Guy finds creative way to pay off his student loan with help of a simple TikTok video

Many people are following the "pay off debt" craze on TikTok. They are creating films and pleading with their fans for assistance to generate money. As per Business Insider, the reason behind the surge of these videos is that the makers want to cash in on TikTok's Creator Rewards program. On their videos creators must have a minimum of 10,000 followers and 100,000 views during the last month to be eligible for this program. According to Viral Marketing Stars CEO Katya Varbanova, it's like the little guys coming together to take on TikTok, a billion-dollar firm. In essence, what they're saying is, "Hey TikTok, give us some of that money!" The trend took off when medical student and TikToker Jake Heisenburg (@jheisenburg) discovered a way to get around the Founder Program's mechanism. His video, which he made about it, has received over 22 million views. He revealed the process in the video so everyone on TikTok knows it.

Jake explained it to us: a staggering 247 million people would need to watch his video for just five seconds each for TikTok to pay off all of his student loans at once. Additionally, his video had to be at least one minute long to be eligible for the money. Therefore, he idly savored his cereal for the rest of the video.

To encourage more people to watch these pay-off debt films fans are banding together and writing tons of comments under videos like Heisenberg's. The purpose is to increase the visibility of these videos on TikTok. Katya Varbanova observed that platforms like Facebook, YouTube, and Instagram wouldn't allow this kind of content. According to her, TikTok is similar to GoFundMe in that users post requests for attention rather than money.

The user reactions were nothing but supportive.

"I just realized I’ve been watching this video for 6 hours on repeat because I fell asleep," said Poppy 

As Katya noted, the way the TikTok algorithm operates makes this entire strategy unique on the platform. Ultimately, Jake's gamble paid off though not like he had anticipated. He revealed to everyone a few days later that he had only made $4,200 from it. Although this wasn't enough to pay off his entire student loan debt, he had previously stated that he owed a significant amount.

He explained two things and determined how much he got: "qualified views" and "RPM," which is basically how much money you get for every 1,000 views. But even though it wasn't as much as he hoped, Jake was still happy. He said, "Hey, this is more than I used to make in two months at my old job, all from just one video!" He was really grateful for what he called an "almost life-changing" amount of money.

He also said, "I can't even express how thankful I am and how unbelievable it is that this happened to me." With the cost of living crisis hitting hard in the US and household debt hitting record levels, folks are finding clever ways to make money like using TikTok.

You can follow Jake Heisenburg (@jheisenburg ) on TikTok for more such videos and content.

Editor's note: This article was originally published on May 27, 2024. It has since been updated.