Matthew Patrick: Game Theorist and Social Capitalist
When people think of celebrities, they often think of entertainers such as musicians and actors/actresses. Man have these times changed. Since the digital age has really hit us, entertainment has been completely flipped upside-down. Social media platforms have elevated regular people like us into stardom, altering not only their lives, but ours. Instead of teenage girls hanging up pictures with their idols, they are hanging up tweets. Rather than watch a re-run on TV, we are deciding what we want to watch on YouTube. “Celebrities” on the YouTube platform such as PewDiePie and Markiplier are grossing a higher income than most TV actors and doctors. Because of this, many people like Matthew Patrick (or Mat Pat) have changed their career paths to jump into this attractive market.
Matthew Patrick was born November 15, 1986 in Medina, Ohio. As an only child, Patrick often played video games as his main form of entertainment. Video games allowed him to connect with and relate to others while he took breaks from academia. Although he enjoyed video games, his true passion was performance. In high school, he was in the “show choir”, playing multiple instruments and performing in many different shows, while serving as the president and captain of the group. His list of accolades include being his high school’s valedictorian, obtaining a perfect SAT score, and getting full scholarship to Duke University. He knew that he wanted to be a star director in the movie or TV industry when he was older, so he decided that he wanted to study Theater. According to Patrick, his college years flew by (which I can attest to). Picking up another major in the Neurosciences as a backup plan, he spent most of his time on his studies.
In order to “open up”, he decided to become a Resident Assistant and used video game tournaments to bring his residents together. Playing hit eSports games such as Super Smash Brothers Melee and Mario Kart: Double Dash, Patrick learned that even in his twenties, video games could still impact his life and others. Even though there was no monetary compensation in most cases, winning these tournaments affected many individuals that were struggling in school or at home. They allowed people to feel as though they were in complete control of their lives and served as an alternative to drinking like most university students do. After graduation, Patrick struggled to find a job that he wanted. He worked in New York for a few years before deciding that theater wasn’t what he though it would be. The resume that he worked to build with his studies simply wasn’t what companies were after.
After around a month of applying for jobs and hearing hardly anything back, he realized that his resume required something more. He needed to find a way to show his analytical and computational skills, while also showing companies that he knew how to work with an audience, specifically internet culture. Thus, Game Theory was born! He created this channel on YouTube as a means to combine his two loves; video games and theater. The purpose of the show was to dive into the realm of tangential learning using video games. This basically means learning without feeling like you’re in a classroom environment. Recent studies have shown that this method is very effective, especially to teenagers who just want to sit and play video games. Patrick came up with this concept but had no idea how to get started. He learned the very basics of components such as audience engagement, branding, and video editing by simply watching similar YouTubers.
Building up a YouTube channel can often be very challenging. From experience, I know that seeking out collaborations and growing relationships with other content creators and your audience is vital to the success of a channel. It’s not easy either. There is a constant battle between establishing a brand and maintaining it over time. You need to ensure that you are collaborating with the right people so that your audience is not only satisfied, but it is also expanding at the same time with new viewers that fit your channel demographics. Mat Pat did a great job of this as he worked his way up through the system, collaborating with others that did similar videos on their channels. Some examples include DidYouKnowGaming, Pat the NES Punk, and Game Trailers. If collaboration is done right, not only will both channels expand, but so will the market size for the type of videos. He recently created FilmTheory, which is a similar show about movies, and a YouTube RED series called “Game Lab”. The addition of these two channels has not only
This following that he managed to obtain and maintain is essentially “social capital”. “Social capital” refers to the resources available in and through personal and business networks. Although it is very broad, we can narrow it down in this instance to “the social following that was earned through YouTube”. This has to do with your audience, your peers, and other factors that we often don’t think about.
So how did Mat Pat earn so much social capital in such a small amount of time?
- He established great relationships with other YouTubers. There are many different ways to do this effectively, such as video collaborations, social media promotions, liking and commenting on each others videos, and shouting each other out.
- He established great relationships with his viewers. His vibrant personality is really what separates him from many other “wannabe” YouTubers. Personality is so vital in today’s entertainment industry. Many people would rather watch their favorite star struggle and be entertaining than be the “GOAT” at the game without commentary or flavor. He isn’t fake or presenting a persona. Outside of YouTube, he is truly who he claims to be and that’s what fans love.
- He established a incredibly consistent and attractive brand. His show “Game Theory” was originally the only content that he created, so he branded the whole channel around it. A indistinguishable logo and thumbnails, a remarkable color scheme, and a great tagline led people to not only click the video, but to watch others and eventually subscribe. Being able to have a high CTR (click through rate) and a lot of conversions is the key to online advertising.
As of January 2017, Patrick has amassed over 13 million subscribers and over one billion views total across his three channels due to his tremendous amount of social capital. His viewers don’t just watch to see the cost of Minecraft diamond armor in real life or to find out if Sonic the Hedgehog is really that fast, but rather to follow his life. If you can build enough social capital by engaging your audience, you will have some loyal viewers and dedicated communities that will support your every move. Not only do similar content creators support him along with their audiences, but he has support from all different types of channels. Due to his data-driven decision making and a deep understanding of YouTube Analytics, he started working as a YouTube Audience Development Consultant. Through this, Mat Pat has helped many different YouTubers learn their audiences and promote their brand. He knows the algorithms behind this platform like the back of his hand, and that makes a lot of additional individuals interested in all of his endeavors.
Mat Pat has said that the “actions of one person could make the world of a difference” and that couldn’t be closer to the truth. Whether it’s one content creator or one viewer, we are changing each others lives. The social capital that YouTubers have amassed is often due to the change in how entertain ourselves and how we connect with others. There are hundreds of channels in the world that have amassed more social capital than Mat Pat has, but the reason that his example stands out to me is his story. He truly loves directing, solving problems, and video games. It’s not some fake persona or act when he writes the scripts and records the videos. He poured everything he had into GameTheory, and has expanded this channel into a digital empire.
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