Top 12 Creator Platforms—Ranked

Here is probably where everything starts: ad-driven platforms (Facebook, Instagram, Youtube) only reward top creators. Mid and small-size creators are left out - no matter how engaged their audience is. Long story short, mid and small-size creators desperately need new tools to engage and monetize their community.

Platforms are now scrambling to compete as “creator platforms”, with a lot of effort poured into ensuring that content can generate real economic value for creators, either by paying for it themselves or by helping the audience pay.

Essentially, creators have to balance the distribution potential of certain platforms with the risk of becoming dependent on them, and monetize by either earning a little off of each fan from mainstream content for a big audience or earning a lot off of deeper connections to a smaller set of fans through niche content.

Traditional publishers and social networks will have to compete with self-serve platforms to offer creators the best growth, monetization, and infrastructure. That’s a win for audiences who get more diverse content, as well as creators who get a more stable career path.

But what was good for average users was not necessarily good for creators. As social apps shifted to algorithmic feeds, that platforms gained even more control over the relationship between the creator and their audience. Creators responded to this shift by attempting to push their audiences to platforms that allowed for unfiltered connection with ... See more

After a decade of inaction, web2 platforms have finally woken up to the need to help their creators make money. This was instigated by TikTok’s $2B Creator Fund, but has resulted in dozens of similar funds and new features across Snap, Instagram, YouTube, Pinterest, and even LinkedIn.
Meanwhile, web3 platforms are pioneering a new form of monetizat... See more

Creator-focused platforms realize that wherever the creator goes, the audience and attention follows. As a result, platforms bootstrap their network by attracting top creators.

Since a platform is in control of what content gets served to who and when, there’s no expectation that a creator’s social network is guaranteed to see their content. Therefore, platforms can also choose what not to program, and there’s little creators can do or say to counteract this. Long gone are the days where a creator can complain about being... See more