But how do you go from producing videos online about how to stop dipping into your savings and friends about savings to having a publisher agree to release a book on the matter?

The popular content creator left university with a maths degree, much like her husband, started a family “and did all the things you’re taught to do”, but found herself living from pay cheque to pay cheque.

“I didn’t have a toolkit for how to change and do anything about it”, she said.

That feeling inspired her to dive into books on financial literacy and pick up knowledge that no one has previously taught her.

Launching in lockdown

“So I thought, right, I’m just going to learn it all and figure this stuff out,” she said.

It was in 2020, during the second lockdown, when her Money Mentora page “absolutely blew up” and she realised she wasn’t alone in feeling frustrated with her finances.

“The big video that blew up first for me was where I was talking about the difference between our parents’ generation and us now. At the time, not many people were actually acknowledging that difference, that actually what I learned to do from my parents isn’t going to work the same for me and my generation, and certainly not my kid,” she said.

After her relatable approach to handling everyday financial matters took off, brands started to get involved, and that’s when she decided to “do the right thing” and become a Certified Financial Education Instructor.

The course requires 40-60 hours of online education and needs to be recertified every three years.

On the reasons for gaining that legitimacy, Brading said: “I had to get an American one, because there isn’t one in the UK. There’s money coaching, education sort of qualifications here, but I didn’t want to be a money coach. I wanted to be a teacher of money.

“I didn’t have to do it, but I just felt I wanted to double check my knowledge and see if there’s any gaps I’m missing, because I’ve been piecing it together from the books I’ve been reading, but I wanted an overarching picture of what I should be talking about and just show that level of knowledge too.”

She added: “I’d love to see something similar in the UK. I’d love to see some sort of similar certification one day.”

As it stands, the only regulation the FCA has in place connected to social media and finance is across the promotion of financial services, which “must be fair, clear and not misleading, meaning they must have balance and carry the right risk warnings”, according to the regulator.

However, this does not extend to influencers like Brading, which she would welcome.

Brading said: “I think that any time you can create in real life crossing over [with regulators] and just getting in a room together, you end up breaking down a lot of stereotypes.

“So the stereotype of the financial world is that it is stuck in its ways. It can’t change. That would be one stereotype, and then you’ve got influencers who are just trying to get you to buy Lamborghinis, right? That’s the other stereotype.

“And when you actually get people that are doing it for the right reasons, and then the people that are in that are regulators, people that are really driving change in the financial world, you realise [breaking down of stereotypes] is happening. It’s a big shift. It’s a really slow shift to turn, but it is happening.

“And I think when you get those people together and they learn from each other, not just one way, it’s not like, ‘right, we’re going to regulate you’, and it’s not like, ‘we’re going to teach you how to do this’.”

She added: “How do we learn from each other? They’re learning about communication. We’re learning about what’s appropriate to say and what’s not, so getting in a room together and actually learning from each other, even just as a first go, would be great.”

‘Getting in a room together’

If the regulators and content creators could get into a room to discuss best practices once or twice per year, Brading believes “it would be a game changer for the UK.”

However, the challenges of regulation are not lost on the author, “it is very difficult to regulate, because not only if somebody takes that, they then have to then check that they’re following what they learned”, she said.

As what comes with the territory of having a huge online presence, she has had to deal with trolls and negative comments online, “mostly from dudes”, about her content, but the 39-year-old remains positive about her “accidental business”.

Brading said: “I’m so big on talking about the opportunities that are out there because when you go for stuff, you just don’t know where it’s going to take you.”

Now, on MentoraMoney.com, she has an initiative where members can sign up to use a financial toolkit that was missing from her earlier life, which offers “debt elimination strategies, and simple budgeting tools to help you take control of your finances”.

The success of her “accidental business” has surpassed the expectations of the now-author could ever have imagined.

Brading added: “If you’d have said to me, you’d have written a book, and [you will have] gone to Downing Street in four years, I would absolutely laugh at you. I think this is why it’s so important to paint this positive picture of your finances, because entrepreneurship and taking initiative and doing these things can open the most incredible doors”.