She's On The Money - MONEY DIARIES: Instagram paying the bills

Episode Date: May 16, 2021

We alllll wish the time spent curating our insta feeds and making our lives look glowy and shiny and fun 24/7 would pay for the bills, and for this Money Diarist, it accidentally does! Happy Monday delicious friends!Love the pod but looking for a more hands-on approach to your money? Look no further. Our budgeting & cash flow masterclass is the tool you need to help overhaul your finances for good. Join Victoria as she steps you through your budgeting and cash flow with all of the smarts and none of the intimidating jargon. Finally, if you're in a money mess and need help untangling the muddle - we've got you sorted - simply record your question and send it through to us at [e-mail] and you may just end up on the podcast! The advice shared on She’s on The Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She’s on The Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. Victoria Devine is an Authorised Representative of Australia Pacific Funds Management Proprietary Limited ABN 34 132 463 257 - AFSL 339151.See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

She's on the money. She's on the money. Hello and welcome to She's on the money, the podcast for millennials who want financial freedom. Today I am joined by Victoria Devine. Hi friend. For another money diary. The best.

and this one is a little inspo-y it's a little bit fun it's a little bit fresh and I've read the email it's really spoken to me internally and that's why you chose it yes I love it can you please read it out for me okay hello s-o-t-m and if you're new that's she's on the money yeah podcast you're already listening to yes awesome for those who love that name I've been a marketing manager in education tourism entertainment fmcg etc for over 10 years during maternity leave i started an instagram page to talk about the perioral dermatitis i have developed from my pregnancy and birth hormones that was 10 months ago and now brands are paying me to talk about my experiences using their products on my sensitive dry skin on my instagram page oh my gosh she's a

little influencer some are also asking me for content for their own use even napoleon purdice wanted me to make content for a sunscreen launch in china why does this have to be um anonymous like now we can't perv on her that sucks well maybe we can let her pick if we give out her little ig account at the end no it's not happening no i protect her privacy i'm gonna ask her for it though so you guys i'm gonna see it you're not i've actually got it i can give it to you okay additionally i'm now writing for beauty blogs and websites i've quit my day job finish in a couple of weeks jemma watts come at me she's now a beauty blogger she's gonna be taking over our podcast soon you watch out jemma and we'll be full-time influencing and writing and also being a mom from

now on oh my god next month i'm already booked for three thousand dollars worth of work what holy moly that's so exciting that's should we should we give her a buzz i need to talk to her All right, let's get her on the phone. Hello, Money Diarist. Hi, Tonya and Victoria, how are you? Oh, she knows our name. She's an influencer and she knows who we are. Doesn't that make you feel famous?

Yeah, it does a little bit. It does a little bit. Thank you so much for allowing us to share your Money Diary. I'm so excited. As always, we're going to go through all of the standard Money Diary questions that the community knows and loves. then after the break we will get into asking you some more pervy personal questions based on your responses how's that sound okay it sounds good i'm excited to hear what you're gonna ask oh my gosh

we don't know what we're gonna ask just yet so it depends on your responses my friend so let's start with the first question which is as always what is your attitude towards money um i think my attitude towards money has just always been to spend less than I earn um so no matter how much I've earned I guess because I have kind of had very different levels of jobs in the corporate world over the last like 10 11 years starting straight after university like it really has just been spend less than I earn so that I don't go into debt I'm kind of staying within my means and that success is earned, so I have to work hard to make more money. Yeah.

So what do you do for work and how much money do you earn? So up until about two weeks ago, I was a marketing manager for a university and I earned $90,000 a year. But from the email that you just read out, I have quit that job now just to focus on being a mum and also made my content creation and influencing a full-time job. So now I don't really know what a year's salary will be like because I haven't been doing it for a year.

But last month I did $3,000 of work. So I'm hoping that I can kind of keep that momentum. That's a lot of money to make from doing something that you love and that people have recognised that you're just good at, that's huge. Yeah, I just love it so much. I love it so much. And I think because it does kind of lend itself from the marketing arm and I am just, like, focusing on something that I love,

it's kind of bringing two things together. Yeah, and it kind of makes sense. When Tony read out that you were a marketing manager, I was like, of course she is. She knows all the tricks. Yeah, those guys are always really good at content. So it makes sense. It means that you've been training your whole life for this.

I have no doubt. I have. i've been training for this exactly exactly so what is your big money goal right now so money goal right now is kind of a big life update was to save a lot of money because i'm actually about to move overseas with my husband and my son for my husband's job so we're moving to canada oh my gosh so far away just down the road so far away so that was also kind of a push for me to have to work um for myself because how perfect that i'll need i know it's kind of i had no idea that i would end up earning any money from any of this so it's all just it's meant to be meant to be so

the money goal is just to um live off our savings um and the income that he has over there it's quite expensive obviously the process to get there yeah living there but then when we come back um we want to be able to buy a house um back here in queen in queensland on the gold coast so yeah that's kind of our long-term um next couple of years goal it's going to be a bit of a weather shock for you my friend you're going to go from sunny Queensland over to Canada where you actually have to wear snow boots on your way to work I know I'm not even taking like hardly any clothes because there's no point I'm just going to buy everything there yeah and just hope that I can adjust so do you currently invest yes we do we only started last year though I have been fortunate

enough that as much as I don't like talking about about finances which is so funny I'm on a finance podcast right now my mom is a financial planner oh my gosh is she actually she is actually but she's not my financial planner because I never want to talk about money so it's just so funny but and my brother works in options trading oh my gosh so you're all finance and you're like I'm still not listening to you i'll be your financial planner it's okay yeah basically i just oh well i i don't have one still so that would be excellent when you guys get back from canada hit me up and we can do it via zoom you can stay in queensland it's all good that would be absolutely perfect can you imagine if the way i got new clients was through the money diaries and i got your

money diaries and they're like mini interviews to be my client and then we got off the phone that's actually quite brilliant because then you know if we have a good fit together You think it would be a good fit? If you actually go working with a client, it would be. I think you and I, we're a dream team, I reckon. I think so as well. We're now pre-positioning her. Compliment each other perfectly.

We're going to get off the phone here and you're going to go. I'll definitely be hitting you up, don't worry. Yeah, it's all right. She's picking up what I'm putting down, Tony. Yeah, I think it's a done deal. Do you guys want me to leave? Yeah, if you could just leave, that would be great. We've got work to do.

I can't even remember what the question was now. Doesn't matter. Yeah, but we've learned that the money diarist's mum is actually a financial advisor. And she's got a financial advisor now, and it's you. It's you. You're my financial advisor. It's the circle of life.

Oh, I remember my brother, he worked in options anyway, so I hadn't invested into anything until last year. And it was because my brother, who basically was spending all day, every day looking at charts, was saying, if you're going to do it, you should do it now, like when COVID was happening. Yeah, smart man. And so, yes, so we had a lot of all of our savings because we weren't able to travel and we just had a baby and we were just kind of had all of our money in cash.

And so he convinced us to start investing them. So that's when we put money into like some specific companies and ETFs. Oh my gosh, that's so exciting for those of you playing along at home. What happened during COVID was a lot of markets crashed because they couldn't either be sustained or people were really, you know, a lot of fear was happening in the market at that point in time, which meant that the share market decreased in value. So, our money diarist, I'm assuming, has put some money in at a low point in the market, which is actually the time of most opportunity. And I'm assuming, money diarist, am I right when I say you've probably done pretty well over the last six months? I absolutely have, Victoria. you are on the money thank you thank you and she's witty i love it dream client dream client

all right we'll move away from investments and ask do you currently have any debts no okay we don't own a house no not yet um we not yet we plan to have that when we buy a house but we don't have any um credit card debt we're renting at the moment and we pay for our cars outright we yeah we pretty much always try to stick with the like living within our means so yeah no debt at the moment so that's a beautiful mentality and I think a lot of people are listening to it being like wow like I wish that was me have you ever been in debt no so what do you think stopped you from getting in debt like obviously growing up um you know we live in I would say the age of Instagram at the moment where you know everything is forced on us

and a lot of us feel like we should be spending more than we're earning how have you managed to slip through the cracks of not ever being in debt and having no consumer debt like what does that look like especially with a career on Instagram now as well yeah exactly career on Instagram you've got a husband yeah you've got a husband you've got a baby like what have you done I want to learn um so basically I think from when I was like at university and I was working like in retail and um I've always had a credit card so it's not that I don't have a credit card I do that because I want um the credit score and everything that comes associated to it and like being able to learn down to learn to pay off my debt but I think having a financial planner for

a mom just in the back of your head like drills down like budgeting and knowing what bills are going to be able to come in and how much you're going to be earning in that fortnight or that month and identifying the gap of how much money you have left over now I won't say I've always been the best saver like that money that was left over I love shopping love beauty of course and um so I'm big on spending that but I think the way the thing that drives me the most to never go into debt is I've always had goals financial goals of things that I'm saving for if I don't have that I tend to just like chuck money around everywhere without really thinking about it but I think just having the goals and always like working hard I've definitely increased my income

and along with that increased costs. But, yeah, just having goals kind of keeps me accountable and we've done a lot of travelling, so I've kind of just always had that in the back of my mind. Yeah, and do you think having a mum that was a financial advisor, regardless of whether, you know, you let her be your advisor, which in all honesty, I love my mum to death, but you best believe I would never let her be my financial advisor,

mainly because she's an autopsy technician. Do you reckon that's probably why? Probably. Anyway, so do you think that having a mum as a financial advisor set you up a little bit differently when it came to money, even though you probably weren't wanting financial advice from her? Yeah, I think so because I definitely don't have her as my financial advisor, same as you. I think I just want to keep those relationships separate. it um but i think just seeing her and how she has worked with mine she's a single mom my parents are separated and so i've always just kind of watched her with finances on the single income

and how to like we don't come from like a wealthy we're just like average kind of situation that a lot of australians would be in and so she's kind of had to be very good at budgeting and i think I'm the oldest child. I have a younger brother. So I've been aware of what, like, how far money can go and you really have to be careful with what you spend. Otherwise, you don't have money to live, I guess. Yeah, it's true.

It's kind of, yeah. Yeah, it's true. I feel like I'm just aware that you need money and, like, budgeting has just been always such a big part of our life. Yeah, and I guess it's important to point out that, you know, we don't create our own money stories but we are a product of our environment right like if we are being surrounded by people making good money decisions and having conversations around money it's very likely that you are too going to be making good money decisions because that's just

what you were taught and yeah around people who are in debt and you know see a credit card as just a tool to use you just grow up thinking all right well a credit card's great like I use credit card my parents use credit cards it's fine like it's not actually in your control but sometimes people grow up and they're like oh I didn't actually realize that my good money habits came from the fact that I was just surrounded by great money habits and a lot of people think that you learn it in your early 20s when in reality it's been ingrained in you since you were seven years old which is cool to think about but also so interesting to start asking other people hey where do you think that came from like why have you never been in debt despite the fact that

you're a millennial and you know, you've grown up in the same age as we have. How did, how did that work? And also the common misconception that good money habits come from being from a wealthy family. It's just not true. Absolutely not. And I've said this before, and I know we're not meant to be having the conversation now. I'm meant to be asking questions now, but haha, it's my podcast. I'll do what I want. It's interesting because some of my wealthiest clients are the ones that don't have the biggest incomes. They're the ones that have actually just been really consistent and really understanding of their budget and you know they understood the value of a dollar and whilst I can't say I've been their financial advisor you know from the very start because

they've been doing this for the past 40 50 years they've come to me and you can just see that consistency and see their history and see why they're in that position and they're not on six figure incomes they're on you know five figure really normal incomes that put them in a preferential space and I just think there's so much power to it and that's why I guess we're here. Me trying to share more stories i love that that's really nice well do you want to get to the other questions yeah sorry money tyrus we've really gotten off track we've gotten off track but i think it was a good derail but let's jump back on the train of questions the next question is what is your best money habit oh my best money habit i think um paying off the credit card um and looking through

my like bank account app like just to know where my money is going i think uh out of sight out of mind is definitely a problem for me and if I'm not looking at what I'm spending I go into this vortex of just spending spending spending and I that definitely happened has happened to me before and I've even had to go to my husband we share a bank account but he's never like come to me and be like why are you spending this but I have to go to him and be like can we like how we I called it money mondays and I was like oh my god cute do you want to do the content shades on the money moving forward oh my god I absolutely can I have all the time in the world moving to Canada yes money Mondays and that's when I sit down with him and we go to our bank app and which has all of our

accounts in it and our like trading and shares and blah blah blah and I'm like can we just go through it so that I can see it and understand every single thing that we're kind of spending and most of it's me spending, but it just makes me accountable. But that's okay. Who's aware of it? I think being accountable, I'm aware. I think that's my biggest thing is like I make an effort to be aware of what I'm spending and then I am much more conscious. And that's half the battle, right?

That's the one thing that we all bury our heads in the sand about. We don't want to just be faced with what we're spending and if you can jump that hurdle, you can jump any money hurdle. Yes, and because I am definitely an impulse spender and if no one checks me and I just go out and like all these brands are having details. You just get real tap happy. A hundred percent.

Like I knew our credit card number off by heart and my husband was like, that's a problem because why do you know our credit card number off by heart? She's a genius. She's just really good with numbers. Her mum's a financial advisor. Why don't you understand? If you need me to back you up, I've got you. Okay, thank you.

All right. And what is your worst money habit? Also, the fact that I am an impulse vendor. I think that sometimes I do find it hard to put, I know you have the rule of putting like 24 hours between yourself and a person. Yeah, I do believe I've heard that, yeah. Yes, I've heard that.

I try to implement it, but I don't always do that. it's harder and that's me in trouble yes definitely things are shiny and I need it like basically I really struggle to do that I go through weeks where I'm like I'm so good at this and I have like goals well it's just the same as like a diet like I feel like start off really well and then I fall off um but that's so true and most people do on budgets and that's why you just want to have some kind of life rules where you're trying to work towards them but do you know what it's okay if you sometimes fall off the bandwagon it's important if you definitely fall off yes so I probably fall off for a few weeks and then I work I like recognize myself and then I

go off and start again and so consistent and over time consistency it is everything like absolutely every every single week like it all it all does add up and when you see the result in your bank like it drives you and keeps motivating me yeah totally i want to keep this conversation going but we do have to take a quick break so we'll jump back into the questions in just a moment okay now we're back from the break tony i feel like we've got a golden opportunity here to ask some really heavy questions about how influencers get paid Because we see all over Instagram paid or, you know, paid sponsorship, that's why I said. But we don't often get to see how that happens, especially from someone who's just new to the industry.

Like, how do you crack into it? So, Money Diarist, how did you begin your influencer journey? Is that what we're going to call it? Oh, yeah. Influencer journey sounds accurate to me. So, it's quite interesting because I started my Instagram account last July, so 2020. it was during the pandemic I was on maternity leave with my little boy Charlie and I hadn't gone back to work yet so I was at home and I was really kind of struggling with

my identity like I was diagnosed with postpartum depression and so I was very aware that I like to work and i like to be doing things for myself as well and feeling like i'm being able to help other people and i developed perioral dermatitis um also while i was on maternity leave looking after my little boy which i was i had never had it before i didn't know what it was i thought it was like hormonal acne basically if you don't know what it is it's like all these red little dry bumps that go around your chin um up to your nose and even on the corners of your eyes and i i didn't even know i was at the doctor for charlie and i was like oh can you look at my face and they were like oh it's periola dermatitis i was like what is that never heard of it before

had to go away and do all my research and i changed all my skincare and i had never been part of the skincare community before getting periodontitis like that I have my own my personal social media I loved makeup but I was not spending a lot of time in that space yeah and I decided my Instagram page basically to share my journey after I was able to clear it and like what's that process look like just from a personal point of view not to like be a doctor to anyone but just say this is what I had yeah and it sounds like you're an educated woman sharing a journey and like that's something that you know if I was going through that that's exactly what I'd be looking for well that was it like when I had it I didn't know anyone else with it and I just felt so alone and

so I was like oh maybe this will help one at least one person and then just started sharing all of the skincare that I was enjoying and buying and because at that stage I was just I wasn't going paid for anything I was just showing things that I had in my house with my terrible photography back then because I didn't I didn't have those skills like I've been in marketing for 10 years so I can write but learning the Instagram world is completely like a whole new side that I've had to upskill myself and yeah brands were like could just tell that I had the authenticity and I wasn't filtered and basically everything was unedited and it was like a real person that was a mom going through skin issues and sharing things that were working for her and I guess that's

been a great thing for me because at the moment brands are looking exactly for people like me so yeah it's been really good how good is that and I feel like in 2021 you know Tony and I we have Instagram we're on it all the time and I just can see through brand campaigns that aren't exactly transparent I can see if it's not a wholesome you know really open conversation and I just it makes me it gives me what I call the ick like it just makes me go yeah like I can't be bothered like I just want to see real people doing real things and real reviews and you know I've stretched into that space now too and I'm really grateful for it it's a bit weird isn't it yeah but I say no to 99% of the stuff that comes through because it's just it's not honest it's

not authentic it's not what I want to do and you know I do accept like complementary products only if I'm already using them or only if I genuinely want to try them and one of my favorite skincare brands oh I felt like I'd made it like I'm obsessed with I don't know if you know aspect skincare but I post about them all the time and then because I was posting about them they sent me a couple of little prezzies and I was honestly I was so grateful for it so obviously I spoke about them but I feel like that makes me an influencer right Tony? I think so. Yeah thank you I was very grateful for it but just like you I'm a bit of a skincare fiend but I guess my question is how did it start for you? Did someone just slide into your DMs and offer you

some product or did you reach out to them or how does this how's it kick off? So for me I was posting specifically about my the products that helps my period dermatitis and so I was using Mugu biology skincare and ultraviolet and I think that the brands just saw me tagging them and like kind of responding to them in like their dms and eventually like biology reached out to me and they said that they would be happy to send me some products and a discount code to be able to use with my audience and so I was so I wasn't getting paid but I it was like a test I guess like to see if my audience was truly engaged and so we did that for six weeks and they had 47 unique code redemption follow me I had 400 followers at this time I was a baby oh my gosh that conversion

that's cool you're a marketer's dream and what we care about here like obviously we have an Instagram account and whenever we talk to brands they always ask what our engagement rate is yours must be massive it is quite a good conversion and I ended up working with them for four and a half months and I did 278 conversions in that time and over $20,000 in sales for them on my account. So good. I bet they're stoked with you. So to move a little bit away from the influencer stuff for a minute,

how have you budgeted to move to Canada? How's that going to work, especially, you know, you said before that your husband is still studying and you're moving for that. How's that all going? uh so basically we're budgeted that we will be using most of our savings we did make initial an initial spreadsheet kind of with um all the tasks that we had to do in order to move and the rough cost of what we thought that would be and we've kind of just been ticking through

our to-do list so and then we've just created like a buffer amount in our savings that we are not touching, that we're just using for our time over in Canada because until we get his salary over there, which is much lower than it is in Australia being a training program, we won't have the income that we have here. I've quit my job. As I said, I was earning quite a bit of money and now the money that I'll be earning from my content and influencing will really become a discretionary income at that point. an opportunity to do more fun things while we're over there what was the number you guys came up

with to save that you would need to move over if you don't mind me asking um we said that we wanted to save a hundred thousand dollars whoa that is much more than i thought you were gonna say but what what does that comprise of how did you come up with that budget because it kind of makes sense given you're moving over there for your husband's training program which i'm assuming you know he's not going to be earning that much you have a young child there's a lot to pay for yes so we do have a young child who um we do want to go to child care kindy over there two days a week i'll be at home and yes i'll be doing content work but he adores going to kindy and the socialization and what he's been learning so i definitely want to continue that

for some kind of normalcy while we're over there and we don't get any subsidies so we need to have a lot of money for that oh my gosh rent over there is yes rent over there is um somewhere between three to four thousand dollars a month for a two-bedroom apartment yeah um and then we also needed money for like flights for visas we had to get charlie like a passport we have um like all of our storage costs because we are coming back after a year so we're paying for everything to be in storage um we want to be able to travel and it might just be within canada but we want to be able to have money to do holidays while we're over there yeah absolutely and then we enjoy actually being there yeah yeah and the thing is that it might sound

like a lot of money a hundred thousand dollars but that is money also that is enough for when we come back that i won't have a job besides content and we'll have to buy a car planned that far ahead like that makes so much sense yeah it plans not only for the next year but the year after that so really it's a two-year plan and then after that we have zero dollars so I don't ever want to be down at zero I'm sure with the amount of planning you do you're not going to get down to zero you definitely sound like you know what you're on about but I also think it's really important yeah and I also think it's really important to point out that this isn't like you being 21 moving overseas for a couple of years to you know find your feet and you know find out who

you are you actually have a young family you've got a husband who's just finished this epic study and going to do a year of residency which is you know going to turbocharge his career hopefully so it's kind of like an investment into your own future and that's why I'm so pervy on people's savings goals because you know Tony if you'd said hey we're going to talk to someone today who's saved $100,000. I'd be like, is it for a house deposit? Yeah, well, that's what people save for now. It's kind of like, oh, well, you can't do anything that isn't saving for a house until you save for a house. That has to be your first tick box. But I really like the way that you just put that V like that it's an investment into your family and your future because I think people

so often see investment as purely dollars and cents when an investment can be so much more. you're investing into your relationship your memories for your son you know all of these things that you're just not gonna get in any other situation like yeah you could buy a house right now but oh my god you're going on this amazing adventure yeah and I think that investment is so much more right like we invest in everything and as you said before it's memories like it's also like mental health like that's to make sure that you know you don't go crazy cooped up in another country away from your family and friends and yeah you know your son still gets to go to kindy and have a really good time and yeah I just love that you've taken so much time and thought to put into

it because yeah I was a bit shocked when you said a hundred thousand dollars but that's such a long game that makes sense yeah it's a long game yeah and also I am yeah I'm 30 and we're both in our 30s and we have a young family and I'm sure we could do it like a lot cheaper but I am at a point in my life, I'm like, I want to live as if I was living here. And so, yeah, I know it's a lot of money and it won't all be spent while we're over there, but that's everything. That's how emergency money, that's everything. And hopefully your influencer work picks up and, you know,

you're able to actually just fund the rent each month because three grand coming in, that's your rent covered, my friend. Yeah, well, I've already had brands reach out to me to send me stuff in my Canadian address. Oh, my gosh. What? That's so exciting. So I'm already forward working at the moment.

Like I have an address where they're sending stuff to already. She's a hustler. I love it. I'm going to have the creepiest stalk of you when we're all done. But for those of you following along who also want to find our money diarist, are you willing to share the deets? Yes. You can find me on Instagram.

My handle is Amanda's Cute Face. Amanda's Cute Face? Yes. Oh, I love that. that's so sweet. I'm going to go follow you now. I'm very excited to see your content. And to be honest, I kind of feel like we're discovering someone before they're popular. So if we all go follow her, we can be like, yeah, well, we were following her when she had the next followers. Amanda, we followed her when she lived in Australia.

She wasn't even verified when I started following her. That's what we're all going to say. Anyway, I think we're done here. Are we done here, Money Diarist? Yes. I'm very happy with the conversation. All right. All right. Let's go. I think we've got a million things to do and we will not keep you any longer but thank you so much for joining us we really really appreciate it thank you for having me and as always just before we head off we'd like to acknowledge and pay respect to Australia's Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander peoples they're the traditional custodians of the lands the waterways and the skies all across Australia we thank you for sharing and for

caring for the land on which we are able to learn we pay our respects to elders past and present and we share our friendship and our kindness. The advice shared on She's on the Money is general in nature and does not consider your individual circumstances. She's on the Money exists purely for educational purposes and should not be relied upon to make an investment or financial decision. And we promise Victoria Devine is an authorised representative of Australia Pacific Funds Management Proprietary Limited, ABN 34132463257, AFSL 339151. And don't forget, You can always join the conversation with the She's On The Money team literally at any time of the day or night at She's On The Money AUS on literally all social media platforms. We're everywhere.

We're literally all over the internet. We're spreading our tentacles through the internet. We are spammy and we love it. No, we're not spammy. We just talk about educational stuff. And we just push it passionately. We're very excited people. We'll see you next week, guys.