It was while filling in time behind the reception desk at her family’s Araluen Motor Lodge in Batehaven that Chloe Morello wrote her first beauty blog.
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Surprised by the attention it attracted, the beauty school graduate began posting some youtube tutorials on applying make-up.
Today, the 22-year-old Surf Beach woman has been named one of the world’s top eight beauty advisors in an international competition run by the US Marie Claire magazine.
She now has 170,000 subscribers and has achieved almost 13 million views of her ChloeMorello youtube channel in just one year.
Now living in Sydney, the young entrepreneur is devoting herself full time to promoting her channel, her blog and her role as beauty editor for the online Missyconfidential.com.au.
Her channel is already attracting advertising along with its staggering audience and a “how-to” video she created on applying eyeliner alone attracted two-and-a-half million views.
To add to the appeal of her tutorials, Ms Morello uses her own, fortunately very pretty, face for the demonstrations, in an effort to keep the content as relevant and accessible as possible for ordinary girls.
“I’ve always been very interested in beauty and when I was managing the motel I had the time, so I started creating the videos,” she said.
“It just grew, through people searching for make-up tips. It’s hard to predict which ones are going to be popular, sometimes they just go viral.
“A popular one I made was how to achieve Victoria’s Secret-style make-up. I try and choose something that’s related to a hot topic, so I did that one when Victoria’s Secret was in the news.”
She explained to the uninitiated that once her channel started getting a high number of views, youtube wanted to put ads there, to put them in front of all those beautifully made-up eyes.
Her site is currently the second most subscribed beauty channel in Australia.
While it’s very big business in the US with lots of girls competing for a slice of the action, the concept is fairly new here in Australia.
Ms Morello likes the idea of producing an Australian alternative to other sites.
“It’s exciting. We’re getting more attention. Most of my viewers are from the US then Australia then Saudi Arabia. Saudi Arabian women are the biggest buyers of make-up in the world,” she said.
She also has followers in the UK, Canada and Germany.
Chloe said she likes to create a tutorial that reflects what any girl can do at her own dressing table.
“Most of my viewers are quite young and I want them to relate to me.”
While there are girls in the US “making millions” with similar sites, she said she preferred to keep her site home-grown Aussie.
“We should be putting more effort into what we’ve got here,” she said.
“There is so far to go. I have so much passion for make-up and for helping the girls. I put so much effort into it.”
The only Australian to make it into the Marie Claire top eight, the former Carroll College student has also been named as the ambassador for hair removal company Veet.
And it’s clear the only way from here is up.
“I want to build up my profile, do more beauty editing and move on to creating my own range of cosmetics,” she said.
Find Chloe’s site on youtube by searching for ChloeMorello.
