Most influencers build an audience on one platform and stay there. Crystal Yu operates across two ecosystems that couldn’t be more different: Instagram in the West and Xiaohongshu in China. The content strategies, audience expectations, brand partnership dynamics, and even the definition of authenticity diverge significantly between them. Crystal has built a following on both, and in this episode, she pulls back the curtain on what that actually looks like.

Crystal walks us through how she became an influencer, what she’s learned about creating content for two very different platforms, and how she approaches each one differently. She also breaks down the business side of influencing — fee structures, how brand partnerships come together, and what brands consistently get wrong when approaching creators for collaborations.

For brands and marketers trying to understand how influencer marketing works in China versus the West, this episode offers a rare insider perspective. Crystal explains how Chinese brands approach collaborations differently from Western brands, why authenticity means something different on Xiaohongshu than it does on Instagram, and how to build trust with audiences on both sides of the divide.