Building a Platform People Actually Want to Follow

What makes you actually want to follow someone online—and what makes you eventually tune them out? As I build my own platforms, I’ve been paying closer attention to my behavior as a consumer of content. I’ve noticed that when creators continually recycle the same material, I eventually stop paying attention. When every recommendation starts to feel like a sales pitch, I stop trusting the recommendation. And when someone's content feels overly manufactured, it becomes much harder for me to connect with the person behind it. In this video, I’m sharing some of the things I’m thinking about as I build my own platform: creating varied and interesting content, embracing the fact that I have more than one niche, maintaining authenticity as a creator, and understanding the relationship between trust and monetization. I also talk about my experience with TikTok Shop and why I eventually stopped buying products after it became increasingly difficult to tell the difference between genuine recommendations and people simply pushing products. I’m building all of this in real time, and part of that process is thinking intentionally about the kind of creator I want to be—and the kind of platform I would actually want to follow myself. #SmilingLeo #ContentCreation #BuildingABrand