The influencer recession

0:01Noel King:Some surveys of Gen Z have found that more than half of them, when asked what they want to do for a living, say, influencer. So I'm going to do my game day makeup routine using all of my favorite Maybelline products. Look how unreal the packaging is. It's actual perfection. I'm literally glowing. It's a job, and for some people it can be and has been a very good job. If you look at, like, influencing at its sort of peak, when it really matured in the late 2010s, What you saw was, and what kids saw, was like people that were getting really, really rich just by like having fun with their friends and being themselves.

0:34Like what kid doesn't want to do that?

0:35Noel King:But thanks to changing trends online, a certain type of middle class influencer is vanishing. It's become harder to make a living. Creator Jacqueline Hill sums it up like this. I feel like I get punished and penalized for not showing up and creating all the time. Coming up on Today Explained from Vox, Influencer Recession.

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2:06Noel King:You recently wrote that we are in the midst of an influencer recession. What do you mean? What is this? So it is a lot harder to be an influencer now than it was even a couple years ago. There is simply too much competition. You're competing against people that have armies of people clipping videos and sending them out onto social media platforms and stealth marketing campaigns. And there's really no way to break through the noise unless you are doing something really out of the box, which is a lot of times that means rage baiting or making such amazing content that like no one can possibly compete with it.

2:43I found this like finally just now I was like, why don't I check and see what hairspray this is? Because it's really good. I found this on my dresser. I think I put fucking wood shellac for woodwork in my fucking hair. Please tell me this comes out. The idea of me being representative for the state of California came to me in a dream, in a vision, if you will. It's so vivid to me. And the reason this matters is because we are spending so much more time scrolling our phones than we ever have. The stuff that we watch used to be like TV shows, music, movies. Now it's just like regular people making content.

3:16So like the stuff that really breaks through our algorithms changes the way we interact with the world. It changes the way we behave, what we buy, how we think, everything. And so the kinds of people that can make careers making content really matters.

3:32The problem is that for the average middle class influencer, that economy is getting a lot more tricky, just like the regular economy is getting a lot trickier for a lot of us.

3:41Noel King:OK, so what exactly happened? Okay, so right now, influencers are having to compete with absolutely everything. Celebrities, too. Regular people, too. Like, everyone knows the feeling of posting online. And you're just like, I feel like no one saw this. Like, I feel like I'm shouting into a void. Jesus Christ, there's like three people that are seeing on both apps. No one is seeing my posts at the minute. These three things are making your content absolutely flop. And I see so many people doing this and I just shake my head. So does anyone actually see my videos on here or am I just posting for nothing, bro?

4:16If y 'all see my videos, like just comment, I see you. And if not, it is what it is, man. And a lot of like established influencers with millions of followers are feeling the same thing. And so a lot of that is because the internet has so much more content than it used to, even a couple of years ago. I think AI is a huge part of that. You know, you feel like you're online and everything is just like slop. There's just like mountains of this that you have to push through. And at the same time, you also have the world's biggest pop stars, movie studios, podcasts. They are paying armies of people on Discord to flood social media with clips of them so that maybe a couple of those videos will go viral and break through the noise and show up on new people's For You pages.

5:00it's a real it's a lot harder than it used to be if you're not part of that sort of just like really like tiny tiny percentage of things that will break through and end up on someone's page then you're kind of just stuck shouting into a void you profiled an influencer named audrey

5:16Noel King:peters tell me about what happened with her and what she learned about all this yeah so audrey peters is an influencer that got big in the early 2020s what your go-to drink at a pregame says about you? Let's do it. My ranking of hot male foreign accents? Let's do it. She was doing this sort of like upper middle class comedy videos about New York City life. My favorite dinner spots in Manhattan? Let's do it. The zodiac signs as New York City neighborhoods? Let's do it. Kicking this off with the most obvious pairing, the Upper East Side and Taurus, because they have the best taste and are also the most materialistic, so obviously.

5:49And then after a couple years, like the joke started to feel just really stale and she wasn't like she wasn't seeing the same kind of engagement as she used to. Then she pivoted to something that she knew really well, which was luxury. And in 2022, she said like luxury fashion really blew up. I know I'm late. I've been off the grid in Mexico detoxing, but did you really think I would deprive you of a luxury Christmas haul a la Audrey Peters? But I finally decided it was time to crack and I got the Valentino feather jeans and I went all in and got the matching jacket to go with it. And then like all things, you know, as soon as one thing takes off on social media, then more and more people start to do it.

6:22And then it just starts to feel a little bit passe. And so she said around 2024, that's when like her views just started to go down again. And she realized like she's just going to have to pivot forever because this is the way the internet works. Like when one thing works, everyone follows it and then it gets boring after a while. So right now what's really working is rage bait, which I think most people on the internet are very familiar with, which is a creator making something that they know will either be misconstrued or enrage people or drive comments and like the lowest common denominator.

6:57And so the series she started was, so this is everything that I'm door dashing to myself in a day. To the average person, this is really extreme. This is an extreme use of money and plastics. and what what is she ordering so she's her her thing is she's like because i'm lazy i hate cooking and because i can so once and she told me she was like okay i'm gonna order starbucks today because everyone gets so mad at me when i order starbucks because i live three blocks from a starbucks this is an iced latte with almond milk two pumps of vanilla vanilla cream cold foam and cinnamon and this was 21 and 20 cents cheers and the funny part this is like the opening of my story but Like she makes this video at the Starbucks and then she's like, actually, I don't need this anymore.

7:41Do you want it? And I'm just like, oh, yeah. And I mean, she knows what she's doing. She is rage baiting with those videos, but it has been a real success for her. She partnered with DoorDash. And so now she's making money from DoorDash now to keep doing that series. and the idea for it came from a conversation with her and her manager about like what about your life can be sort of like mine to get people to watch and react and she said the reaction was like everyone's calling my manager and me being like oh my god are we're seeing the comments are you okay and she was like no this is exactly what I wanted so it's all part of this like thing that everybody kind of does now because that's what you have to do to get attention

8:26Noel King:Okay, so this thing where I go online and I see an influencer doing something that I'm like feels completely out of control and I'm like, oh my God, that is deliberate. Of course. Oh my gosh. I think a lot of trad wife content very deliberately rage-bait, even though many of them won't really admit that. My husband mentioned that he was craving Coca-Cola the other day and since we were out of soda, I decided to make him some today. Yes, I'm a trad wife. And I have trad wife duties. We're going to the grocery store. A lot of content where, you know, it's like a hot take or something or they mispronounce a word or they, you know, like there's so many ways to rage bait that it's almost boring at this point.

9:06And I like to think that we're sort of moving past the rage bait world. And I think that's the other part of this, which is while we also have this very like lowest common denominator rage bait content really blowing up at the same time, there's this real desire for actually educational, actually entertaining, actually niche novel content that is like genuinely compelling. And so that's why you see so many creators now launching sub stacks to be like, hey, I'm actually like very intellectual. I actually have things to say that you can't just, you know, scroll past that you actually have to take the time.

9:40And maybe it's behind a paywall. So maybe it feels a little bit elevated to sort of build this sort of, you know, walled garden of intellect in a world of slop on the feed.

9:50Noel King:We on Today Explained have done coverage about lots of types of entry-level jobs drying up in the American economy. Some people speculate that has to do with AI. Some people speculate it has to do with older workers hanging on longer. Some people say, you know, the economy is just broadly shifting. Is this another entry-level job? Is this another job, career, that Gen Z wants that runs the risk of just going away on them? 100%. Wow. This is just like everything. it is so much harder to start out as an influencer than it used to be because of all these reasons that we're talking about. And I don't think that's a good thing.

10:29I don't think it's a good thing that things are more difficult than they used to be or that you have to sort of sell your soul in this kind of gross way by making content that you know is a little bit icky or that you have to gatekeep all this stuff because the only way to make money is that you have to have subscribers willing to pay for it, which is way harder than it used to be also. So yeah, it's, you know, just like it's harder to get in as a, you know, legal aid or, you know, a copywriter, it's also harder to get in as an influencer.

11:03Where does that leave us, do you think? With a lot of disillusioned young people that are used to a lot of rejection in their lives and maybe sort of turn towards their role as like passive consumer, passive scroller, who is just a little bit more cynical about the way things are. And they would be right to think so, because it is art and it is worse.

11:37Noel King:Rebecca Jennings is a writer for New York Magazine. And hey, she said something very interesting in this interview. That's why you see so many creators now launching sub stacks to be like, hey, I'm actually like very intellectual. That made us wonder about the intellectual influencers. Who are they and what are they up to? That's coming up next.

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15:22Noel King:I'm Noelle King. We're back with Lucy McGuire. Lucy's a features director at Vogue Business. All right, so in the first half of the show, we were talking to our colleague Rebecca Jennings about how it's becoming harder and harder to make a living as an influencer. And she said something that got us sort of fascinated, which is that there is a certain type of influencer who is doing well now, and that is an intellectual influencer. Who are they? What's going on here? So I think there's a few factors at play here, but one of the main contributors to this is AI. We are faced with so much AI slop now on social media.

15:53and faced with a lot of meaningless content. And so I think audiences are really gravitating towards content that holds meaning. And these intellectual influences, you know, whether they're film buffs. It's the best move you ever made. Are you ready to do your Letterboxd four favourites? Four favourite films? We're laying it on you. Whoa! Whether they're from BookTok and they're recommending literature you should read. It is a hot girl reading summer. I have read a lot of books. Eight books that I ate down for breakfast, lunch and dinner. They really have kind of offline pursuits and interests that they bring online that people want to be a part of.

16:23Noel King:Okay, very cool. So give me some examples. You said books, you said films. Who are we talking about and what are they flogging or what are they drawing our attention to? So I'd say that the most powerful example right now is Jack Edwards. So he's a literary influencer. He's a book talk influencer. You may have seen him the other day actually because he did an interview with Zendaya for the Press Junket of the Odyssey. Well, Zendaya, I have to ask you, what is your required reading? What are the books you think everyone should read? And she recognized him straight away and was like, I have followed your YouTube for quite a while.

16:54You've given me many book recommendations. The name. So he, you know, he goes online. He recommends literature for people. He's got a Goodreads account as well that people follow him on. And I'd say that he is kind of the prime example. And what we're seeing at Vogue Business is, you know, brands want a piece of this pie. So Jack, for example, has worked a lot with Valentino. You see him at runway shows. That would have been unheard of. You know, a few years ago, having a kind of book influencer at a runway show just wouldn't have happened. But it just shows that people are really looking for meaning from their content.

17:22Dua Lipa. Dua Lipa.

17:24Noel King:She seems like she fits in this mold. I launched a podcast, which I love because it gives me the opportunity to speak one-to-one with some of my favorite authors. I read as much as time allows. And while some of the books I love become book club titles, others remain private passions. I'm a reader who loves to be immersed in a novel. And I mean really deeply in it. It's quite funny because people do say that it's performative. And, you know, we had the whole performative male phenomenon as well, where men were kind of reading outside on the pavement. But I do think, you know, the stars like us want to do things that are meaningful.

17:58You know, Dua Lipa's a big pop star. Maybe that doesn't hold as much kind of intellectual power. So she's kind of broadening her scope and being like, yeah, you know what? I actually, in my spare time, do go offline. I do pick up a book and I'm going to share that with you. So I think people are interested in it. I mean, obviously some people criticize the approach, but I think a lot of people really engage with their recommendations and their content as well.

18:21Noel King:When you and I and other people who are watching the influencers online watch this stuff, what is it that we want to get out of it? Is it just like, oh, here's a book recommendation from somebody whose name and face I know? I think the key thing is that we all feel like we're constantly being sold to right now. We actually did a study earlier this year with Gen Z. And the main takeaway from it was that they feel like social media is mindless and that they feel like they're just being sold to all the time. Like everyone's an influencer and everybody's selling. I think it's interesting to zoom in on Gen Z when we're talking about how culture is moving in this way, because A, you know, book talk, film talk, all of these intellectual influencer crazes are proliferating on TikTok.

19:02And as we know, the majority of TikTok users are Gen Z with an increasing cohort being Gen Alpha as well. So A, you know, Gen Zs are the ones that are consuming a lot of this culture. But B, Gen Z are the ones also driving culture. We found again and again that the younger people in the household are the ones who are driving brand awareness, influencer awareness. So they're the ones who are showing this content and sharing this content and talking about this content around the dinner table. So I think it's important, you know, when we're having these conversations to really zoom in on young people and why they love intellectual influencers right now.

19:33I know you're tired of just doom scrolling without any purpose. So here are some influencers that I love that genuinely make a difference in my physical and mental health. I'm trying to consume less brainwashed content. And so these are some of my favorite creators on this app that intellectually stimulate or inspire me or just add value to my life. In today's essay, we're going to be talking about how to build an intellectual life. And what also is really interesting about Gen Z, of course, is their spending power. They might have cultural influence, but also they have an expected spending power of 12 trillion by 2030.