Creator Economy: Why Follower Counts No Longer Matter
â–¼ Summary
– Social media algorithms now completely control content visibility, making a creator’s follower count largely irrelevant to who sees their posts.
– In response, creators are developing new strategies to build direct relationships with audiences, such as using paid communities or less algorithmic platforms.
– A key emerging tactic is “clipping,” where creators pay teenagers to post short highlights of their content en masse to game algorithmic feeds for wider reach.
– Trust in individual human creators has increased, partly because AI-generated content has driven audiences to value authentic, experience-based recommendations.
– The future favors niche creators with specific expertise, as algorithms excel at serving targeted content and broad, mass-appeal success becomes harder to achieve.
The landscape of social media has fundamentally shifted, placing a premium on genuine audience connection over simple follower counts. As algorithmic feeds dictate what users see, creators can no longer rely on their entire audience finding their posts organically. This change is forcing a strategic evolution across the entire creator economy, where building direct, trusted relationships is becoming the most valuable currency.
Industry leaders point to a pivotal change. “I think that 2025 was the year where the algorithm completely took over, so followings stopped mattering entirely,” observed Amber Venz Box, CEO of affiliate marketing platform LTK. This reality, long championed by figures like Patreon’s Jack Conte, has prompted diverse reactions from influencers and streamers alike. Creators are now developing new methods to harness their audience relationships, with some offering an antidote to AI-generated content and others contributing to the noise in novel ways.
For a company like LTK, whose business hinges on the trust between creators and their audiences, this fragmentation could be a serious challenge. Surprisingly, a recent study revealed that trust in creators actually increased by 21% year-over-year. Box admitted this was unexpected, theorizing that the rise of artificial intelligence has driven people to place more faith in authentic human experiences. “AI pushed people to kind of rotate trust to real humans that they know have real life experiences,” she explained.
This renewed trust means consumers are actively seeking out content from creators they value. Marketing budgets reflect this shift, with 97% of chief marketing officers planning to increase their influencer marketing spending. Capitalizing on this demand, however, requires new tactics. Creators dependent on affiliate income, like those on LTK, hope AI skepticism will drive fans toward more direct connections through paid communities or less algorithmic platforms. For others, such as streamers and video podcasters, audience growth now involves sophisticated strategies reminiscent of growth hacking.
One emerging tactic is the use of “clipping armies.” Eric Wei, cofounder of financial services firm Karat Financial, describes a system where creators pay teenagers on Discord to create short clips of their content, which are then posted widely across algorithmic platforms. Major figures like Drake and top Twitch streamer Kai Cenat have utilized this method to generate millions of impressions. In an algorithm-driven environment, a compelling clip from a random account can outperform content from a known creator. This approach is a direct response to the difficulty of reaching one’s own followers.
“Clipping feels like an evolution of meme accounts,” said Glenn Ginsburg of QYOU Media. “It’s become a race among many creators to try and take this content and push it out far and wide.” While an effective tool for increasing visibility, clipping has its limits. Reed Duchscher, CEO of the management company Night, cautions that scaling such operations is complex. “There’s only so many clippers on the internet,” he noted, suggesting the strategy’s effectiveness may wane if it becomes perceived as spam.
The saturation of low-quality, or “slop,” content online is pushing users toward more curated spaces. Over 94% of people feel social media is no longer social, with many migrating to smaller, niche communities on platforms like Strava or Substack. Duchscher predicts this will benefit creators with highly specific focuses, making it harder for “macro creators” with hundreds of millions of followers to be replicated. Success stories now include figures like Alix Earle or Outdoor Boys, who cultivate deep loyalty within a particular niche rather than aiming for universal appeal.
This trend underscores a broader point: the creator economy is not just about entertainment. It’s a pervasive force affecting all industries. Sean Atkins, CEO of Dhar Mann Studios, uses the example of Epic Gardening. What began as a YouTube channel evolved into a major player in horticulture, eventually purchasing the third-largest seed company in the United States. “The creator economy generally is viewed through this lens of entertainment. I think that’s a mistake,” Atkins argued. He believes creators are impacting every field imaginable, cementing their role as resilient adapters in a constantly changing digital world.
(Source: TechCrunch)
