A Snapchat influencer who’s made over $1 million since November explains her 3 main posting strategies

Sarah Callahan spends much of her day on Snapchat. 

The actress, model, and fitness influencer aims to post a new video on the app every five minutes. 

“I have a timer and I’m posting video after video,” she said. “My whole entire day I just post Spotlights. It’d be stupid of me not too.”

Why? She’s made over $1 million from it.

Callahan joined Snapchat a year ago, building an audience of around 700,000 subscribers by posting dance and fitness videos and comedic skits. She was hired by Snapchat to promote its augmented reality lenses last year. But the app didn’t become an all-consuming part of her life until the company released its TikTok copycat feature, Spotlight, in November. Snap announced it would pay out a total of $1 million a day to creators who submitted videos for its new short-video discovery page. 

“You don’t really know at first financially what is going to come of it,” Callahan said. “After a month of posting, I got my first notification about how much I had earned and it was six figures. I was like, ‘Holy cow this is insane and real.'”

Callahan has since earned over $1 million in payouts from Spotlight. Insider verified her earnings through documentation provided by Callahan. She’s part of a new class of Snapchat millionaires who have seen huge payouts from Spotlight. In the first six weeks after Spotlight’s release, Snap said it had dished out $42 million to over 2,000 users (Snap has 265 million daily active users and 100 million monthly active Spotlight users).

Like other creators who have made it big on the app, Callahan knows it may not last. The company only committed to making payments through the end of 2020, though a Snap representative told Insider they expect payouts to continue for the foreseeable future. Callahan is uploading videos at a blistering speed to make sure she takes advantage of the opportunity.

“My biggest week was over $300,000, and there’s been a couple weeks after that that have been [about] that high,” she said. 

Snapchat creator Sarah Callahan “Sarati” visited Snap’s offices last year. Sarah Callahan A winning Spotlight strategy

Callahan shared three main tips for what’s worked for her when uploading videos for Spotlight. 

1. Post as often as you can.

Snapchat allows creators to upload new videos for Spotlight every five minutes. Callahan said she uses a timer to try to maintain that posting cadence throughout the day (though she’s committed to getting eight hours of sleep each night). 

“I’ll go though a ton of content that I’ve had over the years,” she said. “Once I start realizing I’ve posted everything that I have, I’ll just start filming a ton of more footage or I’ll film it in a new way so it’s not just recycled content.”

Callahan’s videos tend to focus on fitness, dancing, or comedic skits featuring her husband and dog. She said she was advised to post daily on the app by a Snapchat representative who she was assigned a year ago. 

“It’s important for your following to know that you’re constantly in their face even if it is just you in a selfie with your dog,” she said. “It’s a game and it’s a business and when you’re not constantly on it, then people forget you exist.”

2. Use popular sounds in videos.

Snapchat recently added a new “sound” feature that allows creators to add songs to videos. 

“I’ll use four or five of the same sounds I’ve heard a ton [on Spotlight],” Callahan said. “When they see the video and hear the sound, hopefully they’ll stay on it longer.”

3. Add attention-grabbing text to posts.

“I always put words on the video that would catch people’s attention like ‘This is crazy’ or ‘Oh my gosh, wait for it’ to make people watch fully through,” Callahan said.

A quick perusal of Callahan’s recent videos highlights this strategy. “Wait for the ending!” she wrote on a video she uploaded of her hair being styled. 

What you do next after becoming a Snapchat millionaire

While Snapchat is eating much of Callahan’s social-media time each day, the 25-year-old creator also posts regularly on other apps under the username “Sarati.”

She has over nine million followers on TikTok and a few hundred thousand fans on Instagram. She gets paid by brands like Celsius to run sponsored posts, and also pursues acting and modeling gigs (she previously held case number 12 on the NBC game show “Deal or No Deal”).

“I’m going to be launching a fitness app and starting something with my life that’s not just all about making content and posting content all day because it does get a little exhausting,” Callahan said. “With this money, I’m really trying to be smart about how I go from here.”