Snow dusted peaks.

This is the kind of beauty many of us only see on Instagram.

And this Instagrammer delivers

these views to you for a living.

She's a new kind of celebrity

and she makes money by promoting things to her fans.

It's a lucrative world with billions of dollars rushing in.

As technology replaces old jobs,

it's also creating new ones.

I'm Aki Ito and I'm here to show you the jobs of the future.

My name is Meghan Young and I'm an Influencer.

Alright, we're heading out for our river cruise.

At first glance, Meghan's job

doesn't seem like a job at all.

Check this out, oooh!

For a living, I go on outdoor adventures,

take photos of it, and then share it

across social media platforms when I get home.

But unlike you and me,

Meghan gets paid to share some of these photos.

She has almost 200,000 followers on Instagram

and all kinds of companies pay her

to endorse their products on her feed.

It can be things like technical gear

from raincoats to pants to boots.

It can be different snacks that keep me going on the trail.

And also travel destinations, which are my,

honestly my favorite things to do

'cause it's really fun to explore new landscapes.

Meghan's on track to earn between

$50,000 and $100,000 over the next year.

About 10% of her feed is sponsored.

For a story post on Instagram,

that usually starts around $200 per day.

And then for posts to the social feed channel,

about $1,500 or more for one post.

Right now, much of that

income is helping pay for this home.

Hey! Nice to meet you.

Meghan moved in last month with her partner, Matt.

He's a biologist and a regular fixture on her feed.

What's it like to have a mini celebrity as a girlfriend?

The fame, I really don't think about it that much.

Except for when you get mad at me for using my phone.

She uses her phone a lot, yeah.

Yeah? Yeah.

Replying to her followers - Figuring out -

Yeah. Boundaries of like,

oh, this is work time and this isn't

work time, it's definitely important.

It's a conversation we have all the time.

What's your favorite part of her job?

Probably it's when I get to go on her adventures.

Yeah. Yeah.

Is there stuff in the outdoors

that you've learned from her?

I have never been a person to lay out my gear,

to make sure I have everything appropriately

for each trip, I tend to wing it.

But yeah, preparedness is definitely

rubbing off a little bit on me, which is nice

because you do have to really make sure

that you bring everything that you need.

This guy's gonna come out

and then this tent and then the boots.

Tomorrow, Meghan's taking me

on one of her signature mountaineering adventures.

I have to make sure that all the gear is clean,

it's repaired, that we're safe, everything is ready to go.

She's also packing products from two companies

she's hoping to promote on the trip:

a beer company that's an existing client

and an energy bar maker she's pitching

for a future sponsorship deal.

We're planning a four and a half mile hike

up the Cascade Mountains, climbing around 2,500 feet.

We'll be camping overnight and then hiking down.

The next day, we get an early start.

Good morning, it's 5:06.

Cloudy start to the day, rain and breezy conditions expected

for Western Washington with highs in the low 50s.

And expect showers this evening and likely for tomorrow.

A few years ago, Meghan was in law school,

studying to become an attorney, and it was there

that mountaineering came in surprisingly handy.

In order to get through the stresses of law school,

I started going back outside with a vengeance.

I would post photos on Instagram about

the trips we'd been on and places we had been

and eventually brands began to take notice of that

and reach out to ask if I wanted to

collaborate in different ways.

She ended up deciding against a career in law

and after holding an office job for two years,

she quit in March to focus on being an Influencer full time.

There've been tough moments along the way.

Sometimes I get pretty nasty messages or hateful comments,

telling me how I am allowed to use my voice

and how I'm allowed to use my platform.

I block them and I don't have any qualms about that.

I think that doing this job, people can think of you

as less of a real person but I'm a very real person

with very real feelings and fears,

so it can be a little weird sometimes.

And then there's the constant

pressure to make sure people are liking,

commenting, and following her feed.

Metrics are incredibly important

in the world of social media influencing.

And early on, I became really obsessive with checking them.

And honestly, it got the point of being exhausting.

These days, I try not to focus on it

because it will drive you insane.

And for me to live a healthy,

balanced life, I can't do that.

But we've left all that behind in Seattle.

Oh, it's cold. It's not warm.

The blue sky's really nice.

Hopefully it moves this way.

Yeah, that's the hardest part about

this time of year in the Pacific Northwest,

when the weather won't cooperate.

What'd you get me into?

It's gonna be great, let's go.

Let's do it.

This was supposed to be a mild hike

and it's a total breeze for Meghan

but not so much for me.

This is not easy.

I always wanna make sure

we're as safe as possible but there are

always these moments where we're

on something exposed or we're climbing something,

I'm thinking about, what if there's

a rock fall and we plummet to our death?

Those fears are very real.

So warm outside, you guys, ahh it's crazy.

Finally, four hours behind schedule,

we arrive at the campsite.

Are we here? Yeah, this looks like.

Yeah, woo, we did it!

This is like a really fresh

layer of snow, which is nice.

With the weather worsening,

we start boiling snow to make water for dinner.

And remember that beer Meghan was planning to promote?

It's way too cold for that and she scraps her plans

for an evening photo shoot altogether.

A little past 7 pm, we retreat into our tents,

shivering in our sleeping bags.

But after the coldest night of my life, we wake up to this.

It's the window of good weather Meghan was hoping for

and she uses it to stage a sponsored photo

for the energy bars she brought along.

I'm always trying to think about,

how do I take something and make it look at home

or natural or normal in these wild landscapes?

I think a lot of people will be watching this

and think that this looks miserable,

why did you do this?

So why do you do it?

I am so happy out here, it's a little ridiculous.

You wake up with mornings like this

and you sort of forget the sweating and the heavy bags

and sort of live in that moment.

And these places, they may not last, like global warming,

so I feel this sense of wanting to see things while I can.

For now you get this.

Yeah, not so bad.

It's a pretty good office, I'll take it.

Meghan's post of the energy bar

has now been seen by 16,000 people

and since our trip, she's signed sponsorship deals

with three new clients, making the $1.6 billion market

for Instagram Influencers just a little bigger.

But the world of social media changes fast

and Meghan knows there are plenty of things

that could derail her newfound career.

What if Instagram goes away?

At the end of the day, I have bills to pay

and sometimes you're looking at your calendar going,

"Do I have any projects coming up?"

and those moments are really scary.

But for now, she can't imagine

living her life any other way.

Sun came out, so beautiful.

I've had young women reach out to me

and say that they've found inspiration

or they've gone on a hike or climbed a peak.

That's the upside to social media,

you have this ability to inspire people

and to actually touch their lives, offline.

And that's pretty cool.