Building & Monetizing a Mass Social Media Audience with Josh Richards

High-Level Overview

Lewis Howes sits down with Josh Richards, who at 19 has around 30 million followers across platforms and has turned that audience into a set of businesses: a talent management company, an energy drink, a role at the video app Triller, a podcast with Barstool Sports, and a growing list of startup investments. Howes points out he is one of the youngest guests the show has had. The conversation traces how a kid from a small Canadian town who saved coins in jars became one of TikTok's highest earners, and it spends most of its time on how he actually did it and how he thinks about money.

The tone is relaxed and fast, with a lot of laughing and some swearing. Richards is confident but repeatedly stresses what he does not know, and he is candid about two low points: a tour that he says paid him almost nothing, and his first six months in Los Angeles, when he says partying nearly cost him his opportunity. Howes, speaking for an older audience of entrepreneurs, steers him toward lessons that apply beyond teenage fame: niche audiences, treating followers as friends, sticking with it when numbers dip, and keeping a small circle of trusted people.

The conversation flows chronologically through his story, with stops for business tactics and personal reflection.

The Discussion Explores:

• Where Richards's drive to earn and save came from, and why he still spends very little
• Why he prefers equity to paid posts, and the mentors who taught him that
• The 2019 tour he says ripped off its young creators, and how that led to founding TalentX
• The years of nightly live streams and deliberate growth tactics behind his supposed overnight success
• Why a small niche audience can earn more than a huge general one
• Launching Ani Energy and how he chooses which projects to take on
• Handling dips in views, and how a TikTok feud turned into a Barstool podcast
• Partying, mistakes, and his advice to teenagers about trust and money

Deep Dive into Main Ideas

The kid with the jars

Richards says that as a child he never spent pocket money on cards or gum the way other kids did. He put it in jars labeled for bigger goals, such as a games console or tickets to a Buffalo Bills or Toronto Maple Leafs game. Over time he found he liked watching the jar grow more than spending it. That turned into small businesses built on his sports: a hockey apparel line with slogans on shirts, and a lacrosse venture dyeing mesh with team designs and working out wax formulas to make pockets waterproof. His parents were proud of the hustle, he says, and the family was not in a position to go to games often; when they did, it was the cheap seats and a big occasion.

He says he has kept that mentality. People see his Mercedes and call it a dumb purchase, but it was gifted to him, and so were most of the clothes he was wearing in the studio. What he enjoys spending on is his family, quietly buying his sister shoes or his brother something in a video game when they mention wanting it.

Equity over cash

Richards credits Michael Gruen as his biggest mentor and business partner, the person who showed him how to turn social media into ownership instead of one-off sponsored posts. The standard brand deal, he explains, is pay-to-post, something like a flat fee for a story, and then nothing more. He also cites advice from Ashton Kutcher, whom he quotes as saying "I'd be a billionaire by now if I had taken equity in all my deals over cash". So his deals are now part cash and part equity, or all equity when he really believes in a company, with the hope of a sale or public listing years later.

The investments he names as most promising are Lendtable, which he describes as a 401k match startup; Breakr, which connects independent musicians with creators and gives smaller TikTokers a steady income; and Versus Game, where he says he has made tens of thousands of dollars for very little time. At Triller he came in as chief strategy officer with an investment and equity, focusing on monetization, and says he liked that the company was creator-friendly.

The tour that paid $750

That creator-first stance comes from experience. In the summer of 2019 Richards went on a meet-and-greet tour with several other influencers, playing hotel conference rooms and small venues to audiences mostly aged 12 to 16, selling tickets, merchandise, and $100 add-on dinners with fans. He says the tour grossed probably a million dollars and that he was paid $750 for all of it. In his words, "the tour ripped us all off", with organizers citing expenses and disputing ticket numbers.

He describes the early social media business as shady and under-protected, full of self-styled managers signing kids who knew nothing. At 15 he signed a two-year management contract he felt stuck in. After meeting Gruen he co-founded TalentX, a management company that signed around 110 top TikTokers, with protecting creators as the stated purpose.

Four years of grinding, not an overnight blow-up

Richards is keen to correct the idea that he got famous quickly for being good-looking. He says, "I put in four years of work", about three of them on Musical.ly before it became TikTok. One summer he played lacrosse and then went live every night from 10 p.m. to 2 a.m., inventing games, memorizing viewers' names, and building personal connections. Earnings grew to about $400 a night; one 30-minute stream with friends brought in $2,000, and a marathon day of roughly 12 to 16 hours of streaming brought in about $12,000 when he had around 120,000 followers.

He also describes a deliberate tactic. His father is a high school calculus teacher and he calls himself analytical. Musical.ly published a leaderboard of the top 250 spenders on live gifts. He hired his sister on a 15% commission to sit in the next room during his streams, logged into his account, following those users and liking about ten of their videos each. Most had few followers and noticed the attention; if even 5% came into his stream, they were people known to spend. Because the app marked users he followed, he knew whom to greet by name. The time commitment gradually squeezed out his sports, with track going first and hockey and lacrosse last. He realized he was earning more than his parents and had to go all in. When interviewers say he blew up overnight, he says it shows they did not do their research.

Niche audiences and who can make it

Howes asks what business owners in their 30s and 40s can take from this. Richards says people with niche audiences assume they are at a disadvantage because they will never reach 20 million followers. He argues the reverse. A cooking creator with 250,000 engaged viewers is a far better partner for a mustard brand than he is, and he knows people with a million followers who earn more from brand deals than he does. "people that have niche audiences should be happy that they have a niche audience", he says, adding that he is trying to become more specific himself by leaning into sports. The two also chat about sports card collecting, which both have begun investing in.

He believes TikTok's short-form format lets anyone reach a million followers, since any video can go viral. But those chasing fame or money alone tend not to last. Creators who shoot up in two weeks off looks or one trend, he says, "they also fall quicker than anyone." His view: "it's a long process", and "your goal can't just be like, I want to make money or I want to be famous." Howes compares this to MrBeast describing an obsession with making great videos long before the money came.

Ani Energy and choosing projects

Sway, the Los Angeles content house where Richards lived with other creators, had a problem: its members were seen as controversial and not brand-safe, so other houses got the sponsorship money while Sway relied on ad revenue, live streams, and merchandise. Meanwhile he and housemate Bryce were shotgunning Red Bulls in videos, which started a TikTok trend that he now calls terrible and bad for the heart, and which gave Red Bull millions of free views. They decided to own a drink instead. Through Gruen they partnered with Evan Burns, who had beverage experience, spent about seven months developing Ani Energy, and launched direct to consumer.

He says sales spiked at launch, dipped, and then climbed steadily once they learned to work the drink naturally into their content. The positioning is a lifestyle drink with 75 milligrams of caffeine, not a high-stimulant product, with a can design that leans feminine and marketing that leans toward young men, modeled on how hard seltzer crossed over.

On focus, he says he and Gruen talk often about not spreading too thin and only taking on things he cares about. He cites Dog for Dog, a company with Snoop Dogg that donates dog food to shelters with each purchase, and Unhide, a faux fur company he bought into, which he ties to his concern for animal welfare.

Dips, drama, and Barstool

Asked about creators whose numbers fall, Richards says they tend to panic. Some do increasingly reckless things for views. Others give up, post less, and blame the algorithm or claim they are shadow banned. His answer is that the platform does not know who they are; they simply stopped posting. He points to Logan and Jake Paul as people who were written off many times and kept reinventing themselves. His own approach is to keep giving the audience something new to be excited about: the house, then YouTube, then a product, then investing, then Barstool.

The Barstool relationship began with a public feud between Sway and the rival Hype House involving his girlfriend, which he says dominated TikTok and trended on Twitter for days. Barstool founder Dave tweeted a crude complaint about seeing it everywhere. Gruen tracked down a contact, and Richards and Dave did an Instagram Live together. Snapchat then proposed a show. On the pitch call Dave rejected that within a minute, and with 29 minutes left Gruen improvised the idea of a podcast. After three or four months of negotiation they launched BFFs. Richards says it gives Barstool a younger audience and gives him an older and more male one.

By 25 he expects to be more involved in sports media, to be doing more angel investing and perhaps running a fund, and to have scaled or sold Ani. He says his biggest fear is failing because he did not work hard enough. Success, to him, means being able to buy his parents a home and support a family. He would also like to be the first social media billionaire, which he puts down to being competitive and liking to be first.

Partying, small circles, and three truths

On handling fame, Richards says he was already consumed by it once. He moved to LA at 17, before the pandemic, and for about six months he and his housemates partied constantly. He began justifying choices he never would have before, picking drinking over preparing for the next day's meetings. After a few big mistakes he realized he had a rare opportunity and was throwing it away. He says he is glad it happened early, and that lockdown let him focus on work and get back to how he was raised.

His advice to teenagers is "keep your circle small". Be respectful to everyone, but trust few. He says he was bullied in high school over his social media and had only a handful of real friends, and that in LA people he considered best friends talked behind his back.

His three truths are: "With power comes responsibility.", a line from his father that he has tattooed on his arm; keep a tight circle you can go to when everything is crumbling; and, instead of simply saving, "learn to spend your money, but spend it wisely", for example putting the few dollars saved on a cheaper coffee into an account that earns a return. He is proudest of Sway, which he says was a group of real friends, not a manufactured lineup. His definition of greatness is "leaving everything you have on the field", a standard he credits to his father, who coached him for most of his childhood.

Conclusion

Richards presents his success as the product of method more than luck: years of nightly streams, a habit of studying what works, and a calculated effort to find and befriend the people most likely to support him. The business lessons he draws are to own a piece of what you promote, to value a focused audience over a merely large one, to keep working through the dips, and to keep offering something new. The personal lessons are humbler. He says he was cheated when he knew nothing, lost six months to partying, and learned to trust only a few people. What he says he wants in the end is fairly ordinary: to work as hard as he can, take care of his family, and build something with friends.

This is a summary of "Building & Monetizing a Mass Social Media Audience with Josh Richards" from The School of Greatness, giving you the GIST so you can decide if you want the REST.