Tommy Burns, founder of Lift Off Labs
Tommy Burns is a true entrepreneur.
He started his first business when he was just eight years old.
Burns said, “Me and my friend, Joey D, were always into cool stuff. We didn’t come from much, so we figured the best way to get it was to go out and get it ourselves. So, we started a landscaping business. We started out with our parent’s lawnmowers and leaf blowers and printed out business cards and made shirts with our names on them. And that became my first experience making money for myself.”
In high school he started his career as a professional DJ.
He said, “I was 14 or 15 when I started deejaying and I was playing these large venues. And I was the youngest guy. There was nobody my age. But the guys that were ten years older than me were out getting wasted every night. I was busy building my logos, doing banners and promoting every week. I was always reinvesting what I had.”
After his DJ career, Burns bought a restaurant and was doing some consulting work when a friend introduced him to Marc D’Amelio, who changed his life forever.
He said, “I went to dinner with Marc and immediately knew that we were cut from the same cloth. He came from nothing. He’s started businesses. He always cared about the people around him. And he’s still that way. But never, in a million years, did we think it would turn into this.
So, I started working with Marc and at the time Charli and Dixie weren’t even on TikTok. That was in 2018. And by then Marc and I wrapped up the project that we were working on.
Then Marc calls me and says, ‘Have you ever heard of TikTok? Charli has like 30,000 likes on this post on TikTok.’ And time goes by and Charli starts blowing up. And then one day Marc calls me and says, ‘We’re going on Jimmy Fallon. I want you to come with us. We need to capture the moment.’
And in February of 2020, I left everything behind and formed a working relationship with Marc and Charlie and Dixie and Heidi. I became the head of content for them.
And in July, we moved to LA.”
So, he packed up the family and got to work with the D’Amelios.
Burns was in charge of building and growing the Charli, Dixie and D'Amelio Family YouTube channels. He was the family's head of content/creative director/executive producer for a majority of branded and partner content.
And then he started working with more creators with massive followings, including: Chase Hudson, Aaron May, Zane and Heath and many more.
In addition to helping creators, Burns also works with brands. He applies the same principles to content creation that he learned in the influencer world.
Some present and past clients, include: West Coast Customs, the LA Chargers, Dunkin’ and more.
There’s no menu template to choose from when working with Burns. He does a little bit of everything, including: Building new channels and guiding them to success; structuring, designing and producing digital content; developing brand/creator collab content and much more.
He knows the content world inside and out and he had some great advice for creators looking to grow their following and engagement.
Burns said, “It’s all about relatability. That’s the biggest factor. We find that the more over the top you are, like driving a Lamborghini or showing off your multimillion-dollar home; it’s really tough to give people the idea that they can be you.
You also need to be realistic. If you’re not going to do anything and just hope that you’re going to get a million followers for posting cool pictures; it’s not going to happen. And it doesn’t take a huge investment. You can go to Best Buy and buy a cheap camera. And you have to be realistic too. The effort that you put into something is what will get you there.”
And Burns took his own advice.
He worked hard, took risks and partnered with the right people to build Lift Off Labs into a successful company in a highly competitive field.
There are no shortcuts to success.
