What started as a way to connect with their community while living upstate in Syracuse has turned into a career for 30-year-old Ana Richardson and 32-year-old Michael Calobrisi. Although you may not realize from their separate accounts, the two are a couple who met while studying together in college.

With a background in acting, film and news, they grew their accounts based on their niches. Richardson, who enjoys finding new businesses and budget-friendly things to do has found a way to utilize that in the world of social media, finding a large audience of Long Islanders who feel the same. Taking what she learned from doing the same thing in Syracuse, she started from scratch with a new account, @downstatediaries, when she and Michael moved to Long Island. Now with over 32,000 followers across her Instagram and TikTok, she shows Long Islanders what they can do across the Island without hurting their wallets.

Meanwhile Calobrisi, a born and raised Long Islander, has a love of what he calls “strange history.” He enjoys sharing the stories behind everything from Sunrise Mall in to Camp Hero in Montauk.

“We just really love storytelling and I think that these platforms just kind of allowed us to have a way to tell these stories,” Richardson said.

Through his brand, "Eden on LI," Boakye works with local businesses to highlight the two things he loves the most: vintage style and food. Whether he visits a vintage shop, like Back in Time in Farmingdale, or a soul food spot hidden inside of a gas station like Winnie’s in Amityville, Boakye uses his platform to provide an inside look at what's on offer.

Boakye’s goal in posting to TikTok is not only to grow his own brand, but to help businesses all across Long Island grow.

“Not everyone really knows about social media as much from a marketing standpoint," he said. "When I come around and it might be new to them but overall, once they see the videos gain more traction and people start to talk about it around the whole town, they are actually more accessible to having me on board.”

After a ski accident in college changed Rebecca Koltun’s life, she found a new way to share her story – through social media.

The 24-year-old Plainview native was hospitalized for most of 2021 after the incident left her paralyzed from the neck down. Since then, she has learned new ways to complete life tasks. But one thing that stayed the same: her sense of humor.

Koltun has since used her platform to not only connect with others who have gone through the same or answer others’ curious questions on how she does things like eat, but also to show her funny side. Like in one of her most popular videos, which received over 16 million views, she celebrates 3 years since her accident by blowing out a candle with her breathing tube.

“I think that a lot of people are like so curious about what was going on with me, I feel like it’s just best to hear it from the primary source like how I do things,” she says. “And I think that people do enjoy seeing how I do things and want to see how I’m doing because I feel like I have come a long way.”

In addition to her dark humor, Koltun uses her platform to express her new interests since becoming paralyzed, such as painting.

For the D'Alessandros, pranking is a family norm. Now, thanks to social media, it's also their business.

Marco D'Alessandro Jr., 27, of Lake Grove, is the lead behind the videos that have garnered millions of views and involve his other family members: Dad, Marco D'Alessandro Sr., 58; Mom, Donna D'Alessandro, 55; and siblings, Pier, 25, Lynda, 23 and Nikki, 21.

The siblings have always been pranksters, even as little kids. So when TikTok started to grow, Marco Jr. got the idea to record their pranks on other family members and post it to social media. Quickly, not just the jokes, but the family dynamic, drew millions.

"We were all together during the pandemic, and we were kind of trapped in the house together a little bit, but we saw it as an opportunity to get close and during that time, we spent so much time with each other it kind of just naturally happened on its own," says Marco Jr.

Together, the family has each grown their own social media pages and started the "SaucyTV" business. The family has reached more than 3 million subscribers on YouTube.

Most people associate TikTok’s content creators as Gen-Z, but Nora Sangalang, also known as “Our Filipino Grandma,” is proving the social media platform is for everyone.

Her grandson, Jeffrey Juarez, got the idea to join the app from his younger family members. He started posting content and experimenting with videos and found the ones that went viral didn’t involve dancing or lip-syncing – but were featuring his grandmother.

“I realized I need my videos to make money. I need my videos to have more consistent views,” Juarez says. “The videos of my grandma are the ones that always went the most viral.”

Sangalang launched her own TikTok account, which has now grown to over 1.2 million followers. The popularity of the account stems from Sanglang’s viral series where she shares creative pickup lines, all directed by Juarez.

There are also plenty of videos sharing her Filipino culture with the world. The account has led to advertising opportunities with major companies like McDonald’s, Netflix and Hulu.

Many younger TikTok users refer to her as “our lola” since she reminds them of their own grandmothers.

Thanks in part to social media, Adam Ezegelian, Johnny Barry, Griffin McCarthy and Ryan Daversa are living out their rock star dreams with their band, Adam and the Metal Hawks.

The Long Islanders started the band with the goal of becoming full-time musicians and turned to TikTok for an audience during the pandemic. With a little help from their more than 3.7 million fans on the platform they are now touring the world.

Their platform isn't all about their music. Showing off their personalities, they've been able to reach new audiences and even grab celebrity attention.

It also helps that the lead singer, Ezegelian, bears a resemblance to actor Jack Black. The group started a TikTok "challenge" to get Black’s attention — and it worked. Black "dueted" their video, sending millions of views and new followers to their page. 

The band has played gigs around the world, including in Switzerland last year. Their goal: to one day get the chance to play at Northwell at Jones Beach Theater.

Trotta had just graduated from Marist College in Poughkeepsie and was all set to continue her education to become a Long Island teacher when a phone call changed her career path.

At college, the Manhasset native met her best friend and roommate, Maddie Schrader, who started working at Barstool Sports as an intern and quickly gained a large social media following. She recruited Trotta to be her "right hand man" when it came to filming and content creation, which gave Trotta an opportunity to build her own personality online. So much so that she grabbed the attention of Barstool Sports president and founder Dave Portnoy.

Portnoy recruited Trotta, also known as "Smelly Kelly," to join the Barstool team. It was an easy "yes" for her and since announcing her new job, she’s seen her social media following rise.

"I’m in my 20s, why not? Going to work and hanging out with my best friend everyday, that’s a pretty ideal situation," she says.

Hirsch thought he was "too old" to be on TikTok.

"I don’t dance; I don’t lip sync; I don’t do any of that," he says. But with encouragement from a friend’s younger sister, the rising fashion designer decided to join the app in 2020 to help showcase his transformative dress designs.

Four years and nearly 550,000 followers later, Hirsch has made a name for himself on the platform, which in turn, has translated into making a name for himself in the fashion world.

While he does not dance or lip sync on the app, he is best known for his popular "transformation" dresses, which can also be seen on the runway. This year, he most recently made his New York Fashion Week solo show debut.

The personality he brings to social media clicks: Hirsch originally wanted to be on Broadway. Once his love of fashion was sparked as a student at Half Hollow Hills High School West, he shifted gears to pursue that career path. In 2019, he graduated with a bachelor’s degree in fashion-apparel design from Drexel University in Philadelphia. Now, he is able to channel both sides on TikTok. 

Syed says she joined TikTok “begrudgingly” in 2020 because she had a lot of time to fill during the pandemic, when she was living at her childhood home in Jericho (where she still lives) and taking classes at SUNY Old Westbury. “It was a nice distraction and a nice way to connect with people in a way that didn’t require me to leave my house,” she says.

She films and edits her videos on her own; many are less than 10 seconds long and picture her face with her message in writing. She tries to post daily. “I do like to follow trends as much as a I can. A new movie, an album release, a concert or festival,” she says. For example, she posted about the “Barbie” movie and often invokes Taylor Swift.

She also likes to dispel stereotypes, she says. Being a visible Muslim wearing a hijab on social media gives her the chance to “reclaim the narrative” of how Muslims are perceived, she says. “If it is something that affects me or people who look like me, it’s definitely a responsibility and something I’m grateful to raise awareness about,” she says. “I’ve always been a loud, outspoken type of person.”

Sepsy, whose Hungry Gnome baked goods company makes as many as 150,000 treats a month, did not set out to be a TikTok content creator known for comically imitating Long Island mothers.

In November 2022, Sepsy was tapped to be a contestant on a new HBO Max cooking competition series called “The Big Brunch” created and hosted by actor Dan Levy. “That experience took the business and my name to a whole new place,” says Sepsy, who lives in Garden City. She appeared in all eight episodes, was runner-up and got a cookbook deal.

After the show, she decided to go all in on social media to up her profile and to help grow her business, hoping an engaged audience would then want to buy what she is selling. She hired a social media management company to negotiate brand partnership deals — she’s done videos featuring Brisk Iced Tea and Nutella, for instance. The company also does her filming and editing.

To her surprise, the videos that do the best for her don't necessarily have to do with cooking. “Me making fun of my mom as my Long Island mother, that is what resonated with a larger audience,” she says. “I just had to sort of be myself and not be afraid to be goofy.”

Mele dropped out of Binghamton University to focus on TikTok. He enlisted his father, Frank, 61, who is retired, to star with him in video skits.

“Everybody loves my dad. He’s a character. We’re always cracking jokes,” Mele says. Their first video together was posted in 2019 and had 13,000 views within a few hours, he says. “That one video sparked the whole domino effect, the snowball effect,” he says.

Mele’s followers grew, and he started posting three to four comedy videos a day that he calls “family friendly and wholesome.” Some will feature his mom, Karen, 59, or his brother, Nick, 28. He’s now got more than 27 million followers and most of his videos meet his goal of at least 1 million views. It’s not unusual for his videos to hit 30 million to 50 million views.

Murphy uses his TikTok platform to help him gain exposure for his “dream job” — motivational speaking at colleges and elementary, middle and high school assemblies across the country.

Murphy was born with his legs facing backward — his kneecaps and feet were in the opposite direction, he says. At age 4, he had his legs amputated. The plan was for him to wear prosthetic legs, but his residual limbs weren’t able to bear the weight, so he stopped using them: “It’s like wearing shackles,” he says. “Why not just embrace who I am?”

Murphy goes to schools across the country talking about goal setting and overcoming adversity. He talks about how he became successful as a wrestler in high school and at Penn State University. “They’re always surprised,” he says. “Once I go down to a wrestling practice and roll around on a mat with them, they get it.”

During visits to schools, he’ll take videos with the students and post them. “I’m always looking for different ways to promote myself, put myself out there,” he says.