Rob Anderson is TikTok’s Viral Heart Throb

When COVID hit, Rob Anderson started sharing his woes and personal foibles on social media in his what was to become signature style. His TikTok videos went viral, and he quickly became a fan favorite. Fast forward to current day where Rob is now a bona fide sponsored influencer with 2.5 million followers and growing, a comedian who is selling out his first national tour, a best-selling children’s book author (with his colorful retelling of Fergie’s National Anthem performance), the solo artist behind this year’s Pride bop “Nothing For You,” a favorite gay among mainstream media with appearances on NPR and Good America among others, the mastermind behind the funny if bordering on politically incorrect Gay Science series, the voice of Postmate’s Pride campaign for bottom friendly food choices, the Academy Awards’ social media sweetheart, and Instagram thirst trap. Phew, that list is long.

His sarcastic and dry sense of humor and masterfully constructed viral videos elicit guffaws at the same time they encourage you to think a bit and challenge stereotypes by presenting them as norms. Beyond those muscles and that bigger-than-life-on-screen personality is a gentle giant who, at the end of the day, loves what he does and hopes you do too…and if you don’t, who cares?

His journey to influencer stardom did not happen overnight. As both a class clown and theatre groupie, he was a troublemaker at school – getting suspended for challenging the rules. He moved to Chicago and studied improv, found his tribe of funny people, nonchalantly came out, and got his first industry job as…a construction journalist? Jobs were scarce and he was in a bit of a rough spot. Writing about construction jobs was not his passion, not even the guys in hardhats could keep his focus. From there he would become a marketing department’s secret weapon, all the while honing his skills for his time in the social media spotlight.

I was doing creative campaigns for Grindr and Uber and The Infatuation, my most recent job. And so, I’ve always had this sort of sense of humor in how I market things. And I had to start TikTok for my last job and I realized it was so much fun. I was making videos go viral for them and I thought – I should just do this on my own. I started to and, right as the pandemic hit, so it was kind of like the perfect storm.

When straight comedians and mainstream people in the business started to share and comment on his videos, he started to realize that his brand was starting to go viral. It wasn’t just for the gays; everybody was having a laugh. Rob’s headlines would soon start with the word “influencer,” but what does that mean to him?

I think of influencers as people that started to make their own paths with the recent technologies and new algorithms of these platforms. I think of it very broadly. I don’t know if I necessarily always refer to myself as an influencer. Sometimes I just say I’m a TikToker. I don’t really know; I have to still figure it out. I think it’s a very broad term for people that use the internet in a way to make themselves their own bosses.

With the influencer world including such personalities as the Kardashians to comedians like Rob to hard-hitting LGBTQ activists, there has been a love/hate relationship that has been cultivated by content audiences. Where media can stereotype some influencers with an eye roll as a self-absorbed, filtered selfie-taking, free product-getting, and sometimes unskilled money maker, there are influencers who, like Rob, share their life stories and personal outlook on social and political themes with a comedic flair that truly progress the LGBTQ image within mainstream media and even to that kid in the closet in some small town in the middle of nowhere. No matter one’s view on influencers, they are getting the likes, they are getting the subscribers, and they are getting those sponsorships. They are building an empire. With this tug of war of the idolization of influencers and their place in media comes a different type of pressure on content creators where mental fatigue, depression, and anxiety can manifest themselves. Rob’s life experiences and career ups and downs give him a particular insight into the mental health aspect of being an influencer.  

Mental fatigue is real. I’m 34 and have had my own issues with it, but I think about young kids who are 17-20 and this is all happening for them, it must be much harder. If they haven’t lived experience of adult bullying in some way, they don’t have that thing that lets them dismiss things like maybe someone in their 30s or 40s or older might. So, I really feel for them in those mental health issues. Creating content during the pandemic, I had this break from the awfulness of what was happening in 2020 and this light where I got to make things. But on the flip side, I didn’t have real life to balance out internet comments. The internet comments were our reality. It was particularly hard during 2020.

Rob’s Gay Science has garnered a lot of attention and clicks on the series increase by the day. Rob tackles extremely important, hard-hitting topics affecting gay men today. Topics surrounding why gay men love iced coffee so much, the extinction of versatile bottoms, why gay men can’t sit in a chair properly, and an expose on Disney gays make up this tongue-in-cheek comment on the absurdity of gay stereotypes. But hey, stereotypes come from somewhere, don’t they? While the series is extremely funny, it gives us a chance to add some humor to today’s political and social unrest that not only lies between us and the conservative political groups but also the unrest that exists within our circle. Rob certainly dances on the fine line between comedic commentary and political correctness. With everyone on edge and keyboard warriors constantly ready for battle, is Rob ever scared of being canceled?

I found a sort of sweet spot in Gay Science. Whereas maybe some of the videos I was making before Gay Science were crossing the line, not crossing the line, maybe being too mean, maybe not being mean enough, or not as critical, with Gay Science, it’s a very protected series because I’m taking things that people have already talked about sometimes for years about a stereotype. I’m not inventing anything, they’re pretty well known or joked about, and then I’m making light of stereotypes. So, I’m not reinforcing them, but also playing with the parts that could be true, because sometimes there’s a truth in them and then ending it with a positive message. Like it is some genetic superiority that queer people have and that’s why we have a lisp, that’s why we sit this way. We’ve genetically always been better and that’s always how I end things. So, they end on a positive note.

Rob made his debut as both a songwriter and singer for his summer bop, “Nothing for You.” The song and the music video represent the perfect mashup of his comedy, his theatre background, his shirtless chest, his musicality, and, of course, his biting commentary. You move to the beat, you sing along to the hook until you realize that the song is about giving up your basic rights, forgetting equality, and throwing activism out the window for someone who is super-hot. All those gays with crushes on the straight Republican politicians? This one’s for you.

As Rob’s videos continued to garner clicks and comments, the sponsors started circling the waters. While most times incorporating brands or products with the LGBTQ community in mind, and while always presenting his signature comedy, he is now a business. When every Pride season comes around, so to does the attack on corporations who change their logos to the Pride flag or who release a limited edition of their products with a pride sticker. With Rob’s experience creating marketing campaigns for corporations, but also as a member of the gay community, what is his take on corporate pride?

I think there are a lot of different takes on it. I feel like there is some validity in a lot of what people say. My thought is that if we, as the community, can use what they are giving us, whether it’s attention, money, or publicity, for our betterment, there has to be some kind of relationship there. It has to help us in some way as well as it’s helping them make money and promote their own businesses. So as long as there’s some equity there, it’s up to us to choose the things that we think are worth it.

Remember those fake Skymall magazines in Ubers during April Fool’s Day? That was Rob’s idea. And even with his extensive work in marketing and success as a marketing whiz, he maintains that there is no clear-cut way to gain viral fame.

There are definitely some tricks that you can learn about getting people excited at the start and hopping onto trends. But you have to remember that not everything’s going to do well, and you have to have fun and be honest with what you’re trying to do and not try to play into what people want, and just accept that some things are going to fail on the internet, even though you really like it. I noticed that a lot of the things that I do that are specifically for queer people that straight people would not get or understand, they don’t necessarily do as well on these big platforms, but I’m okay with that because it’s something that I want to do, and some people will get it.

And his creative process?

I have multiple documents on my desktop and on my phone, and I like to listen to music, I get inspired. And I think of dumb things during, I’m like this song makes me feel like this story is happening. But I’ll have things sit on my phone for a while and then I’ll add to them. Sometimes it’ll be 2, 3, 4 weeks before I think it’s ready. Then I’ll put it together and that’s sort of how a lot of these things form. I’ll also have ideas for sketches that have so many elements to them where I need to make fake props, order a bunch of fake things, and design a bunch of stuff, and those things can take weeks to come in. I did a Gay Science episode on bottoms surviving the apocalypse and I created over a hundred original props for that video. And that took like three months to come in. So, when that came up, I was so excited to get that out there.

Rob’s comedy and personality are a breath of fresh air in this climate of tragic activism. Yes, our community is going through a lot, and yes, we need to fight, but, if we can’t enjoy the humor in anything then we really can’t be mentally healthy enough to wade out the opposition. Plus, if the mainstream is paying attention to Rob’s content that does not attack but rather elicits a smile, isn’t that a powerful tool as well? You can check out Rob’s comedy in person for his first outing on live stages in five years. Touring the country, Rob Anderson Live is about gay sex. It’s over an hour of original music, sketches, and a collection of explicit personal stories that aren’t appropriate for the internet. God help us, Rob is now going viral in person.

You can check out everything Rob at HeartthRobAnderson.com.