A WOMAN has revealed how she makes £80,000 a year with a simple side hustle – and she only works a few hours a week.
Kelly Rocklein dropped out of college in 2015 to become a user-generated-content (UGC) creator and hasn’t looked back since.
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The 28-year-old is a creative director in Bend, Oregon, but took on the UGC role as an easy side hustle.
The part-time gig sees her creating “concepts” for companies that they use in videos to promote their products online.
The ads are then launched on social media to create sales.
Kelly is self-taught and and over the past nine years her efforts have enabled her to work with more than 500 brands in fashion, skincare, health and tech, according to Insider.
She initially began video editing for fun in 2014 – but her side hustle allowed her to rake in almost £80,000 in 2022.
Kelly charges between £400 to £1,600 per concept as they lead directly to sales – with her top UCG ad bringing her client more than £8million in revenue.
She now only has to work 10 to 15 hours per week and is able to comfortably take more than six weeks off throughout the year.
The business woman also took up coaching UGC on her TikTok channel (@ugc.social), which she started in June 2022, after seeing stacks of misinformation being spread on the subject.
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She created her page to help others understand the truth behind UGC and has since racked up a whopping 51.9k followers and over 207k likes across her page.
Kelly was then able to offer one-to-one coaching, newsletter writing and portfolio audits in August 2022 due to the high demand.
She is now so successful and recognised in her field that she no longer has to reach out to clients as they are now all from referrals.
Kelly has shared her pearls of wisdom on how to become a UGC pro and revealed that creating a portfolio is key.
She said: “I figured the only way I’d get hired was if I had a portfolio that was attractive to the brands I wanted to work with. I created example concepts with products I already had in my house and loved using”.
Shortly after, Kelly bagged her first client and was able to afford moving out of her home and in 2016 she relocated to Los Angeles to kickstart her career in creative marketing.
She took up a number of creative roles from 2016 to 2021 but still kept building her UGC side hustle in her free time.
Another tip Kelly has shared to her budding fans is to make the ad concepts as natural as possible – as if your friend had posted it instead of a company.
I figured the only way I’d get hired was if I had a portfolio that was attractive to the brands I wanted to work with.
Kelly Rocklein
“Most best practices revolve around the direct-response formula: a captivating hook in the first three seconds, both visually and audible, she said.
As well as making it neutral, Kelly also mentioned that communicating a problem that a viewer may have faced with the product as its solution is crucial in ramping up sales.
Teaming this technique with “call to action” phrases such as “Get yours today for only $xy!” also works wonders according to the UGC pro.
Kelly also offers services like scriptwriting for £80 a script which only takes her 15 minutes to create.
And due to her large social media following, she also includes an “allowlisting” service which is where she charges over £400 a month for clients to post ads on her Facebook and Instagram channels.
The UGC creator reassured her fans that a career in the field doesn’t require a degree – but is all about their portfolio and case studies.
But she also highlighted the darker side to starting a side hustle in this field, claiming that “it’s not for the weak”, “founders depression is real” and “rejection hurts”.
This comes after one high school dropout revealed how he became a millionaire at 20-years-old and now makes up to £2000 an hour.
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