Caspar Lee on how he became a chief vision officer

He was a YouTube star with 6 million subscribers. Now his platform of choice is the C-suite. How – and why – did he make such a radical transformation?

Caspar Lee has no illusions about his unusual journey to the C-suite. “The only route to becoming a senior executive at my age is to start something yourself. I haven’t worked my way up in a traditional sense.”

The 29-year-old’s career began when he was 16 and launched his YouTube channel. Though both this and his second attempt were self-confessed “disasters”, the third time was a charm and within five years he had amassed more than 6 million subscribers. 

While he’s no longer a full-time social media star, Lee has turned that early success into a longer-term career. “I’m now on the business side of the creator economy,” he explains. 

The creator economy describes the ecosystem which has sprung up around online personalities, be they actors, comedians, chefs, historians or even Excel experts. These digital natives managed to amass vast audiences which, in turn, attracted the interest of brands. Lee saw an opportunity and co-founded a company that matched the two and Influencer.com was born (although, these days, he prefers the term ‘creator’ to the much-maligned ‘influencer’.) 

“We work with people who entertain or educate others and who need a way to fund that content creation. My vision has always been giving people – both brands and creators – as many options as possible.”