Hey there guys, I'm Joe Roman, a newcomer Twitch streamer and aspiring Youtube content creator / producer. An often witty, sometimes nerdy, gamer/developer who also happens to be a recently overwhelmed dad.
This is my new off-stream hangout, a blog I'm starting to be able to relay some interesting information to you guys, perhaps help out fellow newbie streamers through my experiences, initiatives and their varying highs and lows. You can probably expect some helpful articles or tutorials here and there too, if I get too many people encountering the same issues or can help them learn to improve their production quality or engagement. .
A hopefully helpful, humorous and enlightening journal for our little quest - From Zero to Hero, a Content Creator's POV.
Be warned that it should entail that there's a content creation rollercoaster ahead. From Highs and lows to mountain tops and rock bottoms.
Imagine being able to provide or create entertaining content on a full-time basis, for example having enough viewers and followers and getting partnered on Twitch... or drawing sufficient Youtube audience, engagement and ad revenue to get by.
All of it with you here, getting informed, improving the experience and contributing to everything (which is just an awesome part of the process, crucial even)!
How great would that be?!
Pretty great, in my book!
You see, that's the one thing no one ever tells you: Alone, a person can't really do it, but when you do your utmost, try and try, then try a bit more, to provide for people, often enough they will heed your call to arms and join in, contributing to the effort, giving it more exposure, engagement and contributions.
It's an ongoing process, until, lo and behold, you're doing it! You, that little ant that could, you've dragged that huge heavy burrito to your little colony (or should I say Empire, Kappa) and can now have a round the clock fun-fueled feast!
This is all thanks to the help of those other hundreds or thousands of little ants! Ain't no way you'd manage to get there all by yourself.
I'm a regular guy who happens to love video games. Everything from playing them and beating them, down to making them in the first place.
I'm usually a positive person but am also known to occasionally spit some mad truths, hard ones! However, I personally think that people who bury their heads in the sand, stay stuck in their ways and stuff are often being idiots since you learn or get absolutely nothing from doing that. You tend get zero out of it and it's almost impossible to better yourself with that kind of attitude.
Therefore I will always take real or constructive advice under consideration and try and learn from the knowledge that other people can impart on me.
I do however expect others to at least try and do the same, to some extent.
Speaking of truths, for instance, most people tend to think that you either need to have massive amounts of money or time to invest on top-notch production quality, or just flat out get lucky to be successful as a content producer nowadays, when in actuality all it takes is just hard work.
Please note that while I say 'just', it is in fact a lot of work. A LOT of it, as in every single day. So please don't take it as being easy, but do note that it is indeed possible and attainable.
Despite all of the above, you're still probably wondering "Well, my schedule is already so full, it's not like I have any time to spare... Seriously then 'Mr. Mad Truths' what will I get out of reading these posts of yours? What makes it worthwhile?", which is perfectly reasonable and our online presence just keeps growing and growing nowadays.
Hopefully, from reading this blog what you'll get is some rare, deep and valuable insight, really.
From successful strategies and the highs of reaching some milestones, to the woes of failed attempts at audience engagement or getting them involved in specialty efforts like contests. You'll be privy to these results, first-hand, of real experiences held on a real channel with a real audience and be part of its' evolution, perhaps even take part in the strategies behind it.
We will have posts that sum up some specific plans, posts filled with post-event reports, even debates or suggestion or question submission posts that inquire as to how to improve the channel, or the content production scene as a whole.
If nothing else, were you to sadly leave us right now, never to return or do follow-up readings on future posts, this would be the piece of knowledge I'd want you to take with you:
If you have a dream, that one dream that seems too big and overwhelming, whether it be streaming on Twitch, making videos on Youtube, starting your own Blog or even your own Business...
It is attainable, it's right there outside your reach for now, but it won't be like that forever.
Do not make excuses, waste your time feeling sorry for yourself or feeling like it would take purely dumb-luck to grasp it as that accomplishes absolutely nothing but weigh you down and doesn't get you farther up your path, it actually moves you backwards until you're at the Starting Line all over again.
What it does take is work. Work, more work, a lot of work, plenty of work... And some more work on top of that.
Think of it like this: when trying to snap a really hardy cane, if you chose to do it lightning fast it may indeed break, but there's plenty of chance for it to end poorly, from pure failure, to injury through muscle strain or worse. The real strategy is to apply pressure, constant pressure...
Just keeping at it, and at it, and some more.
Until it breaks, and the world is yours.
