PEAKLIFE

Content is a large part of your everyday life. It’s hard to avoid, but why would you want to? Content keeps us informed, answers our questions, entertains us, makes us smile, guides our decisions, and more. From the prospective of the marketer, it helps attract, engage, and ultimately generates revenue for the company.  

Aashqeen, is a Famous Indian Youtuber, with 20 lakhs plus followers and makes humours content.

Content creation has come a long way since the days when social media was in its infancy. Since their beginnings, those who have created content have reshaped much of our society and given life to new brands, changed the way we think, started new movements, and given rise to new curricula in business schools. Memes have been created by content creators which cleverly express sentiments many in society couldn’t before. Some of the changes in the landscape of content creators since the early days of content creation are as follow.

Creating Content that Doesn’t Offend

Social media is a multibillion-dollar industry. Nearly every company that aspires to attract new clients has a presence on social media. Content creators who make the content shared on social media have to be careful about not offending people. While this may seem simple it is not so, creative people are driven to push boundaries which can and at times does offend some members of society. So while in the early days of content creation when content posted on YouTube or Facebook when unnoticed by the powers that be, today content creators have to be doubly sure that what they create does not land them in trouble. While such censorship does limit expression, it is a price that must be paid by content creators today.

Taking Criticism from the World

Everyone uses social media. This means someone who creates content has to be open to receiving criticism from all corners. Criticism from every quarter is a burden and sometimes even hinders the ability to create good content. When a video is a success and is appreciated, a content team feels ecstatic; however when a video is less well appreciated then the feeling is less than joyful. What has changed over the past few years is that today a large and diverse audience is watching content that is shared for free online, so anyone can comment on a video and naturally “you can’t please everyone”.

Audience Have Shorter Attention Spans

Content creators have to create creative content and doing so often demand that boundaries be pushed. While pushing boundaries does create quality content, when everyone is doing so simply because people have short attention spans and want to be entertained as much as possible in as short a time as possible, it can lead to chaos and disagreements among content creators. The need to entertain people means that sometimes content creators have to create content that is not what they would have liked to have created. Such compromising does have an impact on one’s integrity yet as content creators one’s role is to create content that is enjoyed by the public.

Creating Collaborations with Brands

A full-time content creator has to regularly create content. This can be time-consuming but is made worthwhile when brands are willing to pay for the privilege of being mentioned by the content creators. Successful content creators have to find ways to attract brands if they expect to continue to create great content they like and that is appreciated by an audience. Brand promotions were not common in the early days of content creation during which time most content creators made videos simply because they enjoyed making videos. However, as a channel grows successful and attracts more viewers it has to work with brands which at times also have their agenda and a direction in which they want to push the content that is created.

Consistently Living Up to Expectations

Content creators are like movie stars, they have to live up to expectations. While in the early days of content creation, creating content may have been just for fun- and while it’s still fun today- having a large captive audience means that content creators have to fulfill promises made to an audience many of whom are strangers. It’s important to know that failing to live up to an audience’s expectation does not simply lead to personal disappointment but can also lead to a loss in viewership.

Attracting Viewers

In the early days, videos could be made using a simple DSLR camera and a few friends. However, today’s content creators also use some special effects and may also need to attract a celebrity or two to their channel to increase viewership. While such actions are not compulsory today they can attract a larger audience and increase the quality of the content created.  

Keeping a Channel Secure

While this may seem trivial, it is crucial because if an account is hacked it can lead to irreparable damage. In the early days of content creation keeping a channel secure was not a big concern; however, the landscape has evolved to make it so.  

The landscape for content creators will likely continue to change in future. It’s likely that in as little as five years much of the content that is created will be in VR which will give rise to new expectations and create new stars. Yet only content that resonates with audiences, despite the medium on which is viewed, will continue to attract large viewerships.