Leilani Green Is 'The One': Viral Beauty Influencer Talks Sephora Collab & Social Media Success

Beauty and fashion guru and social media influencer Leilani Green, known for her high-energy makeup tutorials and relatable personality, is making big moves on and off of social media. 

The viral TikTok content creator, highlighted in Forbes’ “Top Creators: Fashion 50” list, has a collaboration with Sephora to launch a new lip stain shade named, “SHE’S THE ONE.” 

Green took some time out of her day to walk The Blast through what a day in the life of a popular and successful influencer looks like. She also shared some tips for anyone just getting started on social media, and how she got her start and grew to be a viral content creator.

Green, a Gen-Z beauty expert who shares relatable content on social media, is one of the fastest growing beauty content creators in today’s market. With her stunning make-up looks and tutorials, fabulous tips, and “big sister” persona to appeal to the younger generation, Green continues to attract new fans and followers daily. 

Her love of makeup and fashion began when she was younger thanks to her older sister.

“So, I have an older sister. She's 31, and I'm 23, so there’s like a pretty good age gap, and we'd share a room. So every day before school, she'd wake up two hours early to do her makeup, and I was never able to wear makeup before then. She would get up, and I would watch her every single move with my eyes half open, and the moment she left, I would sit right where she sat and do my full face, take it off, go to sleep, and then wake up for my time for school,” she told The Blast.

“That would happen the whole entire year of her last year in high school. And after that moment, it was a wrap. That's what really got me into beauty, for sure, without a doubt.”

Starting out with content creation 10 years ago on Musical.ly, Green is now on multiple platforms. 

“I would just find myself rushing home from school and opening my app and just filming,” she said about what got her into being a content creator. “I’d be lip-synching songs, singing to songs, random little videos that I would have makeup on just to kind of showcase my makeup look. I remember I couldn’t wait to get home to film those little videos.” 

For Green, it’s important to keep her content as fresh as possible so she said she had to figure out how to do that. What has helped keep her content from going stagnant is all about challenging herself. 

“Every beginning of the year, I challenge myself, or end of the year, to purchase new equipment, a new camera, or lens. The first year I decided to do this was when I bought my camera and stopped filming on my iPhone only,” she told The Blast. “And it was such an expensive camera. I had no idea how to work it, but once I figured it out, it completely opened up a new avenue. So it upped my recognition as a creator and it just brought it to the next level.” 

Sometimes, it is her surroundings that need to be refreshed, so she said she tries to focus on reinventing and changing her surroundings often.

With many different social media platforms that have unique features and its own following, Green said there’s one where she feels more herself.

“I feel like the platform for me is Snapchat, which more people are hopping on now because it’s the one platform that I don’t care how I look. I don’t care if I’m crying, sick, happy. I vlog myself every single day,” she told The Blast. “I feel like myself on there because you know I show absolutely everything and people genuinely feel like they have a friend. I feel like there is no boundary when it comes to Snapchat.” 

Green said that creating her videos is “therapy” for her. 

“I wake up, truly listen to how I feel, whether it’s a bad day, I don’t want to talk this day, or if I’m really happy, I let that reflect my makeup look that I’ll film,” she said. “I’ll just sit in my beauty room, put on a show based on how I feel, or some music, and I’ll just go.”

Green explained that a down kind of mood might mean a “deep, black, smoky eye” or something that properly reflects how she’s feeling. If she’s in more of an upbeat mood, her look of the day will reflect that feeling. 

Choosing which products to feature in her content is a big deal because there are so many to choose from.

“I typically aim for the ones that sometimes have controversy around them that people need to know, whether it’s good or bad,” she said. “If not, it’s more brands that people typically use, and they drop a new product. I’ll be one of the first to review it to really fill the audience in if it’s worth purchasing.”

Green was able to share some insight into what post it was that made her feel this was what she should be doing. 

“This was about when I started homing in on beauty as my niche. This was about three years ago, I got an offer from Instagram Reels when they just started pushing out reels on Instagram. They came to me with an offer saying they’d pay me a certain amount of money to post three reels a week,” she said. “I never posted a video on Instagram before because there weren’t videos on Instagram. It was just pictures.”

She further explained that she originally thought she wouldn’t do it, but a dream she had about posting the videos made her reconsider. 

“But what can I do three times a week that people would want to see? So I did my first transition video. It was very bad. It was outside, bad lighting, where I had no makeup on. I covered the screen and then I had a full look on," she said. "It got 23 million views and I never stopped.”

Earlier this year, Green shared the big news that she joined forces with Sephora.

"ITS OFFICIAL! Me and @sephora @Sephora Collection have worked together to create the PERFECT shade of their ICONIC and best selling Cream Lip Stain and I have named her 'SHE'S THE ONE.' And it has my name on it," she captioned her announcement on social media.

"This is truly a surreal moment for me, as someone who has worn a lip to school ever since I was a child. I truly believe a face is not complete unless you have the perfect lift to top it with, so I decided to deliver “SHE'S THE ONE” to you guys. She is now available on sephora.com so that you guys can purchase this beautiful one of a kind lip while she lasts. 10hour wear, transfer proof, vegan formula all for $16."

Green told The Blast that she's worked with Sephora Collection for about three years as a partner promoting certain products, and they saw "the potential in me as a creator."

"I really felt special that they came to me with the offer," she said. "They were like, would you want to make your own perfect shade of our viral Cream Lip Stain."

For anyone who’s considering getting started in content creation, Green has some advice to share. 

“When I reflect back on my career as a content creator, the point in life where I didn’t make money and wasn’t recognized as a creator was when my page didn’t have the thing that people can come to me for in order to get help. I didn’t have that special thing that I was really good at,” she explained. “When someone looks at your page, they should know what you do and what to come to you for.”

The other tip is to remember that the numbers will go up and down, so don’t focus on that. 

“Sometimes my reviews don’t do as good as my transition videos but I’m going to keep doing reviews because people genuinely want to see how the product goes,” she shared. “So don’t let the numbers guide the content you make.” 

Leilani Green can be found on Instagram, TikTok, and YouTube.