Sponsored by RockWater

A common refrain from talent to their digital reps: “I don’t have the budget to be like MrBeast.”

My answer was always, “Then just learn lessons from his success but do it on your own scale!”

I’m not so sure about that advice anymore.

As mid- and longtail creators get more plentiful, it’s getting harder to squeeze together a career.

But the top creators, the tippy-tippy-tippy top creators, are more powerful than ever.

I’ll break down what the digital media blockbuster era means for us regular Joes and their clients.

Also in this edition:

• Pick Your Moment

• Popeye’s Streamer Meal’s Not a Thing

• Media Matters Beats X…for Now

• Podcast Have Their TV Moment

• Job ops from Skybound, Golin, and Saltair

• …and a dank creator economy meme by yours truly!

Let’s get into it.

NEWS:

The Creator Economy’s Guide to Super Hits

The numbers are getting insane.

Back in 2012 when I was a plucky young digital media exec at Fullscreen, my team and I knew pretty much every creator over 1 million subscribers.

We chatted daily with many of them.

Now people start telling me about someone with 20 million followers and my answer is usually, “Wait…who is that?”

Breaking through is getting harder and harder.

But this summer has shown it’s possible, breaking records with Ryan Trahan’s cross-country tour or going to Streamer Prom.

So what do these events have in common?

They are built on already popular IP. In an age of text-to-video AI and a flooded content market, all that’s left is curation and scarce IP. And creators do both. Taylor Swift, MrBeast, and even K-pop stans can make anything pop. Whether the next one will continue the viral trajectory depends on the quality of the previous entry. And yes, I do consider K-Pop Demon Hunters part of the IP story, but the IP is Netflix.

They are built on story. Taylor Swift + pro football boyfriend + his podcast that’s talked about her a lot but has never had her as a guest + appearance right after the online announcement of her new album with a title that demands more info = crazy virality. There’s so much story there it’s bursting at the seems. And all of the other examples are the same: unique, clear stories with feel-good angles and smart resolutions.

They are a payoff to something set up over time. Streamer prom was hyped for weeks before the record-breaking event. MrBeast already announced his huge charity event with Mark Rober before bringing in Adin Ross and xQc. Even K-Pop Demon Hunter feels like the continuation of the ‘K-pop taking over the world’ story. They are teased, launched, they build well, and have a big payoff.

They have distribution. MrBeast brings his own audience. As does Taylor Swift. And Netflix. And this also happens to be the hardest part for small or mid-tier creators looking to create their blockbuster moments. They depend on algorithms as distribution, which is a crap shoot that’s mostly crap.

I don’t see the hits era slowing down as AI slop muddies up the mid-tier, but for those creators and their reps that are lucky enough to have distribution solved, now it’s a matter of building the other three components properly.

SPONSORED BY ROCKWATER

How to prep your creator business for a sale.

RockWater advises owners in the creator economy on the sale of their business. We have the largest buyer network, and negotiate the best deals possible for our clients. We’re proud to be the industry’s top M&A advisor.

We recently advised Lionize, an influencer marketing platform, on their sale to gen.video. We’ve also advised Long Haul Mgmt (sold to Wasserman), Bottle Rocket Mgmt (sold to Night), Bounty (sold to gen.video), and have many more deals yet to be announced.

If you want a POV on your company’s valuation and readiness for a sale, reach out to to [email protected] to setup an intro call.

GROW 1%:

Phil Ranta’s weekly social media growth newsletter with one actionable tip to grow.

This week’s ‘Grow 1%’ is titled Pick Your Moment and discusses why creators don’t need to chase every trend to grow valuable audience.

Here’s an excerpt, and you can read the entire edition in the link above:

Trends are like Vodka Red Bulls.

They feel like they're going to kick everything up a notch, but if you have one, you may be thinking, "How can I sleep at night?"

Yes, trends absolutely have a far better chance of 'going viral'.

We conducted a quick non-academic study once where we looked at the 200 most recent TikToks of our partners, separated them into 'following trends' and 'not following trends' and the trendy videos, on average, had more than triple the reach.

How can you resist those results!

Here's how: ask yourself, are these views helping to build a valuable brand, or are the views just...views.

Remember: we're in an FYP (the 'for you page') world. Most people open TikTok, YouTube Shorts, or Meta Reels, and just watch the feed.

Those views are great, but they aren't very valuable for creators.

Continue reading here.

FAME & FORTUNE:

Popeye’s got some spicy hot backlash after launching curated streamer meals with top stars like RaKai and Cinna, but didn’t actually launch the product in stores as something you can order. Fun idea that got huge attention, but left fans not knowing what to do with that information.

Twitter (X) has gotten pretty scary with Elon’s cozy relationship with the U.S. government, so when the FTC started investigating Media Matters, the media watch dog group, for showing clear examples of major advertisers showing up next to antisemetic posts, no thinking person questioned why that was happening. A judge knocked down the investigation as a clear violation of first amendment rights, which I could have told you from what I learned in my high school government class.

Edison Research conducted a UK study that showed people who use TV as the primary place to listen to podcasts jumped from 4% to 8%. Turns out TV wasn’t dead, just the old model of pricing, viewing, and production.

Famous Birthdays, the IMDb of the social generation, teamed up with Pixability to identify creators before they blow up for advertisers. Finally Madison Avenue can fire all of their precogs.

INDUSTRY HIRING:

Skybound needs a Manager, Influencer Marketing (Games) who can get through a jump scare without dropping their controller.

Golin is looking for an Senior Manager - Influencer Marketing and NO I didn’t say ‘goblin’ so stop asking if they’ll pay in bird bones!

Saltair wants a Director, Influencer Marketing and Partnerships who can smell the difference between lilac and lavendar.

MEME ZONE:

Thank you for reading! If you enjoyed this edition, give it a share and if you get someone to sign up, I’ll send you my ‘10 Rep-Friendly Ways to Monetize Today!’ deck!

Until next time, protect yo rep.