Content creators are an integral part of the modern digital ecosystem. Responsible for entertaining, educating and influencing, these individuals have given birth to the creator economy.
With over 200 million independent content creators, the global influencer market value is projected to reach $21.1 billion in 2023, up from $1.7 billion in 2016. Its value is on track to reach $24.1 billion by 2025.
Digital content creators have proliferated thanks to an unprecedented surge in demand for information. Not only does the average person spend around 6.5 hours per day online, but the number of social media users continues to grow steadily, hitting 4.76 billion in 2023.
It’s essential, however, not to equate content creators solely with social media influencers. The term content creator is broad and covers many different disciplines, including the social media space. Digital content creators can be bloggers, photographers, videographers, and podcasters.
Let’s look at what a content creator is, the different types of creators and the content they make, and what hopeful entrants need to know to succeed.
What Is a Content Creator?
A content creator is somebody who creates written, graphical, video or audio content for audiences.
The term commonly refers to digital content creators who make entertaining or educational material for websites, social media networks, and video and image platforms. This content can be incredibly varied, including:
- Articles
- Blogs
- Apps
- Games
- Social media posts
- Videos
- Images/graphics
- Photographs
- Newsletters
- Emails
- Ebooks
- And more
As the above list suggests, there are many content creators, each with their niche, medium and strategies.
Content Creator Types With Examples
With the term “content creator” covering so many different disciplines, we’ve explored some of the most popular digital content creator types in greater detail below.
Influencers
Most popular platforms: Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube
Influencers build a personal brand to attract followers and shape their opinions, behaviors and buying decisions. While influencers can be found in almost every niche, from science and technology to health and fitness, their ability to influence and engage with followers is a defining characteristic.
The most successful influencers tend to be individuals that already have achieved fame in another field and they convert that into social media followings. Cristiano Ronaldo, for example, has built the largest following on Instagram thanks to his success on the soccer pitch.
Source: Instagram
Some influencers have become famous purely from their internet personalities, however. The best example is Khabane “Khaby” Lame, a former factory worker who found success through lifehack parodies on TikTok.
Source: TikTok
Any content creator who builds a large enough personal following is classed as an influencer.
Bloggers
Most popular platforms: WordPress, Medium, Substack
These content creators regularly publish blog posts to inform, entertain and engage their audience. There are millions of blogs online today, with WordPress alone believed to host around 60 million unique blogs.
The line between blogger and publisher can be hard to define, especially once a blog has achieved a certain amount of success. For example, Techcrunch began life in 2005 as a blog about dotcom start-ups, while Gizmodo started as a single-writer tech blog in 2001.
Source: Gizmodo
Some estimates suggest the number of blogs is much higher at 600 million, but that comes down to how we define blogs.
For example, if we include microblogging in the mix and count Tumblr’s more than 500 million accounts. In that case, we’d also need to include Twitter and Instagram, expanding the count into the billions.
Vloggers
Most popular platforms: YouTube, TikTok, Instagram
Vloggers, a portmanteau of “video” and “bloggers”, tend to produce video content for social media networks and video hosting sites.
Vloggers produce short and long-form content covering many topics, from lifestyle to health and fitness. Casey Neistat one of the most successful lifestyle vloggers on the planet, amassing more than 12 million subscribers on YouTube.
Source: YouTube
On TikTok, meanwhile, #dailyvlog is at more than 38 billion views and still counting.
Podcasters
Most popular platforms: YouTube, Spotify, Apple Podcasts
Podcasting is a versatile platform for storytelling and sharing knowledge and has grown in popularity thanks to its suitability as a supplementary activity. People listen to podcasts while commuting, exercising and working in much the same way they listen to music.
Joe Rogan is the biggest name in podcasting, achieving fame from his show The Joe Rogan Experience that outstrips that from his work as a comedian, TV host or UFC commentator.
Source: Spotify
Content Marketers
While not commonly perceived as content creators, content marketers also fill this role for companies worldwide. Many of the biggest brands use blogs as content marketing.
The companies hire a strategic content creator to help them come up with a comprehensive plan to achieve their specific goals. This individual produces content in line with the company’s brand values and as part of a broader strategy.
One example is Etsy, which has an in-house content team dedicated to producing content that resonates with the eCommerce company’s audience.
Source: Etsy
These creators can also serve as social media managers for brands, managing their online presence and maintaining audience engagement. Wendy’s is famous for giving its social media team unprecedented creative freedoms.
Source: X
How Do Content Creators Earn Money?
Content creators either sell their content to the public or a company or become employees. All creators broadly fall into the self-employed or employee camps, with the first carrying greater financial risk and reward.
While content type will affect which models creators can leverage at any one time, generally, most can be used simultaneously to maximize revenue.
These include:
- Ad revenue: Creators can earn ad revenue from their website and content hosting platforms like YouTube.
They can serve display ads on their website, apps and newsletters, native ads on social media platforms, video ads on platforms such as YouTube or Twitch, and audio ads during podcasts or between songs.
- Sponsorships/brand partnerships: Brands pay content creators to promote a product or service in a way audiences find relatable. This type of content requires the creator’s editorial input to ensure it engages their target audience.
Examples include general channel and site sponsorships, product overviews and reviews, guest posts and collaborations, hosted events or experiences, and webinars and workshops.
- Affiliate marketing: Content creators can integrate unique affiliate links or brand promo codes into suitable content — such as listicles — to earn a small commission from associated sales. These links can also appear in product reviews, tutorials and guides.
- Merchandise: Selling merchandise — such as branded clothing, accessories, books, eBooks or courses — is another popular source of income that can help build brand loyalty at the same time.
- Subscriptions: Platforms like Patreon allow content creators to offer exclusive content to audience members willing to pay a monthly fee.
- Public speaking/consulting: Content creators who are experts in their field can earn money through public speaking engagements, running online workshops or advising a business in a particular area.
- Content licensing: Brands can also license a creator’s work for advertising or educational material. This can be a lucrative passive income source.
What Skills Do Content Creators Need?
A content creator’s skill set will depend heavily on their content format and niche. For example, lifestyle vloggers need video shooting and editing skills that lifestyle bloggers don’t.
Here are some of the skills content creators will need to achieve success:
- Creativity: Generating engaging ideas with a different enough spin to capture audience share is key to remaining relevant.
- Writing: This is an essential skill for written work and video creation, with a strong script being the backbone of an exciting video.
- Design: Basic design skills are essential for video content and can help create infographics for articles and clogs.
- Video production: Vloggers must shoot and edit videos, work with lighting and sound, and edit the final product.
- Search engine optimization (SEO): We’ll explore it in more detail below, but SEO is essential to improve content visibility and understand audience interests.
- Social media marketing: Creators need to know how to promote and distribute content on social media, using social media tools to navigate algorithm changes.
- Research: Being able to find and evaluate reliable sources is what differentiates the great creators from the mediocre.
- Branding and storytelling: People love stories, and content creators who learn how to tell memorable stories will have an easier time connecting to their audiences.
While these are all valuable skills, creators just starting their journey shouldn’t worry overly about the skills they might be missing before making a start.
How Do Content Creators Start?
The simple answer for anybody wondering how to start is the majority “just start”. It may seem overly simplistic, but starting the content creation process provides a point of reference to improve from. Accept that the first blog or video might be terrible, but that the rest will be better.
MKBD, arguably the biggest tech channel on YouTube with almost 18 million subscribers, started life on the kitchen table of a young teenager reviewing his personal possessions.
Source: YouTube
Make mistakes, get it wrong and look to improve.
What Does a Content Creator Do?
Content creation is a complex and multi-layered process involving several distinct but interrelated tasks. A successful content creator needs to be able to weave these elements into an overarching strategy.
1. Industry Research
Good content provides value to the audience, which requires in-depth industry research. This is especially true when considering how much new content is posted daily.
In 2022, 4.4 million blog posts were published every day, while 500 hours of new video content was uploaded to YouTube every minute.
A content creator can provide more value to their audience by creating content that tells the reader something new or presents already-known information with a fresh perspective and more insightful detail.
2. Topic/Keyword Research
Source: Google Trends
Creating great content is of little value if it isn’t discovered. This is where search engine optimization (SEO) comes in. Whether creating blog posts or making YouTube videos, creators need to be mindful of two things:
- Keyword search volume: What is the audience searching for?
- Keyword search difficulty: How intense is the competition?
Keyword research helps content creators find keywords and topics in high demand while also letting them know how much competition they can expect when creating keyword-specific content.
Tools such as ahrefs, Semrush, and Google Trends can identify search volume, search difficulty and other search-related metrics before valuable time and resources are used to create content that is unproven.
3. Creation
While a creative process, the content creation phase can still be broken into constitutive elements to deliver more predictable results. By eliminating the element of uncertainty from content creation, creators have a better chance of scaling their output.
Prepare a Brief or Outline
Whether creating the content directly or outsourcing it to other creators, it’s always a good idea to have a brief or outline before the work begins. A brief typically specifies the following:
- Structure
- Length
- Main topics with primary and secondary keywords
- Links to internal or external sources
- Content monetization elements (for example, affiliate links or product placements)
Create the First Draft
First drafts can be rough and messy, and worrying about getting everything right at this stage can be counterproductive. Leave the polishing to the next step.
Editing
This is an essential step. Irrespective of whether it’s a blog post, vlog or Instagram post, it’s crucial to revise and edit the first draft before posting.
Publish and Monitor
Next, it’s time to publish the content. Once it goes live, however, it’s important to monitor its performance to troubleshoot potential technical or content-related issues. Understanding what connects with audiences and why is vital to reliable growth.
4. Promotion
Once content creators have published their work, they need to promote it. Without promotion, content is far less likely to have similar levels of visibility, while the creator won’t generate as much brand authority.
Creators with different niches and formats will use different strategies to achieve similar outcomes. However, we can boil down these approaches into the use of one of the following types of content distribution platforms:
- Owned platforms: These include the various social media channels that a publisher or creator owns, such as Instagram, Facebook, LinkedIn, etc.
- Paid platforms: These include the use of display ads, paid search, sponsored content or paid partnerships.
- Earned platforms: These include instances where users find content so useful that they recommend it to others. User reviews, testimonials, and other social proofs fall into this category.
3 Tips on How to Become a Successful Content Creator
The deluge of content hitting the internet each day makes it hard for new entrants to make a name for themselves. But that’s not to say it’s impossible.
Creating engaging content is central to building a following. While there are no guarantees that any content will capture an audience’s imagination, leading to organic sharing, there are several habits content creators can use to remove some of the uncertainty from the process.
Tip 1: Read Widely and Deeply
Reading widely and deeply will help form connections between niches or industries that might not, on the surface, seem connected. Here’s how to start:
Set Up a Feed
Source: Feedly
An RSS feed or an app such as Feedly provides a reliable stream of relevant industry news, events and trends. Following the social media accounts of niche-related publications can also offer value.
Set a Reading Schedule
Allocate a set amount of time every day to read the latest news in social media posts, blogs, and other media, even if that means getting up an hour early, and treat this slot as non-negotiable.
Follow Social Media Conversations
One of the best ways to gauge readers’ thoughts on a matter is to check their social media posts. Use the hashtag function on Facebook, Twitter or Instagram to search for relevant conversations to understand customer or audience views.
Keep a Reading Journal
Successful content creators will summarize and review the articles they’ve read, and any other media they’ve consumed, as part of their ideation process.
The best way to achieve this is to keep a reading or commenting journal, either physical or digital, to store thoughts and resources.
Tip 2: Practice
Content creation is about consistency. In his book On Writing: A Memoir of the Craft, Stephen King encourages aspiring writers to set a “low” daily writing goal of 1,000 words to develop a habit.
James Clear, who spoke about the importance of developing writing habits in his book Atomic Habits, wrote twice per week at the beginning of his career. He recommends the Two Minute Rule as a means of developing the habit.
Set a Writing Schedule
Setting aside a particular time every day for the creation process will help turn the process into a habit. While the morning works best for most, research on circadian rhythms sheds light on how biological rhythms affect the creative process.
Set a Yearly Target
Having a yearly goal will serve as a motivator because writing anything will, in one way or another, bring that goal closer.
Create a Content Calendar
Brainstorm a few ideas, then create a content calendar to help organize production. Sticking to a consistent release schedule of one video per week requires methodically planning time for scripting, shooting and post-production.
Establishing an excellent editorial workflow is vital to setting realistic timelines and consistently meeting them.
Tip 3: Create and Curate
Experiencing success is as much about monitoring what’s working and what isn’t as it is about creating great content. Such curation is an important part of creating and maintaining audience relationships. Here are some ways to do just that.
Monitor What Others Produce
Research 5-10 creators that produce a steady flow of content. They can be direct competitors or creators that share some similarities. Analyze the content they produce, including any audience feedback.
Identify Audience Needs
Content is directionless without feedback. Set up a tracking or a dashboard system that allows for real-time audience feedback.
There are several outstanding media monitoring software to choose from that can collect and analyze performance data from social networks and blogs. These tools can help creators understand the type of voice their audience loves to listen to or read.
Add Value
Curation works best to add value to existing work through a new take on topics or challenging the audience with a difficult question and then actively engaging with the ensuing conversation.
Final Thoughts
Successful content creators understand that for information to resonate with readers, the right ideas have to be communicated in the right way.
This comes down to research, presentation and promotion. Mastering these three pillars is at the heart of producing high-quality content.
Every digital content creator has learned new skills on the way to success. New platforms may emerge that attract a new audience. TikTok’s emergence as a force in the media landscape forced its rivals to adopt and embrace short-form video.
Long-form video creators adapted by repurposing content in a short-form package, while TikTokers themselves learned to repurpose their content on established networks to reach new audiences.
The ability to adapt, embrace new ideas and leverage emerging technology are some of the biggest strengths of the modern digital content creator.
