Influencer

Updated: 11/12/2023 by Computer Hope
Influencer on a smartphone.

A content creator, Internet celebrity, or influencer is an individual who gains a large following on a social media platform, such as Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, or YouTube. Influencers can earn income by promoting products and services to their audience through advertisements and sponsorships. Social media content creation is a full-time job for some influencers who have generated a large enough online following.

Note

Influencers with millions of followers can have a lot of power. With this power to influence many people into purchasing goods and services, they may willingly or unwillingly suggest scams (e.g., crypto scams). These scams can cost you a lot of real-life money with no ability to get your money back. When anyone tells you to buy something online, remember they could be paid to say what they're saying or have an invested interest.

Examples of content creators

Anyone who creates any content is considered a content creator. Below are examples of different content creators in alphabetical order.

  • Artist - Painter, musician, sculptor, sketch artist, etc.
  • Streamer - Anyone who streams audio or video for others on the Internet.
  • Writer - Anyone who writes anything (books, reporter, web content, fanfiction, etc.) for others are a content creator. Even those on social media who create original posts are content creators.

How do I become an influencer?

To become an influencer, you must build a big enough audience (followers) to demonstrate to advertisers that if you say something, it may influence enough people to buy something. How big an audience is depends on the niche you talk about the most. For example, if you're interested in becoming a gamer influencer, get as many followers as other influencers in the same niche. You can see that a gamer influencer like Markiplier has over 33 million subscribers on YouTube. Competing against someone this big wouldn't be possible initially, so you'd need to have a more specific niche. For example, it'd be better to focus on a specific game instead of being a general game influencer. Once you become a big enough influencer in that game, you can expand into other games and genres.

What is a kidfluencer?

A kidfluencer describes a young kid between the age of 6 and 12 who has enough of a following to be considered an influencer.

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