I don't think there is a more sought
after job title than content creator. And I also don't think there's
ever been a better time to become a content creator than right now. It's not to say it comes easy. It's not to say that there are
not certain nuances or changes that happen year over year. And that's exactly what I'm
going to talk about today. What trends do I see happening
in the creator economy for 2024? What are some things
you should look out for? What are some opportunities out there? For those of you who want to become a
full time content creator in 2024, first prediction or piece of advice, I guess I
have is not to just focus on one platform. My advice is always don't just focus on
one thing in general that comes down to revenue streams, you know, making sure
that you're diversifying and not ever just like leaning on one thing, because
if that one thing breaks or goes away. You know, it can be really challenging. So knowing how to pivot, knowing how
to give different offers as a content creator is really important, but I
really want to talk about platforms here because I think there's a big,
um, massive freak out happening. Let's just put it, put it bluntly
about Instagram right now. Instagram is becoming very challenging
for people, myself included. I don't know what happened, but it's like
overnight, the algorithm just decided it doesn't want to show people our content. And I've never been the type of
person to blame an algorithm. You know, I'm always like make
better content if the algorithm isn't working for you, but no, it's there. There's really some weird stuff going
on and maybe it'll go back to normal. Maybe things will change,
but maybe it won't. And I am so glad that I've never just
relied on just Instagram or just YouTube or just Tik TOK to get my message across. I think it is very important that
we as creators are able to really. Diversify and also do our best to. Get people onto an email list. I know I sound like a broken record
here, but I think email is going to be so important for creators in 2024. It already is. It already has been, but I think more now
than ever, we've got to make sure that we are getting people onto an email list
so that we can communicate with them. Even if Instagram decides
one day to just show. Are real to eight people, you
know, like sometimes it does. Here's the thing. There are a bajillion
platforms out there nowadays. I know that can be really stressful
to try to create original content for every single platform and
be everywhere all the time. I don't recommend doing that. I don't recommend, you know, driving
yourself mad by doing all the things I say, pick one or two core platforms. For me, that's YouTube primarily
and my podcast and then repurposing distributing to the other platforms. Based off of that core
content that you're creating. So if you're listening on the
podcasting platforms, guess what? This is also a YouTube video. This is also going to go
out on Instagram reels. This is also going to go out on Tik TOK. I'm also going to send out a
newsletter alongside this episode. So there are so many different
ways that I can the maximum amount of life out of my content. I'm going to show you how you can do
that without recording a new, you know, video or having to do all the things. So think about that for yourself. How can you repurpose? Are you really getting the maximum
amount of life out of your content? And if you are doing something
that's super, super quick and short form, maybe thinking about. Creating something that's a little
bit longer form so that you can get a little bit more life out of that
content so you're not constantly having to reinvent the wheel. I will leave a good primer for you
if you're looking to start an email list on exactly how to do that. Now is the time. Seriously. I found an article from Influencer
Marketing Hub that really validated a lot of my predictions that
we're going to talk about today. And they said specifically on this
topic, successful creators tend to have large audiences interacting
seamlessly across their accounts. They aren't just Instagrammers
or YouTubers, for example. Instead, they see themselves as
specialist creators showcasing their work to fans across the web. So I think this point is also important,
not just for engagement and retaining your audience, but also when you're
pitching yourself to work with brands. I have found this to be true. I don't have a large Tik TOK
following, but there are brands that want to work with me on Tik TOK
because that is their, their goal. That is the campaign that they're doing. And they look at my work across the
internet and see that as kind of a total. Total influence. They see the value in working
with me because I have built up this, you know, following and
this reputation across the web. It doesn't matter that I don't have
a million followers on Tik TOK. They're still willing
to work with me there. So keep that in mind. Another thing that I see as kind of
a trend that I see happening is this massive burnout on low quality digital
products, low quality coaching programs. Um, you know, I, I think in 2020 and
2021, we had this massive explosion in the world of online education and it
felt like everybody and their, you know, mother were creating a digital product
and not just creating one, but like doing really well with digital products. I want to be clear that I still think
there is absolutely a place for this. I absolutely still sell them, do that,
teach people how to create these things. But I think we are really getting
to a point where consumers are tired of spending so much money
on things that just don't deliver. So monetize in this way, directly
to your audience, you need to make sure that you are really. So I'm going to talk a little bit
about how to make sure that you are actually delivering value that you
are really holding up your end of the bargain and that you're being realistic
and that you're being fair and you're understanding where people are at,
meaning that you're not pricing things at 20, 000, just because you have a few
followers, you know, again, I think you can still make a lot of money doing this. I'm not saying you have to under
price or undervalue yourself. You have to make sure that you are really. Delivering value. And one of the ways that I think
I've been able to do this and that I hope to continue to be able to
do this is by integrating community into digital products, offers,
courses, coaching, all of that. I find that when I am just giving
somebody a template or an ebook and walking away, it's easy to
replace them with the next person. It's easy to say, oh, well, I can
just Google this, or I can just. Chat GPT this, right? Why would I want to pay for it? If I could just find the answer on
an AI tool or something like that, but what you really cannot replace or
what AI cannot replace, at least not yet is you is the experience of being
in a community with you is, you know, the ability to ask questions when
they get stuck or ask for feedback. And I think this can
really help you stand out. So. I have a community, it's called
the Freelance Friday Club. I've been seeing a lot of renewed
engagement and interest in that format, uh, that I didn't necessarily
see a couple of years ago. So I see this as a big trend. I think this can be a great add on if you
do have a digital product, a course, a coaching program, being able to facilitate
relationships between members, deliver bonus content, lots of things like that. I talked about it before, but I
recently switched my membership platform over to Uscreen. That's a tool that I'm using now,
and I am so, so happy with it. In addition to being able to
deliver premium video content, I'm also able to facilitate community
through our community tab. It is a place where we can all go and
chat with each other, ask questions of one another, tag each other, get
referrals, post gigs, do all kinds of There's a lot of stuff in between our
live calls and in between watching videos. You can leave comments on the videos. playlists for my members. It's just a really, really great tool. And in addition to that,
there's a mobile app, which is. Awesome. Because people, people are on the
go once again, you know, in 2020 and 2021, when I was doing a lot of
courses and memberships, everybody was sitting at their computers online, just
waiting for, for people to go live. That's not the case anymore. People are back in offices. People are running around to events. People are on the train, you
know, using public transportation. And so having an app. In their pockets is
really, really helpful. I can also send notifications
to the app, which is great. And so I think it's all about just
being accessible, meeting people where they are delivering that value. Those are the things that are
really going to make you stand out. So in addition to Apple
and Android devices. You can also create branded apps
for Apple TV, Roku, Amazon Fire TV on Uscreen, which is really great. And Uscreen also takes care of video
hosting, billing, monetization tools, analytics, end user support, and
really anything else that you need to create and scale an amazing membership. So if you're looking for more ways to
keep your members engaged and to help them really realize the value of the
products and tools and services that you're offering, a membership just
might be in your future and Uscreen can help you get started if that's
something that you're interested in. Be sure to get in touch with them. You can use the link down in
the show notes and let them know that LaTosha sent you. They'll set up a discovery call
with you, totally free to kind of talk through your goals, see if a
membership would be right for you and put together a roadmap for you. They are an amazing team. I've loved working with them. They've been so, so helpful at helping
me put together my membership strategy. So if you're interested,
be sure to check them out. Thanks so much to you screen
for sponsoring today's episode. And the last trend that I want to talk
about today is affiliate marketing. I've always. I don't know, I've always
been a little hesitant to get too into affiliate marketing. I don't know, it just kind of carries
a bit of a stigma with it, I think. It kind of sounds a little bit like It's
like, it's like sketchy in a way I went to a conference actually just recently,
and it was all about affiliate marketing. It was really interesting talking to
creators, one to hear about the potential that there is to make money in this space. And I guess the, the right way
to do it, you know, a lot of the creators that I talked to, they're
like, I don't push, I don't sell. I help my audience make
decisions about products. Um, positioning this as a service, you
know, I'm really enjoying what I'm doing. I'm having fun with it. And I don't think it has to be all about
like hacking SEO, keyword stuffing, and, you know, you know what I'm talking about. I think there is that side of affiliate
marketing that can be a little bit sketchy, but I think there also is
a side of affiliate marketing that is just about creating content about
stuff that you love helping people decide on the best things for them. Right? So if you love cameras and you want to
talk about cameras all day, Make sure that you've got your Amazon storefront,
or if you don't want to do Amazon, you know, reach out to whatever brand it
is that you shoot on and see if they have an affiliate program so that you
can refer people and earn a little bit of additional income that way. It doesn't have to be this
pushy, weird, sketchy thing. It really is. It's money sitting on the table. So many tech brands, so many
tools, so many products nowadays have affiliate programs. So if you're a super fan of something,
if you talk about something in all of your videos or all of your posts or
podcasts or whatever, see if there's an affiliate program, cause there is
likely money that you are leaving on. The table. I think the key here, if you're
really looking to scale this or leverage affiliate marketing is
making sure that you're only working with brands that you truly love. Affiliate marketing allows you to
really steer the ship so you can decide when you're talking about
it and you're not going to talk about it unless you really love it. Right? So only work with things, tools. Um, services, products that you
really, really enjoy and are going to want to talk about. And you don't want to damage
that relationship between you and your audience. If you're referring things that
you don't actually recommend, nothing can save you from that. I'm telling you, if you break
that trust, you've got nothing. So That's really key. But I also see a huge opportunity if you
are somebody who sells something yourself, whether that is a course, a membership,
a product, I see a lot of potential for leveraging affiliates as well. Some of my best course creator friends
swear by their affiliate strategies so much so that I'm totally copying them
and opening my own affiliate programmer. Restarting revamping my own
affiliate program for my programs. And I think just this,
the whole idea of like. Um, leveraging community, you know,
community over competition, if you will, is really huge being able to work with
other creators who maybe have something that you don't have and, you know,
bouncing things off of one another can be really huge and I think will be really
huge for 2024 so yeah, that's something I've been putting a lot of effort into is
just restructuring my affiliate program, really looking at it and thinking, what
do people need in order to share my stuff? And that is a. Dashboard, a private
dashboard for each affiliate. So I've built this out in notion. So all of my affiliates now get
their own custom links, get their own custom coupon codes that they
can offer to their audience as well. Also get access to my calendar. So if they want to create collaborative
content in order to help them, I'm making myself available for that. I am also giving bigger affiliate payouts
because this is something that I've learned as an affiliate myself, is there
are certain affiliate programs I'm a part of that honestly, I just never share
because the payout I get is like, you're gonna get a dollar a month, and I'm like. Thanks. With this 2. 0 version of my own affiliate
program, I'm actually giving my affiliates 30%, which is a big payout
in my opinion, and will hopefully incentivize people to share things more. So those are three things that
I see really making a big splash in the creator economy next year. Let me know if you have any predictions or
if you've noticed any trends as a content creator, things that are changing for you. I'd be curious to know. Uh, thank you so much for tuning in. I hope this was helpful, gave you some
new ideas and thanks to Uscreen for sponsoring today's episode as well. Memberships are going
to be huge next year. I think they already are huge and
they're just a really fun way to stay engaged and um, also to earn
recurring revenue for yourself. So be sure to check them out at the
link in the description and I will talk to you in my next episode. Bye.
