Being an Influencer During COVID-19 with Chinae Alexander
Being an Influencer During COVID-19 with Chinae Alexander
Today is another new episode that I recorded post quarantine. Today’s guest is Chinae Alexander, social media influencer and host of the Press Send Podcast. Chinae joins me today to talk about how her life as an influencer has changed in the face of COVID-19 and how she’s managing her finances and her content in the new state we’re in.
If you aren’t following Chinae yet, I highly encourage you to follow her. I’ve gotten to know her well over the last year and she is as genuine offline as she is online.
What are we drinking?
Chinae - Blackberry Citrus Sparkling Fresca
Shannon - Blackberry Schweppes
Podcast Notes
Chinae was a marketing director for eight years for a luxury furniture design company. In 2015, her friend, Abby, was working for ClassPass and her company was interviewing for a social media coordinator position and she encouraged Chinae to apply.
She wasn’t looking for a job, but she thought she would check it out. Chinae made the Instagram handle @getfitbrooklyn, to showcase her fitness life, for the job interview.
Chinae did the interview and they turned her down for the job, because she had no experience and only 300 followers. She decided to keep Instagramming on that account, because she found a community.
Two or three weeks later, her boss pulled her aside and told her she wasn’t supposed to be there anymore, because she was supposed to be an entrepreneur. He kindly fired her, paid her for two months, and told her to go start a company.
Chinae freaked out and went into despair for 24 hours and then decided to start an event planning company. She created a Squarespace website and ordered business cards. She was busy from the beginning and her business was growing, but she was still updating her Instagram.
She started monetizing her Instagram account and realized she needed to pick one or the other, because she couldn’t do both of them full time. Chinae decided to go with Instagram and she stopped taking clients for her event planning company.
She focused on growing her Instagram life more, and she transitioned out of fitness into more of a lifestyle account, talking to people about empowerment, body image, and all aspects of personhood.
Instagram was a very unknown thing at the time. There was no way to tell how much money she was going to make.
At her furniture job, the highest salary she made was $60,000. The cost of not being miserable and having a lot of freedom to do projects she wanted to do was adding on to her salary and a reason to stay.
When Chinae went out on her own, all she wanted to do was make as much money as she could. She made $80,000 her first year being an event planner. She didn’t start making real money on Instagram until 2017 or 2018, about two years into it.
Chinae wanted to make sure she could match her event planner salary. Once she felt like she was making the same amount of money, she stopped taking clients and whittled it off slowly, so there wasn’t a big gap in her income.
At that time, she was not making good financial decisions. When she was making $28,000 her first year working at her furniture job, she was ordering a $25 breakfast every day.
It wasn’t until 2017 or 2018, that she started saving and making better purchasing decisions. It wasn’t until 2019 that she knew what to do with what she saved and started working with The Financial Gym.
Unless it is a pain point or a growth opportunity, most people aren’t ready to make a change to their financial decisions.
Chinae was able to double her income three years in a row, and she now makes over six figures.
The week of March 12, 2020, everything changed. Chinae was at a restaurant with friends when she heard about Tom Hanks contracting COVID-19 and the NBA canceling games.
Chinae’s boyfriend was laid off from his job and she had to make decisions about events she was scheduled to host. These decisions affected her financially.
None of her brands have canceled, but they have postponed work for an indefinite amount of time. However, this could turn into cancelations. The most worrying for Chinae is that she gets two to three brand deals a week, and it went silent for a month. There was no new work.
People are now starting to come back. It is a lot slower, but she did get two new projects in the last week. Everyone is just trying to figure out what to do.
Chinae’s first stage of this was trying to provide comfort through words and trying to live her life in a way that showed people there is light and hope in this and we will get through this. She was also highlighting that we aren’t supposed to be used to this.
During the second stage of this, she tried to dig in and help people, and they did a couple different fundraisers. One was for hospital workers, another for grocery store and pharmacy workers, and another for Campaign Against Hunger and she partnered with a foundation.
She encouraged anyone who wanted to give to Venmo her money and she encouraged anyone who was one of those people to send her their Venmo email and she would send them money for lunch or something. They raised about $6,000 total.
After this, Chinae got the Coronavirus, and she documented it on her Instagram account. She wanted people to see a real example. The feedback she received showed her it was really helpful to other people.
Chinae is now feeling the urge to be more creative. There is always and underlying anxiety about body image, and that is being amplified right now.
As a person that people look to for a certain level of confidence in their body, she errs away from diet culture. Even those who have it figured out to some level are struggling. It is okay to be having stress right now. This is temporary.
Chinae has a very positive, uplifting community online. She has maybe had 20 rude messages total since she has been doing this. Everybody has their view of how other people should do their job.
For her, it has been important to block out the noise of how she should be doing her job and decide how she wants to do her job during this time. She also wants to make paid content feel good and nourishing for people. It’s not about selling something to someone it is about talking to them about something. It has to be something she would recommend personally to a friend.
Chinae has been able to weave her sponsored content into the story of what has been going on now, which has been a fun challenge. Any brand who has been open to shifting to fit this time has been really well received.
Chinae works with a nail care brand and she thought it would be fun to have people share the nail art they are doing at home. She wanted to pick a few and showcase them on her page. People really enjoyed this.
This is a special time and we are all in this together. We need to showcase this. We are revolutionizing everything, from medicine to education to work. The things you thought you needed to survive or do your work, you really don’t.
Chinae and Shannon did an event, pre-corona, and many attendees signed up at The Gym. Now, Chinae is hearing from many of them that had they not signed up and made financial changes, they would be in a much worse position financially now.
Having an emergency fund is vital right now. After this, there will be an emergency eventually. Chinae has one year of expenses saved up, because she is a freelancer.
The day Chinae got the Coronavirus, she received a letter from the IRS saying she owed $15,000 from 2018 taxes. She didn’t have to worry about it, because she had the money saved up in her emergency fund. She is now realizing how important it is to have one.
The Gym recommends three to six months of expenses in an emergency fund for people who work W-2 jobs. Freelancers should have one year of expenses saved up.
Takeaway: My biggest takeaway is the importance of a larger than normal emergency fund when you’re a freelancer. We always talk about emergencies with our clients, and this pandemic has certainly showed us what an emergency could really look like.
Random Three Questions
What is the hardest part of being an influencer?
What are you binge watching right now?
If this is your last night on earth, what is your last meal?
Connect with Chinae
Insta/Twitter/TikTok: @chinaealexander
Podcast: Press Send
If you have any topics you would like me to cover on this podcast, or If you’d like to get in the financially naked hot seat, I encourage you to email me to Shannon@fingyms.com, or join the private Martinis and Your Money Facebook group, and let me know what you want to hear.
If you’d like to talk to my team at the Financial Gym to give you the plan you need to not only survive during these crazy times but to thrive during them, we’re offering a number of great deals right now. While you’re quarantined from home, our team is happy to help you make your plan and take money stress off your plate. So head over to, or send friends to, financialgym.com to get set up today.