh, like how many clients do you have right now?
What's the benchmark? But what's the benchmark of what you think they should earn? Should they be earning $100 grand a month, a million? I mean, what, what do you—
It really just depends. We don't really have a benchmark right now. We kind of just look at their socials, look at like how much reach they have relative to how many people have already converted to their platforms to see if like, okay, well we can work with that. There's some potential here. If it's a really bad conversion, maybe, maybe not, you know, but if it's like, it's relative to how big they are already.
Here's a dangerous question, but I am curious. What works for conversion? Like we talk in the startup world about growth hacks all the time. It's like, oh, did you know that when Airbnb started, they didn't have any listings, so they scraped Craigslist local house listings, they made them all on Airbnb, and they messaged people on Craigslist saying, hey, I saw your listing on Airbnb, uh, can I book through there? And it was just a robot sending it, and then that caught people to put their listing up. So startups have these like classic growth hacks, things that unlocked new sales or tactics that unlock new sales. Um, on your road to making millions and millions of dollars on OnlyFans, what are the growth hacks? What are the things that work best for, for growth for you and for, for the girls that you manage?
Gosh, that's so tough because things have worked before and then algorithms change and they don't. So it's been like an evolution of what's worked.
Um, well, like I, I don't actually, like, I'm not gonna do it, so you don't actually, actually give me the functional things that work. What are the stories that are like, the story, oh, that's funny that that worked. Oh, that's cool that that worked. Uh, I want the more entertaining stories, not the boring stuff that actually, you know, works over time.
Yeah, well, what used to work, um, really well before Instagram really cracked down was, um, you could have long descriptions being like, um, spam, spam, like, uh, a word. If you saw my latest juicy content, people would be like spamming a word that was like, it's like moist or something. And then people would go read the comments like, why is everyone saying moist? What did I miss? They would go back to the caption and they would still be confused. And they would click on the profile and they would see the link in the bio, stuff like that.
That's hilarious. Yeah, that's actually—
that's pretty sophisticated, like, kind of like provocative words, like letter by letter, so people would be like, what is happening?
And other games, like, pattern interrupt, right? They have to— like, it's not what they're used to seeing, so then they had to go investigate to find out.
Yeah, yeah. Or other things I would do would be like, um, tell me when you see it. Or I would put like I Spy in, in the pictures, and there would be like a swipe image. On each different image, there would be like a, like, check the link in the bio for really good content. Like, just like words like on a shirt so the algorithm couldn't detect it. Like, like curved with the, with the shape of the shirt and stuff. Like, you'd have to like zoom in and stuff. And then the comments would be like, right shoulder, right shoulder, right shoulder. So people would like zoom in and it would do great. I really missed that.
That's, that's, that's, that's a really good one too. Why do you miss that? You can't do that anymore?
Well, I mean, my, my main Instagram got banned. So now I'm just— now I just play things super safe.
Yeah, yeah. And you, um, you're wearing this like, uh, OnlyFans like tube top or whatever right now. Do they give those to you to like— is that their company swag to like promote, help promote their site, or you make it?
Yeah, I think I actually bought it from the website, but I probably could have asked. I just— it was cheaper just to buy it, or faster, because time is money.
So I'm just like And what were you doing before this? Because you're clearly like smart and a hustler and like whatever. Were you like, did you have like a job at like, you know, Blockbuster back in the day? Like what was the career before you became this person who you became?
I had a really weird one because most people, they do like work retail or like, uh, waitressing or something.
I actually— Blockbuster, Blockbuster.
I'm doing her thing where I throw in a random word. That's why the YouTube comments are gonna be like Blockbuster, Blockbuster. It's gonna The algorithm.
I'm learning from her. Wait, but hold on, how old are you? 28. So no way is she gonna be working at a Blockbuster. A Blockbuster?
I used to get games from there as a kid, but once, once I was 16, there was not really a Blockbuster anymore.
Um, but what was the weird job you had?
Yeah, I actually— it was really wholesome. I did character parties for kids' birthdays and hospital visits and like festivals around town, Make-A-Wish Foundation stuff. I was like princesses and superheroes. So that was my company.
So you would dress up in cosplay and basically like go to a kid's party or a hospital?
Basically. Yeah, basically. Yeah. And that was my, my little startup entertainment company.
What an amazing pivot. That's the best pivot I've ever heard. Like, you know, Instagram used to be this like location app that just happened to have photos and then they were like, let's just go all in on the photos. And you basically were like, I'm going to go all in on the costume thing, but like Instead of little kids, let's just do like big kids.
So yeah, exactly. That's amazing. And you pay like, uh, you know, I have this researcher who helps me with the pod and, um, I was like, hey, she's coming on. Um, and I like to not know everything because if you know everything, you come in and you just ask questions you already know the answers to. It's kind of boring. Um, and so, but he did surface one interesting thing in his, uh, research, which was he's like, yeah, there's like, you know, leaked stuff online where you don't have to pay for the OnlyFans. You can just like find something.
Don't tell anyone.
Well, remove it.
But he was like, he's like, I think she has like a, like an on retainer, like, you know, bloodhound agency or lawyer or something that's trying to like just shut all these down. How— is there like a cat and mouse game of you trying to like keep your content behind the paywall? And do you like— how much do you pay per month to like prevent— protect yourself?
Yeah, we have, um, a whole like little DMCA staff here. Um, it's a combined effort. Like, I, I do have, uh, lawyers.
No.
What?
Yeah, yeah, I have a— I have my own little like, um, that's a startup opportunity.
Create a little agency that's gonna do that for all OnlyFans creators. We all had 2 for our girls.
Yeah. But it's funny though, because I streamed so much that like I have a very close relationship, I guess, with like the moderators of my chat on my Discord. They will actually actively like find leaks because people do something stupid, which is on my Twitch channel, they'll try to— viewers will start mass DMing at people like, leaks here, leaks here, leaks here. And then my mods are just like, boop, send to my DMCA team, then we get to delete it. So they're just like self-reporting. I don't have to go looking for them. They ended up just exposing all the leaks to me already.
So MrBeast, when we were hanging out with MrBeast, so we did a pod with him and Sean and I flew down and got to talk to him. And, uh, the maybe the most— there was a bunch of fascinating things about him, but one of the more fascinating things that a lot of people don't know is, so he's like this big shot in America and, uh, has all these followers, but YouTube's global. And so he decided to hire a team to start translating his stuff, meaning like they would, they would dub his content with voice actors. And what he did was really interesting is he would actually over— you know, a lot of people like, oh, let's just get the cheapest person who kind of sounds interesting. And I believe he would overpay where he would get like the guy who voiced a famous character in Brazil would also voice MrBeast. And everyone thought that was pretty cool and it sounds neat. And so all creators were like, hey, do that for us. And he goes, yeah, sure, I'll do it for you. And I forget how it works, but I believe he takes a percentage of the—
I'll spin up your, you know, Portuguese channel and we'll manage it. We'll have a— we have a person who speaks Portuguese. They'll write the descriptions. We'll have the voice actors. We'll do all that stuff. And we take like, I don't know, 30% of the revenue of that YouTube channel.
I need him to do that for me in Turkish because I have a lot— I have a huge Turkish audience because Pornhub ban.
Exactly. Those repressed Turkish people, they need it.
So they need my try-ons in Turkish.
But they, they like—
yeah.
Do you talk much?
They probably mute anyways.
You know?
It's a universal language.
They probably just mute it anyways.
But what's— yeah, that's a good point. But what's interesting is you— I don't know if you're doing this because you're trying to be humble, but you're kind of downplaying, I think, like, the shit that you're doing. You're like, "Oh, I just have these personal assistants, and we just—" It could be you're just being humble. But have you thought about, like, kind of like scaling this like crazy. Beast or Jimmy just raised some like $200 million at like a $1.5 billion valuation. Have you thought about being like, well, no, let's like, we're not just gonna call it personal assistance. We're going hard at this and we're gonna completely operationalize and help this niche of content creators. Have you ever thought about like kind of from that angle as opposed to like, I don't know, maybe you're just being nice, but you, it kind of sounds like you're, you're downplaying like how good this is.
I think that that's what we're trying to do with Realwork. We just started it though, like a few months ago, so it was my personal assistants that were kind of turning into an actual organization.
You, um, you're very like, uh, nonchalant, uh, about— that's what I mean about your— I'm trying to figure out where— what gets you basically excited about what you've done. Because I think you're basically like, it's, it's not new to you, right? When you tell it— when we hear what you're doing, it's kind of mind-blowing. When you hear what you're doing, you're like, yeah, I know, that's what I do every day, right? It's not gonna like— it's not gonna be mind-blowing to you, but there's got to be some part of you that's like, Holy shit, I can't believe this is what's happening. And like, oh my God, like this could be blah, blah, blah. And there's gotta be some part of you that still has that, I don't know, less laid back and more excited part of you that's like, yeah, I really want this. And I know that's gonna be crazy, but like, I think I could do it. Is there some part of this that's like really mind-blowing to you or like really exciting for you going forward?
Yeah, I think all of it's pretty mind-blowing when you step back and think about it. I guess I've just gotten used to like the day-to-day, like this is how it is. And then doing more and more over time, you kind of just get desensitized because it's such like a slow process over the past 6 years. It feels slow to me anyways because I do it so much. Um, but yeah, I mean, I really want to do animal content on my Twitch stream, and you know, I'm hoping to move towards that soon, kind of away from like so much of the e-girl like side. Like, I'm still going to be an e-girl, I guess, to people who want to brand it as that, but like, I feel like content can be so much more than sitting in a hot tub, you know?
When you're saying— when you're saying animal content, I'm not a Twitch person, When you're saying animal content, is that a phrase for something else or is that literally like— No, no.
Like I have horses and dogs that I want to do like Twitch streams with and training and trail riding and taking care of them and having a stable and a ranch in the near future, hopefully. I can't find this client info. Have you heard of HubSpot? HubSpot is a CRM platform, so it shares its data across every application. Every team can stay aligned. No out-of-sync spreadsheets or dueling databases. HubSpot, grow better.
Do you have like, um, like a therapist or anybody? Because like, I've seen what, like how Twitch streamers, like what they have to put up with. And like, there's this crazy, like love-hate weirdo stalker thing that happens. Then you get famous on Twitch and like, you get a lot of like, you know, you know, you, you see comments that are super negative. You see comments that are super like like super positive, and it's just like a lot to take in while you're just sitting at home in your room streaming for like 8 hours, which is kind of an unnatural thing without seeing the light of day during that time, right? Like, do you do like mental health— do you do anything proactively for mental health so that you're not like going nuts while you do this?
Uh, well, I do have a therapist now for some other reasons, but I probably should have had one this whole time for streaming as well. But my kind of mental health, I guess outside of therapy would just be horse riding. It's kind of like my meditation replacement.
Does that stuff actually get to you? Like, I do a decent job of, you know, it's actually funny. I do a decent job of like ignoring haters. We're not nearly as big as you, but we still get like, you know, hundreds of comments a day of like hate or good and bad. And like, I recently got fit and I remember people commenting of like, oh, you look less fat. Or they'll say like, oh, you know, today you're looking a little chubby. And I was like, damn, these people are mean. You must get like thousands. I mean, you do thousands of people a day commenting on your looks. Does that actually get to you? Are you, are you pretty good of, of kind of, I don't know, ignoring it?
I would say it used to get to me more, but at this point I just kind of immune to it, I think. Yeah, it's not so much comments that get to me. What gets to me is comparison to myself because I'll, on a photoshoot day, say I'm feeling bloated or I'm working out or whatever, and I'll be referencing like pictures that did well on my social media before, just so we know like what to recreate that we haven't done in a while. And I feel like, man, it looks so good there. I look like shit today. Like things like that, because like at the time, you know, it's like the perfect lighting, the perfect angle, whatever, and it just doesn't look that way in the mirror, you know. Um, but then usually you did done with the shoot and you're like, oh no, these are fine. Like, because it looks different on camera. So the reality is what fucks me up. Not really people's comments.
Or maybe it's like a child actor thing, and like in 15 years all the like famous Twitch streamers are going to be like, yo, I screwed up. It's like they were fine at the time when it was all good. It's like later when things get weird. Um, you know, you, you, you also tweet about like what you do with your money, which I think is kind of interesting. Um, we'll talk about the gas station thing in a second, but like we always ask, you know, the guests who come on, we say, all right, cool, like Money's this weird thing where it's kind of taboo. It's like in entrepreneurship, you're supposed to say, it's not about the money for me, but like they fight like hell to like every point of equity and every dollar earned. It's like clearly money, money does matter to people. And they also don't really say what they do with their money. And therefore there's a bunch of people who are listening to podcasts like this that don't know, like there's like an information wall. It's like, um, you don't get to know what happens on the other side. It's like only through many years and hard lessons you get to figure it out. And we think that's kind of silly. We try to like break down that wall a little bit. Um, so if I was going to describe to you like a pie chart, like, okay, here's all your money, uh, where do you, what do you do with it? Uh, do you just leave it in a checking account? Are you putting in the stock market? Are you buying crypto? Like, can you roughly draw us like a pie chart of like, you know, how you manage your own money?
Um, it's kind of complicated. Uh, I, I didn't really get to manage it as much until recently, but, um, the gas stations Yeah, those are, those are a fun investment though. My accountant actually brought me to that one, and, um, they help save me on taxes because I can— I got to expense the entire cost of the building up front, so that reduced my, my yearly income on paper, and then I had a lower tax rate.
Depreciation, accelerated depreciation.
Yeah, exactly. Um, so that was that kind of thing.
You have to be like a real estate professional technically, right? So you're doing like the 500-hour test basically.
Uh, no, you actually don't, don't have to be with this.
Explain that to me. I want to do that. What is— do you know?
I thought it's basically if you're passive, then it can only offset passive income, but your other stuff is active income, right? So do I have a misunderstanding or does it work differently?
Uh, I just know what my account— my accountant team brought to me. They said there was this opportunity and they explained to me like, okay, So I'm just putting money into that and then, uh, yeah, they kind of have all the rest of the details. I just throw the money at it.
Is most of your, uh, is most of your, is most of your portfolio just in boring index funds?
I would say most of it's in, in stocks that make sense with like—
Yeah. I mean, that's like a really, that's a reliable thing. It's not going anywhere, especially since pandemic is kind of, at least the fear of it is dying down. People are out there. Traveling more, getting out more. It's just only going to get better.
It's also like a cashback program for you. You've probably paid like nearly a million dollars in credit card fees to Visa.
And it's a way to sort of— what else did you buy?
Um, I mean, I have some Google, I have some Shopify, um, Amazon. Uh, yeah, I have some crypto, but I don't, I don't know how I feel about crypto yet. Why not? How do you feel? Because I just, it's, it's so up and down all the time that it's just I can't tell what it's really going to do. So yeah, I have some Bitcoin.
Where do you— when you're researching which— what you want to buy, where do you learn? Like, what resources do you turn to?
who do you listen to? I don't really have like a certain person, I guess. It's just kind of like I get linked various things that people send me. Yeah. I used to actually talk to a lot of streamers about it in my DMs. Um, yeah, I don't know if you guys knew who Reckful was. Maybe you worked at Twitch. Um, we used to talk about stocks in our DMs, so that's kind of where I got started with it. And then I was just sent stuff and kind of explored it. And then I got like an accountant and it all just kind of compiles from everywhere.
Do you do any other type of investing that's interesting? So you, you, you, is it one gas station or multiple? And then do you have stocks? Is there anything else?
Well, I have some businesses I've bought, um, and some private equity too.
Tell me more. I can't really talk about the private equity because it's private.
Legally, I can't say anything much about it, but basically they just acquire small businesses throughout the year, and I send them money as needed, up to like $5 million or so is what the total will be.
But on a deal-by-deal basis, basically?
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whenever they need it, they call for it. There's not like a scheduled payment system with it. Gotcha.
And then what about businesses you bought? What are you buying and who's running these things?
Well, usually I buy businesses that can just run themselves. Like, I guess the— if you guys heard about like the ball pit company or like the plastic ball company I used for my ball pit.
No, no.
What is that? That's smart.
It's just, it's, it's like a, I bought like a manufacturer. They're based in China though. They make like playground balls, like, uh, you know, like ball pit type. Yeah, we have one of my house. Really? Yeah, see, it was just really, um, hold on, you bought a Chinese manufacturer? Well, the, like the, they share the facility with other people, but, um, yeah, they manufacture balls and I bought that company. Uh, what?
Why? How?
It was really, it was actually really good profit margins. Like, how did this even come across your desk? Accountant, accountant, they just send me stuff. They're like, this thing. And I like to gravitate towards the ones that I can also use for publicity stunts and, uh, on Twitch.
So like, I turned my entire room into a ball pit. Your accountant is like the LeBron James of accountants, or the Bernie Madoff of accountants. I don't— I haven't decided which one yet, but he's doing way more than the Call of Duty as an accountant. It sounds like—
yeah, I have like a team. It's, it's hard to explain it all. I normally, I just throw them the money. I'm like, yes, make it work.
Are you afraid of like being one of those like athletes that goes broke on like, you know, my, my manager, my accountant talked me into buying these like this chain of, you know, Wendy's that was like nonexistent and ran away with my money? Because it sounds like, uh, you know, you're throwing money into crazy places right now. Is that a fear for you?
Uh, no, no, not really. Um, if you're not afraid, I'm not afraid. Yeah, I had bigger fears than that.
It, it, uh, it almost like we were asking you some of these like super specific money questions and it, people are listening now, but, uh, you know, your, the look in your face was like, why the fuck are these guys asking me all these questions about this money shit? Like, this makes me uncomfortable. Isn't it hilarious?
I only recently got back in control of my finances. I don't know if y'all saw that drama, but What happened? I can't say too much about it, but I got out of kind of a controlling relationship a bit.
So yeah, yeah, yeah, we keep the dark stuff over there. We just do the money stuff here. We don't worry. We try not to get into the heavy topics.
What I was saying was you do things that 99.9% of people would find to be incredibly embarrassing to do. Like, they would be, they would be too nervous to do that, you know. It's too taboo. I'm uncomfortable doing that. And I think that it's, it's wild that we think that, all right, we're okay with that. And, but we're also nervous about talking about the money thing. And like, that, that's just like an interesting insight. And we've talked to so many people and it's very rare that someone's comfortable talking about money. It still makes me really uncomfortable, but it's just like an, an interesting thing. It's like, oh, I thought this woman wasn't afraid of anything. But when we talk about money, like, You know, it's, it can be a weird topic.
Yeah, no, I'm pretty comfortable talking about the money so much like some of the more like investment business side. It's not just me. So it's like, I can feel like I can't talk too much about it because I'm not like the only person driving those types of things.
So when we were talking to MrBeast, he's been going into like, you know, Feastables, like his chocolate bar. And then he created like a pop-up, uh, like cloud kitchen restaurant thing called Beast Burger. And he's like talking about different, like, businesses where he can go into and say, okay, I could use my fame and my distribution to give these businesses an unfair advantage. Are you doing— it sounds like the Ball Pit is sort of like that where you're like, okay, if I buy this company and I make it part of my content, then sales could go up. But I can imagine any of the taboo sort of like, or whatever sex-related type of products, whether it's It could be swimwear, it could be lingerie, it could be sex toys, it could be like, who knows? I don't know. I don't know what else it could be. Like, are you going down that path where you're like, we should actually like either buy or create a business like in those categories and use me and maybe the other, my, you know, other girls I know that will be a part of promoting this and like we can blow this company up into a pretty big company. Are you thinking along those lines?
Yeah, I am. Uh, definitely for the future as I'm trying to move towards you know, more collaborative efforts with other girls with the rework. So I really want to do like lingerie. I think makeup is a good way to go too. Beauty industry is huge. But yeah, definitely like those are on my mind right now.
Do you have to do products that guys want or is it products that like how many of your fans are women versus men?
It's going to be a mixture. It's looking like since I'm blowing up more now where it's like I do have more of a female audience, especially like since a lot of the girls kind of look to me as a person to follow as far as like the OF side goes, e-girl side, whatever you want to call it. Um, so it's getting more balanced. But yeah, I also still have a, a project that I've been working on with Ludwig this past year. We're making an amaranth flashlight.
So yeah, that's kind of what I was thinking about.
Uh, we're doing that too.
That was the idea that I was thinking about. But, uh, yeah.
Have you, uh, have you guys ever heard of kink.com? Have you heard of kink.com? Mm-hmm. All right, so kink.com was like, I think that they were a website but also the parent company, and they owned all these like fetish websites. So, you know, kinks. And I don't know what they all were, but like one of them, or one of them that was pretty funny, was like these people who would like wrestle and then have sex. And this guy started it. Yeah. Well, they were like, no, but they were like Olympic wrestling. Like they were wearing like unitards and then like they— it warps into sex and whatever. And they— the guy who started it, it was just a guy and he started it in the late '90s during the dot-com boom. So he was an early mover and he built it into a huge business. And eventually he bought this old armory, which is basically a huge building in the center of the Mission District in San Francisco, which is consider some of the most expensive real estate in the city because it's like a desirable hipster neighborhood. And he built this huge thing. It was basically like a palace. It was like an airplane— imagine an airplane hangar, but like in the one of the more desirable neighborhoods of San Francisco. And he owned it, and they eventually would film all their shit there. So like they had like a wrestling area, and then they had like a bar where they would do like people who like to have sex in public. They like mimicked a bar and people would have sex in it and film it, and they would charge subscribers money, whatever.. And when I first moved to San Francisco, I took a Groupon tour of it. Like, you could— like, you could— because it's just like an interesting building that's an old armory where they like— it's like an old historical building, and it's also a porn studio. And I was hanging out with this girl, and she was like, hey, do you want to go like see this thing? It's on Groupon. It's a— it's a porn studio. We can just go take a tour of a historical building. And I was like, yeah, I guess. And that's how I learned what Kink.com was. I went and like like, you see this stuff and I'm like, this is crazy. And then I started thinking about like all these media companies, like Jimmy and I used to do it too, where we'd be like, oh, we want to become like the Disney of blank. And I'm like, oh, this guy at Kink, that's his Disney, Disneyland. Like he, like he had all these people taking tours to come. I think we spent $50 and we got a tour where they're like, here's where like the army used to prepare. Now we use it as a dungeon for sex takes because like there's a hose here so we can spray people with water while they have sex. Like, it was all kink stuff, and it was pretty wild that this was like part of their business model. And like, the people on that tour— like, I'm a pretty straight-laced guy— it was like straight-laced people who had no idea what this website was. And then there was other people that were like totally into it, and they're like, oh, I'm seeing where this— I'm seeing the studio where my favorite stuff is filmed. It was incredibly fascinating. Sean, I'm never— I'm shocked you haven't heard of that. It was like right in the middle. I remember the building.
Yeah, I didn't know the website part, but yeah, that building is kind of famous. It's a beautiful building from the outside, and when you go by, somebody will always tell you, you know, hey, this is what that is.
Is.
What is it called again? The building?
The Armory, right? The Armory.
But if you look up like kink.com building San Francisco or something, there'll be a Wikipedia page. And this building, it might be worth north of $100 million at this point, maybe more. And it, uh, it's like a huge building in a very desirable neighborhood. And it was just like super fascinating. This guy did this. And so maybe in the future what we're gonna see you have is we're gonna see you like be like, oh, hey, creators who work with me, do you want to like a come— you want a place to come and stay? Like, uh, you know, I can— you could, you could host your office in my studio. And then eventually it's like, hey, uh, fans of us, whoever wants to spend $100, you can come get like a walking guided tour. And then eventually you're just gonna own like all this amazing— yeah, red light district style, you're gonna own all this real estate. Anyway, it was a really interesting play that these folks did, and it— I think it— I think the, building became worth more than their, the porn brand. Wow.
I, I, I read something you said that I thought was pretty interesting. You go, I think you said this, it was, uh, you go, there's like the, but Warren Buffett has this phrase, like you only have to get rich once. And you were saying like for social media, it's the same thing. You gotta just build an audience once. Uh, you only gotta get famous once. And so what, how did you actually get famous? What was the. What, what was the, were there any big inflection points where it like, it went from like, you know, not that many people watching me or following me to like way more, or was it just very steady or were there bit, were there any like big moments?
Um, I said the hot tub meta was probably huge. That was probably doubled my growth at least. Um, but before that it was kind of just, I guess I entered the social media space at a time when it wasn't oversaturated, like 2016, it wasn't as crazy as it is now where everyone wants to be an influencer. So I think I got really lucky with the timing and then I just was growing on Twitch and Twitch wasn't oversaturated either at that time. And I just kind of grew with the platform 'cause I streamed so much. And what separated me from others was I was also making content on pretty much every other platform at the same time. Like I had Facebook page, I had Instagram, I had Twitter, I had YouTube and I was just kind of growing it. Plus Patreon also kind of boosted my ability to just make that my full-time thing. Because I wasn't relying just on Twitch. I didn't have to keep like a day job or whatever.
And describe how intense the content like work is, because I think some people would say, oh man, you just post a picture on OnlyFans, that's like you make $100 grand a month, you know, you make a million dollars a month, uh, and all you got to do is like post a pic like, you know, once a day or whatever, like that's it. What is the— what's the reality like?
Uh, right now my content schedule is a little crazy, but pretty much every week, I'll have like a day or two where I just dedicate to OnlyFans and Fansly and Patreon, like all my NSFW platforms. And then I also like the next day I'll do all my YouTube, Twitter, Instagram content as well. So pretty much 2 days out of the week are like 12-hour photoshoot days across all my different types of content. And then the rest of the time I'll just stream on Twitch because that's kind of my my billboard that pays me. Got my funnel.
Okay, it's just like, there's no reason— it's completely illogical why I feel this way, but it is just funny to like hear like, you know, Sean and I talk about the exact same shit. It's just like in such a, uh, just with different types of content. And it's so funny that it's like, it just not a normal conversation that we typically have where it's with, uh, not-safe-for-work content. And I think that's so cool. Yeah, it's very different for sure, but it's all the same mechanics. And it's just like, what? And in my head I'm like, why do I think— what? Like, she's just doing the exact same shit we do. It's just a different niche and frankly a significantly bigger, significantly more profitable, and significantly, uh, like, you just, you just, you just— like, we're happy with like a million dollar a year maybe if like in the tech world, on the Twitter world, and it's just like, oh yeah, that's cool. I'm, I'm, I'm decently happy with a million dollar month too.
Yeah, it's kind of crazy. So I'm just trying to get it while, you know, the getting is good because I feel like it's such a rare opportunity to have. I don't waste it.
Do you, um, like, okay, so you're like, you know, doing really well with this stuff now. Uh, do you, what's the, is there like an end of the road where you're like, okay, I'm just gonna, like, I have to retire at certain points and like like, you know, do you sort of see like, I have a very small window here for this, or do you think it's going to be much longer than that?
Um, I do feel like I have a small window compared to other types of content since it's mostly based off my appearance and there's always younger people coming into the space. Um, but yeah, I don't know how much longer. I don't have like a cutoff period. I would think I would like to be done with the grind within the next year. Maybe 3 max.
Um, if someone's confused, by the way, because like when I first heard about OnlyFans, I was like, why would I pay? Like, porn's free. What do you mean? Uh, why would I pay $5 a month for this? Uh, is there like some psychological benefit that people get out of it? Like, you know, what drives somebody to actually pay for something when there's so much of a free alternative available to them, um, out there on the internet?
I think part of it is the parasocial aspect where it's They feel like they kind of like know this person because they'd see them on either YouTube or Twitch or whatever it is. Some people go overboard with it. Like they treat it like, "This is my girlfriend," which is definitely not, not your girlfriend, bro. But yeah, I feel like part of it's just like they like a certain person's kind of look. Like they're really into whatever characteristics make up that creator and they want to see more. From that specific look that they've become like attracted to, I guess, or have some form of attachment just from seeing their face so much.
Sam, have you ever heard this word parasocial? No, no.
Can you define that a little bit?
Okay, you've used that word, and then the word about when you were talking about spamming the comments, I've never like heard someone call it that. That was, that was an interesting one too.
Um, parasocial is basically like a one-sided what air quotes, relationship that the viewer has with the content creator. Like, some people get way too invested in a creator's, like, personal life. Like, they want to know who they're dating, what they did today, where they've been, why aren't they online right now. That's— I would say that's a very parasocial thing. It's like they feel, like, more entitled to a relationship when they don't actually know the person.
But it's a— I mean, but that, that's good for you, no?
Um, in some ways, until it gets to, like, a stalker threatening level. But, um, most of the time, yeah, parasocial is profitable for the creator.
But how many times do you think it crosses the line? Like, how often would that happen to you where it actually is an issue?
Um, I would say you get like multiple red flags per day in messages. I'm sure there's even more that I don't read. But as far as in-person altercations, um, typically a few a year will try to physically show up at your house. But then you get a horde of people also just trying to swat you and dox you in general. Who are mad that either you're not dating them or that you didn't respond or whatever. So it's complicated.
Crazy. Yeah, people are insane. We—
I'm glad we're not more famous. Well, we— Sean and I get like 1% of that because sometimes people will hear Sean talk and they're like, oh, you're really good at talking about money and like you're pretty successful, therefore like show me the way. Uh, what the hell, you didn't reply to me? Like, after all I do for you? Yeah. And That's like 1%, I'm sure, of what you get, because it's when love and all that shit's involved, it's just like way more intense and way more dangerous, I think. It's like, what would someone do? Like, they just think that, hey, what the hell, man? I messaged you and like we were talking and I thought we were together. Now you're still doing this stuff?
Yeah, some people get catfished too by like people just pretending to be me. And so they'll be like, I gave you all this money and you didn't show up. Blah, blah, blah. And I'm like, oh no, oh no. But yeah, typically it's just crazy people who are just basically talking to themselves, a one-sided conversation in the DMs, never getting a response, and they just keep going. They just keep going.
I feel like, uh, I feel like I could create an AI OnlyFans creator and, um, like just crush it because she could do anything and she would talk to anyone any time of day and she would, you know, be, you know, the, the girlfriend you always wanted. And so, uh, if anyone out there is a an engineer who wants to help me with this. Let's, for a stunt, let's try to create an AI OnlyFans, uh, girl who's gonna make a million dollars in a month. That's the mission. And we'll publish how we're doing along the way, and we're gonna learn all the growth hacks, and we're gonna put it all out there. And they can't dox her or swat her because she doesn't exist, she doesn't live anywhere. And so, uh, I think it is the, uh, maybe the future there. So, so that's my dude. So listen, action, anybody who wants to help me with that project, get in my DMs on Twitter.
Sean VP, have you guys seen, uh, is it called Avatar.me? Yeah. Have you guys seen that? I have not. All right, so check this out. So there's like all this like AI shit where you, it's like all built on the back of one thing and then all these people are creating plugins and layers on top of it. And so there's this new thing where you can upload 20 pictures of yourself and it will give you avatars created, with you in mind. And okay, good.
I did it. AvatarAI.me. That's the—
it's fucking amazing. So check this out. So I just uploaded a bunch of pictures of my face, and there were a few pictures that I posted of my body because I was doing like before and after of like fitness shit. But it sent me photos back of me looking like a dominatrix. Look at these pics I put. But then it gave me this other picture that I have no idea what this is. It gave me this other picture where it's supposed to be like— I only post— gave it pictures of me with like my stomach up, and it, and it like gave— it made me— it like made a fake picture of my ass, and it was just like a picture of my butt. And, uh, it's fucking disgusting and weird, but like, but I was looking at this and I'm like, oh, there definitely should be— there's definitely going to be this type of thing. Because have you guys seen, uh, I think it's called replica.ai. It's basically a service where you can like, you can just spend money and you get like a friend that learns how to interact with you. And you also can get like an online girlfriend who just is like, it's a text-based conversation that you're having with this fake woman and she gets to know you and figure out your tastes and likes. It's all built on AI. Now we just got to add it with some of this, with some of these pictures and then eventually deepfake videos and like like your job ultimately is gonna be completely like, you know, unnecessary. Like you, the yous of the world are gonna be, it's like, hey, wait, you're real? Why would you do it? Why are you wasting that time being real? You know? Or like maybe there should be like bots of you that understand your personality and actually do talk to these men and you can like license out your face to replica.ai. There's gonna be a lot of interesting things like that I think in the near, in like the next 2 years probably. Yeah, for sure.
It's getting kind of crazy, the technology.
Uh, right on. All right, well, listen, this is great. I'm glad you came on. Uh, thanks for doing this. And, uh, where should people, uh, where should people find you if they want to, uh, you know, see more, learn more, get to know you a little bit better?
I usually just refer people to my link directory, and the URL is easy to remember.
It's downbad.com. What? Downbad.com? Yes, downbad.com. Okay, that was easy.
Uh, okay, basically it has all my platforms listed there because sometimes, you know, stuff gets banned and the link will change, so it's always there.
That's cool. All right, thanks Kate, appreciate it.
Yeah, thanks, appreciate you.