- Nicole Miranda made up to $400 a day speaking to men on the dating apps Meete and ToChat.
- She used to spend all her time on the apps, but now she markets them on TikTok for referrals.
This as-told-to essay is based on a conversation with Nicole Miranda, a 32-year-old affiliate marketer from Alburtis, Pennsylvania. The following has been edited for length and clarity.
I have bipolar disorder, so I've always struggled at regular jobs. Before the pandemic, I worked for Verizon as a saleswoman and was living paycheck to paycheck. When the pandemic happened, I took a year off because I was feeling so burned out.
When unemployment started running out, I really didn't want to go back. Customers are ruthless. Every single day you're dealing with angry people, and it's usually not because of anything you did wrong.
I was scrolling on TikTok one day when I came across a video of a girl talking about an app where guys pay to talk to you. That sounded interesting, so I downloaded Meete and started using it.
When I first downloaded the app, I was literally on it 24/7. I was lonely and depressed, so I'd spend all day trying to make money.
Now I use both Meete and another app made by the same company called ToChat to make cash-out points, which I earn by interacting with men, of up to $200 per app per day. I make around $10,000 every month.
These apps are not as easily usable as Tinder or Bumble, so you need to learn how they work
The basis of both of them is talking to guys. They have to buy coins through the app and then spend those coins to talk to you, which then turn into points that you can cash out for money. Ten points is equal to $1.
You can also get more points by sending content such as a selfie. You can send whatever you're comfortable with. The image is blurred and you set the coin amount they need to pay to see it.
These apps also have referral programs. They might run a banner on the app for six weeks with a special promotion to encourage you to sign up more people with your promotion code.
You can also advertise special gifts, like sending pictures and videos at a certain "gift" price like 399 points. The app also allows you to track your performance, and I was always in the top five or 10, which helped me get coin bonuses.
When I started out, there wasn't much content online about how to succeed
I made a YouTube channel and posted some tutorials with the answers to some of the questions I had. I started posting similar content on TikTok, too.
Once I started getting a lot of referrals from TikTok, I downgraded from being on the apps all the time to spending about 10 to 15 hours a week talking to a handful of guys who I offered a "girlfriend experience" — meaning I would always be available to chat with them.
Most of the men just want to feel like someone cares
A lot of them just make small talk with you in the same way they would on any other dating app. I find just being myself and showing compassion works pretty well.
Some guys will ask if you want to go on a real date with them, but I always politely decline. These are men who are willingly paying to talk to women, so I wouldn't meet up with any of them because I'm sure they would be expecting more than just a regular date.
If guys are annoying or try to cross a line, I block them immediately. I don't give them a warning because I learned that if I do, they'll eventually push the line again.
I've had guys claim they don't know they're paying to talk to girls on the app and get upset about it
They're fine with giving their money to random app developers in a foreign country, but as soon as they find out that same money is actually going to the girls they're talking to, it becomes a problem.
The weirdest request I've gotten was from a guy who wanted a picture of my feet holding a remote control. I made a ton of money off of him. He always wanted to talk and always wanted more weird feet content, including standing on tiptoes and touching random objects with my feet.
Another guy would ask me to send him videos of me spitting food on the floor and telling him to eat it. He also liked when I demanded that he pay me.
Viral videos promoting the apps get you bonuses
Bonuses start at $30 for 50,000 views and go all the way to $1,000 for 2 million-plus views. I've had more than 50 TikToks go viral.
Going viral is really easy — you just need to create as much content as you can and post 10 to 20 times a day.
When I'm on TikTok, I look for trending sounds and then twist them to my style. As soon as I come across a sound that I like, I create a video right then and there. Most of my videos are just me with text over my face.
I've found that hashtags aren't as important as using trends and putting out a lot of content.
When people ask me what I do, I say affiliate marketing
About a year ago I pivoted, so I don't use the app to talk to guys at all anymore. Once I learned how to market the apps really well, I stopped hustling the guys for money because it was a lot of work and mentally exhausting. I was making so much off of referrals that I didn't need to do both.
Every time somebody signs up and uses my promo code, I make a few cents, and it goes up slightly for every 100 people you refer. My links usually get 200,000 to 300,000 clicks per month, which I measure on Linktree. From those clicks, I get around 5,000 referrals a month.
There are plenty of girls on the app still making thousands a month talking to guys, but for me, it's turned into an affiliate-marketing career. I want to be an advocate for people who struggle with mental illness to let them know there are other ways to make money besides working a nine-to-five.