Kelsey Impicciche turned a viral Sims video into 1 million YouTube subscribers

Even though a single viral moment can seem like a fast track to fame, the internet's fickle nature rarely turns one video into a lasting career. Creator Kelsey Impicciche knows that "overnight success" is usually years in the making, with a little fun along the way.

"Everyone says overnight success takes 10 years, and that's 100 percent what happened with me," Impicciche said when we sat down with her at BookCon 2026. Impicciche, a creator with over 1 million YouTube subscribers, has also added author to her resume with the 2026 release of her debut novel, The Voice of the Ocean.

We sat down with Impicciche to talk about the video that started it all and balancing life as a creator and author.

Mashable: What was your experience in gaining a following? Was there one video that took off, or was it a gradual incline?

Kelsey Impicciche: I started in content creation as a side thing because I was an actor in Los Angeles and wasn't getting a ton of auditions, especially ones that were challenging. So in the interim, I wanted something creative that I could own.

I just started posting online once a week to give myself something to do. I started from zero subscribers on YouTube and worked my way up, getting more opportunities until someone asked if I wanted to apply to be an intern at BuzzFeed. I gained a couple of thousand subscribers on my channel at that point, applied, and got it. Then I worked at BuzzFeed for a year and a half, and that's when my most viral video happened.

So I had been working on YouTube for like two, maybe even three years at that point, and had put out so many videos before I had this, like, mega-viral hit that everyone knows me from.

I remember the day it happened, too. It was the "100 Baby Challenge," where I played The Sims 4 and had one Sim who was supposed to have 100 babies [in one lifetime]. It was Christmas break, and I was on leave, but everyone at the office was texting me, like, "We've got to go back in and make more of these, because everyone's loving them." I had pitched the video as a joke because I was in between other projects, and I thought it would be funny. I really didn't think anyone would see it. That's always when magic happens, when you're having fun, you're not taking it too seriously, but you also really do know the audience. The cultivation of that title came from so many different videos that I had done up until that point that had done well, so this title has all the little ingredients that I know people gravitate toward. It happened to be this magical little concoction.

Was that the moment you felt like you had made it as a content creator?

There were so many moments along the way. The first audition was when they brought me in because I was a content creator, and I think I only had a couple of hundred subscribers at that point. And then when I first got the job at BuzzFeed, that really felt like I'd made it. Even just as an intern, I had my literal dream job making content.

Until the Sims video, I'd never put myself alone in a video. I'd always put myself surrounded by other people. I always felt like I wasn't funny or interesting enough to carry the whole video by myself. It felt like nobody knew who I was. But with that video, I was the only one who knew the challenge and knew the game well enough to play it, so I had to cast myself. It was a confidence booster, like, I don't need to be surrounded by funnier comics. I can stand alone here.

And when did writing a book come into your career?

With the internet, I feel like you have to just find your niche and stay there. kind of thing. So it's interesting that people think that [writing] came out of nowhere. But for me, I've been obsessed with books since I was a child, and that was actually my dream job. I went to college planning to write, but then took a swerve into acting. It's funny that you sometimes hide these pieces of yourself on the internet. At the end of the day, it's all storytelling.

When writing really kicked off was in the middle of COVID, and I was bored. I had so much downtime and felt really lonely. An email came across my desk from work, offering a creative writing workshop by one of the writers on staff. It was as if this dream deferred, bloomed inside of me.

So my first novel, Voice of the Ocean, was just me alone. It was a message in a bottle that I just flung into the universe, hoping someone would see it someday.

Over time, I realized BookTok was taking off, too, and my two worlds didn't have to be so separate. It's very similar to the plot of Voice of the Ocean, with the feeling of being pulled between two worlds. You can embody more than one thing online, so it was so exciting to start bringing books into my content and seeing how many girls who love games also love books.

How are you balancing writing with content creation?

Not well. I wish there were magically more time. I always remind myself to try to do it even when I'm tired. Sometimes it is a job, and you have to show up. But I still feel like the luckiest gal in the world every time I feel a little down on my energy, or I feel like I don't have enough time. I have to be like, "Dude, you're pinching yourself. This is the coolest experience ever." But I think the big thing for me is segmenting writing into many to-do lists, making sure I break each task into smaller ones. That way, I keep everything moving.

Have you embraced being an author in your content?

I'm still trying to strike that balance of showing up for all the people who love the Sims, introducing a new world to everybody, and showing up for the people who really love the book. It's hard. A lot of people suggest making separate accounts for everything. And for some people, that works, but I'm balancing the two on one channel. I think it might be the harder path, but it's really rewarding.

How do you feel about readers being in writers' spaces and vice versa?

I definitely think readers deserve their space and the ability to talk comfortably about a book without being beholden to authors. When I first started reading, I never felt like I had to take care of the writer's feelings. The book is for the reader. It's not for me [as the author], right? Like it might have been once, right, when I was writing it, but once you put it out in the world, all art is for its consumer. That's a magical part of it; the consumer can have whatever experience they're having.

But I do think it is quite hard because I'm also a fan of books and authors, and I'm also a content creator. So I've tried to walk that line where I'm not gonna be here to review books. I might talk about what I'm enjoying, but I always keep a positive spin on it.

I think it makes sense for readers to keep their own space while also not inviting me into it. If you want to see something sassy about me, that's totally fine, but please don't tag me.

What's next for you as an author and a content creator?

I have some really exciting stuff coming up in both fields. I'm writing the sequel to my duology. The first book is in edits right now. Hopefully, a title and a release date are somewhere on the horizon. I'm just so excited to be able to share all of this with readers and viewers alike, and to engage with people who share my passions.