Addison Rae – TikTok Icon to Popstar

Author: Maria Rossi-Keen

Addison Rae is a 25-year-old entrepreneur who turned an online dancing career into a 25-million-dollar net worth. Addison started out as a typical teenager with a background in competitive dancing. As the world of social media and TikTok grew, she decided to make content of her own, recording dance and lip-sync videos. Within a few months of joining, her account grew to over one million followers, leading her to drop out of LSU and focus on her career. Addison grew her brand into dancing, product reviews, and promotional videos. Her account shifted from a hobby that she did for fun into a highly profitable job. Over the next year, Addison accumulated over 30 million new followers through her dancing videos. She continued to grow her account and make TikTok videos, eventually gaining 85 million followers. Addison leveraged her popularity to launch her own beauty line, Item Beauty, in 2020, which has a projected $677 billion revenue by the end of 2025. She continued dancing and promoting her beauty line; however, her ultimate dream was to be a performer. In August of 2024, the movie He’s All That premiered with Addison as the star.  In August 2024, Addison released her first single, “Diet Pepsi”.  Her song was criticized harshly, and did not do well in the public eye. However, she made an unexpected comeback through releasing creative music videos, collaborations with artist CharlieXCX, and edgy photoshoots. Addison revolutionized her image from a family-friendly dancer into a sexy, edgy, talented young popstar. She continued to release new music and steadily rose to the leaderboards. The success of her rebranding catapulted her into several new opportunities, including further promotion of her beauty line and a wildly successful tour. Addison is currently on a global tour with thirty-two scheduled shows. She is an excellent example of resilience and the importance of persistence in highly critical environments.