It used to be you needed to become a musician with a record deal, a Hollywood actor or actress or a successful athlete to become famous. With social media like YouTube, Instagram and Twitch, you can become famous to millions of viewers.
9 Tips for Becoming Famous on Social Media
Follow these tips to become popular on social media.
Be Unique
If you look at popular social media stars, you'll notice that all of them found a specific niche to focus on. Whether it's being a great player of video games or an expert on fashion and beauty, find that topic that you really are passionate about and can provide expert advice that will make people want to follow you.
Be Entertaining
A similar trait among famous social media stars is that they're fun to watch. Just viewing someone play a video game isn't particularly interesting, but with great commentary, funny jokes and helpful insights, you're likely to want to follow them. Likewise, someone who just shows the steps to doing your makeup is not as memorable as doing the same while also being engaging, witty and with a great manner demonstrating their skill. You need a 'hook' for your niche, coupled with a personality and vibe that draws people in for more.
Provide Quality Material
In addition to a unique focus and an entertaining personality, the third major component is to be really good at what you do. If you're going to stream on YouTube or Twitch, invest in good audio and video equipment, learn how to edit videos and ensure proper lighting. If Instagram is your target, then beautiful, professional photography is an absolute must. If your presentations provide no value, people aren't likely to subscribe to your channel or page, and more importantly, share it with others.
Focus on Followers
Once you have your channel or page, focus on getting as many followers as you can. Contact everyone you know and ask them to follow you and share your information with others. Then work on following others, as more often than not, once you follow them they'll follow you back, and their followers will see notifications that you have been followed and they may follow suit. Look at larger social media accounts that are in similar areas as you as these are people likely to be interested in what you have to say.
Develop Relationships With Other Influencers
Another tactic is to contact major players in your area and exchange friendly messages with them. If you are able to strike up a relationship, the other person may be willing to promote you on his or her channel to help you out. Of course, you can always return the favor by promoting the person on yours.
Engage Your Audience
Another similarity between social media celebrities is their active engagement with their audience. If you want to become famous, responding to comments and making videos or photo shoots based on audience requests helps to make you look approachable. This is a big difference you'll see with Internet celebrities as opposed to Hollywood, music and fashion celebrities. Social media stars have a reputation for being willing to engage their audience rather than appearing aloof and above being social and responsive.
Learn Social Marketing
Another important way to get people to find you is to use proper SEO on your page, which means researching and using keywords, tags and possibly even paying for ads with Google AdWords, YouTube, Facebook and other platforms. Learn also the ins and outs of hashtags to use them to your benefit and increase followers and shares.
Be Consistent
Create a regular schedule for your posts and videos. You want your followers to be able to consistently expect quality material. If you post too infrequently, you may fall prey to 'out of sight, out of mind.'
Approach Companies
Another tactic famous social media celebrities have used is approaching companies that service their niche about promoting their brands. If a company finds that you're a good fit and wants to reach your audience, they can work out a sponsorship deal with you that works to both of your advantages.
Examples of Social Media Stars
It helps to look at some famous social media stars to see how they achieved success. You may recognize names like:
- PewDewPie, a Swedish video game commentator with 62 million YouTube subscribers
- Bethany Mota, a fashion and style persona with 10 million YouTube subscribers
- Zach King, known for his 'magic vines' videos, who has 2 million YouTube subscribers
- Julie Sarinana, a fashion YouTube personality with her own clothing line, who has 4 million Instagram followers
- Tyler "Ninja" Blevins, a pro gamer personality with 7 million followers on Twitch
These are a few examples of people who use popular social media platforms to become famous. While each is different, they followed similar steps to become important influencers on social media.
Become a Social Media Star
If you're looking for social media fame, it takes time, dedication and a plan. If you follow the steps of other successful stars, you'll be on your on your way to stardom!
