Elyse Myers on Why Making ‘Something Cool’ Is Better Than Going Viral

This post was created as part of an ADWEEK House content agreement.

Elyse Myers, a content creator with over 7.1 million followers on TikTok, has worked with major brands like Audible and Geico. During an ADWEEK House: Austin session, Myers sat down with Zoe Ruderman, chief content officer at ADWEEK, to discuss her experiences working with brands, why she values trust in her partnerships, and her thoughts on why going viral is overrated.

Authenticity—with boundaries

Like all content creators, Myers was once anonymous. But rather than curate her persona to a certain audience, she leaned into her authentic voice. One of her first videos was her simply telling the story of how she went on a date with a guy who made her buy 100 Taco Bell tacos. It has over 3.3 million views.

“I’m really passionate about being very honest in my relationships with people, and I never considered that that would be weird to do online,” Myers said. “It was an unconscious decision that I have consciously decided to continue.”

However, as a mother, Myers has also set strict boundaries around her personal life. She has a house that she creates content in that’s separate from where she lives, and she won’t feature her kids. This can be challenging for brands that target parents or moms. But Myers refuses to budge.

“When you have a very specific goal and a specific vision of how you want to show up, and you know that that’s a strong value of yours, it’s really easy to make decisions within that,” she said.

A metric for picking brands

Myers prioritizes creative control when partnering with brands and isn’t afraid to say “no” if she doesn’t have that. It’s important to her because, at the end of the day, she wants to be proud of what she makes, whether it be for herself or with a brand. And her metric is simply if she wants to share her work with her husband, Jonas.

“Jonas knows when I’m proud of what I do,” she said. “I’m always going to come home and be like, ‘Can I show you something cool?’”

Myers said trust in her creative voice allows the campaigns to be as successful as they are. She mentioned Audible as a brand that gives her the trust she needs.

“There’s really nothing I could say that they would be like, ‘no,’” she said. “There’s just trust. High trust breeds high creativity and great results.”

Virality is overrated

Myers believes in herself as an “endless well of creativity” and she focuses on that instead of “chasing viral trends.” She said that aiming for a viral video is a reactive way to be a creator and build a brand.

“If you’re waiting for all your content to go viral, you’re actually missing so much because that’s one video,” she said. “In the grand scheme of things, 3 million people on one video is nothing compared to 10 videos that perform consistently very well because they’re good.”

Consistency is another value for Myers, and when she was starting out, she would post every single morning at the same time. This meant her audience was never wondering when her next video would come.

“That kind of consistency is really, really good for a brand,” she said. “The virality of a video is kind of irrelevant. That doesn’t change what you should make. You should just be really proud of what you’re making.”