Ever since Matt Hey was little, he had dreams of being a star. Admittedly, he didn’t really know whether that would mean dancing (he was pretty good), acting (he was average) or singing (he was bad). But what Matt did know was that he wanted to spend his life entertaining people.
Thankfully for the natural entertainer, he was born in the era of social media, and in 2014, he began creating content. A few years later, in 2019, Matt went all in. He packed his bags and moved from NSW’s Central Coast to Sydney, internally repeating the mantra: “I’m going to be a star”.
Little did the bourgeoning talent know, the pandemic was just around the corner and ready to make him question what the future held for his dreams of stardom. But as Matt kept making videos and connecting with people online through those difficult months, it became abundantly clear that his unique online presence filled with authenticity, honesty and humour was just what people needed.
(Image: Matt Hey / Instagram)
After the pandemic, Matt’s star continued to rise as people started recognising him by his online username Alright Hey. Flash forward to today, and he’s one of the country’s most beloved creators with more than 135K followers on Instagram, 370.7K followers on TikTok and a loyal bunch of fans who hang on his every word.
For this week’s Insider Trading, we’re chatting to Matt for all the juicy industry secrets he’s used to become one of the best in the game.
Insider Trading: Matt Hey
Hey Matt! Thanks for having a cheeky little chat today. First up, can you please tell me a bit about yourself and what you do?
Of course! On a professional level, I’m a comedian, podcaster and content creator based in Sydney. On a personal level, I’m also a fashion icon, queer activist, professional eater, always the life of the party, always down to have a good time.
And look, I’m just here to have fun. Life is short. We’re just here to have fun.
How long have you been a full-time content creator?
I’m a bit of a veteran when it comes to social media content creation. I started 11 years ago, but I went full-time in 2019, about six months before the pandemic.
I packed up my entire life and I moved down to Sydney, and I was like, ‘I’m going to be a star’. And that was late 2019, and things were going well, until obviously the pandemic hit, and then the world shut down. And I was like, ‘Oh my gosh, I’m not going to be able to live my life being a star’. All these dreams I had went out the window during the pandemic, like it did for so many people around the world.
But then, thankfully, there was a huge shift on social media. I feel like, before the pandemic, it was all about the influencer on the beach with the tanning products and promoting luxury. We wanted glamour — I mean, we still want glamour sometimes — but we just had this whole unattainable thing.
Everyone wanted the unattainable part of social media, whereas now that scene, since the pandemic, has become out of touch, and everyone wants real and relatable.
Although I still give glamour, my thing is you have to be real as well and show all the things that go wrong. We always talk about social media being a highlight reel — It isn’t for me. I talk about everything that goes wrong in my life, as well as all the good things. So COVID really changed the landscape in terms of that, and I think I was just ahead of the curve and took it to another level. So it all worked out in the end… although there were a few months there where I needed to go on Jobseeker.
How would you describe your typical day?
Well, the best part is that no two days are the same for me. I don’t have a typical day. It could be as monotonous as replying to emails from nine to five, filing my receipts for the tax man and all that boring stuff. But it also can be really exciting, things like the movie premieres and the red carpets and getting to work with fun brands and being creative all day.
I’m a very creative person, and it could be anything from planning a live show or recording our podcast, High Scrollers. No two days are the same, and that’s what makes it so exciting for me, but it can also be very relaxing. Sometimes I’ll just give myself the day off because I need to take some annual leave and reset my mental health, because sometimes it can be really full on as well.
Like, I’m lucky enough to be doing really cool shoots for national brands, sometimes global brands. Not too long ago, I wrapped up a campaign which included two 16-hour shoot days back to back, and it takes me a week to recover from something like that. But obviously it’s the best job in the world, and I wouldn’t change it at all.
What’s your favourite part about what you do?
My favourite part is definitely the live shows. I love being on stage in front of a crowd. But as well as that, I love meeting the people who follow me, and I love meeting people who have bought a ticket to my show.
I always do a free Meet and Greet afterwards and love sharing stories with the people I meet. I’m obviously such a talker — as I think we’ve already established — and I love to meet new people. I’m the type of person who just wants to grab a drink with a stranger at the bar and go on like a friendship date. I’m so down to just meet new people and talk.
I’m such an over-sharer, which is probably half the reason I’m so successful online, so my dream day out is a D&M with a total stranger. Because life online is very nice, but I think the connections in real life are what make it so special.
What was the biggest learning curve so far?
I think that no matter what you do, someone’s going to have a problem with it, so there’s no point trying to change someone’s mind. Let them have their opinion and protect your peace. I used to be such a people pleaser, but I think this industry has given me a bit of a backbone, and I love that.
When you were starting out in the workforce, what was your dream job? How did you end up where you are now?
I knew from a very young age that I always wanted to be an entertainer. I wanted to be a singer, an actor or a dancer. I’m a good dancer, I’m an average actor, and I’m not a good singer. So none of those career paths were really ever going to work out for me, but I just knew that I wanted to entertain in some way.
Fast forward however many years, I never thought that social media would, well, even exist when I was younger, but two, that it would be so accessible to entertain people.Things like the live shows and the podcasts are so much fun for me, but the fact that I can entertain people almost instantly with social media is a dream come true.
Funnily enough, in year 12, I did go through a four-week phase of wanting to be a speech pathologist.
What’s your advice for people who want to work as a professional content creator?
I would say, if you want to entertain, whether you want to be a content creator or whatever it may be, just don’t follow trends. That is my biggest piece of advice.
You can’t follow the trends and what everyone else is doing. You have to create your own, and I think you’ll see in my content that trend is very, very prominent. It’s like, ‘what are other people doing? And how can I flip that on its head?’ That’s my kind of mantra.
When it comes to content creation, you have to have your finger on the pulse, but you also have to be willing to adapt, change and keep up with the landscape because it just changes so quickly. We see a lot of people rise to fame very quickly with social media, and my rise has been very slow and consistent. And I think some of those people, think of the huge content creators in lockdown who rose to huge, immediate fame, where are they now?
A lot of them we don’t hear from because they haven’t kept up. They weren’t able to shift their perspective or show a bit more of their personality, or they didn’t know how to communicate the rough parts of their day. So you have to keep your finger on the pulse of what’s happening, and especially if you want it to become a career where you then work with brands.
For example, I’ve just done a collab with Allen’s for the release of their new Ripperz Remix, and I was able to weave a connection between opening a bag of lollies and opening a Labubu, which are so hot on the internet right now.
So while it’s a serious business, you can’t always take it too seriously. Realistically, if you want to be an entertainer or you want to be a content creator, you just have to remember not to be so serious with the whole thing and just have fun with it.
A big part of content creation is working with brands. What is it like for you working with brands like Allen’s, for example, to create content?
Well, yes, working with brands like Allen’s is a dream gig. Doing a job where the requirement is to eat lollies? Who could ask for more, really? But honestly, though, I really need brands to jump on board with me and my vibe. If we don’t vibe, it’s not going to work. I love it when brands like Allen’s give me creative freedom, because at the end of the day, I’m the creator. Just give me the details and I’ll do the rest.
Of course, it is a collaborative project, and brands still have feedback and jump in with ideas as well. Then, we kind of build the content together. But, at the end of the day, I know my audience better than anyone else and often people to say to me, ‘your ads are the only ones that I watch in full’ and I don’t know many other creators who have people say that.
I don’t know whether it’s because my followers just love me and they’re willing to support me and watch the whole video, especially in this day and age where there are so many ads all around us that we’re programmed to switch off. Hopefully, it’s just because I’m making such engaging, sponsored content that they just genuinely want to stick around because it’s so entertaining.
Who knows? Who can say what? But it’s very important to me to find that healthy balance, because my audience always comes first.
If you weren’t doing your current job, what would you be doing?
I don’t even want to think about that!
Honestly, I’ve always been a bit of a hustler and someone who wants to make enough money to have fun every single day. Life is so short, and there’s not much I wouldn’t do. I always say I’ll try everything once. But I would hope that no matter what I was doing apart from this, would be something in entertainment. Before I went full-time, I was a DJ and a drag queen as well, so potentially, if social media went away tomorrow, I’d pick up my headphones or put on a lash and get back on stage in some other type of way.
What’s the most unhinged thing you’ve seen at work that we can legally publish?
Unfortunately, the most unhinged things that happen usually happen to me.
But there was an event last year that I went to on the 55th floor of a high-rise building in Sydney. At one point, they brought out this cake with sparklers in it and it set the fire alarms off. Just picture 100 influencers running for their lives down 55 flights of stairs, high heels clip clipping down the stairs.
It was the most hilarious thing I’ve ever seen, and I love telling that story.
Who do you admire in your industry?
My biggest inspirations are down the comedian route. So, Joan Rivers — may she rest in peace — Bianca Del Rio and then in the Australian zone, Joel Creasey. I just adore him.
When it comes to content creators, I’m inspired by any queer creator. It fills me with joy seeing queer people come up on my For You Page.
For years, we have always been kept in the shadows of history. So social media is fabulous because it amplifies anyone’s voice. The queer community always inspires me, and I always make sure to leave them some love on their videos, because it’s quite special that we’re living in a day and age where people like that now get to be seen.
Describe your inbox in three words.
Everything awaiting response.
How do you sign off your emails?
It depends on my mood. If I’m in a good mood, it’s a ‘cheers’. And if I’m not happy? It’s a ‘kind regards’.
You can keep up to date with Matt on Instagram and TikTok, or you can check out his antics by listening to his podcast, High Scrollers.
The post Insider Trading: Social Media’s Most Beloved Diva Alright Hey On Content Creation & Following Your Own Lead appeared first on PEDESTRIAN.TV .
