Transcription
Imagine building a brand. I want to introduce you to my skincare line, Ntorium. Getting hit with the biggest FTC investigation in creator history. The FTC called me. They were like, "We've never received this many complaints about an influencer ever," and still walking away with $355 million.
Many people know of Susan Yara, but a lot don't know the story behind that exit or the surprising moves that made it possible. Because this isn't just about Susan. It is about the creator advantage that most people completely overlook. And the lessons inside this story apply whether you have a thousand subscribers or a million subscribers.
And look, this isn't a gossip channel. That is not what I do here. Did Susan get everything right? No. She made some mistakes and one very big one. And there is no denying that what she built with Ntorium and accomplish is impressive. And trust me, I love me some tea. Gossip is fun. But my goal here as a YouTube channel producer and strategist for nearly 10 years isn't to idolize creators. It's to study them, how they blow up, how they build impact, how they get rich. To go beyond the polish highlight reel and uncover what is actually going on behind the scenes, the good, the bad, the shady, and everything in between. Behind every shiny success stories are strategies, setbacks, and lessons that you can use for your own channel and business. So, if you are ready to learn, class is in session.
Everybody's heard of influencer brands, whether you love them or hate them. Jeffree Star Cosmetics, Lunar Beauty, M Cosmetics, One Size. Some blow up, some blow up. But what Susan Yara pulled off, that wasn't just another influencer cash grab. She sold Naterium to E.L.F. for $355 million. ELF's biggest acquisition at the time, their first major buyout since 2020. And it wasn't just hype. It wasn't because they just thought she was pretty or had a few followers. Notorium was doing 90 million in net sales with over 17 million in profit a year. ELF CEO called it an unusual profile because most fast-growing brands just aren't profitable, but Susan's was. And here's the craziest part. Nurium had only 5% consumer awareness when E.L.F. bought it. That means that 95% of people didn't even know it existed. And that is a kind of brand that scales not because it's everywhere, but because it is ready to be everywhere. This wasn't about follower count. It wasn't about going viral. It was about something deeper and more powerful than that.
And Susan didn't start with millions of followers. She wasn't famous. In fact, her story starts in a completely different world. Susan's story is not an overnight success. It's about a foundation that most people don't ever see. She was born in Seoul, raised near Santa Fe, and grew up being half Korean and half Hispanic. That helped shaped her perspective early on. She's the first in her family to graduate college. She was in Miss New Mexico, competing in Miss America. Then she moved to New York to work in beauty journalism. She became a beauty editor working at Total Beauty, New Beauty, and Forbes, reviewing products, interviewing experts, and gaining a professional level understanding of the skincare industry. So, when Susan launched her own YouTube channel in 2014, it wasn't a side project. It was the next step of a long strategic career.
"But I actually think to be a successful content creator, especially on a platform like YouTube where you have to do long form content. You have to really plan things out almost like you're creating a TV show. Um, I think you have to be very businessminded. And this is critical." Susan didn't treat YouTube as a hobby. She treated it like a business from day one. When she pitched an idea for a YouTube channel to investors, they told her that she was too old at 30 and should find younger hosts instead.
"When I look at the analytics, there are women who are looking for the content that tells them what skincare products they should be using. They want somebody who's actually dealing with aging issues to tell them what they should be using. They want, you know, video content that's well produced, features actual experts in it, like dermatologists and plastic surgeons, so that they know that there's an authority behind it. And these guys were just like, 'No, we don't. We we're not biting.' And so I decided to just start the YouTube channel myself."
So she built it anyways and she built it right. Dermatologists, ingredient breakdowns, real authority. Every video wasn't just content. It was market research. What ingredients were viewers curious about? What price points were they comfortable with? What skin concerns kept coming up again and again and again. By 2019, Susan had 5 years of insights most brands pay millions for. But audience insights are just the beginning. Susan was sitting on data that would make any startup founder jealous. Most creators think that their biggest asset is their follower count. They're wrong. Your real advantage is your data.
"I tell content creators this all the time. You have so much data that brands would kill for because if you use affiliate links, if you have done brand, you know, like collaborations, if you, you know, just look at who your demographic is, where you're selling, what price point, you have so much information. Every link clicked, every comment posted, every video watched to the end, it is all feedback that most entrepreneurs have to pay thousands to get through focus groups and market research firms. But creators here on YouTube, we get that for free every single time we post."
"And people come to me all the time, it's crazy. They'll be like, 'I want to start a brand.' And they'll tell me their idea, and I'm like, 'Do you sell that kind of stuff as a content creator?' They're like, 'No.' And I'm like, 'That sounds absurd then.' Like, 'Why would you why would you sell that? Go look at what sells. Like, what have you been selling to your viewers?' You know, they'll tell you what they want."
Susan listened. Her audience was obsessed with skincare, and she knew what they loved, what they couldn't find, what stopped them from buying. So when it came time to choose a retail partner, there was no guessing.
"We knew early on that we wanted Target in the United States to be our first retail partner and that was because we knew where my viewer was shopping."
A lot of founders go with their gut and Susan had receipts from her audience. Every video was insight, every click a clue. She didn't just grow an audience, she understood it inside and out. Having data is one thing, but turning it into a real business, that's a leap that 99% of successful creators never make. But Susan did. She had formulas, manufacturers, everything ready to go. Then she got an email. Her Korean manufacturer shut down due to COVID. They offered her one option. Pivot to hand sanitizer or walk away.
"In February of 2020, I get this email from the person I was working with that's helping me put my brand together. She was the person like in contact with our contract manufacturer in Korea. Okay. And essentially what happened was this contract manufacturer was like, 'There's this virus going around. Don't know if you've heard about it.' You know, it's in the news. I think in February of 2020, we were all aware that there was something weird happening with the virus with co um and they basically just put a stop to it. In just an email, it was like, 'This is over. If you want to pivot and launch hand sanitizer for your brand, we're in. Otherwise, we have to put a stop for all new clientele.' And it was crushing because I didn't know what to do."
"Right."
"I really I sat there and I was like, 'Wow, that was a lot of time and money wasted.' And that could just be over in an email."
"Yeah. And people don't even think about that."
Over in an email. But I'm not I'm not a quitter. I'm not a quitter. So immediately I start contacting every single person I know in this industry who works behind the scenes of brands, right? Everybody. And in the midst of that, um, probably in like March at this point, um, I get in contact with, uh, the man who would become my business partner and investor. We were a week or two into lockdown, I want to say. At this point, I had received in PR and I'd been loving the brand that he had started."
"Okay."
"Um, which would eventually become my brand."
"Okay."
"And I was obsessed. So I get in touch with him because I had questions on how like where is he having this made? Why is it such high quality? And how do you have such a good price point? Right? Because even when I was working on my own thing, I I just couldn't get it to that price point. It was just not going to happen. And so I wanted answers. And then I also wanted to then ask him to invest in my brand."
"Yeah."
"I want your money."
"Yeah. I want your money."
That one decision to act fast instead of freeze, get disappointed, and discouraged changed everything for her. At that point, Susan reached out to Ben Bennett. He's a beauty industry veteran. She had met years earlier. He had just launched a new incubator called the center. Susan brought that audience insight. Ben brought the operations and manufacturing playbook. They joined forces. 3 months later, June 2020, Ntorium launched.
"So, growing Ntorium, I mean, one of the best experiences ever because it felt like it was boot camp because we were in lockdown when when this all really started. There was a lot of time to focus on just the brand and building it and really building it online, which was a big part of the success of the brand." Many creator brands fail because they try to do it all. Susan didn't. She stayed in her zone of genius and let the experts handle the rest. Take the Ace Family for example, and yes, I did a whole video on how their brands collapsed. They wanted total control and it imploded for them. And Jaclyn Hill got in her own way with her businesses. You can check out this video I did about it as well. Susan let the experts handle the operations and it scaled. Even her pricing strategy came from understanding her audience's psychology, not just her own preferences.
"I started receiving all the really expensive luxury products in PR. And I started taking some of that home to my mom cuz I was so excited about it. I'm like, 'Mom, you have to try this cream. It's worth hundreds of dollars, this serum.' And then I would come back a few months later and it would all be sitting on top of her dresser unused. And when I would ask her, why aren't you using these products? I didn't even pay for them. Why wouldn't you use them? And she's like, you told me they're expensive and I don't want to waste them. And I think to this day, people do think this way when it comes to luxury products, right?"
That became Ntorium's edge, luxury formulas at affordable prices, products that people actually use and not just admire. And then when it came time to pitch to the retailers, Susan had data-backed confidence.
"That was a big one for us with Target. We were like, 'We're confident. We're going to be able to get people into the store and buy our products with you because we've got a plan.' And they loved it. They were they were all in. And when I would tell them about the products, even products that that they weren't sure of, they were like, you know, they they've got their their research and they've had brands come in with products and they've taken chances and seen it fail. So, you've got to show them, well, what makes you different?"
That is what sold Target. That is what got her into Ulta. That's what helped Ntorium expand to 3,000 stores in the US, Canada, and the UK.
"Since the acquisition, we've we've also launched in Ulta, every single Ulta door in the United States."
"How many doors is that?"
"That's over a thousand. Wow. Yeah, it's over a thousand doors in the United States. Um, and then we've also launched at Shoppers Drug Mart. Also, over a thousand stores in Canada."
Even with perfect business execution, Susan almost lost everything because of one major mistake. I don't know about you, but for me, one of the worst things is the feeling of being lied to. When you feel like you know who a person is, they've presented themselves to be one way and then you find out that they were lying. That's the way that I felt about Susan Yara back in 2020. In April of 2020, Susan promoted Ntorium in her Facebook group and on her YouTube channel without disclosing that she was a co-founder. She positioned it and she made it look like it was this new product that she just discovered in her PR mail. She even gave out a discount code and compared it favorably to The Ordinary without ever mentioning her own ownership of the brand. And people noticed fast. The backlash was instant and brutal. Jen Love, a longtime beauty YouTuber, was one of the first to break it down publicly in a video titled The Susan Yara Ntorium situation explained. Susan had been promoting Ntorium as if she had no connection with the brand at all. Promoting discount codes, talking about how amazing the products were, saying they were better than The Ordinary, just touting them on both her Facebook group and her YouTube channel without disclosing that she had any kind of relationship with the brand.
"At first, Susan stayed silent, then defensive, and she has admitted that she handled it pretty poorly. Like I wasn't that worried because I knew I hadn't done anything wrong besides being a jerk, right? Besides being like a person who decided to be stubborn and egg everybody on instead of just being forthright."
"Right."
The beauty community, rightly so, felt deceived. Susan had built a brand on transparency, education, and trust. So, this felt like a complete betrayal. And Jen Love explained what made this so serious. "If you endorse a product through social media, your endorsement message should make it obvious that you have a relationship, material connection with the brand. A material connection to a brand includes a personal, family, or employment relationship or a financial relationship such as the brand paying you or giving you free or discounted products or services."
And it wasn't just creators calling her out. Viewers flooded the FTC with complaints. "I didn't get a chance to actually talk about what happened for the longest time because the FTC called me and they were like they were like we've never received this many complaints about an influencer ever in like the history of the FTC."
The investigation lasted nearly 2 years. "It's very intrusive. They they make you hand over every form of communication with anybody that might be even closely like slightly involved with the brand. Like they've got my text messages and I'm talking text messages. You can't erase anything. Like you have to give them everything. So your most personal like if you're telling your friends like oh like about a BJ >> that is going to the FGC. >> Everything. They're reading everything."
For some reason or another Susan was not fined for this. But there was some damage to her reputation and the fear was even bigger. At one point she thought her entire career was over. And the real kicker, if she had just disclosed everything upfront, this backlash probably would not have happened. And she learned this lesson the hard way.
Years later, Susan finally told her side of the story. And according to her, it's way more complex than anyone realized. Remember how I mentioned her original brand got killed by COVID? Well, Susan claims that when she first started mentioning Ntorium in early 2020, she genuinely was just a customer who loved the products. She says she was actually trying to get the founder to invest in her brand.
"Instead of working on two separate brands that are essentially conceptually like the same, why don't we just work on this one brand together?"
According to Susan, during lockdown, they decided to merge forces and she became co-owner of his existing brand instead of launching her own. But here's the key detail that if true changes everything. She claimed that from April to June 2020, she actually stopped talking about Ntorium because she now owned it but couldn't announce it until the legal paperwork was finalized.
"I realize I now cannot talk about this brand anymore until I announce my association with this brand."
So, according to her version, that timeline gap that looked suspicious was actually her trying to be compliant, not deceptive. This was the biggest lesson that I learned from this was that I have a community and they will listen to me. And if you're just honest, even if you feel scared about it, even if you feel trapped, even if you feel like it's just going to be turned around, just say it because that's what everybody wants. They just want to know what happened. I wish I would have trusted in you and just told you what happened because it would have been so much easier and so simple to just trust.
Whether you believe her explanation or not, her biggest regret was clear. Not trusting her audience with the truth when it mattered the most. The moment you launch a product or business, everything changes. The FTC doesn't care if you're just a YouTuber. The rules are real. Transparency is not optional. But the craziest part, even after all of this, Susan still landed one of the biggest creator exits we've ever seen. Here's the part that really blows people's minds. Even after the backlash, even with an open FTC investigation, Elf Beauty still bought Ntorium for $355 million. Why? Because Susan had built something that nearly every startup dreams of. Real profits, real loyalty, real customer insight, and a brand strong enough to survive controversy. E.L.F. didn't just buy a skincare line. They bought trust at scale.
"And what's interesting, it's almost like speed dating. They're presenting your brand to people that are potentially going to acquire it. And then you're kind of weeding those people out. Like they're weeding you out and you're weeding those people out."
Most founders dread the process. Not Susan.
"I got to talk about my brand and what made it so special and what we wanted to still do with it because you can't get your brand acquired without there being this potential of more growth, right? So, it was exciting and fun to me. A lot of people might say that it's the most stressful thing ever, but to me it was so much fun."
Of course, it was. She had spent 11 years selling stories to an audience on camera. She had a lot of practice with this. This was just a higher stakes version of what she already knew to do. And that is a major creator advantage. The storytelling closes deals. And the best part, Susan stayed on to run the brand. She kept creative control while Elf took over the operations and cash flow.
"My day-to-day now hasn't actually changed that much. If I'm being really honest, I don't handle a lot of the operations. And the the biggest relief for me now is that I don't have to figure out where to get cash."
She also fulfilled a lifelong dream.
"You retired your mom?"
"I retired my mom."
"That made me cry. Honestly, I was crying. That was the dream come true. Yeah, that was like, you know, when you when you're a little kid, especially when you've you have immigrant parents, right? And you know that they've all the sacrifices they've made to get here and the things that they put on you as the first daughter also, right? I've got the first daughter, the immigrant mom, like that kind of stuff going on."
"So much pressure."
"So much pressure. Um, but I always knew that I wanted my parents to stop having to bust their asses every single day as they get older, working for other people just to get by. And it happened not because she had the biggest following, but because she used her content and her audience to build something bigger than content.
So, what can you steal from Susan's playbook? Here are the exact lessons that turned a YouTube channel into a $355 million exit.
First, never give up. When the YouTube investors didn't want her as a host and wanted someone younger, she launched her own channel. When COVID shut down Susan's manufacturer, she could have walked away. When the FTC investigation began, she could have disappeared. But she didn't. She used every setback as fuel. And that is the difference between creators who build wealth and creators who stay stuck and give up.
"But I'm not. I'm not a quitter. I'm not a quitter. Like, I'm a hustler. I am going to go after what I do to get right."
Second, take massive scary action. Susan didn't just dream about YouTube, she launched it. She didn't just talk about a brand, she built it. She didn't have millions of dollars or a product development team, but she had a network, an audience, and the mindset to find the right partners.
"I truly believe that it's a mentality that you're born with, right? Like I really really think that success and and and knowing that you're going to go do something big, you're just that person. I have always always thought that. I I always knew that if I worked really hard, I focused and I and I knew what I wanted to achieve that I was going to achieve it. And I always thought that even as a poor little girl."
And this is a story of someone who came from the ground up and used her platform to build something generational.
Third, content compounds authority. Didn't get lucky in 3 years. She built trust for over a decade. Every single upload was a brick in her business foundation.
Fourth, trust beats scale. Susan had about 1.2 million subscribers on her main channel when she exited. There are creators with 10 times that who haven't built anything close to what she did. Why? Her audience trusted her. She took massive action and she didn't give up.
And fifth, build audience-owned businesses. Sponsored posts pay you once. Your own brand that pays you for years. Legal compliance is non-negotiable. Susan almost lost everything due to FTC violations. That investigation took 2 years and forced her to hand over every email, every text, even the personal ones. This is real business now. You can't just say, "Oh, I'm I'm an influencer." The second you launch your own product, you're in the world of legal liability, and ignorance is not a defense. Don't do it all yourself. Susan partnered with Ben Bennett for operations. She focused on content and marketing. He ran the back end. That's how you scale. The Ace Family did the opposite and destroyed their opportunity.
And finally, your data is your most valuable asset. Susan didn't guess what people wanted. She knew because she had the receipts. Click data, affiliate conversions, comments, shopping behavior. That's why Target and ELF trusted her. She showed up to the table with proof. That is how one-time small creators become future CEOs.
Susan's story isn't a one-off miracle. She is the blueprint for what is coming next. The creator economy is growing and it's growing fast. Right now, there are over 67 million creators worldwide. And that number is expected to surpass 100 million by 2030. And this isn't just about people posting videos. In North America alone, the creator economy is already a $32 billion industry in 2025 and projected to more than quadruple to 143 billion by 2030. Globally, it's worth $250 billion today. And estimates show it could grow to nearly 480 billion by 2027. And here's the wildest part. Most creators today are still leaving money on the table. They're focused on brand deals or AdSense, but not thinking about building a real business. And look at what's happening right now. Haley Bieber sold Road to Elf for $1 billion. Mr. Beast is building a business empire worth hundreds of millions. Emmer Chamberlain's coffee brand is scaling globally. The next generation of creators won't just have followers. They'll have companies.
And listen, I'm not saying that every single person needs to start a company or be a CEO. Many creators are very fulfilled, successful, and thriving doing exactly what they're doing. But if you want more, if you want to build something bigger, if you see yourself as a CEO, this is one of the best and smartest paths to get there. And that's why I'm sharing this story. Not to say that you should copy her step by step, but because whether you ever want to sell a brand or not, there are lessons here that can shape how you create, monetize, and grow, no matter what size your channel is.
And I want to end this by sharing a quote she said in a magazine, which I love. "We hear a lot about our male counterparts deals. Mr. Beast is always in the news for all these things he's doing with his businesses. This is proof that you can be a female content creator and a very successful entrepreneur."
As a YouTube channel producer and strategist for women, I find Susan Yara's story incredibly inspiring. She is living proof that you can build something life-changing and even generational from the ground up by leveraging the power of YouTube content. Her journey shows that success no longer has to come from Ivy League degrees, industry connections, or family wealth. Instead, visibility earned through consistent, valuable content is now one of the most powerful currencies a creator and business owner can have. Despite the controversy and the public setbacks, what stands out to me most about Susan is her tenacity. She didn't let the backlash define her. She took accountability. She kept building and ultimately created one of the most successful influencer founder brands we've ever seen. Personally, she's reignited a fire in me. I've considered her starting my own product company. And watching her do it is really, really inspiring and encouraging. Whether or not you want to launch a brand, I hope that this story inspires you to keep going. You do not need permission. You don't need connections. You just need to believe in the long game and keep showing up. YouTube can be the launch pad for something extraordinary. And Susan Yara is proof.
So the question is, what are you going to build? Comment below and tell me, would you ever launch your own brand? What's holding you back? Do you find Susan's story inspiring? What do you think about the fact that she got in trouble with her audience, with the FTC, and she still continued on? I'm curious. Let me know in the comments below. I would love to have a chat about this. And do you want more creator business case studies like this? Let me know as well and I'd love to do them if you have any ideas of who you want me to cover. And if you're serious about turning your content into real long-term wealth, join my YouTube boot camp where we discuss these types of things all the time as well as give you the framework on how to grow a successful YouTube channel. And if you want to see exactly what not to do, check out my deep dive into the Ace Family's business disaster. It is a perfect contrast to Susan's success story. Keep shining, keep creating, and most importantly, keep being you. [Music]