Shifting from a typical 9-5 job to being a full time online content creator can be a liberating experience. Not only do you have the freedom of time to create but also the financial independence that comes along with it. But the struggle is how to keep motivated when all of life’s distractions seem to pile up on you.
However just like any pursuit we undertake, keeping motivated when under your own supervision can be tough. I for one have gone days trying to produce content with no end in sight. But slowly overtime you create your own systems and methods for keeping motived and on track.
Below we have sourced extremely valuable insights from successful online content creators on how to keep motived. I would like to thank each of these people for putting in their time and effort.
Insights From Successful Online Content Creators On How To Keep Motivated
Cielo de la Paz
What keeps me motivated as a creator is seeing the positive impact on others that I have with my content. For example, I created this video on my iPhone and shared it out and it emotionally moved my audience. When I post tips on YouTube, I get comments about how helpful my tips have been.
Knowing that I am helping someone with my content – either by inspiring them, or giving them knowledge, is why I keep creating. My secondary answer is that I’ve learned most everything online, and I want to contribute back that as a way to give back.
Josh Brown
Staying motivated, is a tricky thing. Because by simply asking the question, you are revealing to yourself that you have lost some motivation. Perhaps you are tired, or bored, or not seeing the results you had hoped for.When we started our YouTube channel in 2015, it was just a personal travel log to share with family and friends. After 6 months and 500 subscribers, we thought, ‘Hey this could be a thing!’ After a year, we had just barely crested 5,000 subscribers and getting 500 views on a video was an achievement.Christmas rolled around and we took a small break from making videos. During that time we felt free, but purposeless. It was then we decided to put everything we had (literally) in to making YouTube videos and share our experiences around the world with the world.Fast forward to last week. We have 27,000 subscribers… and could barely get 1,000 people to watch a video. In that moment I felt defeated. I didn’t know why our videos had been doing so poorly. And motivating ourselves? Well that’s not really possible when you are having a pity party.So what did we do? Nothing.By which I mean to say, we didn’t change anything. We pressed on.Motivation in and of itself doesn’t come from anywhere. It’s a strong will to keep going despite the current circumstances. It’s the gut feeling you know that you are giving your work everything you have. Motivation is knowing that no matter what ‘value’ others are putting on your work, that you have created something to the best of your ability. Motivation is knowing that in the end, it will all be worth it.As the saying goes, when the going gets tough, the tough get going.
Edie Weinstein
I am a journalist with several decades of experience as you will see below. What keeps me motivated is that I can’t NOT write. I don’t get writer’s block. I get writer’s runs. There are always ideas percolating and writing prompts are all around me. Feedback from readers keeps me going. Knowing that my words make a positive difference helps as well.
Evelyn Mann
What keeps me motivated is passion. I am passionate to share hope and offer inspiration to others. Can a blog, a Facebook post, or a video touch others? Yes! And that motivates me to keep going. People crave stories of hope. Stories where the underdog wins. And, where someone thinks they can forage on because they see your story. That too is motivating.
Sarah Donawerth
To keep motivated in creating online content, set benchmarks that you have to reach. Will you post one blog post per week, or can you commit to sharing one photo on Instagram everyday? Pick the task that has to be done to grow your business, and set an actual, achievable goal for content creation. For creative industries, I would also encourage content creators to stay involved with other blogs, websites, and social media profiles.
It is easy to keep your head down and try to grind out projects in time for the deadline all day, but it will also deplete you until it is a struggle to get anything accomplished. Take a moment to browse Pinterest (the holy land for all creative projects), read an article from a blog you follow, or search for a technique or trick that you didn’t know before. This will ensure that you are not only meeting your goals, but that you are constantly surrounded with new ideas that will keep the content circulating in your head. It is better to have too much inspiration than not enough.
JaneA Kelley
The way I’ve stayed motivated to keep writing my blog, Paws and Effect, for 14 years is that I founded my blog with a sincere desire to help cats and their guardians understand one another. When I’ve felt like giving up–and that has happened a few times–I sit down and think about what inspired me to start writing it in the first place. It also helps that in my blog I answer readers’ questions, and there’s never a shortage of those! Basically, it started as a labor of love, and that love has only grown through the years.
Alex Shumaiev
I think that the main thing that motivates me is a passion. If you want to create nice content you have not to think about money, traffic, whether this content becomes viral or not.. I suppose that you have to think about one thing: will this article help someone or not? If the answer is yes – you are on the “Light side.”Another thing that motivates me is good reviews and comments below my articles. Especially when I saw that users not only leave comments but also begin to discuss this article between each other.Sometimes when I have some hard topics and spend all day long writing several paragraphs, I begin to feel frustrated. In this case, I make the short brake, and then I watch several videos on Youtube (sometimes about my topic, sometimes about the same field, e.g. travel, cruise history), read several articles from other authors. And I understand if they have described this topic – I also can.The last thing I want to mention is progress. From time to time, I look through my article, and I see the result. It motivates me to change something or to keep going if everything is good.
Sarah Ratliff says
My farm: the animals, the fruit trees, the bamboo, living deep in the country on an island in the middle of the Atlantic Ocean are all reminders of the stressful corporate life we left behind.