By Asenath Were
While social media is mostly seen as a place for entertainment by most, some view it as a source of income, so they go there not only to entertain themselves or to get entertained but also to make money out of it.
Esther Birungi is a social media influencer doing digital marketing for various brands, an activist for girl children and women’s affairs, and a lawyer who is one of the many who saw social media as a source of income rather than just entertainment.
“I earn off social media through digital literacy; for example, I work with several organizations to put out information about rights and equality,.” Birungi said.
Birungi also said that she earns from other businesses, like communications companies, restaurants, book stores, and so on, that bring their products in for marketing or exposure. Not only that, but Birungi also hosts online spaces (Zoom, etc.) and thus gets paid.
According to Birungi, in 2020, during COVID-19, people were idols and did not have much they were doing, hence spending more time on social media because they were not working and the only source of happiness was through social media.
“That’s when it actually hit me that, yeah, you have this platform, but you can actually start making money out of it.” Birungi said.
Birungi said that at that time, she started approaching different companies and selling her ideas to them. Fortunately, the heavens were on her side, and it turned out well. She got partnerships from different people and kept growing.
Birungi said that her parents did not initially support her decision to become an influencer, especially a social media influencer. According to her, due to the age gap between parents and their children, her parents did not fully understand what this whole social media thing was about.
“We have to acknowledge the fact that there is an age gap between us and our parents, so sometimes the things that we think are not the things that they think, because there is a gap in technology between our generation and their generation, so they did not understand what was happening.” She said.
Birungi said that at some point, her parents asked her to get off social media due to the bullying, but with time, they came to terms with it, they started seeing the advantages, she grew strong, and as of now, they are really supportive of the work she does.
However, this does not mean she does not get challenged. To her, social media is not for the faint of heart because, as you grow a presence online, it comes with a lot of disadvantages, some of which include cyberbullying, which, according to Birungi, is her greatest challenge.
“Sometimes people are very opinionated and do not agree with what you are saying, so they are going to harass and abuse you.” She said.
Birungi says there is no protocol to becoming an influencer; rather, she advises anyone wanting to take on this path to be mindful with whatever they post because people will judge you according to what you post.
“If you want to end up as an influencer and you want to end up working with major companies, they are going to have a media check on you, and all the things that you posted will reflect on you, so you have to really be careful because companies do not want to associate with people playing around online.” Birungi said.
However, according to her, that does not mean you should not have fun on social media because it was created for fun as well, and if you are too serious, your audience will get bored, hence the need to strike a balance between the two.
She advises anyone who would want to make money off social media to do so because it is not something that requires you to be qualified academically.
“Therefore, in a country like Uganda where employment is very low, the digital space is something you can easily tap into and earn a living from.” Birungi said
Birungi went to Mengo Senior School, where she completed her high school education, and then proceeded on to Uganda Christian University, where she attained a Bachelor of Laws.
