Edition #17

Happy Monday — hope you’ve all had a great June and start to July. I know I’m a little late with this one, but it’s getting harder and harder to do this on time with everything going on in the world, with work and everything else. We’ve been busy at Social Currant & I’m excited to give you a quick recap. Today’s edition will be a little shorter than usual, but I’m excited to keep you updated on all things creator economy.

Before we get in — to all the new readers — welcome! Every month, Ellie & I (& the rest of the team helps too!) put together a round up of news, highlights, tests and things we’re exploring around the creator economy as it relates to the progressive/impact space at Social Currant.

If you were forwarded this email, subscribe here. If you want to learn more about the work Social Currant did in 2023, view our impact report here.

--

SAY HI!? Will you be at Netroots? Let me know! I’d LOVE to say hi! Reply and let me know. P.S: We’ve got Currant sweatshirts to give away. 👀

Alright, some other updates:

• [NETROOTS HAPPY HOUR] RSVP to a happy hour we’re doing in partnership with some other folks.

• [CREATOR DINNERS] We’ve continued meeting creators where they are and are still seeing appetite for creators to talk about social issues they care about. More and more creators see their role in the ecosystem, but need more resources and support getting in.

• [CAMPAIGN DASHBOARD] We’ve updated our campaign dashboard so that you can track things more effectively. Here’s a preview! We’ll also be demoing the tool at our booth and at the New Tools Showcase!

—

[QUICK VIDCON TAKEAWAYS] I (Ashwath), unfortunately, did not go to Vidcon this year, but Ellie did! A few quick takeaways and things we saw:

• We hosted two events, a creator happy hour and a talent agent happy hour focused around social impact and using platforms for good and we saw incredible demand with 300+ RSVPs. For talent agents especially, they were grateful for having a space and that we were recognizing the role they play in this ecosystem.

• Creators are motivated to talk about issues that they have lived experiences around, even if they aren’t currently talking about those topics on their page. Bringing creators together to have conversations around how they can use their voice for positive change will be pivotal in continuing to grow the creator x impact space.

• Gen Alpha is taking over! VidCon was packed full of creators that the next generation of voters follow — partnering with those creators to talk about important issues is an opportunity to get young people involved in the advocacy space at an earlier age.

—

[THE POWER OF IN-PERSON] I’ve already talked at length about the power of in-person collaborations, but I want to do a quick reminder to reiterate how important it can be to bring creators together in person:

• Creators, both impact focused creators and creators interested in using their platforms for good are always looking for spaces to meet like-minded people. While there may be a lot of infrastructure in the creator economy in the brand space, even that infrastructure is limited to New York & LA.

• Hard conversations are even harder online and when we think about the work we’ve got to do this year, we need every single voice we can get and a lot of that organizing can be done around a meal or with a 1:! meeting.

• Creators are able to ask harder questions — things they may not have felt comfortable asking on a Zoom with 100 people.

Here are some ideas around in-person activations you can do:

• Host a creator dinner in your city.

• Host a fly-in around an issue your organization is working on

• Host a creator studio around a major cultural event.

• Meet creators in your city for coffee.

And make sure to make it consistent!

—

[SOME CREATOR ECONOMY NEWS TO BE AWARE OF] Some things about the platforms:

• The White House announced a creator economy conference. Check it out here.

• Instagram doesn’t care if your reels are edited with Capcut. Read the experiment here.

• Tiktok Launches an Instagram rival called Whee and it doesn’t have any traction. Read more here.

• Threads is officially a year old! Can you believe it’s been that long. Read a little bit about the work the platform has to do this year.

• While ad spend is accelerating on TikTok, user numbers are balancing out a little more with % of the app users who are 18-24 falling and the % who are 35+ rising. Read more about some key changes from 2022 to 2024.

—

Anecdotes, observations & what we’re hearing from creators: Our Slack has been active with a lot of conversations around suppression, especially with an eye towards TikTok. Some other things we’re seeing:

• Videos randomly being put under review on TikTok.

• Sharing videos with friends/family and having them watch the full video a few times when it is initially posted can help boost the content in the algorithm.

• Posting on all platforms is becoming increasingly important to expand overall reach and deal with platform suppression.

--

If you made it all this way - thank you! For reading, trusting creators and me. I'm building Social Currant to make an impact and you all are a part of this journey. Until next month!

Found this email useful and want someone else to get these insights? Forward this to them and they can subscribe here.