The Glow-Up Is Real: Ethiopian Creators Turn Beauty Content into Cash

During her third year as a construction technology student, Tsion Azmeraw ,25, realized that the 9-to-5 life would not really suit her. She began taking makeup classes on the side, hoping to change a childhood passion into a potential career. After graduating, she took the freshly polished skills to social media and started to post makeup tutorial videos on TikTok, which quickly gained a loyal following. A year later, she has over 3000 regular customers and has earned six-digit profits through her makeup business.

“90% of my clients come from TikTok,” Tsion told Shega.

Her channel Tia’s Makeup Corner is part of a new wave of Ethiopian content creators who are using social media platforms to launch and scale beauty businesses. The ability to showcase their skills and directly engage customers is proving to be a powerful, low-cost marketing tool. Social media platforms are becoming storefronts, portfolios, and community hubs rolled into one.

Most of Tsion’s customer base is composed of 17–to 24-year-olds, reflective of the general user base currently on TikTok. Her videos are usually a mix of makeovers, tutorials, and collaborations with other famous content creators.

“Knowing your audience and their preferred content type helps in curating posts and setting prices,” she says. Early viewers were critical and responded negatively to her content.

“The algorithm was pushing my videos to the wrong type of audience,” she recalls. 

For the 28-year-old Sophia Joseph, owner of Sophus Mani Pedi, Instagram became a springboard to grow her five-year-old nail salon business. The biopharmaceutical science graduate opened her first salon five years ago but had been struggling to create a regular customer base.

“There was little to no care given to the nail-tech business,” she told Shega. “That is why I started the business.”

She has now opened two more branches with most of the bookings coming through direct messages (DMs) on social media. It took nearly two years before Sophia’s content managed to consistently garner thousands of views. 

TikTok’s algorithm relies on several factors that determine whether a video reaches a massive audience or is limited to a few contacts. After a video is first uploaded, it is shown it to a test group of around 300 random users, and the content must earn at least 50 engagement points, through likes, comments, shares, and saves, to be displayed further.

While most beauty content creators slowly find their footing after experimenting with different formats, some venture into social media with concerted intentionality.

Redwan Nuredin, a hair stylist with 167.K followers on TikTok and 72.1K followers on Instagram, is one of the most well-known beauticians in Ethiopia. Long before opening his first salon, the 26-year-old used to film the makeover transformations of clients at his former job. This helped familiarize his face to customers while giving him a head start when he officially started his own business. The efforts appear to have paid off as his two ‘Red’ salons handle nearly 10,000 customers annually.

“I became a hair stylist after finishing tenth grade and only opened my first branch three years ago,” he recalls.

With two busy branches and over 20 employees on payroll, Redwan has now begun to teach other aspiring beauty entrepreneurs on his page.

The influencer advertising market in Ethiopia is projected to reach US $9.82 million by 2029 at a growing rate of 7.54% annually, according to some estimates. Realizing this, Redwan also collaborates with “influencers” to attract more customers. 

As Ethiopia’s internet subscriber base continues to grow from its current scale of above 43 million and smartphone penetration increases, more entrepreneurs will rely on social media platforms to boost their businesses. But for now, it seems individual entrepreneurs with an aesthetic inclination appear to be making the most of it.