We caught up with the brilliant and insightful Lydia Alty a few weeks ago and have shared our conversation below.
Lydia , so great to have you with us and thanks for taking the time to share your thoughts with the community. So, let’s jump into something that stops so many people from going after their dreams – haters, nay-sayers, etc. We’d love to hear about how you dealt with that and persisted on your path.
With regard to haters, the beta thing to do is ignore. Usually they will feed or other negative energy or want your attention. If we get a mean comment we aim to reply kindly, even if it does make us quite angry. Regardless of how many mean comments we get both on the business and the personal accounts we tend to ignore or delete. I personally have had people comment very horrible messages to me and sometimes threaten very nasty things, unless it’s serious or very nasty I tend to not go for the blocking immediately. I tend to give people the benefit of the doubt. One question i always ask is why? Why do they do it? And I think that sometimes they have something going on, but sometimes they are just nasty people and you’ll always get those people in your life and you can’t let them get to you because your your own person and whatever haters say they clearly don’t like you and if they don’t like you, it doesn’t really matter. You don’t need everyone to approve of you or your business idea, for you to just be your amazing self and follow your passions. The people who follow you are fans of your work and are the true fans! Surround yourself with kind people not people that want to be negative all the time!
Thanks for sharing that. So, before we get any further into our conversation, can you tell our readers a bit about yourself and what you’re working on?
I started doing online media when I was around 13 years old, yes I know very young. It’s always been a passion of mine to share stuff online and I am honoured to now do it alongside my studying and my job too! I started YouTube as Lydia A in early 2017. It started of as a drawing channel and then it changed into Vlogging, when I basically decided to show my face. Well that’s where it all began. Just a little 14 year old girl with a passion for filming. It started of as Lydia A and then Royal Reporter Lydia, a royal journalism channel was started in May 2018 after wanting to share my passion for the incredible royals and the incredible work they do. I especially focus on the now, new King and The Prince and Princess of Wales as well as the younger royals, Prince George, Princess Charlotte and Prince Louis, as well as their cousins and senior royal parents! It’s interesting because the royals are always up to something and throughly enjoy the work they do. Her Royal Highness The Princess of Wales does Early Years and that’s something very close to my heart because I agree early years education is so important to our society. I work in early years as a part time job alongside my hobbies and studying, so it’s really relatable to me seeing as I also work in that field. Anyway so in 2020 over lockdown I noticed that there was barely any entertainment businesses that actually help people, without wanting to have thousands of pounds out of your account. Now that’s perfectly fine if your a big YouTuber or creator with millions of subscribers but the small YouTubers are always forgotten about, so I used my 5 years of experience on YouTube to set up a media company to help bring small YouTubers together and know they are supported. YouTube now is so good at supporting all YouTubers no matter how big or small and that’s really good. The media companies do still only work with big YouTubers, which is absolutely fine, but I work with small YouTubers, well to be exact any YouTuber or creator to help them feel supported. We started of as just me and a couple of my mates, but now it’s a fully fledged team with 4 different departments and because I do this part time, majority of my business is free of cost, except for production we do offer a very small fee, but nothing like over a couple of pounds. We offered this free service because why should people have to pay to be represented. It’s not full time, as I do study and work too, so I can have this out their for people to use and get support should they need it. The company since opening has made 2 royal documentaries and helped over 38 small creators! Which is crazy! We also have diversified and made a group which represents YouTubers and gives them one on one support. In the group they have a network around them to also be able to get involved with company opportunities.
Looking back, what do you think were the three qualities, skills, or areas of knowledge that were most impactful in your journey? What advice do you have for folks who are early in their journey in terms of how they can best develop or improve on these?
Definitely determination, kindness and passion.
These are so important because if you don’t have determination to do something alongside your various other commitments you really can’t do anything with the business. Lydia A Entertainment runs and powers content for both Lydia A, Royal Reporter Lydia and my younger brother Harry’s content, it’s sort of like a media house and base for those channels. All business enquiries are also dealt through there. So a lot of planning went into it, and some money too! Of course we don’t ask people to pay, we find majority of this ourselves the only time people pay is for a big production which will cost time and money, but we do create high quality and that’s what we pride ourselves in.
You have to have kindness too, because helping other people in multiple way requires kindness. People in this industry need more kindness too, so many people are just plain nasty and don’t actually appreciate creators when they are starting out and a little bit of respect can go a long way.
You gotta have passion for it too. If your like me and media is a part time role alongside your various other work and study commitments you have to have a strong passion to go back and keep improving it and building new models for the business.
Awesome, really appreciate you opening up with us today and before we close maybe you can share a book recommendation with us. Has there been a book that’s been impactful in your growth and development?
Well it wasn’t really a book, but an article in a magazine said “Carry your passions for your hobbies and find passions for your work, I think it’s such a pivotal piece of advice for any person hoping to go into this industry, whether it be full or part time.
Interestingly one song that has recently encouraged me to help others is the song by Biddy ‘People help help the people’ it’s such a beautiful song, also ‘Everyday Life’ by Coldplay, both all about everyday things and helping others. People can and should help eachother, kindness should be the forefront of every business and so should passion, not just Money. I find people all the time looking for business ideas and ho what could make me the most revenue. Of course you have to think about costs and stuff but why should that be your sole focus. Make a business, again whether it be in your free time or planning on doing it full time, make it count, make it make a difference to our world and to your community, make people take something special away from your business. Trust me kindness is free and it’s a much better feeling than money. Make a business around your values and try and add some love into this world.
Contact Info:
- Website: https://www.lydiaaentertainment.com
- Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/lydiaalty
- Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lydia-alty-88856b296?utm_source=share&utm_campaign=share_via&utm_content=profile&utm_medium=android_app
- Twitter: https://www.twitter.com/alty_lydia
- Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/RoyalReporterLydia
Image Credits
all images are copyrighted to Lydia A Entertainment/Lydia Alty
