Why I won't make it as an influencer

Influencers killed the game: The case of Aliexpress

Fearing criticism is fearing progress!

Benjamin Franklin once said, " Any fool can criticize, condemn and complain and most fool do". Well, this has never felt so true these days as I faced my first critics on Instagram.

 I was really surprised as I am not a  big "influencer". I don't have many followers. I don't spend my time selling products. I don't do this for living. I don't seek followers (not now).  Being mentioned in any way even if it's in a "bad way" is quite positive at some point. Somebody cared enough or (had time to waste) to write a "negative comment" on your posts. And when you start, what do you really need? Being noticed, of course. 

On the other hand, you feel disappointed. Why did you feel the need to come up with "questionable comments" on my posts when you're not one of my followers???? I am not even an influencer....What are your real motivations? The problem with criticism is that if it is constructive, this helps you to progress. If it's not, this is just a waste of time. As I am quite a positive person, I don't think that those comments were made in a malicious way. I hope not so. 

To tell the whole story, I had a promo code from the jewelry brand "Freyatreasures" and someone put a comment about the fact that jewelry from Freayatreasures are bought from Aliexpress...Let's check it out by yourself below:

To be honest, I love promo codes. I sometimes just follow some influencers to get promo codes from brands that have items I want to buy from. This is good for everyone. You have an eye on item you want to buy and thanks to a promo code, you get it at a reduced price. The brand sells and the influencer gets paid with a percentage on purchases. What's wrong with that? 

I know many influencers spend their time selling any kind of products they don't use or wear with promo codes but it's up to you to choose whether you want to buy them or not. I am well-educated so I buy only what I want to buy and I am not influenced by influencers online. If you're very young, it can be problematic. But if so, your parents are supposed to be educated for you. 

I am also aware that some influencers have launched some eponym brands selling the fact that they had exclusively created items for their brands while they were just buying items from suppliers...Or buying a large number of products from Aliexpress to resell them. I won't give names. We all know who they are. By acting this way, they shaded the entire business. Every time a brand sells an item you can find on Aliexpress, people tend to think that this brand buys its items from Aliexpress. Guys, please, be smart. 

What is Aliexpress? Aliexpress is an e-commerce website based in China that allows international shoppers to purchase items from wholesale retailers. That says it all. There are many reasons why you can find items from a brand on Aliexpress. As my critics were about jewelry, I will especially focus on this field. I also need to specify that I used to work in this field as well. 

First, if a jewelry brand sells common items with Aliexpress, it might be because they share the same wholesale retailers (for common quality items). In the jewelry sector, there are two ways to "get" your products. The first one and the most common one is "picking" which means that the brand selects and buys items on a catalog made by a wholesale retailer. You will be surprised to know that most of the popular jewelry brands use this method, especially the trendy ones with thousands of followers...The second one is creating. To create jewelry, you need to hire a jewelry designer that knows how to use some particular computer software to design jewelry pieces. After designing, you need to find the perfect suppliers to produce your designed pieces. That's why the second method is less chosen. If they share the same wholesale retailers and quality items, why do they sell at different prices? Well, Aliexpress is based in China which implies fewer taxes, lower labor costs, no physical costs as an e-commerce website, no or few marketing or communication costs...

Second, in the industry, there are two ways to make a profit, Profit per piece, or per volume. With its selling prices, Aliexpress is probably making its profit per volume which means that it has to sell lots of products to make a profit. The margin it gets on each product is too low due to the low prices. So the more it sells, the more it makes a profit. That certainly explains why Aliexpress tends to copy items from other brands too. If another brand is selling an item, it probably means that this item is wanted. Offering a perfect dupe of this item to its online customers insures Aliexpress that this item is wanted and will be sold (out). Usually, a dupe is made with cheaper materials. In the jewelry sector, you can have the same item made with different materials and this makes a big change in terms of pricing, longevity, and caring. That's simple. That's business. 

Third, this is less profitable for an established brand to buy items from Aliexpress. The more you have intermediaries, the lower will be your margin. You'd better buy directly from the wholesale retailer. As a brand, you are allowed to, when simple customers like you and me are not. That may explain why some influencers buy their stuff from Aliexpress. They are not registered as an established jewelry brand to be allowed to buy directly from wholesale retailers. In fact, when you're established as a jewelry brand or a jewelry professional, you own a card or a document that will be asked every time you will have to buy directly from any wholesale retailer. 

So this is it. This is my full answer to my first critics. Next time guys you have something to say, to criticize make sure that your critics are valuable. Valuable means that you actually have arguments to support and defend your point of view. Just make sure you did your homework. Don't get fooled by assumptions. Assumptions never make the truth. Otherwise, your critics are just pointless. And if your critics are pointless, they don't lead to any type of progress. 

The power of pointless critics

Now I wonder if I should renew my collaboration with this brand. They asked me to collaborate again with them. If at first, I have accepted, it was because, I liked their stuff, the mood of the brand. Trust me I had so many new and "small" brands asking me to collaborate with them and I haven't accepted except this one. But now, as my goal is to get people to notice the work I put on my posts and not on the brands I collab with, I am lost. I am not sure if it's a great idea to do any collaboration for now. I just don't want people to put shade on my "hobby", "work" because of a brand. The saddest part for me is that I planned to give to charity the money, if so, I would have made from my promo codes. It's not that I have been affected by these critics. It's that I don't want these critics to affect my work on Instagram. I don't want to turn into a brand PR agent to explain how they work, what they do, and why they do it that way. Come on I haven't signed for that. I don't have time for that. I am not a fulltime influencer neither an influencer at all. For now, I would love to hear critics about my posts so I could improve myself.