Five Niche Creators, Through Our Lens

Quick reminder: on January 20th, we are back with our second Creator CEO summit in Los Angeles. We are working on approvals shortly so be sure to sign up if you haven’t already. The inaugural one was a ton of fun and oversubscribed.

Similar to our last event, we’re focused exclusively on creators who have built (or are building) companies. This time you'll hear from Kevin Espiritu, The Tiger Sisters, Samir Chaudry, Jordan Matter, Mary Heffernan, Jess Rona, Warner Bailey, and Dr. Victoria Rose — all offering practical frameworks you can apply whether you’re launching your first product or scaling what already works.

Find more details + RSVP here — hope you can join us!

Longtime readers of this newsletter might remember back in May 2023 (!!!) I wrote about how we identify attractive niches and verticals. The tl;dr is that it has less to do with checking off various categories, and more to do with understanding consumer needs, behaviors, and psychographics.

This sort of thematic sourcing / evaluation borrows heavily from traditional consumer investing and aims to understand a creator’s significance to their audience – why a fan might seek out, follow, and deeply engage with them.

Surprisingly (or maybe not), the handful of “categories” we care about, first posited nearly three years ago, still guide our areas of interest today — so I wanted to 1) re-share them and 2) highlight incredible creators we’ve recently met who fit each area perfectly.

Importance of hobbies: In our increasingly high-stress world, consumers are pursuing skill-based hobbies as a respite from the demands of modern life. They provide an outlet to express creativity, improve a skill, or pursue a goal. Creators share entertaining and educational content for hobbyists; further, they build deep relationships with an audience that has a high propensity to spend on hobby-related goods and services. Examples: duck hunting, chess, cycling, beekeeping.

Widening knowledge gap: In specific categories, consumers are in (often desperate) need of guidance but don’t have the resources to effectively make and execute on decisions. They require an expert to distill complex information and provide advice. Creators in these spaces are usually technical, educated, highly skilled, or deeply experienced. Examples: hormone health, parts of parenting, physical therapy.

Taboo topics: Consumers usually approach taboo topics privately or anonymously. Creators have an opportunity to provide a safe, trusted space for their followers to engage in conversations they might not be comfortable having with family, friends, or peers. Trust yields greater attachment and, ultimately, higher lifetime value. Examples: sex and relationships, mental health, salary and compensation.

Paradox of choice: Modernity has offered an unprecedented level of choice and convenience for consumers. Consequently, many are seeking to shortcut purchasing decisions through reviews, recommendations and, increasingly, individual tastemakers. These curators provide a trusted perspective that is particularly important in large, subjective, and nuanced categories.Examples: skincare, healthy eating, romance novels.

Cultural milieu: Social media has meaningfully democratized content – anyone with access to a cell phone can share their environment and perspective. For the first time, audiences are able to see their own communities (geographic, religious, ethnic, demographic, etc.) authentically represented and are offered insight into others’. Culture creators’ work can range from evoking a romanticized past to asserting a realistic present, but it is always fundamentally grounded in their lived experience. Examples: New York culture, Christianity, sorority rush

If you are, or know of, a creator who might fit within an above framework(s), we’d love to connect.

See you in LA,
Megan