Social media and content apps like TikTok, Facebook, YouTube, ShareChat, Likee and Helo are chasing creators and influencers to join their platform, in a bid to attract more first-time internet users who are demanding diverse and engaging content.
These apps are offering cash rewards, exclusivity contracts, training workshops, incubation programmes and traffic boosts to creators and influencers, who often help these platforms attract users, increase content consumption and drive engagement.
Earlier, content creators had only YouTube, Facebook and Instagram to go to, but with the explosion of content platforms, they are spoilt for choice.
Every platform is approaching the creator community differently, depending on its popularity and priority.
“I view creators as tastemakers, and where they spend their time creating and sharing content, communities will flourish. So, I think it’s fair to say better and more creators lead to more traffic and engagement,” said Kieley Taylor, managing partner, global head of social at GroupM. “Creators offer good value to the platforms where they share their content.”
YouTube hosts workshops for creators and has launched new formats such as ‘Diversify Your Revenue’ and ‘Brand Jam’ to help creators discover alternative revenue streams to build a sustainable career off the platform.
It hosts pop-ups to train on strategies used by the most successful YouTube creators, and is expanding these to Delhi, Mumbai and Chennai this year. It also has hands-on workshops to improve creators’ presence across Google and YouTube, and opportunities to meet and collaborate with other members of the YouTube community.
“Diversity of Indian content on YouTube has never been this good before. Today, more and more creators are coming up with great content from all across the country in all content verticals and in all native Indian languages,” said Satya Radhavan, Director Content Partnerships, YouTube India.
More than 1,200 creators in India have crossed the threshold of a million subscribers, versus five years ago when there were only two creators with one million subscribers, he said.
Facebook and Instagram provide consulting and online resources to creators apart from conducting workshops and events. Facebook also recently started ad-breaks for videos, helping creators make money off their content.
“We’re constantly working to create value for them by educating them on our suite of products and best practices, enabling them to best use our platform to engage millions of their fans and empowering them to build a strong and sustainable business model,” said Manish Chopra, Director and Head of Partnerships, Facebook India.
ShareChat, a homegrown regional language social media platform, has a ‘creator success’ team of 10 people who reach out to promising creators on the platform to mentor them on better content creation. So far, the startup has mentored 25,000 creators.
It is also testing a rewards program for top creators.
“At ShareChat we don’t go out looking for creators. We have them coming organically. If he or she is making an effort, we will reach out to them to coach and mentor them on how to create content, what duration it should be, what kind of location, background can be used,” said Sunil Kamath, the chief business officer at ShareChat.
ShareChat’s Chinese rival Helo is offering free traffic boost and staff support to eligible creators, apart from an opportunity to be part of ‘Helo Stars’ incubation program which will help 100 creators reach one million followers.
The regional social network has launched live-streaming on the app so that creators can engage and interact with their audience in real time. It has also launched ‘Helo Analytics’ to make it easier for creators to understand what their followers want, to create more engaging content.
Likee, owned by Singapore-based Bigo Technology, is luring creators by paying them money to create videos. The payment depends on the number of videos, the creator’s fan following on Instagram and exclusivity of the content that is created.
