With nearly 500 million cumulative subscribers on YouTube—plus millions more on other social networks—Jimmy Donaldson, better known as MrBeast, is one of the most famous influencers on the planet.
If you don’t know who he is, your kids sure do.
But this has been a tough year for Donaldson, who has in recent months faced a lawsuit alleging poor conditions on the set of his upcoming Prime Video reality show; accusations that his Lunchly line of packaged meals sometimes contains mold; the resurfacing of insensitive comments he’d previously made, including the use of a homophobic slur; and an investigation into whether his former collaborator had groomed a teenager.
The third-party investigation, which Donaldson commissioned, found no evidence of sexual misconduct and noted that alleged victims had rejected such claims. Lunchly has stated that its products undergo “a stringent review process,” and Donaldson has apologized for the comments he made when he was younger. Still, it’s been a particularly high-profile series of scandals for the embattled YouTuber, even as Donaldson has carried on making videos and operating his business–which he recently told Time earns him around $600 million to $700 million a year, the bulk of which he reinvests in his content.
Alessandro Bogliari, co-founder and chief executive of The Influencer Marketing Factory—a social media marketing agency—offered Inc. a few more lessons to be taken from Donaldson’s tough 2024.
1. Establish guardrails early
Part of the reason a lot of influencers seem to run into scandals, Bogliari says, is that they sometimes don’t start thinking about themselves as a company until it’s too late.
“It was not even in the plan for a lot of these people to get that big,” he explains. “They kind of skip all the HR-slash-DEI [groundwork] that is normal for a company.”
For instance, Bogliari says, influencers don’t always spend enough time and effort creating a healthy workplace culture or putting in place clear policies around harassment and discrimination: “There is a gap right now, a misalignment, between the influencer world and setting up things from day one to be sure that every[thing] works well.”
The upshot? Even if you’re not planning on being in the public eye, set things up early on so that if you ever find yourself there, you’re ready.
2. Beware the influencer apology video
When things do hit the fan, Bogliari says, many influencers turn to a tried-and-true social media classic: the monologue-style apology video. But that can be a mistake.
“The majority of times, they backfire,” he says. “A lot of their followers, they’re like, ‘Hmmm, now that you got caught, [you’re] trying to win over sympathy again.’ … Many times, unfortunately, these apology videos, they don’t come off as authentic.”
That’s particularly true with overly “PR-oriented” statements that “sound a bit too corporate,” he adds. Bogliari instead suggests doing a behind-the-scenes video or a Q&A with a reporter that would seem more genuine and could do more to rebuild trust.
3. Show how you’ve changed
Everyone makes mistakes. Part of the process to rebuild an audience after those mistakes, Bogliari says, is to show that you’ve learned from yours.
“You cannot change the past,” he says, suggesting that people being publicly criticized need to be transparent about what went wrong and demonstrate that they’re “still learning many things.”
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