Ever increasingly in our digital age, people locally and around the world are turning to social media to develop new connections, acquire tips, recommendations, or seek out humor and relatability online.
MassLive chose six leading and emerging social media influencers, each of whom brings unique specialties and content to the small screen. They all call the Bay State home, from downtown Boston to Western Massachusetts.
Whether you’ve seen their faces before scrolling on social media or they’re entirely new to you, we think you should hit the follow button for these six Massachusetts social media stars.
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Tina Vo
Tina Vo, 30, is a social media creator for the foodies, who was added to this list for her compelling food content and for shedding light on the Massachusetts restaurant scene.
She started posting photos and videos of food on her personal social media pages. After people around her suggested she create a page dedicated only to food, she started an account in 2017. Ever since then, the page has been growing in the number of loyal followers.
Now with almost 9,000 followers on Instagram, Vo — or @livetoeatfood — goes around the state and throughout New England looking for the next place to eat, sharing her review with her followers.
She also has roughly 3,000 followers on TikTok, over 1,000 followers on Facebook, and almost 100 subscribers on YouTube.
Vo usually brings some of her siblings along to restaurant visits, assisting in filming, note taking and the best part — eating.
While at each restaurant, Vo will order a number of different dishes to taste, whether it’s the restaurant’s recommendation or whatever sounds good to her.
From there, she spends her time filming the eatery and the food she ordered. Once filming is done, much work goes into crafting the video, including editing, voiceovers and captions.
“I’m always honest. I never lie and say anything tastes better than it is,” Vo told MassLive.
One of the best parts of the job is seeing the conversation her videos create online.
“I’ve had a lot of people message me personally and say, ‘I checked out this place because of you and loved it,’” she said. “That’s what really makes me feel really excited and happy, is when people take to the recommendations.”
And while at different places — big or small – Vo always speaks to restaurant owners and staff.
“My favorite thing about it all is finding a small family-owned business or restaurant and really lifting them up and spreading the word,” she said.
Now, Vo balances her love for social media content creation with her job as a nurse practitioner, along with owning her own business.
But when you love something, it doesn’t feel like a job, she said.
“My siblings just kind of paused for a second like, ‘Wow, I can’t believe all of this is just because you started posting food online,’” she laughed.
Massachusetts-based social media influencer Elijah Boivin. Image Credit: Jess Gray, courtesy of Elijah Boivin. Massachusetts-based social media influencer Elijah Boivin. Image Credit: Jess Gray, courtesy of Elijah Boivin.
Elijah Boivin
Elijah Boivin, 31, is perhaps best known for his humorous videos and sketches, which tend to strike a chord with the average New Englander’s sensibilities. They usually hinge on themes from the region’s capricious weather to the perpetual urge to get Dunkin’.
Boivin, who was raised in Northampton, is a full-time barber by day. He dreams of putting his performance skills and stage presence into acting work on bigger screens — TV and movies.
His videos often garner tens — if not hundreds — of thousands of views and likes, with many commenters commiserating or getting a laugh out of the routines.
The videos come with an array of recurring characters played by Boivin such as “Masshole Harry Potter‚” Boivin’s California roommate who doesn’t quite get New England-isms, and Bartholomew, a fictional Pilgrim ghost who haunts the social media star’s home and who tends to spook him when he’s least expecting it.
The latter was inspired by a dated apartment Boivin once lived in, where he said strange occurrences would happen in the building’s basement storage units. The experience inspired him to come up with the idea that a figure from long ago haunted the place.
The name “Jack” was also spray-painted in red with a backwards J in the storage space, Boivin said. But, thinking the name Jack wasn’t old-fashioned, he opted for the more classical Bartholomew, who has since become a staple in Boivin’s videos.
Boivin told MassLive in an interview that he might take Bartholomew — pilgrim costume and all — on the road across New England this summer.
Boivin first leaned into social media during the COVID-19 pandemic as a creative outlet to help cope with his anxiety and depression, which worsened amid isolation. He also continues to address the subject of mental health in some of his content.
In the five years since COVID, he’s seen steady growth in his Instagram following of more than 95,000, and he has accumulated almost 230,000 followers on his TikTok account. His Threads account has roughly 12,000 followers as of June 25.
“At the end of the day, I’ve always wanted to make people laugh,” Boivin said. “I’ve always tried to be the most positive person that I can be for the people around me.”
“I really love knowing that I hopefully make someone smile,” he added. “There’s a lot of stuff going on in the world that’s very dark and negative … just anything to kind of combat that.”
Boston-based social media influencer Madi Beumee. (Courtesy of Madi Beumee)
Madi Beumee
Madi Beumee, 28, is a relative newcomer to Boston, having only lived in the city for under a year.
Yet in that time, Beumee has made it her goal to consciously and consistently get out of her comfort zone — and she takes her growing social media following along for the ride while encouraging them to do the same.
Beumee’s content centers around challenges such as “Boston By Myself‚” when she explores somewhere new in the city while forgoing possible social hangups, and a budgetary “$20 Challenge” in which she tries to spend only the money she’s allotted for a day on the town.
Beumee also does weekly and weekend roundups of interesting and fun events her followers may not know about that are happening in Greater Boston.
Beumee, a New York City transplant, moved to Boston in September 2024, looking for a fresh start. She also has family in the area.
“I think subconsciously, I was always like ‘I feel like I would enjoy Boston,’” Beumee said.
Professionally, Beumee works as a self-employed social media strategist for online business owners, entrepreneurs and other content creators.
Academically trained in musical theater, the COVID-19 pandemic shuttered live performances in New York City, which caused Beumee to reassess her career trajectory at a time when she had been involved in regional and off-Broadway shows.
Content creation, as a creative outlet and a way to document her life and forge new connections, turned increasingly into a career for her.
Beumee wants to promote the concept of getting comfortable “being seen trying” to her viewers.
“I think sometimes being vulnerable in kind of sharing the different sides of an experience can end up being your superpower or connect you with people,” Beumee said.
As her social media presence “snowballed,” Beumee said she has made many friendships through her videos on her TikTok account, with 60,600 followers and counting, and her Instagram account with about 15,000 followers as of June 25.
Beumee embarked on a month-long solo trip to Paris, France, this spring, where she employed many skills she learned from “Boston By Myself” in the foreign city. Going on her extended trip was also a part of Beumee’s “One Big Thing” mentality.
In her explanation of the concept, Beumee points to milestones like getting married and having children as the occasions when family and peers most often celebrate young people in their late 20s and early 30s.
However, for those whose priorities and place in life don’t necessarily line up with these markers and lie elsewhere, Beumee wants to celebrate other achievements in addition to those important developments.
“I can be there with a cake, we can have a party, we can have a dinner party, we can celebrate in whatever way matters to you,” Beumee said.
Lindsey Basara, who is know as New England Chickadee on social media, is a New England travel social media influencer. (Courtesy of Lindsey Basara)
Lindsey Basara – “New England Chickadee”
As a Western Massachusetts resident, Lindsey Basara — known as New England Chickadee on social media — explores the Bay State and the rest of New England, showcasing travel content for her followers.
With an interest in photography, Basara, 39, started an Instagram account focusing on traveling in New England, capturing her experiences along the way in video and in film.
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Her Instagram took off from there.
With more content came partnering with places such as local breweries and other businesses. Sometimes, Basara picks the locations where she’d like to shoot video and photos.
She loves to show followers not only places they can travel to, but also places that don’t cost money to visit. Whether it’s local hiking trails, paddle boarding, kayaking or historical properties, she pairs the information with local food spots.
But she adds a lot of unique twists to her page, framing content like “you can go and experience 80-degree weather in the middle of winter in New England to see all of these beautiful butterflies.”
But shooting the content is only the start of it for Basara. Planning is a significant part as well.
“What’s going to be the best in terms of the messaging that I want to do? Is it a carousel post? Is it a reel that I want to put together? What stories do I wanna put along with it?” she told MassLive in an interview.
The goal is to showcase not only her fun adventures in the state and beyond, but also to help her viewers follow her itinerary, checking out places they’ve never been to.
“It’s probably one of the most exciting things when someone says something like ‘I went to this property because you recommended it and I loved it‚'” she said.
As of June 25, Basara has accumulated over 35,000 followers on Instagram and over 3,000 on Threads.
Massachusetts skit influencer dubbed “Proper Masshole.” (photo by Clodagh Bartholomew, courtesy of Dalton DeLima)
Dalton DeLima – “Proper Masshole”
Dalton DeLima, 30, is known for posting hilarious Massachusetts content on his social media pages.
Going by the name The Proper Masshole, DeLima has taken silly Massachusetts stereotypes, running jokes and culture to his platform.
DeLima began posting lip-sync and skit videos out of boredom in 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic. He only had a few hundred followers at that time. Later that year, DeLima was driving over the Zakim Bridge when he thought, “Wouldn’t it be cool to show off Boston?”
DeLima took a video driving over Boston’s landmark bridge, a video on the other side of a nearby tunnel, and threw the song “I’m Shipping Up to Boston” over it. He asked, “Where’s my Boston crew at?”
Overnight, DeLima jumped from around 300 followers to almost 5,000.
“I was like, ‘well, I guess this is what I’m doing now,’” DeLima said. Thus, Proper Masshole was born to share Massachusetts content that resonates with the audience that he has accumulated.
DeLima has grown his TikTok page to almost 90,000 followers, churning out feel-good, authentic, Bay State hilarity.
“I don’t script anything. I don’t write scripts ahead of time. I just do it,” DeLima said.
His work is what he loves to share with his audience, hoping it resonates with people in Boston and beyond.
“New England’s really awesome. It’s historic. It’s really beautiful and I love sharing it. I love introducing people that aren’t from here to it,” he said. “And if you get a little bit out of that from my content, that’s my goal. If you laugh, if you cry, if you smile, I just want to share it with the world.”
DeLima has accumulated almost 90,000 followers on TikTok, almost 2,000 on Instagram, roughly 1,500 on Facebook, around 400 on X and 60 subscribers on YouTube.
Boston-based social media influencer Daena Antonelli, otherwise known as “BaddieDae.” (Courtesy of Daena Antonelli)
Daena Jeanne Antonelli – “BaddieDae”
Daena Jeanne Antonelli, also known by her “BaddieDae” screen name, has been growing her online following for more than a decade — even before she became known as the “cool Boston mom.”
Around 2012, Antonelli started her page posting about her workouts and runs. In the years that followed, she shifted to include events, activities and dining out experiences around town. Marriage and motherhood spurred her to branch out yet again.
Born in the Philippines, Antonelli moved to the United States when she was 11 and grew up in Melrose. Now in her 30s, she calls Boston’s Allston neighborhood her home with her husband Brian and young son Rafi.
Some of Antonelli’s recurring content centers around day-in-the-life style videos, following her from when she gets up in the morning until she goes to bed at night — at times even synced to a song.
Antonelli also produces videos showing how much she spends in a day as a Boston mom traveling around the city with her family.
The majority of Antonelli’s content is broadcast to her “BaddieDae” Instagram account following of roughly 24,500, as of June 25.
Many of her videos are “as organic as you can get,” she said, thanks to her style of creating content on the go, centered on her everyday life and then edited in real time.
“Ultimately, with my page, I just like showing things to do around Boston, either as a mom, as a date night or things you could do with kids, and still kind of romanticize it in a way,” Antonelli said.
Some of Antonelli’s top recommendations for dining out include Phin Coffee House in the Financial District, Pasta Beach at Rowes Wharf, and Source, a pizzeria and gastropub in Cambridge’s Harvard Square.
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In October, she left her 9-to-5 job and dove deeper into social media management, where she now runs the Instagram account for Dumpling Daughter.
Her other business ventures are as an etiquette consultant for several prominent Boston-area businesses and running an “elevated picnic experience” business she started during the pandemic called Daedream Picnic.
Moving away from a more traditional job with more structured hours has not only allowed her more time to spend with her son, she said, but also allowed her more time to prioritize herself, her growing social media presence, and her current professional affairs.
