Guide to the creator economy
Posted: Mon Dec 23, 2024 10:10 am
The lines between the creator economy and entrepreneurship are blurring, with creators taking an independent approach by building brands.
Illustration of a person navigating a map with a cage of flowers growing around them
On this page
What is the creator economy?
A Brief History of the Creator Economy
Meet the middle class of the creator economy
Entrepreneurship in the creator economy
Starting a creator business
The creator's path from influence to ownership
Frequently asked questions about the creator economy
Start your online business today.
For free.
Free trial
A YouTube stuntman buries himself alive for 24 hours in a box filled with supplies and a camera. On Instagram Live, a world-renowned musician gives an intimate concert. And a gamer on Twitch streams a battle royale to thousands from her bedroom.
This is the creator economy, where stars are made in suburban living rooms and millions of fans peek through the curtains.
With the lines between the creator economy and entrepreneurship blurring, independent creators are experiencing a pivotal moment.
In the past, a few large media companies, record labels and publishers controlled the flow of content between creators and fans, deciding who and what audiences saw, and exerting financial power over creators and their content.
Click here to start selling online right now with Shopify
However, in the last decade, a new digital-native canadian email addresses playing field has emerged, allowing creators to become their own publishers.
Platforms like Twitch, Patreon, and TikTok democratized distribution and allowed creators to reach audiences directly. Monetization tools soon followed, and the audience-centric business was born.
Many are now anchoring their brands to their own channels and building independent platform communities. And with the lines between the creator economy and entrepreneurship blurring, independent creators are experiencing a pivotal moment.
What is the creator economy?
Illustration of a person juggling abstract shapes
The creator economy refers to a type of business run by online content creators who monetize their audiences through paid partnerships, advertising revenue, tipping platforms, and merchandise sales.
An estimated 50 million influencers, artists, curators and community builders make up the creator economy.
The easel for this canvas is another group of entrepreneurs: the founders who build the technology that sustains this economy.
This includes everything from content creation apps to e-commerce-enabled social media platforms and monetization tools like Patreon.
With this technology, creators can build personal brands, attract viewers and make money.
A Brief History of the Creator Economy
The creator economy phenomenon has been growing for over a decade, but its roots go back even further. In the late 1990s, Web 2.0 ushered in an era of user-generated content and interactivity, and the rise of mobile contributed to constant internet consumption.
Blogging platforms were the first, evolving from online diaries to one-person media machines, feeding these extremely connected audiences.
Monetization options like ads and brand sponsorships allowed some to make a living from blogging alone, amassing audiences that rivaled those of major media publications.
Huffington Post and BuzzFeed were among the first to embrace the blog spirit as a formal media property.
“Real people” began to appear in major advertising campaigns, replacing traditional celebrity endorsements, and the first signs of modern influencer marketing emerged.
Reality television accelerated the trend, catapulting the unknown to celebrity status overnight. And when YouTube launched to the public in 2005, budding stars no longer needed production deals to gain an audience.
The next decade would welcome a wave of new social platforms and, in recent years, incentives for creators like YouTube Shorts. Progress happened slowly and then all at once.
The creator economy today
In recent years, the creator economy has welcomed a diverse mix of influencers, bloggers, social media personalities, comedians, activists, podcasters, videographers, artists, musicians, and athletes.
They range from part-time entrepreneurs to full-time entrepreneurs, from micro-influencers to big stars.
Portrait of Colin and Samir, a creative duo with a huge following
Colin and Samir have built an empire in the creator economy, growing a fanbase with content and monetizing through online courses and paid partnerships.
Colin and Samir/Instagram
But that number is exponentially higher if you consider the entire ecosystem. “People look at a very successful creator and don’t realize how many team members are behind them,” says Samir Chaudry, one of the filmmakers in the duo Colin and Samir .
These behind-the-scenes roles are key to helping creators transform personal brands into established businesses.
In 2022, creators were generating income directly from platforms, but only a fraction of them were actually earning enough to live off that income alone.
On Spotify, 98.6% of artists earn just $36 per quarter, and on Patreon, only 2% of creators earned a minimum monthly wage.
Illustration of a person navigating a map with a cage of flowers growing around them
On this page
What is the creator economy?
A Brief History of the Creator Economy
Meet the middle class of the creator economy
Entrepreneurship in the creator economy
Starting a creator business
The creator's path from influence to ownership
Frequently asked questions about the creator economy
Start your online business today.
For free.
Free trial
A YouTube stuntman buries himself alive for 24 hours in a box filled with supplies and a camera. On Instagram Live, a world-renowned musician gives an intimate concert. And a gamer on Twitch streams a battle royale to thousands from her bedroom.
This is the creator economy, where stars are made in suburban living rooms and millions of fans peek through the curtains.
With the lines between the creator economy and entrepreneurship blurring, independent creators are experiencing a pivotal moment.
In the past, a few large media companies, record labels and publishers controlled the flow of content between creators and fans, deciding who and what audiences saw, and exerting financial power over creators and their content.
Click here to start selling online right now with Shopify
However, in the last decade, a new digital-native canadian email addresses playing field has emerged, allowing creators to become their own publishers.
Platforms like Twitch, Patreon, and TikTok democratized distribution and allowed creators to reach audiences directly. Monetization tools soon followed, and the audience-centric business was born.
Many are now anchoring their brands to their own channels and building independent platform communities. And with the lines between the creator economy and entrepreneurship blurring, independent creators are experiencing a pivotal moment.
What is the creator economy?
Illustration of a person juggling abstract shapes
The creator economy refers to a type of business run by online content creators who monetize their audiences through paid partnerships, advertising revenue, tipping platforms, and merchandise sales.
An estimated 50 million influencers, artists, curators and community builders make up the creator economy.
The easel for this canvas is another group of entrepreneurs: the founders who build the technology that sustains this economy.
This includes everything from content creation apps to e-commerce-enabled social media platforms and monetization tools like Patreon.
With this technology, creators can build personal brands, attract viewers and make money.
A Brief History of the Creator Economy
The creator economy phenomenon has been growing for over a decade, but its roots go back even further. In the late 1990s, Web 2.0 ushered in an era of user-generated content and interactivity, and the rise of mobile contributed to constant internet consumption.
Blogging platforms were the first, evolving from online diaries to one-person media machines, feeding these extremely connected audiences.
Monetization options like ads and brand sponsorships allowed some to make a living from blogging alone, amassing audiences that rivaled those of major media publications.
Huffington Post and BuzzFeed were among the first to embrace the blog spirit as a formal media property.
“Real people” began to appear in major advertising campaigns, replacing traditional celebrity endorsements, and the first signs of modern influencer marketing emerged.
Reality television accelerated the trend, catapulting the unknown to celebrity status overnight. And when YouTube launched to the public in 2005, budding stars no longer needed production deals to gain an audience.
The next decade would welcome a wave of new social platforms and, in recent years, incentives for creators like YouTube Shorts. Progress happened slowly and then all at once.
The creator economy today
In recent years, the creator economy has welcomed a diverse mix of influencers, bloggers, social media personalities, comedians, activists, podcasters, videographers, artists, musicians, and athletes.
They range from part-time entrepreneurs to full-time entrepreneurs, from micro-influencers to big stars.
Portrait of Colin and Samir, a creative duo with a huge following
Colin and Samir have built an empire in the creator economy, growing a fanbase with content and monetizing through online courses and paid partnerships.
Colin and Samir/Instagram
But that number is exponentially higher if you consider the entire ecosystem. “People look at a very successful creator and don’t realize how many team members are behind them,” says Samir Chaudry, one of the filmmakers in the duo Colin and Samir .
These behind-the-scenes roles are key to helping creators transform personal brands into established businesses.
In 2022, creators were generating income directly from platforms, but only a fraction of them were actually earning enough to live off that income alone.
On Spotify, 98.6% of artists earn just $36 per quarter, and on Patreon, only 2% of creators earned a minimum monthly wage.