If you’ve turned on your phone today, you’ll have seen that Love Island’s Molly Mae Hague has given away £8,000 of gifts on Instagram in celebration of hitting 1 million YouTube subscribers.
Molly - who is still with Tommy Fury, who she met on Love Island- was keen to emphasise the message ‘NO SPONSORS ALL FROM ME!’ with many of her followers marvelling at her generosity. But, after some cunning internet maths, it’s clear that the person who stands to win the most from this giveaway is Molly Mae, with us estimating that the growth she’s seen could stand to boost her earning by tens of thousands a month.
The giveaway - where you have to follow a number of accounts, like some posts, tag friends and also, I don’t know, pledge your first born’s name or something (jk!) - is a commonly used tactic by influencers looking to boost their following and engagement levels. But this giveaway seems to have gone wild on the internet.
Molly's giveaway mostly consists of a load of Louis Vuitton, a iPad, an Apple Watch, a laptop and some of her tan range. A GOOD HAUL.
READ MORE: The Internet Is Obsessed With Molly-Mae Hague's £8,000 Giveaway
So far the post from Wednesday night (at the time of writing) has received almost 850,000 likes and 1.2million comments, which is obviously a big boost to Molly’s engagement levels. So that’s the first win to note.
When brands decide how much to pay an influencer, engagement levels are key, not just followers. Most influencers will have a figure they say to brands that is their engagement rate – a percentage. It means, how many people actually engage with the posts they put out. To put it another way, it’s a way of checking accounts aren’t just followed by fake users and brands will actually get sales from posts.
Influencer Marketing Hubsuggests Molly’s engagement rate is around 8%, which, means per 100 followers, eight followers interact/engage with her posts on average. Multiply by millions – and that’s the big bucks.
Then there's followers. In creating such a high-profile challenge, in just the 18 hours since the post was created, it appears that Molly has, just today, increased her following by more than 105,000 people.
Crunch that with her engagement and it means that already 12,500 more people are being ‘influenced’ by Molly’s Instagram today than yesterday. Those people are potential buyers that brands want to target.
It’s previously been claimed Molly earns between £8,000 and £11,000 per post – and makes an incredible £399,000 per month from sponsored posts – this was earlier in the year.
Crudely, just overnight, Molly’s increased following may have seen her be able to charge almost £1,000 more per sponsored post. That’s because, as a starting point, marketers look to pay people around $0.01 per follower. For and extra 105,000 followers, you’re looking at $1,050 (£809.69). And that’s only per post. And that's only a rough estimate.
Oh, and the giveaway is continuing until midnight on September 20…
And it’s not just sponsored posts that bring in the cash for influencers. More followers means more deals. So, for instance, it’s reported Molly's already pocketed £500,000 for her Pretty Little Thing range – what will come her way now?
She also has her own fake tan range – how many more eyes on her Instagram account will she get, and how many more sales will she make thanks to that increased influence and follower account?
And that’s not even to mention the original celebration for the YouTube channel – 1 million subscribers means more money from brands, pre-roll ads money… and that following will now be growing thanks to the increased publicity around her post.
Molly's net worth is estimated to be around £800,000 currently. She has previously admitted going on the show was a 'business decision'saying: 'Yeah I guess it kind of was a business move,' she said, winking at the camera. 'I went on there not really bothered if I found love or not, I found love... When you're not looking for something you find it. Out of all the girls, I was really chilled like: "If it happens it happens, if it doesn't it doesn't, either way it'll be a fun experience".'
So, look, it’s fair to say there stands to be two winners. The person who wins the Molly Mae’s haul – and Molly Mae herself. But, £8,000 of stuff kinda looks like a good investment now, right?