When students nowadays are asked what they want to be when they grow up, responses like “a YouTuber” have become more common than traditional responses like a fireman or a doctor. Becoming a professional content creator is a dream of many, but it is not one that happens overnight.

The team at Loudly is comprised of digital creators, music producers, and social media influencers who have come together to give you the best advice on how to become a content creator. 

Before you start creating content, create a plan. Do research to find what topics are trending, and what topics you think will trend in future. Where do people need content? What kind of solutions can you provide? Be sure to find something that is in demand, but also something that interests you. When you decide your niche, focus on somewhere you can provide unique, authentic, valuable content to people who want to consume it.

It is definitely recommended to create content in advance, before you start sharing. Ideally, content creators will have a release schedule with videos, infographics, and other media created weeks or months in advance.

This means once you launch your account, you can continue sharing on schedule without stress. Make sure that your content fulfills the following goals: to provide value with interesting, unique information, and to emit authenticity with genuine and personal content. 

Engaging and interacting with your audience is key for growing your following and for improving your content. High engagement rates and interaction rates will boost your standing in the algorithm on any platform, helping your account reach new levels of visibility. This visibility will lead to increased popularity as long as you continue to push authentic, valuable content.

That being said, remember that deciding which content is valuable is not entirely up to you. Use engagement and interaction tools to your advantage to gauge your followers’ and potential followers’ interest on various types of content.

From Instagram stories’ polls and questions, to simply reading and replying to comments, to encouraging users to DM you - there are a plethora of tools available across all digital content platforms, and being a good content creator means using them to your advantage and taking action on their responses.

Finally, don’t forget to be patient. Don’t fall into the traps of buying fake followers - some platforms notice ‘ghost followers’ and punish your account’s standing in the algorithm because of it. Quality content, especially in a valuable niche, will attract the people who are genuinely interested in consuming it. Building this key base of committed followers is an important first step, and oftentimes, it is the longest step in the process, so don’t rush it!

When creating and sharing content, creators must always follow community guidelines and legal restrictions. The most common violation of this, especially for new content creators, is from copyright infringement for audio usage. Avoiding copyright infringement is essential for monetizing your content and making sure your account or posts don’t get blocked.

Use a royalty-free music library like Loudly to curate and download non copyright music for your videos, so your content can live safely and successfully on whichever platform you choose.