Navigating through the rise of creator economy
Imagine you’ve just watched an influencer creating a fine piece of pottery that has inspired you to enhance your pottery skills and eventually start a small business out of it. This is the power of creation and the influence that good content can have. The creator economy has been around forever. What was earlier limited only to giant media houses has now been democratized by the power of social media. This has encouraged more and more people to create. The reach of creator and creation has broadened, which has led several brands to realize that they can tap their potential customers with the help of the right creator. This way of marketing looks more relatable and connects well with the customers.
Even though various platforms were available for a long time for influencer marketing, the primary way of monetizing influencers was through brand collaborations and ad revenue. Both of these require a large audience base for them to make a sustainable living. This paved the way for platforms that bring power to the hands of the creators and allow them to monetize their art and start earning even with a small community of art supporters. Patreon’s success is a perfect example of this. With time even the traditional social networks realized that they were missing out on some significant creators and content by not introducing monetization options for creators. Twitter bringing monetization in spaces and rolling out its super follow feature in September 2021 to let avid tweeters charge for their exclusive tweets and paid ticketing for its audio chat rooms is an example of that.
- Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg recently introduced a suite of influencer tools on Instagram, including creator shops, native affiliate links, and a marketplace to connect influencers with brands to capitalize on opportunities.
- Joining the parade is the app TIKTOK which built a native marketplace to connect advertisers with creators and has also launched a $200M fund to invest in its top creators.
- After paying out ad revenue, YouTube is also taking the creator fund route by introducing a $100M fund for creators on its TikTok clone, Short.
- Spotify announced that it won’t take any cuts of its profits until 2023 and, even after that, will charge only 5% to lure podcasters to its podcast subscription service.
How big is the creator economy?
It is difficult to calculate the exact numbers around the creator economy, given the ever-growing reach of the term “creator,” which can refer to anyone selling PDFs on the side to professional vloggers. According to SignalFire, there are approximately 50M creators today.
- According to Inc 24 article, the highest-rated creators on platforms like YouTube, Instagram and a few other social platforms in India make approximately INR 1.5 Lakh per month to even INR 10 Lakh — INR 15 Lakh per month, which can go up to as high as INR 2 Cr per month.
- A Forbes report states that the top-performing YouTube channels reaped $211M between June 2019 and June 2020,
- Famous Instagram influencers like Huda Kattan or Eleonora Pons can net up to six figures per post.
- The highest performing writers on Substack can make as much as $1M annually.
What is the Future of the creator economy?
The creator economy remains relatively new, but it is right to say the ownership of it is in the hands of creators and their audience. Corporate Media giants are rigorously planning to roll out many more new tools for monetization to keep creators and their respective fanbases engaged on their platforms.
Lately, many new startups have emerged, with a mission to cater to the various needs and reimagine the ways influencers connect to fans, produce content, and run their businesses. The sole purpose is to give power in the hands of creators and provide them with the right platform to build and grow their community.
Simply Cue believes in the power of the creator economy and aims to bring creators together to create massive opportunities to monetize their art, grow together, and build a flourishing ecosystem for the budding creators.
Wish to know more about Simply Cue? Visit https://simplycue.com/
