By John Salazar
So you’ve finally decided to go into streaming. Congratulations! Not everyone has the guts and the resources to be able to put themselves out there and share their experiences with everyone. Regardless of your reason, streaming can be quite the exceptional hobby – especially if you consider yourself someone who just loves to share what they’re doing with others. So you’ve decided to stream, gotten your gear and your webcam, and you have a game or a concept to fiddle around with. What now, though?
That’s the tricky bit – no one can dictate what you should and should not do with your streams. And being in control of your content releases can be overwhelming if you don’t know where to go and what to do. Thankfully, this article can give you some streaming tips. Here are some of them:
Think about your branding early on. If you want to take streaming much more seriously, you’ve got to focus on your personal branding even before you start showing off content. Finding your voice and knowing exactly what you want to do as a streamer can greatly make streaming much easier on your end. This also helps motivate you into streaming more unique content and applying your unique voice and tone into your work. When you stream, you don’t necessarily have to apply the same styles as your idol streamers. In fact, it’s when you offer something unique to the market that can really help you shine and become unique to the industry.
° Try to establish a tone and a voice you want to use early on. It doesn’t necessarily have to be how you appear in real life, as you can have a “personality” or a “unique identity” as a streamer.
° Try to decide on how you want other people to “feel” when they see you. This greatly helps in establishing the overall tone and voice you want to use throughout your streaming career.
Understand your platforms and audiences. It’s important to understand just who you’re dealing with when you’re streaming, especially since your rise or fall in the industry really relies on how these people perceive you and your work. Don’t limit yourself to sites such as Twitch, and you should start exploring your options in the market as well. Try to check what Facebook Gaming and YouTube Gaming have to offer, and see how they and their audiences differ across various sites and platforms.
° If you’re focused on getting paid for streaming, try to look into the rules of streaming services such as Twitch, Facebook Gaming, and YouTube Gaming. Certain platforms need certain numbers of views, subscribers, and certain content requirements to be included in their paid streamers program.
° Aside from the money-end of things, try looking into your audiences as well. What sort of people do you want to appeal to, and what do you want them to take away from watching you? Certain content appeal to kids, teenagers, and adults so it helps to plan carefully.
Create a content calendar for your releases. Just because you’re streaming doesn’t necessarily mean you should be releasing your content haphazardly. If you want to appeal to the right kind of audience at the right kind of circumstances, you should start focusing on planning what content to release and when.
° This allows you to be more sure of what sorts of streaming you want to do and if you want to add or remove things on your current content plan – like streaming single player or multiplayer games, or whether you should branch out of gaming for things like travel blogs, and event features. Being on top of your releases allows you to plan and research your content more carefully, and in turn improve quality.
° Check what sort of content you want to release, and how often you want to release them. It’s the “when” that’s important, as this more or less helps you see how intensive your streaming work can be and adjust accordingly.
Practice isn’t a bad idea. Just because you see your idol streamers make amazing content doesn’t mean they do it in one go. Most, if not all, of their efforts come from constant practice. And if you want to be just as entertaining as them, you’ve got to practice as well. We don’t necessarily mean to just repeat playing games over and over. Rather, it helps to plan and experiment with your video formats and presets, try and test the appeal of certain scripts, and even mix and match games to see which ones fans really like best.
° It helps to understand the value of practice and experimentation for you to start applying your own ideas into the picture and create something unique.
° Practicing your streaming style can also help you find a “unique” identity. And incorporating this into your streams can help you gain more fans as these people can see your “growth.”
Invest in the right equipment and gear. While it’s true that most streaming likely works with your personal computer or device’s built-in software, it still won’t hurt to plan what sorts of equipment you want to use and how you want to use them. Knowing your equipment’s strengths and weaknesses allows you to adjust your streams accordingly and plan what things you want to release. After all, even if you’re an entertaining streamer, the wrong equipment might turn off your viewers.
° It can also help to plan your budget for streaming and how much you’re willing to invest in equipment, so you know whether or not you’re overspending for a hobby or underspending for a potential livelihood.
° Decide on how heavy-duty you want your streaming to be. Some can be content streaming through their mobile phones. But if you want to show off awesome graphics or want to make sure you can stream almost any form of content, you should adjust your tech accordingly.
With the tips we’ve just shared, it’s important to remember that just because you’re a streamer doesn’t mean you can just release all sorts of content you want. It’s important to maintain a semblance of order and consistency with your streams and your formatting to have a sense of identity and branding.
The above might be a bit overwhelming and heavy to read – at first. Once you digest these principles and apply them to your streams, you’ll likely find it much easier to create content that both represents you and appeals to your viewers.
Image Sources:
https://pixabay.com/photos/fortnite-computer-game-game-gamer-4129124/
https://pixabay.com/photos/game-playstation-gamer-play-xbox-4448065/
https://pixabay.com/photos/gaming-game-console-cards-4465495/
https://pixabay.com/photos/apple-calendar-desk-device-1867752/
https://pixabay.com/photos/gaming-games-gamepad-ps4-2215601/
https://pixabay.com/photos/apple-calendar-desk-device-1867752/
John Salazar is a certified techie-at-heart, but he shares a love for all things science and technology, health and wellness, and even a bit of music on the side. As a creative writer, John makes sure to write both informative and entertaining pieces. He loves writing, and he plays the guitar when he has free time.
