With almost twenty thousand followers on Instagram alone, Ellam’s reach expands all over the world. She has worked on several extremely successful projects, including working as a writer, host and influencer for AwesomenessTV, Verizon’s Go90 app, and ArsenicTV’s Snapchat stoy. She also single-handedly wrote the award-winning film The Woods.
“I think I’m a good writer because I know how to make things relatable to other people,” said Ellam.
When YouTube sensation Matt Smith of the channel DangMattSmith saw what she was capable of, both as an influencer and a writer, he reached out to Ellam over Instagram to write different videos for his channel. The result of their first collaboration was a hysterical video that went viral with over 1.4 million views.
“It’s kind of crazy to me. On a screen 1.4 million doesn’t really look like anything, but I get daily comments and messages about the video and my friendship with Matt, which makes it feel more real,” said Ellam.
The premiere video, which Ellam also showed off her acting talents in, is about girls commuting. DangMattSmith is acting as an Uber driver, and Ellam and her friend Rio Sage show off different funny things girls do in cars.
“It was honestly inspired from a conversation we had about me and Rio taking Ubers all the time. We were just brainstorming ideas and it just all came from that one off track conversation,” said Ellam. “I love working with my friends, and working just with each other instead of a big crew can be fun because you get to make your own time and get to experiment more with different ideas. Matt really comes alive on camera and has hilarious ideas about what to do. I like that he likes to make videos outside and likes to take the audience on an adventure.”
As both a writer and influencer for the video, Ellam’s work was vital to its success. It was so successful, that Smith invited her to work on another video, and now wants to develop an entire series.
“When Anja and I work together, it doesn't feel like work. We work really well together. I would love to work more with her in the future. She is bright, intelligent and has super creative ways of thinking for new ideas," said Smith.
After the two wanted to collaborate on a project for a while, they finally met to brainstorm and quickly came up with the idea while talking about commuting. They decided to add Sage to the video because she would add another comedic element. They then wrote the different types of characters and planned how they would portray them.
“Having us be in the video would make our followers more likely to view the video when we promoted it,” Ellam explained. “We promote the video on all of our social media platforms to let all our followers know to go and watch. A lot of my followers always ask when I'm doing more videos with him and we've gotten great response and growth in followers from making these videos. Instagram is a tool influencers use to grow their brand and connect with more people which is what I use it for.”
Smith and Ellam are now looking to launch a reality style vlog series on the channel, with a new video once a month. The second video they worked on together adopted this style, and it was a massive success. The video features Smith going to visit Sage and Ellam at their apartment, and then taking a dog for a walk. It is a different type of humor from their initial video, but just as comedic.
“They’re very different because reality style vlogs allow you to make things up in the moment that show your personality more, whereas scripted videos are all very carefully written so you don’t want to be improvising in the moment,” said Ellam.
To watch Ellam’s hilarious work in that first viral video with DangMattSmith titled What Girls Do in Cars, click here.