I'm 19, and I've tried a bunch of different side hustles.
I've tested dropshipping, affiliate marketing, flipping, and a few other things, but the one that's consistently made me the most money has been UGC.

I started about 9 months ago, and since then I've earned around $17k creating UGC for brands. Over the last 6 months, the content I've created has generated more than 10M views across different campaigns.

I've also had the chance to create UGC for well-known apps like Picsart and Suno, along with a number of other startups and consumer apps. I'm definitely still learning every day, but after working with a lot of brands, these are the biggest mistakes I keep seeing new creators make.

1. Don't start in the most saturated niche

Almost everyone starts with beauty, skincare, or makeup because that's what they see all over Instagram and TikTok.
Yes, those brands spend a lot on ads, but they're also getting hundreds of creator pitches every week and If you're just starting, there are more other niches with much less competition where it's easier to land your first clients.

2. Stop charging beginner prices forever

Charging $50-$80 for your first few videos is completely fine bc you need a portfolio, testimonials, and experience.
But once you've worked with 5-10 clients and have results to show, your prices should increase too. A lot of creators never make that jump.

3. Negotiate performance-based bonuses

This is probably the biggest mistake I see.

If you create an ad for an app and it's still generating revenue for the company six months later, why should you only get paid once?

Whenever it makes sense, negotiate bonuses tied to performance, based on views or clic, anyway, if your content keeps making them money, you should benefit too.

4. Learn how to communicate

The highest-paid UGC creators usually understand advertising and they know why certain hooks improve retention, why one CTA converts better than another, and what makes people click, buy, or install.
Learning paid ads and consumer psychology has helped me a lot (Just go deep one week watching every YT video)

5. Show KPIs in your portfolio

Brands want proof that your content performs, o if you can show that one of your videos improved CTR, lowered CPA, generated installs, increased ROAS, or became a winning creative, that's what gets clients.

6. Apps are one of the biggest opportunities right now

Everyone wants to work with beauty brands but I personally think apps are one of the best markets in 2026.

These companies spend huge budgets on paid acquisition, which means they constantly need fresh creatives to test.

There are also far fewer creators specializing in app UGC compared to beauty or skincare, so there's less competition and often much bigger budgets.

One campaign with an app alone ended up paying me around $5k, and if I were starting from zero today that's where I'd focus.

Extra tip:

My first videos weren't great and I still cringe when I look back at them, but you get better by making content, getting feedback, and improving with every project.
Every creator you look up to started with zero clients and a terrible portfolio.

If anyone wants to see some of my work, I've been updating my portfolio here:
https://app.sideshift.app/portfolio/BIAaWzsrg3PDR5xcu9Lvy3Y7o4F3

I run a brand on Shopify selling premium silk sleep products, just a few core products like silk pillowcases and sleep masks and some upsell.

Almost all of our sales coming from Meta Ads.

Instead of increasing the budget or launching another campaign, we decided to run a full diagnostic of the ad account using Adwize that analyzes campaigns and highlights the biggest bottlenecks based on your account data.

Some of the suggestions confirmed things we already suspected, while others pointed out issues we hadn't really considered at all.

Over the following three weeks, we implemented most of those recommendations without touching the daily ad budget

1. We stopped optimizing for CTR and started optimizing for contribution margin

For a long time we judged creatives almost entirely by CTR and CPC.

Some of our cheapest clicks consistently produced low-quality traffic, while a few creatives with a noticeably higher CPC were responsible for most of our profitable orders.

We stopped turning off ads just because they looked expensive and started looking at what they generated. That alone changed how we evaluated every new creative

2. We reduced friction throughout the buying journey

Instead of trying to increase desire, we focused on removing reasons not to buy. We shortened the page, moved the strongest social proof much higher, simplified the product options and made shipping, returns and delivery times immediately visible. None of those changes dramatically increased conversion individually, but together they reduced abandonment across the funnel.

3. We improved the quality of traffic instead of chasing more traffic

The budget stayed at roughly €60/day, but we stopped making frequent edits to the account. The campaigns had enough time to stabilize and Meta gradually became more selective with who it was showing ads to. The number of visitors didn't explode, but the percentage of visitors with buying intent clearly improved over the following weeks.

4. We aligned the landing page with the ad creative

One thing we noticed was that our ads and landing pages were telling two different stories. The ad focused on benefits, while the product page immediately switched to technical specifications. We rewrote the first screen of the page to continue the same message users had already clicked on. Bounce rate dropped and users engaged with the page much longer.

5. We started making decisions from behavior

We spent several evenings watching session recordings and that completely changed our priorities. We found users repeatedly hesitating in the same places, reopening shipping information, scrolling back to reviews before purchasing and abandoning after interacting with certain sections.

6. We refreshed creatives without resetting the account

We simply kept feeding the existing campaign with new creatives while leaving the overall structure intact. That gave Meta fresh material to work with without constantly sending the account back into instability.

7. We became much stricter about what we removed

Every app, every badge, every widget and every section had originally been added because someone claimed it would increase conversions. After a while the store became a collection of "best practices" that, together, created friction and we removed a 80% of that

Looking back, none of these changes were particularly groundbreaking on their own. Most of them are things you've probably heard before. The difference was actually implementing them all at once instead of constantly looking for the next "winning" creative or audience.

We’re looking for a content writer who is ACTIVE on Reddit and deeply familiar with the platform, especially in tech,AI,and machine learning communities

This is NOT for generic writers, we want someone who understands how Reddit works

What we need:

-Writing high-quality blog posts (AI tools, machine learning, tech products, startups)

-Identifying trends and topics from Reddit communities 

-Writing in a natural, non-corporate tone

Requirements:

-Active Reddit user (you regularly browse/post/comment)

-Strong knowledge of AI / ML / tech ecosystem

-Know all the news about Tech-Ai-Mll 

Details:

-Fully remote  

-Ongoing work  

-Payment: $300-$500 per week (depending on experience & output)

To apply here: https://tally.so/r/pbJQJJ

Thanks!

Im new to running and I just can't seem to get morning nutrition right. I usually go for a run within an hour of waking up. But I noticed that eating fruits beforehand (riped bananas, apples, avocado) makes my stomach hurt and my energy bonk out around 6 miles. When I eat anything heavier I'm super uncomfortable the whole time.

Im constantly looking for what foods are best for me, when is the best time to eat and how to make sure I’m getting the right nutrition, but these are some of the things I’ve noticed so far:

• Foods I ate the day before: I didn’t think about this too much but apparently if you wake up hungry you should look at the food you ate the day before. I usually eat something like pasta and that makes me hungry every morning that’s why I can’t run fasted or my energy bonk out easily in every run.
• High fiber and high fat foods: I like to eat avocados or dried fruits before runs but too much fiber or fat can affect digestion that’s why i feel horrible a lot of time, thought it’s good because of its health benefits but it takes more time to digest which makes me feel heavy or bloated
• Simple carbs digest a lot faster: Foods like jam, honey, or white bread seem to work better for me before running compared to heavier meals. I track how much carbs I’m getting on mena and it usually shows I’m lower on carbs than I think before runs. It became a habit to me lately to track all my foods to make sure im getting the right balance of carbs
• Timing rules after eating: If I eat 30 mins before run, even light food can feel heavy at the start. If I eat too early, I feel hungry again halfway through the run. I’ve been experimenting with that 60 to 90 minute window before running, where I try to give my body enough time to digest but still have fuel available.

Still trying to figure out that balance where I feel light but don’t run out of energy halfway through my runs. I’m still pretty new to running, so I’d really appreciate any advice. What do you usually eat before early morning runs, and how long before you head out?

This will be a long story and could be interesting for you if you are actively trying to quit smoking (nicotine, weed, iqos, vape..). I’m spanish, 35 yo and this is officially one year without smoking after more than 20 years. I’ve started very early and stopped from time to time but never consistently. I will share my full experience and what led me to the decision of quitting once at all.
- Why I did quit? The most important thing to quit smoking is having a real purpose and reason to do it. For me, I will soon become dad of a little girl. My wife is pregnant (7 months). And when we decided to have a baby we deeply discussed the need of both quitting smoking before this new adventure. It’s extremely important to cut with any toxic stuff before having a baby and it has been long proven that everything ingested or consumed during pregnancy can impact the baby’s health. I researched about this for very long before even thinking of having a child, and I think anybody should look into it. Here’s a good starting point for who’s interested https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC3750375/

- Having a partner or companion along the journey. This is the second most important thing, which as you may have inferred from the first point, in my case its my wife. We both decided to quit smoking and we’re helping each other along the way. But this is a personal journey, and you will be alone when the temptation comes. What I found useful was having a Daimon to talk with every time I was about to give up and smoke one. (https://daimonapp.ai/)

- Finding your triggers and attacking them one by one. For me it was stress at work and social situations, like a beer with friends or hanging out. Being honest with myself about when exactly I was most vulnerable, once you have that mapped out you can prepare for those moments. I started having a plan for each trigger, gum in my pocket before going out, a walk instead of a smoke break at work. It sounds mechanical but it works. (If you want a practical framework for this, this video can help u to spot your triggers) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mykSBO1aMeU
- Accept that you will have bad days and don't let them reset you: The second month I had a rough week where I smoked three cigarettes over five days, in the past that would have sent me straight back to a full pack because in my head I had already failed. But this time I just kept going the next morning like nothing happened. Most people who successfully quit long-term had multiple slip ups along the way, the difference is how they responded to them

For everyone in this situation or if you’re thinking about quitting to smoke, the best time to start was yesterday, for every question fell free to ask

I started with little knowledge of what I was doing, what platform to focus on, what type of content to create, and if I should post on Instagram, TikTok, or Facebook Reels. I didn't expect that the hardest part would be deciding how to even start with the small audience I had. I used to think that creating content itself would be the most difficult part.
But over time I began to notice that simpler content about everyday life is what people enjoy watching.
Another thing you need to put the attention are the Hooks (the first few seconds of your video)
I used to stress about coming up with something original and creative, but honestly the simplest approach works best: Find hooks that are already performing well in a completely different niche, and adapt them to yours. It sounds almost too easy, but it works because the psychology behind a good hook is the same regardless of the topic.

After about 6 months, when I had around 5K followers, I started landing my first brand deals through Sideshift. One of those early contracts was a CPM deal $1.50 per 1,000 views. Sounds small, right?
One of the videos from that campaign hit 3 million views, which technically would have been over $4,500, but the contract had a cap, so I ended up getting paid $3,000 from that single video.

That was a turning point, after that video blew up, my profile kept growing and I started hitting over a million views on other videos too and the dynamic shifted, brands began reaching out to me instead of the other way around.

Now almost a year in, I'm making at least $6,000 a month with 19K followers, from brand collaborations. (the half goes on duties tbh) And it still feels organic to me, I post about 4 times a day, and roughly every other day one of those is a collab. It doesn't feel forced because I'm still doing my regular content the rest of the time. If you're also starting out, my biggest takeaway is you'll figure things out by doing, not by overthinking.

I lost 26 kg (98 to 72 kg) in a year. The hardest part was staying disciplined since I live in company accommodation and don’t really have full control over what I eat most days. Had to rely on oats, whey, and whatever was available. Despite this, I stayed consistent with training and diet. Today I feel more confident, energetic, and disciplined compared to before. My next goal is achieve visible abs.

My workout split looks something like this:

Mon - Upper strength (bench press or incline bench 3-5×5, barbell rows 3-5×5, overhead press 3×6-8, pull ups, then finish with some tricep and bicep work)

Tue - Lower strength (Mostly back squats 3-5×5, Romanian deadlifts, split squats, calves, and core work)

Wed - Zone 2 + mobility (25-40 min easy cardio and 10-15 min hips/shoulders)

Thu - Upper hypertrophy (dumbbell press 3×8-12, lat pulldown 3×8–12, lateral raises/face pulls 3×12-15, cables/arms 2-3×12-15)

Fri - Lower hypertrophy (front squat or leg press 3×8-12, hamstring curl 3×10-12, walking lunges 2-3×12/leg, core 3×10-15)

Sat - Conditioning or sport (10×30s hard/90s easy or a long brisk walk)

Sun - Rest day/light cardio, I let my body fully recover before starting the next week.

In terms of what i eat:

Most of my diet ended up being a mix of whatever I could get from cafeteria meals when available, plus simple stuff like oats, whey protein and potatoes depending on what was served. I track my intake through Mena AI just by taking a photo of my meal and let it break down the ingredients, portions, and macros. I do cheat meals now and then but most of the time I completely avoid processed food and sugar. I change my normal cardio to HITT sessions to burn more calories to lose faster.

Just wanted to share my progress with you guys, because I'm really happy with the results I've achieved so far and honestly even shocked when I look at old pictures and see how much my body changed. It motivates me to keep pushing even harder to see how far I can go. Feel free to ask me anything, I will be reading y'all!