[{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BlogPosting","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#BlogPosting","mainEntityOfPage":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/","headline":"Why Your Favorite Content Producers are Failing By @ChrisPirillo","name":"Why Your Favorite Content Producers are Failing By @ChrisPirillo","description":"Adam and Chris Pirillo This is a guest post by one of the most well known and Proud-to-be-a-Geek Vlogger, Affiliate Rockstar and overall Techie Evangelist, Chris Pirillo.\u00a0 Get some coffee (preferrably from a Lockergnome.com Mug), grab your favorite sci-fi stress toy and possibly a Harvard English Major to help you through this awesome look at […]","datePublished":"2014-02-17","dateModified":"2014-02-17","author":{"@type":"Person","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/author\/adamriemer\/#Person","name":"Adam Riemer","url":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/author\/adamriemer\/","identifier":2,"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/fda62f751f2a6c2ec2b079fedff69720852e4a65633212ffb11832454c29160a?s=96&r=g","url":"https:\/\/secure.gravatar.com\/avatar\/fda62f751f2a6c2ec2b079fedff69720852e4a65633212ffb11832454c29160a?s=96&r=g","height":96,"width":96}},"publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Adam Riemer Marketing, LLC.","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/arm-logo-2.jpg","url":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/wp-content\/uploads\/2017\/10\/arm-logo-2.jpg","width":600,"height":60}},"image":{"@type":"ImageObject","@id":"http:\/\/adamriemer.me\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/adam-riemer-and-chris-pirillo.jpg","url":"http:\/\/adamriemer.me\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/04\/adam-riemer-and-chris-pirillo.jpg","height":"346","width":"259"},"url":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/","commentCount":"4","comment":[{"@type":"Comment","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#Comment1","dateCreated":"2014-11-26 16:49:04","description":"I gotta say, I kinda get where Gordon is coming from in his comments above.  Fair commentary, sir.","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Mike","url":""}},{"@type":"Comment","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#Comment2","dateCreated":"2014-02-18 20:15:39","description":"nice shoor chris","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"lahiru","url":""}},{"@type":"Comment","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#Comment3","dateCreated":"2014-02-18 03:21:48","description":"Good one bro","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Edwin","url":""}},{"@type":"Comment","@id":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#Comment4","dateCreated":"2014-02-18 03:11:05","description":"This may come across rather blunt, but the real world is like that sadly at times, but I feel the points are valid and straight to the point.\n\nSome content creators may possibly need a reality check, and maybe that is why they are not in the position they think they should be in? Their large number of followers will change in the blink of an eye if they went to a fully charged model, and of course, according to the views here, sod those people as they don't matter... and probably not if all you want is their money, and not their respect or admiration :)\n\nThere are many people who only follow certain content creators to participate and generate traffic to their site, that time and energy used is deemed worthless according to the views expressed on here. Other peoples time is deemed worthless and only the creators time has any monitory value? I find that a very sad view and feel it says a lot about the person.\n\nAll I tend to see online these days are people promoting themselves, it's all ME ME ME, and the actual content is limited and poor and the viewers are treated with contempt by some. The lines you hear are WE DO THIS FOR YOU GUYS, what utter rubbish. You do it to try and make whatever money you can, by spending as little as you can, and use whoever you can to do it... let's get the truth out there, content creators only want YOU GUYS to make make money off of, and if it's not enough, then expect to get the dummy thrown out of the pram and all YOU GUYS get tarred with the same brush....\n\nIf you are unhappy in the job you are in and the wages it is paying, then do what other people have to do... get another job that will hopefully make you happy or pay you what you feel you deserve, let's stop blaming others!\n\nI write my comments to content creator sites for FREE, I take the time out to participate and give me views on what they have created, even though some may not agree with what they are. Maybe I should think about charging content creators for my valuable time used to comment on their work, and in turn, making their site followers list grow or comment feed grow?","author":{"@type":"Person","name":"Gordon Keenan","url":"http:\/\/www.tech-reality.co.uk"}}],"about":["Blogging"],"wordCount":2471,"keywords":["chris pirillo","content","content producers chris pirillo","content production by chris pirillo","quality content"],"articleBody":"Adam and Chris PirilloThis is a guest post by one of the most well known and Proud-to-be-a-Geek Vlogger, Affiliate Rockstar and overall Techie Evangelist, Chris Pirillo.\u00a0 Get some coffee (preferrably from a Lockergnome.com Mug), grab your favorite sci-fi stress toy and possibly a Harvard English Major to help you through this awesome look at content, production, the value of quality content and yourself all tied into Economics.\u00a0 Not to mention that the post wraps up with a great ending and gives you an Ahhhh Haaaa moment.\u00a0 The trick is to read through the whole thing.\u00a0 Thank you again Chris for contributing this monster piece on Content Production.Why content producers could be failing and what you can do as a content producer to be worth more value in the market.I\u2019m a \u201ccontent consumer.\u201dWe\u2019re accused of having short-attention spans, but it\u2019s not that \u201cstuff\u201d is losing our attention quickly – it\u2019s that we\u2019re losing our attention on more things more frequently when faced with a constant onslaught of \u201cstuff\u201d worthy of our attention.I\u2019m also an independent \u201ccontent producer.\u201d This means I don\u2019t have millions in external funding, I don\u2019t have experts at my beck-and-call, and I don\u2019t have near-unlimited (stable) resources to keep producing as my supporters might expect me to produce.Sounds great, right? Well, not when you\u2019re expected to compete on a playing field of producers who are better funded, better staffed, better sourced, better ranked, better whatever – and our mutual competitor remains the attention that everybody doesn\u2019t have enough of.And \u201cbetter content\u201d isn\u2019t a comprehensive answer, unfortunately. To put it to you another way: just how much \u201cgood stuff\u201d are you missing out on right now simply because you don\u2019t have enough time in your day to consume it? You may not even know that a piece of \u201cgood stuff\u201d exists in the first place – but that\u2019s a different problem I really don\u2019t care to cover.how much \u201cgood stuff\u201d are you missing out on right now simply because you don\u2019t have enough time in your day to consume it?So what is the value of Content?By @Iqoncept \/ purchased from DepositPhotos.comThe free content ride is not quite over (and it may never end), but it\u2019s slowing down substantially. To this point, consumers could get content for free because producers had a solid way of offsetting costs (through mechanisms like advertising). But, just as advertising budgets are increasing, so are productions against which those ads might be run. And therein lies the rub.The value of a piece of content is likely measured per thousand views. If you have a high value for an advertiser, the cost per thousand (CPM) is higher – right? Well, what happens when there\u2019s more producers creating things of equally-important value? What happens when you are producing at the same levels and are no longer receiving the traffic you once did because of uncontrollable, external factors? Same pie, smaller slices all around. Pay attention.A content consumer still likely values the produced content equally.And that\u2019s the disparity which is giving rise to a scenario that seems to be unpalatable for the average consumer, but absolutely necessary for the producer if they truly expect to continue producing for the consumer.And the average content consumer, mind you, is largely ignorant to the reason that changes are coming \u00a0– because they\u2019ve never faced these stressors as a producer.A content consumer\u2019s knee-jerk reaction to a content producer who might look to more direct options for monetization is to suggest that the producer is \u201cdoing it wrong.\u201d The consumer\u2019s course of action may be to find a producer that better suits their whims (and budget), but this still may not diminish the value the consumer holds for the content that doesn\u2019t come to them \u201cfor free.\u201d Enter dissatisfaction, all around.Consumers have long been whining about ads (and some of them, blocking ads outright and demanding that the world continues to spin on their terms); these are not your supporters, and they are not people you want around you. Do not take their feedback with any degree of seriousness, as they\u2019re probably the same people who don\u2019t vote and complain about everything they had the opportunity to change during the last election.If I walked into a coffee shop and tried to haggle with the Barista and suggest that the triple espresso they made isn\u2019t worth anything because I\u2019ll just take my business elsewhere (to where I can get a free triple espresso)\u2026 uh, yeah. Right. What am I paying for? The coffee drink itself? The expertise to make a coffee drink that I enjoy? The electricity for the machine to help make my coffee drink?If I went to get a book that offered something of value to me, what am I paying for? Am I paying for pages, or am I paying for whatever it was I wanted (which isn\u2019t necessarily a printed volume)? Are all books free? Do all books need to be free? Is information free for everybody? Well, I suppose in Utopia\u2026 but we don\u2019t live there. I can\u2019t pay for my triple espressos with nothing, and I can\u2019t produce content without offsetting my costs. Obviously, I am not a communist – nor is anybody who bothered to read this far.Producers have to work twice as hard to drive half as much revenue from ads anymore. That\u2019s an overly-generalized statement, but its premise stands. Don\u2019t turn to an impersonal study for data – just ask any one of your favorite content producers directly. Forget about SEO & SEM (and other miscellany that most content producers don\u2019t understand or care about) for just a moment.How are we going to keep doing what we do without having to find a \u201creal job\u201d (because most content consumers simply do not understand or appreciate the amount of work that goes into making something look easy)? How are we going to increase stability while increasing longevity accordingly? There\u2019s really only one answer on the table for everybody involved.We find patrons and cater to them above the masses.By ellandar \/ purchased from DepositPhotos.comWhat are the Patrons looking for? Quality Content, display it and keep them coming back.YouTube has been a fantastic platform for independent video content producers – the likes of which have not been rivaled by any other entity for any other form of content to date. It\u2019s an unfortunate anomaly, but its no less a victim of reality. YouTube has experimented with the pay per view model, but that only works well for well-known one-offs. I\u2019m not trying to bring up the subject of charging for content, either (at least, not likely in the way you\u2019ve experienced it before).I\u2019m talking about better enabling a relationship that facilitate value where it matters most – between the content producer and the content consumer.Think about what a never-ending IndieGoGo for content would look like. Now, I use IndieGoGo as a brand reference instead of KickStarter intentionally – because with KickStarter you must reach your financial goals in order to produce something. IndieGoGo doesn\u2019t impose such a restriction; all funds raised in IndieGoGo are available the project to use.I learned about a service a few months ago that would help enable content producers to engage their \u201cbiggest fans\u201d – but it took me a while to set up my own profile and launch a campaign for the thousands of people who claim to have been missing something I used to produce for them.http:\/\/patreon.com\/ChrisPirillo was borne, and it\u2019s not likely to disappear anytime soon. It\u2019s not a limited engagement – it\u2019s an opportunity to address most of the issues that have plagued me as a content producer from the very beginning.Are content consumers ready to donate to their favorite producers on an ongoing basis? I believe so. Though it\u2019s not a very popular idea with most producers or consumers today, I\u2019m confident that it will eventually be accepted as the best way to make everybody happy.If someone suggests that the value of my time or content is worth nothing to them, then they (in turn) mean nothing to me. What\u2019s the point of them watching something I do versus watching something that anybody does? I\u2019d rather support 3,000 people who are supporting me doing something for them that they want instead of dealing with 300,000 people who don\u2019t care whether I produce or not.Get it?Traffic is irrelevant. Subscriber or follower count is irrelevant. Existing production and consumption models are untenable for every party.Some producers are upset that Facebook is now charging to help you improve coverage of any given status update – but how else would you expect that what you had to share is going to rise above the 100s of other things that other people are sharing in a user\u2019s feed for the day? It\u2019s no better or no worse than having an email newsletter and watching your open rates decline as more people are turning to more places to get more stuff.If you set up a system where you\u2019ve given your supporters an opportunity to give you what\u2019s tantamount to the monetary value of a bottle of water on a monthly or one-off basis – and you don\u2019t have to worry about maintaining the system for transactions – and you can offer as little or as much as you might want to those supporters – and you can start concentrating on what you might want to do and stop wasting your time on things you\u2019re not good at – and if you can stop worrying about market forces beyond your control\u2026 what\u2019s stopping you from pursuing the model?Pushback? Some people complain if you do anything or if you don\u2019t do anything – so, either way, you\u2019re going to lose if you don\u2019t give yourself a chance to win. Stop caring about the people who don\u2019t care about you – and if they have the means to support you but refuse to do it on principle, then you (again) can\u2019t count them as true supporters.I\u2019ve had to do a lot of explaining to consumers who see the goals on my Patreon profile. They\u2019re looking at the wrong number, really – and Patreon still has a long way to go in educating the would-be supporter. Some detractors see how much is being accrued by a producer and may believe that the producer is asking for \u201ctoo much.\u201dWhat I have to explain (over and over) is that I do not limit the reach of my content. Would someone begrudge a book author who crafted \u201cvaluable\u201d content simply because the author sold more copies? That a movie with actors achieved more box office sales? I\u2019d hope not. The value to that individual remains constant.Same goes here, folks. If you don\u2019t value something, nobody is here to tell you that you should value it. However, if you value something, you must not make gross assumptions in how the sausage is being made (if you will). If you don\u2019t like that the barista\u2019s manager wants to charge you $3 for a triple espresso, it\u2019s your right not to buy into it. However, if you want that triple espresso, then you must also be willing to exchange your money for receiving the product.And if someone tells me that they don\u2019t think the value of what I have done for them in the past (or am aiming to do for them in the future) is worth $2 a month, then I\u2019m not so sure I\u2019d ever have risen above the din of content they\u2019re consuming in the first place.In the past, I’ve sold eBooks and services – intangible, but still valuable to the person who is looking to have what I have to give. I’ve learned what has worked well (and what hasn’t), and I’ve learned that the most valuable thing any of us have is NOT money, but time. Could you set up this kind of system on your own? Possibly. Is it easier to work with people who do what they do well so that you can continue to do what you do well? Absolutely.Again, time is more precious than money. Attention is more valuable than money. You can’t earn time or attention back by any means.Is Patreon the only game in town for such services? Doubtful, but it was founded by a YouTube content creator and is already being supported by known producers. I\u2019m quite nervous about placing such an important part of my enterprise in someone else\u2019s hands (What happens if they get acquired? What happens if they can\u2019t make it work? What happens if something else happens?). I was equally as nervous about putting my videos on YouTube in 2006, and that turned out to be one of the best decisions I ever made.The reward, I do believe, outweighs the risk – and I know that if tomorrow, everything else gets wiped out, I can count on that growing number of patrons to keep doing \u201cmy thing\u201d for them anywhere I can possibly get things done.As an independent content producer, I have a greater possibility of achieving platform independence without being shackled to increasingly-difficult production paradigms. Holy Grail? No. Meaning of Life? No. Something completely different? No.The \u201cpatron model\u201d is just a better way of making the people who truly matter happy.They say that money can\u2019t buy happiness, but you just see how many triple espressos you can buy without any money next time you walk into your favorite coffee shop. Don\u2019t drink coffee? Cool. Try buying a book (sans discount) without dropping a dime the next time you need or want one. Let\u2019s see how far you get. Even if these scenarios don’t fit your lifestyle, just don’t gloss over my reality because it doesn’t match yours.By the way, I wrote this guest post \u201cfor free.\u201d I figured I might find a few more patrons by writing it – damn any other perceived value. \ud83d\ude09You can find and follow Chris Pirillo at the following places.\u00a0 (and don’t forget to donate the $2 if you’re a Chris Pirillo supporter on his Patron.\u00a0 http:\/\/patreon.com\/ChrisPirillo).http:\/\/chris.pirillo.com\/http:\/\/twitter.com\/ChrisPirillohttp:\/\/facebook.com\/ChrisPirillohttp:\/\/Instagram.com\/ChrisPirillohttp:\/\/google.com\/+ChrisPirillohttp:\/\/youtube.com\/ChrisPirillo"},{"@context":"https:\/\/schema.org\/","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Blogging","item":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/#breadcrumbitem"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Why Your Favorite Content Producers are Failing By @ChrisPirillo","item":"https:\/\/www.adamriemer.me\/blogging\/favorite-content-producers-failing-chrispirillo\/#breadcrumbitem"}]}]