A creator is just a 'cool' word for a one-person B2C bootstrapped business

This is a great point and brilliant advice. I think when people use the term 'creator' it makes what they're doing sound easy and fun, and also easier to walk away from when they realize it's actually damn hard. It's a psychological 'safe word' in a way. It feels like there's a lot more at stake if you say you're running a business vs 'just' creating.

Most creators are selling their lifestyle as a business. Be cool like me and have it all when in reality they are probably working 12-hour days like actual business owners. But that doesn't sell so they slap the creator label on and suddenly it's become super easy to sell their course, workshop, product etc. This makes them salespeople at best.

This is a great perspective. Glad to see that people are open to this idea of the "creator economy." A always wondered why solo developers weren't included in the idea of the creator economy. It was like you had to be internet famous and sell products to be considered a creator.

I feel like SaaS founders are by default leaders in the creator economy. They just aren't as obsessed with becoming famous.

Solid article! I'd highly recommend reading Paul Jarvis' Company Of One if you're thinking about being a solopreneur. Changed my whole outlook on things.

This was a good one. The reality is that a successful enterprising venture which involves creativity ends up as a good business. Even YouTubers build a full fledge team & hire more people as they find their content to resonate more with their audience.

This decade seems to drive the Creator Economy forward at full force :)

Okay l didn’t get the time to read this ..l will circle back latter .l wanted to ask how do you get the time to write this long article..amazing that is all l can say for now…thank you for sharing……

I'm less interested in how the word 'creator' is being used and more interested in the tips he gave. Many of which were great. But, he very briefly mentioned affiliate marketing in this, and I think he missed a growing opportunity there. He basically says if you create really niche content it must be a paid offering. But I know people who are making hundreds of thousands of dollars a year offering very niche free content to their community while essentially promoting other people's paid opportunities.

There's also another way to become a "one-person" creator...buy businesses and improve them. James Clear does this on Twitter and he tweets a lot about this. He buys content sites that rank well on Google (most of those sites make money via sponsorships or affiliates) and then improves them so they rank even better. Then he flips the sites for a profit.

I like this shift in perspective. To me, "creator" is a trendy word and I want to be one. But it's a little foreign to me — how do you go from "I'll be a creator" to actually making money as a creator? It's unclear. Whereas creating a small business is much more digestible. I get it. You make the product, you launch the product, you sell the product.

It's really just semantics, but it's important — bringing lingo back down to earth makes it more accessible.

This is a very interesting question. There are 2 kind of creators : Full-Time and Side-Job Creators. The first kind are dedicated to turn their passion/knowledge into a business, and have the ambition to be able to sustain themselves through their content. The second type is just sharing/creating content for the fun of it, they are less consistant and have other project they are more passionate about.

The way I see it is : both are considered creators but not both can be defined as a "B2C Bootstrapped business".