This is Edition No.4 of this weekly newsletter.
I started a weekly newsletter about creativity last month and began posting on Threads and X this week. During this process, one thing I learned is: niching down is not a good strategy for content creators.
Niching down means continuously producing specific, well-defined content. It is suitable for functional products (like a piece of clothing that can always fit into some specific category) but is not for content creators who turn a part of their own existence into a displayed product.
Why It’s Useless To Niche Down?
For the algorithm, this strategy doesn’t make it easier to succeed.
For a content creator, when you niche down, it means you have to choose an already existing persona, learn from your competitors, and turn yourself into a product similar to others.
If you maintain a very popular persona, then you have lots of competitors, and it becomes more difficult to differentiate yourself, making it hard to gain more attention in a crowded feed.
If you stick to a very niche persona, then your target audience is small, making it difficult to reach them and gain more attention.
If a persona is unsuccessful, you might suspect it's because you chose the wrong persona, and continually switching personas can lead to losing followers and, of course, wasting time.
Audience only care about what they want, not about the niche.
People follow a creator because of resonance, not for some practical functionality.
Resonance is very personalized and fragmented.
Resonance is always moving and has no fixed definition.
Resonance comes from the vastness of life, encountered when someone shares a common experience, similar viewpoint, and genuine perception with us, making us feel that in the vast universe, indeed, there is someone connecting with us.
Resonance is fragments of our souls meeting accidentally in this fragmented, confrontational world.
You can't create it by niching down.
Niche down is not sustainable for creators
The motivation for creation comes from self-expression.
The motivation for creation always includes self-expression; only with a strong enough desire to express can a person sustain output.
If your purpose for creation becomes "more fitting to a niche," rather than building your own artistic persona, it contradicts the source of this motivation. Creating to fit an external standard is not sustainable.
Creators embrace change.
People are changing all the time; there's not necessarily a static niche. We are always repositioning, always finding new expressions of our identity.
This month alone, I've changed my bio's self-description several times. I often develop new interests within a few weeks, and when I read my journal from a month ago, I've already moved beyond those thoughts.
We don't need to use a niche to limit our direction.
How To Position Ourselves As Content Creators?
Since 2022, I started posting my illustrations on Instagram, but besides my works, I'm just not interested in creating other popular forms of art content: I don't want to record videos of myself drawing, I don't want to teach skills, I don't want to create and sell templates. What I'm always obsessed are unpopular topics: creative workflow and inner growth during the creation process.
I'm an illustrator, yet I don't fit this niche very well.
So I tried new ways. And these are what I’m doing.
Show the growth process, let the persona naturally emerge.
Our existence itself is a niche. Show your growth process, observe your output from an outsider's perspective, and see how we truly position ourselves. Don't hide our current state; the current thoughts are only for the next attempt and will be useless much later.
Focus on improving yourself, not social media metrics
Social media is a game full of illusions. It attracts you with a few super successful cases, but its extremely long-tail nature is hard to see. In this game, gaining and retaining attention is hard for everyone. Don't spend too much energy focusing on followers and engagement data; put your energy into growing your own abilities. If you create some successful content, try to understand why it work and replicate it, but don't spend too much time analyzing the attempts that don't work. Just move on with it and keep creating.
Be special, but focus on general issues
What makes us special is our personality, abilities, and experiences. Dive deep and showcase them without letting any niche limit them.
General issues are the common human themes and life topics that are relevant to everyone, such as personal growth, relationships, business, body, etc. Choose the general issues you are naturally interested in, combine your characteristics, explore topics, provide insights and methods, and gradually meet your audience.
Our mission is not to fit into a mold and become someone else.
Our existence is not to follow a pre-existing path but to create a original path.
Be a better version of yourself. And that's our true niche.
P.S. Lately I’ve been summarizing my past experience in creating a workflow for making art as well as turning my current life into a publishing workflow. I’ll share more in later articles. If you’re interested in learning more, just reply and subscribe. And thank you for reading!
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