Web (candy) store

So this morning, I was scrolling through HackerNews . An excellent online candy store filter for finding high-quality content. You know to see if there's anything cool there and had another aha moment.

I'm still storing to much educational material that I could consume during next nuclear winter/pandemic.

Assessment

My aha moment made me check how much I spent on online education in the first half of 2021. Once I wrote down the numbers and realised that I've spent 1,5 times more than I expected, I was a bit shocked. Let's not even start on the amount of money I've spent on books. That expanse was at least conscious and is paying off dividends already.

No shit, I saved less in the last 6 months than I expected to. Still saved plenty, but huh.

Just to name a few places where my money went:

• Foster write together.
• Ship30For30 How to build an online writing habit.
• CSS for JavaScript developers
• Master YouTube In's and outs of video making.

Now I mean those are some really high-quality products. I only wish they were around two years ago so I could learn those skills faster. But this content didn't exist, so in some sense, it's not surprising I wanted to get access ASAP.

All this money for the above courses is well spent as long as I finish consuming that knowledge and then use what I learned.

Sure the high-quality content is excellent, but that's, you know, the 1‰ of courses made. The rest have the same price, but the quality is well 🤮, not as high.

But how do poor quality creators still manage to sell? Well, they play the psychological game of advertisement and product scarcity very well.

So don't be surprised if you start following someone on Twitter; read their newsletter. After two weeks, you're suddenly buying a 200 $ product from them. Then in about a week, you realise that you didn't really need it in the first place.

After the first 200 $, I learned my lesson and pretty much stopped following anyone on Twitter. Except for the few high-quality accounts (that made me buy the above high-quality content 😂 ).

Oh, and refunds. Some people claim 30-day money-back guarantee or some crap like that. Well, most (some still play it fair) don't give the money back. So if you pay the pretty, 💰💰 don't expect to see it back.

"Flood" of (high) quality content

Since very-very-very few people make a lot of money with online content creation, the whole path towards the content-driven business sounds pretty sexy.

Being in it for about two years (making 0 $ intentionally and unintentionally), I can say that this isn't for those who want to make quick money, cash out and go. It's a long term game, a very long term game. This is great because most wannabee creators quit after few failed attempts.

But there's still enough creators that stick around long enough to create high-quality content. This is great because, as humanity, we benefit from all high-quality educational material.

Sure our wallets might not agree if we spend too much of our income on the educational content we never consume. However, the high-quality material is good for the progress of humanity.

With all that high-quality material around, how come that we still struggle with learning?

Content abundance.

You see, with so many options out there, you (can) get paralysed what to focus on.

And this is where the flood of content sort of backfires, not for the creator but for the consumer.

As a consumer, you can afford, are interested in way more content/courses/books/articles than you can consume in your lifetime. Yet every content creator is trying to sell you their best stuff you shouldn't miss on.

Yet despite being aware of this, we as consumers still "lose" this psychological game every day. In some sense, our brain simply isn't equipped to resist the temptation of eating, buying yet another candy.

We overeat, puke and do it all over again.

Unfortunately, the above is the current "state" of the so-called Creator Economy (few words about this phenomena here or here ).

Prediction

So what's next?

Less content but more personalised and of even higher quality?

One example of this is Cohort-based-Courses (CBC). One analysis of why they work here by Wes Kao .

CBC's are the same thing as self-paced online courses, just that they have live sessions and a tight community of learners. Yet Seth Godin started with CBC's in 2015. It's 2021 now when everyone else is realising the value of them. I would say that most of us are a bit late.

So the natural question is, what's next? Even more personalised content/education? Maybe that would be for the best, but then we are back to synchronous teaching in the classroom again. If we follow this direction (and the trend will go in this direction), it's inevitable that eventually, the statement:

Content making is a bubble.

will eventually become true. The bubble is in its early stage, but it's been growing exponentially for at least a year or two. When will it burst? Who knows, but one thing is clear:

Content creation only is a losing battle.

There will always be someone who can out "create" you.

So how to position yourself against the content flood?

My rule of thumb: Do something that every person with one year of focus can't just copy/do.

So what would be an example of this? What's the area with a high barrier for entry in terms of becoming the expert.

Well, writing, YouTube, Web Design, Drawing certainly isn't. Even in software development, one can become an "expert" quickly (1 - 2 years). Combination of all of them, maybe.

My advice focuses on something that requires many nuances, deep thinking and can't be copied fast. Don't just build content; build relationships with people (not for the sake of money) but for the network. Build reputation. Work on skills that last and will stick around for a while.

Take Basecamp for example. Yes, they have a fairly good product, not the best. But they've been around for 20 years doing the same thing. Building reputation, a good product and lasting relationships with other industry leaders and customers. No new productivity app can blow them out of the water overnight in a year or in few years. (OK, unless Basecamp stopped doing what they are doing).

You can still find your niche (few words on being top 1‰ in sth. here ) there are plenty of them left. But settle for sth. that's actually unique. Hint developing a unique position, reputation takes time. Easily years.

Now let's circle back to the elephant in the room:

Should you try to make money "on" the new Creator trend?

My guess. Yes.

The market might be flooded already with high/low quality free/paid content, but the market is expanding daily. More and more people are turning online for re-education. But keep in mind that this gold rush will end eventually.

Or maybe better say, the gold rush will shift to something else. So be on the lookout and make sure you can adapt.

I still believe that there's enormous potential for very high-quality content.

Why?

Well, people want it, and it doesn't really exist for most niches. 😎

But no. New writing course, new Twitter course, new python course isn't new high-quality scares content. OK could be high quality, but you will be competing with everyone else.

My take? Find something with less competition, something that no one wants to do. Learn that, teach it, and you are golden.

When you pick something that seems hard at first glance and master it, you suddenly realise that you just got rid of your competition.

Work on something unpopular and make it popular. Don't jump on the trend. Make the trend.

And yes, that's hard.

But hard, clever work pays off.

Eventually and always.