The world’s largest celebration of digital video and online creators descended upon Anaheim last week, and with it came thousands of fans, creators, marketers and more. With the curtains now closed on VidCon 10, here’s what has us talking from the annual tech summit meets film festival meets superfan convention.
New Kid On The Block: Gen Z’s best-kept secret is out and the industry wants in. TikTok is making waves and creators and publishers who have been slow to adopt the platform for short-form mobile videos are scrambling to break into the space. The industry wants to learn how to leverage TikTok to achieve business goals. The creators want to know how they can monetize it. And the community just wants more content. Expect to see an influx of videos on the platform in the near future as everyone tries to figure it out. Our advice? Start now.
Bespoke Is In: Consumers don’t want cut downs and teasers. They want the full story. Instead of developing and optimizing content for one platform and teasing it on the others, invest in bespoke assets that expand on your story and appeal to different audiences on different platforms. Invest in your stories and let people watch them in full—where, how and when they want.
Call Me By My Name: Digital talent no longer fits into a single category. Podcasters are on tour, YouTubers are making merch and the DIY subset is vlogging. Limiting “job titles” are out. Triple threats are in. The time to stop pigeonholing creators is now.
Let’s Get Meta: When it comes to metadata on YouTube, the thumbnail, title, tags and description reign supreme. Need a little help? Check out Google’s Cloud Vision. The talk of the town at VidCon, the tool can analyze your content and thumbnails and identify any red flags before it’s too late. Because metadata matters most at the point of upload.
Influencing Holistically: Influencing is a changed game and brands are no longer prioritizing large media spends with a small group of high-profile names. Instead, they’re focusing on co-creation. #SephoraSquad. #MacysStyleCrew. Brands like it. Creators like it. It’s a win-win. Expect more.
LIVE From New York, It’s Saturday Night: Live streaming isn’t going anywhere. And people are happy about it. They really are. But no one has quite figured it out. It’s a new animal that calls for a new way of thinking. It’s not VOD and can’t be programmed as such. Maybe by the time VidCon 11 rolls around, people will have it figured out. Until then, push yourself to get creative.
And that’s the tea.
