Eric Siu and Neil Patel break down why follower counts don't equal money. A consumer influencer with millions of followers might make less than a B2B creator with thousands of engaged subscribers. AI could soon replace appearance-based influence, shifting what actually matters in the creator economy.
Followers don't equate necessarily directly to the amount of income you make.
All the views in the world don't matter if you don't have this, right? So for example, let's say Neil was like a bikini OnlyFans girl, okay? Let's say he had all the views in the world, millions and millions, 11 million followers on Instagram, and then he had millions and millions of views on each video. The problem with that is it only converts in one way. If Neil decides to start an OnlyFans, right? But it doesn't really convert into revenue. Like, Neil can't influence me with that bikini account on buying enterprise software, for example. Now, for example, if somebody else decides to talk about— let's use the Clue.ly guys. They want to talk about their consumer product, right? And they're just showing it in action all the time. And each video is getting like 3 million, 4 million views or so. They're actually driving more sales, more adoption that way. So all the views don't matter if you don't have— the influence to get people to purchase a product. And so you have to think about the value of an audience based on that influence.
Yeah, I was talking to a dude a few months ago, male model, you know, jacked, good looking, and has, I don't know how many millions of followers, but on each platform he has millions of followers, all right? And he does like these high-end campaigns and stuff like that with like fashion and whatever else, like, you know, car companies and stuff. And he was asking me, you know, I have way more followers than you, Neil. Why can't I make more money than you? And I said, followers don't equate necessarily directly to the amount of income you make. I'm like, we'll walk down the street, more people will know you than they know me by far. But the problem is, is people know you for what? And I asked him and he's like, For looking good and taking pictures. I was like, cool. So where's the money value on it? And he said, well, the money value is, is I can make their products look good because if a good-looking person wears a specific watch, maybe other people will want to buy that watch. I said, okay. And how many good-looking people are there out there? And he's like, a lot, right? And I was like, I'm like, you probably know better than me. Because, you know, I hate to say it, Eric's a handsome gentleman, but most of my friends are not male models. And I'm assuming you would agree with this, Eric. You're not a male model.
I'm just an average guy, just an average guy just trying to make money online, just like you, Neil.
Eric's above average. All right. He's not average, but he's definitely above average. But this guy, you know, I don't know what the rating scale of a 10 would be, but let's call it a 9 or 10 or whatever, right? Because he has millions of followers. I'm just basing it off of that. And he was just like, well, Neil, you know, you have a lot less followers. There's a lot of marketers though. And I said, yeah, there's a lot of marketers, but A, how many of them can actually produce results within the budgets companies have and within the time constraints? And B, how many independently owned ad agencies are there that have a global reach in 28+ countries that can help companies with their global campaigns and things like AI, you know, ranking on ChatGPT or getting mentioned there and App Store stuff. and traditional SEO and CTV and all the services? And he's like, I don't know, I don't know your space. And I'm like, the list starts going lower and lower because one, companies don't offer all services, and B, most companies don't offer it in a lot of regions unless you're typically a publicly traded organization or a massively large holding company. And he's like, oh, okay. So I was like, so my market's just bigger. Right? There's a lot more being spent on things like Google Ads and taking a portion of it than how much people pay for someone to be in a picture with a watch or a car. And I think people forget 2 things, how big is your market and how many competitors do you have?
Yeah, well, I think what's also important too is the value that you're adding, right? So if an enterprise is paying you, let's say a dollar, they're expecting a multiple on that in terms of return, right?
Yes.
So 3x or 5x or 10x or even higher than that. Now, he might argue, oh, he puts his beautiful face on something and it helps it convert. But no, he can be replaced by any other beautiful person on the street.
AI.
Yes, yes, exactly, dude. And some of these AI models, I'm sorry to say, they are beautiful. They are gorgeous. Sometimes it takes me a little bit to figure out that it's AI and I'm like, damn, but that's pretty good, right? And pretty soon we won't be able to tell anymore. So the thing is, It's one, you guys are harder to find, right? The business that we do is harder to find. 2, the value we add is why we get paid. If you're in B2B, here's the deal. LinkedIn account-based marketing sucks, but it doesn't have to. With Carrot, it allows you to create personalized ads towards your customers and also personalized landing pages that align with the ads. So you're going to have higher conversions and influence pipeline reporting to prove that you're ABM works. So if you want to learn more, just go to karrot.ai and you can join the waitlist. Again, it's karrot.ai, and we'll see you on the other side.
Dude, I was, uh, you know, my wife was showing me this Instagram video in bed yesterday because she was just scrolling before we were going to bed, and it was a video on, you know, someone saying like, draw me an M&M eating spaghetti. Okay, so she's watching it at the same time because I have my iPad out. I go to ChatGPT and I say, draw me Eminem eating spaghetti.
Yeah.
Mine took a little bit longer than the Instagram video. Keep in mind Instagram, you know, speeding up, but whatever. By the time the person was done, even if it was faster and let's say they did it in a minute, ChatGPT took me multiple minutes. When I showed her, mine was like 10 times better and, you know, I don't know what I paid. I don't know if I needed a paid account for that. I have a paid ChatGPT account, but I don't know if you even need a paid ChatGPT account.
You can do it for free, but you get very limited. But yeah, that's how it works. By the way, you want to know a crazy stat? I found this on Instagram today. So this is just random because we're talking about good-looking models, right? So here's a crazy stat. Only 1 in 25,000 men over 35 have a visible six-pack. That's just 40 out of 1 million. In a city like Austin, Texas, that means only 40 men with abs. Isn't that crazy?
So is your goal to get a 6-pack now?
No.
You could already have one.
No. By the way, by the way, our videographer Noah, very handsome man, he has a 6-pack. So he's clearly 1 in 25,000 men. It's actually even rarer to be over 35 years old with a 6-pack versus to be a millionaire. I don't know if you know that.
