Yoyo Zhang, a 20-year-old University of Chicago computer science student, turned down a six-figure tech internship to pursue content creation. She missed her 10,000-follower goal, sitting at around 1,000, but is doubling down on business and startup content aimed at Gen Z technical founders.
I turned down a 6-figure tech internship to work on social media this summer, and I failed. I had a goal of hitting 10,000 followers by the end of the summer. Now we have about a month left, and I just hit 1,000. I'm very, very grateful for all 1,000 of you, so I wanted to take this opportunity to show you what it's really like behind the scenes, because I think people can make social media seem a lot easier than it actually is because you only see the winners. In reality, there's hundreds of thousands of people who have been grinding every single for months and months and months to see no results. Yes, I could have taken the easy route to ragebait people or use viral hooks or focus on my viral skits. I've had a few videos gone viral and I understand the algorithm, but that's not the point of my platform. I want to build a platform to talk about business, how I made 6 figures at 18 years old. I want to talk about startups from the perspective of a Gen Z technical founder. I want to talk about educational content. I want to talk about building a personal brand, how I got 10,000 followers on LinkedIn in 6 months. It's going to take me time to figure out my voice and deliver true value. Do I have confidence in myself still? Yes. Am I gonna stop doing this? Absolutely not. I'm gonna do the exact opposite. I'm going to double down because I found that I actually really enjoy this. I've spent every single day for the past 2 months planning, executing, filming, editing, researching, and a lot of times it can seem like all that is going to waste, but I know that my vision is going to come true. Like, I just know that I'm going to hit my Cambria moment very, very soon. And 99% of people are going to give up at this exact moment, but that is not me. So yeah, if you're new here, my name is Yoyo Zhang. I just turned 20 years old. I am still in college. I'm studying computer science and economics at the University of Chicago. I talk about startup, tech, business, personal branding. So if you're interested in that, please follow along, and I promise that you will not be making the wrong bet.
