The 2 Big Traps that Content Creators Should Avoid
We’re all creators in some way. When we write a blog, compose a song, paint, take a video, cook some food, develop a product or have a child, we create a legacy, our legacy, that will be left behind.
Modern tools and technologies has enabled everyone to be able to create content, regardless of their level, both in our physical and digital world. The internet allows individuals to voice their opinion without any regulation.
There’s so much content to consume on the internet now. “Attention economy” is where we live in, where companies compete for customer’s attention to advertise and bring their brand to the top of mind. In addition, it can be addictive to see the engagement, likes and loves on our content. It feels good to be heard, it feels good to be liked and it feels good to feel that we have a voice in the world.
Consequently, it creates a dilemma for all creators. Do they create the content that people love, only because they want to be loved and not hated, or should they create a content that speaks the truth from their heart, even if that’s not what most people want to hear, resulting in less engagement and monetisation opportunity?
Let’s dig deeper into the two common traps that all creators should be aware of.
1. Creating content to please others
If you have seen the documentary Social Delimma on Netflix, you would have realised how polarised the world has become as a result of social media algorithms. If you haven’t, it was revealed that social media platforms will serve you the content that you engage with so you spend more time on the platform, even if it means showing the same kind of content over and over again to confirm the world’s view that you wanted to believe in. In fact, this not only happens on social media but all kind of mediums that someone can consume.
In order to hook and grab the attention, news and article headlines have to pick a stand to be controversial to get into the spotlight. Sadly for most media, their revenue comes from their audience engagement, not how smart they audience become.
This doesn’t necessarily mean that what is shown to us is wrong. But the more we have seen it, the more confident and certain we are of that view, and the more ignorant we may become to learn the other side of the story.
It is impossible to begin to learn that which one thinks one already knows.
— Epictetus, Stoic Philosopher
There are always two or more sides to every problem and arguments. The aim of the debate is not to win it but to learn and understand the other point of view, to challenge our thinking. Either we are wrong, or we should find another way or evidence to solidify our argument.
Do you find frustrating when someone disagrees with you? Do you have the need to correct them? It’s normal and human to answer yes to these two questions.
After all, our advanced human brain has the need to always make sense of things. It’s our survival instinct. If we understand it, we know what to expect so it cannot harm us. We want the world to be the way just we wanted it to be otherwise we won’t feel safe.
Sometimes, we become so attached to our world view that if someone tries to disapprove it, we feel offended personally. Imagine when someone criticises your taste of music or movies, or our styles of clothing, most people would feel offended by that even though they have no involvement with the production of the product.
Marketers have always known how attached consumers can be to their beloved brands that if someone criticises the brand, it criticises them too. When there’s a difference in the taste of consumption, most of the time we may feel like we’re being judged or we judge others for not being like us.
In fact, can we learn to accept that people can be different? How we determine a quality of something mostly is subjective. The word ‘best’ is subjective. Best for whom? Best according to whom?
Social Conformity
The famous Ash experiment has shown that people will sometimes change their world view to follow others, even if we know that it’s dead wrong. This again, thanks to our survival instinct. We want to be a part of the group. We don’t want to stand out and expose ourselves to threat. Rather than speaking up to rock the boat, we prefer to hide behind the crowd and feel safe.
Imagine if this is not an experiment. Imagine if this is a real world where you find something that could harm us all, that most people choose not to believe. Would you just let it go like them? A good example of this can be seen from the movie Don’t Look Up starring Leonardi Dicaprio and Jennifer Lawrence *Spolier alert* where they found an approaching comet that can destroy our planet Earth. Sadly, no one believed their discovery. Should they just give up, follow the crowd and let that be the end of the human kind?
2. Not creating content to not offend anyone
On the other hand, should we just give up on expressing our voice to our put ourselves in a spotlight, so we are not hurt and we can’t offend anyone? Perhaps someone else can help the humanity, I’ll just stay in my cacoon.
What kind of life would that be?
Let’s answer a question by a question. How do we measure our life?
For me, it’s about contribution and doing our role to serve nature. How many lives can we touch and help?
Yes, speaking up and putting ourselves into the spotlight opens ourselves to danger. Jesus was put on a cross as his gospel was seen as a threat to the other Roman belief but his death also lightened up a fire within those who followed him and gave rise to Christianity that the majority of the world population now follows and holds on to.
Thankfully in the modern day with more peace, laws and civilisation, we don’t need to sacrifice our life to make a stand. Hopefully, it just involves opening ourselves up to criticism. Who knows. Those critics might be right or wrong, but it does present us an opportunity to learn and solidify our point. If we can see it that way, in fact, we have nothing to lose.
Who else is going to be the change we want to see in the world but us?
Empathy and understanding the audience
I wouldn’t walk my talk if I didn’t present a counter-argument to my points above.
What we actually said and what people heard can completely be a different thing, while we have no control of the latter. So should we not bother?
We have the right to. But if we really want to be a bigger person, if we want to be a leader, or simply someone who just want to grow to help as many people as possible, we could see this as an opportunity for us to improve our communications.
We also need to ask ourselves. Who are we communicating this to? Are we creating this content for ourselves or to influence others? If the latter, what’s the best way to present information to them to ensure the influence?
If the critics or complaints aren’t who we were aiming our message for, you might just need to remind them that this is not for them.
Final note
There’s nothing wrong with creating content to please others. But for me, I know deep down that chasing other people’s approval is a never-ending journey. It leaves us wanting more. We leave our confidence to be measured by external factors that we have no control of, we give them the power to define our worth. On the other hand, it’s possible to create a content that you want to create, as eventually it will attract like-minded people who want to hear you, even if they’re a minority.
It’s also okay to not create anything at all to not offend anyone if it feels uncomfortable. I’ve never liked debating or voicing my disagreement. But then I asked myself if I want to live my life in a shell or make a stand that could impact many lives, and set an example that others may follow.
What people hear and how their consume information also depends on their filter. Sad people are always looking for things to blame but themselves because it’s easier than taking responsibility over their own action and perception. Nonetheless, it also depends on the context that we’re in. We still need to read the room and learn from the feedback.
Lastly, there is only one of you in this world. We’re all different and unique in our own way based on our life experiences. So why don’t we create something that only we can offer? Something comes from within us rather than following, listening to the crowd and pretending to be someone else.
Just like all the animals in the wild that were created by nature, they’re already perfect in their own way.
