Today we’d like to introduce you to Michelle Vo.
So, before we jump into specific questions, why don’t you give us some details about you and your story.
I am a first-generation Vietnamese-American immigrant. My family came to California in the Bay Area since the mid-90s and have been here since. I grew up being taught the “American Dream”, go to school to get a degree then land a stable job. As growing up in an Asian American family, having a passion was not important. I later learned from reading books that to be able to pursue your passion, you must find the right vehicle to produce an income that can fuel and start your passion. This is why I am keeping my 9-5 until I can get on the right vehicle and go in full time with my passion. My passion is in creating and designing. The first time I felt like I enjoyed creating something was from editing videos. I bought my first Sony camera in 2008. My journey for youtube and video started back in 2009. I started with making short fun music clips, prom proposal videos for friends, and my own video slideshows for memories.
From then, I was intrigued with filming vlogs and editing them. I had my channel since 2009, but it took some time for me to make an official post on youtube and started the vlogging journey. With the support of my significant other at the time, to follow my hobby and passion for video editing and vlog, we named my channel “The Life of Sang & Michelle”, and from there was the birth of our Youtube channel in 2014. Our content consists of our lifestyle, journey of our business, and our travel vlogs. Travel vlogs are my favorite, but the most tedious to edit; however, the outcome is just amazing to watch and memories to keep. My business journey vlogs are fairly new content that we started brainstorming last year and brought to life this year. We wanted to bring educational content to our viewer to provide value while also letting them transparently see our journey from the start. Last but not least, I think we all know what lifestyle vlogs are so I won’t go into details.
With vlogging and editing creative video as my side passion and in hopes of being my passive income, I still work a regular 9-5 job for a steady income; however, there is a fire burning in me that just knows that I will be running my own business soon. The question I often asked myself is what kind of business do I want to run? In the last two years, my now fiance and I have been studying the real estate market. We have a plan and vision in mind for our real estate business and it is still a work in progress that we are excited to share with you in the near future! I believe that real estate will be my vehicle to fuel my passion for design. I explored into staging and interior designing as my new hands-on career interest that I know I’ll enjoy doing. I’ve interviewed and met several local bay area stagers to get a feel of the business concept and inventory resources. Many of the stagers I met/spoke to several stagers that have provided me with valuable tips and great resources that I cannot wait to execute into our real estate business! For now, I am just helping some friends with minor projects and staging for fun.
Has it been a smooth road?
Starting up your career path is definitely never smooth, but worth it. I struggled with keeping our vlogs consistent. Having to commit to filming and editing “x” amount of vlogs a day is a challenge for us especially when we both have two full-time jobs, our side real estate career, and trying to balance our personal lives/ relationship. We like to blend all of them when we can, and not having to force ourselves to film as that creates unnatural content for our viewers; when we do feel creative and full of ideas, we plan it one day ahead and shoot the next day so that we have organic content for our viewers; however, this became a challenge as it causes an inconsistent flow and views for our channel. As for our real estate struggles, it has been really tough as the market is still really hot even during the pandemic; inventory is low, and the competition is on high demand. Although I am not licensed yet at the moment, I am giving my fiance full support in this business to also familiarize myself in this field/market.
Alright – so let’s talk business. What else should we know about you and your career so far?
I have multiple business and side hustles that I do. I am mostly known for my Youtube Vlogs and Instagram that is still growing. You can search up my Youtube Channel, “The Life of Sang and Michelle”. I also recently started my staging company called “Modern Bliss Staging” and my real estate business with my fiance, which is currently still in progress.
The proudest moment of my career so far is just simply watching myself and my career grow over the years. What sets me and my business apart from others is the fact that I am always continuing to further my career and goals, never comfortably settling even after achieving them, and hoping to inspire others the same way. When I first started my career, I wanted to do nursing in hopes to help other people’s health and wellbeing so I majored in nursing. Soon I realized that nursing was not for me and getting classes for that major was way too impacted in college. I wanted to finish college ASAP to start my career and earn money because I realized in order to help others, I must work on myself and achieve my goals first. I switched majors to Public Health and quickly graduated. During my last semester in college, I knew that I wanted to work in the medical field and specifically in a hospital. In my last two semesters in school, I interned at UCSF Medical Center, and then Kaiser Permanente Medical Center.
Working for free was hard, especially getting up early to take public transportation but the experience was rewarding. I landed a position at Kaiser and have been working there since I graduated from college. After a couple of years into working my 9-5, I knew that I needed to start doing something for another source of passive income. I also became tired of doing the same thing every day and working for other people’s business. After that, I continued to explore my options and side hustles that I can do to keep a passive income while building my new career. I got into selling items on Poshmark, Mercari, Youtube, Amazon Associates, and now developing a Real Estate and Staging business. My Staging business is currently under construction but currently is named Modern Bliss Staging.
How do you think the industry will change over the next decade?
In 5 to 10 years, I envision that my industry will still be strong. Homes will always need staging to give them a welcome and warm feeling. I possibly see a shift into virtual staging as well as it is more cost-efficient and less work for both the seller and listing agents. For youtube, I assume that there will be a new big platform and youtube dying out so I definitely am looking into spreading the viewers and audience out to other new platforms.
Contact Info:
- Instagram: @Modern.Bliss, @loveMVo_
- Other: Mericari-Michellehcim, Youtube Channel: The Life of Sang and Michelle
Suggest a story: VoyageLA is built on recommendations from the community; it’s how we uncover hidden gems, so if you or someone you know deserves recognition please let us know here.
