Agent Provocateur
Hana Tjia is pitching brands eager to reach young female gamers—and willing to pay seven figures to do it.
Not far from the giant screens flooding E3 with video games, Hana Tjia is leaning against a cinder-block wall and typing furiously on her phone. The United Talent Agency representative is coordinating informal meetings at the giant gaming convention with M.A.C. Cosmetics, whose execs flew from New York to meet her clients—Valkyrae, 27, and Alexia Raye, 23.
They’ll have to wait. Enclosed in glass booths, the two women are playing Borderlands 3, offering a preview of the shooter game to about 4,000 of their combined 1.1 million Twitch followers and to onlookers in the Los Angeles Convention Center. Their devotees, many also female, represent a new market for the high-end cosmetics brand. Sales of M.A.C. lipsticks inspired by the mobile game Honor of Kings were “gangbusters,” say the execs. A chance for a repeat success has sent them into the crowd of mostly male gamers in search of Tjia.
Most advertisers “have been thrilled to have these conversations, because I think they have like a stereotype of what a gamer is, and when they see my roster they’re just like, ‘Okay, this is very different. I want to know more,’” Tjia says. The obvious first difference: “The majority of my roster is female.”
The 26-year-old agent acts as a kind of sherpa to companies navigating the unfamiliar terrain of Twitch video game streaming. Young adults are watching eight fewer hours of TV a week than four years ago, according to Nielsen. That’s forced advertisers to look elsewhere—they’re expected to spend $3.3 billion on ads in games this year, up 16% from last year, says eMarketer. Mastercard, State Farm, Honda and Nike sponsor esports—organized video game competitions—and some are backing individual gamers with big online followings. Deals can reach as high as $10 million.
Advertisers have also discovered female gamers, an often-overlooked group, even though 46% of gamers are women, says the Entertainment Software Association. Propelled by the popularity of Fortnite across genders, female streamers Imane “Pokimane” Anys (3.1 million Twitch followers) and Rachell “Valkyrae” Hofstetter (811,000) have emerged as stars.
“There’s a ton of little girls who are growing up wanting to become a gamer,” says Tjia, a Canadian raised on reality TV. “There’s a huge influence that the females have.”
Clad in a white T-shirt, black leather jacket and jeans, Tjia looks more like her gamer clients than a traditional Hollywood agent, the Michael Ovitzstyle smooth talker who lunches at The Grill.
Tjia’s haunts are more offbeat. She frequents Magic Castle, a private club that features magicians, and scouts future clients on Twitch, Instagram and YouTube. If they’ve got the right stuff, she coaches them in the nuances of hashtags and photo shoots, joins them at gaming tournaments and fields panic calls, like one from Streamer Camp, a type of boot camp with costumes.
The job is lucrative, though not in the millionaire mold of superagents like Ovitz and his legendary 10% fee. Tjia has worked for UTA since it bought the firm her husband and a business partner cofounded to manage Snapchatters and other online influencers. Forbes estimates an agent like Tjia makes around $75,000 a year, plus an end-ofyear bonus, while senior agents can earn as much as $300,000. (UTA declined to comment.)
As her clients’ fortunes rise, so should the agent’s. Mastercard named Pokimane and Lily Ki (LilyPichu), another Tjia client, as brand ambassadors for its promotion pegged to a League of Legends tournament. Gaming-headset maker HyperX spent an estimated $910,000, according to researcher iSpotTV, for three airings of an ad shown during the 2019 NBA Finals that included Pokimane. Tjia has inked deals with hot social network TikTok (for gamer Leslie Fu, a.k.a. Fuslie), Geico and Hot Pockets—and cosmetics may be next.
“People don’t equate makeup with gamers,” says M.A.C. communications director Cary Neer. “It’s a whole new world for us.”