PEOPLE OF INTEREST
research and discipline, Harvey was able to create her own
unique content. Starting in 2016, she learned how to film, edit
and post her own videos.
After graduating high school in 2010, Harvey worked
various 9-to-5 jobs while pursuing a bachelor’s degree at
Indian River State College. She still managed to build her
viewership and put out new content weekly. Because of that
hard work, her YouTube channel, OnlyOneJess, currently has
330,000 subscribers and nearly 23 million total video views.
She aims to post at least one to two videos per week and
recently made vlogging her full-time job. As part of the You-
Tube program, Harvey has had to maintain a certain amount
of views in her channel. She is able to earn a living from ads
and sponsorships.
“I think my success came from a few things,” she says. “For
one, I studied a lot of other successful YouTubers to see what
they were doing, how they edited their videos and what type
of content they were creating. So, I went ahead and took what
I learned and applied it to my own videos using my own
technique and made sure I remained true to myself in the
process of it all.”
Her videos are a mix of beauty tutorials, relationship
discussions and general life updates. Her videos have been
well received as she dishes out beauty advice on natural hair
styles, upkeep and maintenance. Harvey brings her vivacious
personality and fun sense of humor to the screen and does
not apologize for being herself.
Because of her larger-than-life personality, a hair product
company, Crème of Nature, nabbed Harvey over a year ago
to work on its color campaign. The company creates products
with natural ingredients and asked Harvey to be one of the
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JESSICA HARVEY
Age: 27
Lives In: Port Saint Lucie
Occupation: Social media
People
influencer
Education: Bachelor of Science
in organizational management,
Indian River State College
Hobbies: Relaxing at home
with music, shopping, movies, hanging out with friends.
Who inspires me: “My mom.”
Something most people don’t know about me:
“I made it to the third round of “The Voice” but never
got any camera time.”
Social Media Handles: @OnlyOneJess and
YouTube.com/OnlyOneJess
faces on its new hair color boxes, on shelves at Sally Beauty
Supply and Target.
As seems to be status-quo on social media, many “influencers”
are faced with negative comments from viewers.
“Being a social media influencer is not for the weak
hearted,” Harvey says, laughing. “You will definitely develop
some thick skin and it makes you realize there are a lot of
people out there who hate to see others succeed. But then you
have everyone else who is so supportive and that outweighs
the rest and makes it all worth it.”
In the beginning of her vlogging career, Harvey said the
harsh words would often ruin her entire day. Now, she says
she lets the words roll off her shoulders.
“If I choose to respond to negativity, which is rare, I usually
reply with, ‘Well, thanks for watching anyways!’” Harvey
says with a smile.
“All I’ve ever wanted to do was entertain people. When a
viewer says that my videos brighten their day or helped them
in any way, I know that I’ve achieved my purpose here,” Harvey
says. “I hope to continue to be able to provide happiness
for people and add a little sunshine to their lives.”
ANTHONY INSWASTY
Harvey’s authenticity, great sense of humor and knowledge around current
beauty trends has attracted a fairly large fan-base to her YouTube channel.
In many of her videos, Harvey demonstrates how to perfect an entire hair
routine or style. Between the instructional portions of the video, she chats
about her life or answers questions from her viewers.
/OnlyOneJess