The beauty businesswoman and vlogging superstar discusses her issues with diversity, confidence online and the importance of bloggers
Photography: Amanda Jackson / Beauty: Kate Pope
If you have yet to have come across the social media powerhouse that is Chanel Ambrose, let us introduce you.
The content creator not only shares confidence-building and inspiring videos on her YouTube channel, but is also the Creative Director behind Amby Rose, a beauty and cosmetics line that specialises in affordable yet unique brushes, lashes and liquid lipsticks.
It’s not hard to understand the 29-year-old’s appeal – the chatty tone to her videos makes her easy to listen to and her confidence in talking about difficult issues within the blogging and beauty industry is refreshing when others often hold their tongues for fear of scaring off potential sponsors.
In fact, it was after watching her video about the lack of diversity and representation within brand campaigns (DOES REPRESENTATION MATTER?) that we decided we just had to sit down with her and ask about her views on the brand campaigns that now celebrate influencers and why there’s still a lot more that they could be doing in terms of diversity.
“Some brands are choosing a select few [bloggers and vloggers] to work with when there is a range of people that they could reach out to.
“I don’t think it is something to do with our numbers being lower because I have blatantly seen people who are lower than me, subscribership-wise and viewership-wise, get amazing opportunities in comparison to me. So it makes you think, ‘what is the reason? What’s the excuse?’,” Chanel says.
“I’m not going to throw the race card but it’s still unfair because they’re neglecting a potential audience, my audience. Diversity is not just colour, or religion, it’s literally something new each time.
“Everyone and anyone uses social media now, so brands may need to re-assess their marketing strategies and really find out where the people they want to reach are and how they can reach them.”
Chanel wrote her first blog post six years ago, at a time when the online world was vastly different from now, and most people were far more focused on blogging ‘for the fun of it’ rather than for the brand opportunities and sponsorship deals.
She argues that the blogging community felt far more equal when she began writing her own blog, and that as the business side of blogging has developed, diversity has actually become more of an issue.
“It felt very equal because when I started blogging and started YouTube it was the first era of it, almost like the first generation of YouTubers, so it felt kind of equal and everybody was engaged with one another,” she explains.
“It was mostly people just creating content because it was a hobby and, to be honest with you, we were just doing so much free advertising. A lot of us [YouTubers and bloggers] were pretty much putting out, ‘Oh my god, I love this brand’s product and, you know, get it guys because it’s amazing, I love it, it’s what makes my hair so straight!’ And that brand was probably making so much money out of it!”
Of course, her understanding of how to market products to an online generation and the value of social media influencers is not surprising when you consider the years she has put into building up her own channels and launching her own line of cosmetics.
Interestingly, it was her background in makeup artistry that originally pushed her into creating content for YouTube. Unhappy with the traditional route of becoming an established makeup artist, she took her work online and quickly built her own, loyal fan base.
“I was a makeup artist, and after working on a Benefit Cosmetics counter I went freelance. I worked within the fashion industry, doing beauty for editorials, I did all of that and left it because I didn’t like how the industry was. It was very selective and honestly very catty and bitchy,” Chanel says.
“I thought ‘You know what, I’m a makeup artist, let me do it on YouTube on other dark skinned models’. Kind of like Pixiwoo and Lisa Eldridge. People actually began calling me the black Lisa Eldridge!”
While her beauty videos were initially popular, Chanel began exploring different types of content when people lost interest and she found her niche as a plus-sized YouTuber, creating a mix of fashion and lifestyle content for her viewers.
“I stopped doing makeup videos because I felt that people weren’t really interested anymore. So I started plus-sized fashion and that became a massive niche for me because there really were no other plus-sized YouTubers in the UK. If there were, you could barely find them. I already had the platform and the following and I had gained confidence online at that point, so I started doing fashion and lifestyle content instead.”
She may appear confident in her videos, but this isn’t something that Chanel feels is crucial to success online. In fact, she believes creating content can be the perfect way to build confidence.
“I think if anything, if you’re someone who lacks confidence, this is a great way to build your confidence. I wouldn’t necessarily wait until I felt confident before I start talking or I start using my voice online to share what I love and what I like,” she explains.
Building an audience online is far trickier now than it ever has been before, and you only have to skim read your Twitter feed to see the endless complaints about Instagram bots and declining blog readerships. While some of us may like to think fixing the problem is as simple as bloggers being more supportive of each other’s content, Chanel doesn’t think this is a realistic ambition.
“It would be nice if we could hold hands and work together and collaborate because I honestly think a big answer to growth is to work together. But, I have to be realistic about other bloggers, and I’m speaking about other bloggers because personally I’m open to collaboration,” she says.
“However, I’ve never been given the opportunity to collaborate with others and when I have approached people I’ve been ignored. I guess most bloggers just want to stay on their own path, and do their own thing. You can’t force somebody to collaborate with, or even offer their support, to you.”
Now that her online presence is established, Chanel has ambitions to break into the world of traditional media, and wants to try her hand at TV presenting. She believes that while print journalists may not respect bloggers and vloggers now, they soon will realise their worth and how much they need them to stay relevant.
“I think a couple of years ago it must have been ‘Blogger, what the hell is that?!’ and even when you look at the fashion industry now I know magazines like Vogue [US] pretty much hate us bloggers. But I guarantee you, in about a year or two, they’re going to be wanting bloggers to create more content for Vogue.
“I remember there was one editor of a fashion magazine who used to actually despise me because I was a blogger.
“She wanted me to be the beauty editor for her magazine and she told me to make the choice: do you want to work in high fashion? Or do you want to be a blogger? And I was like ‘I’ll bloody be a blogger! I can have my voice whenever I want and I can connect to a community of people on my own platform’.
“And I think that’s much better, rather than the fashion world where it’s all just fake. In years to come they’ll probably think, ‘Oh, bloody hell we need these bloggers because they’re everything right now’. So I’m very optimistic about that.”