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Florida becomes overnight social media star
A Florida man has become a TikTok star after amassing million of followers who watch his home repair videos.
TALLAHASSEE, Fla. - "I'm gonna show you how to clean your old wooden fences with pool chlorine and water," said TikTok user "jmg8tor" in a video that has racked up nearly 12 million views.
It was one of the hundreds of home repair videos the social media star has posted.
Going just by Gator, the Tallahassee-based jack-of-all-trades said it was his son who got him on TikTok.
He never expected the massive response to his videos. "Just one day somebody asked me about doing a home repair, which I've already been doing my whole life, I said I don't know why I've never made that content, and I made one video on how to do a little hack on measuring a board and it did 20 million views in two days," Gator said.
That was a little more than two years ago. Since then, his jmg8tor TikTok channel has amassed nearly three million followers and 44 million likes. Gator has given out practical tips on everything from pool care to plumbing, to hardware. "I'm gonna show you how to adjust your cabinet doors with just a screwdriver. I get this question all the time, so let's dive right into it!" he said in one of his videos.
Gator always ends his videos with his signature catchphrase, "NEXT!"
He said it was just something he randomly said at the end of an early video, and never thought it would become his closing line. "It was totally just nothing, and the next few videos I did, I didn't say that, and people were asking what happened to the next? And I was like what are y'all talking about? So then I started saying next, and it gradually transpired into what it is today, you know?"
His popularity has grown to the point where he has started to profit from the videos.
One of his biggest successes comes from the popularity of one particular video involving WD-40. Not long after the video was posted, Gator landed a sponsorship from WD-40. He still had a day job repairing his rental properties.
Mostly, Gator said he kept posting because he liked to help. "It's really nice to be able to help somebody, and it's nice to see the comments that people leave, and that's why I keep doing it."