Streamer Tips - Because I Get Asked in Chat All The Time
If you’ve found ANY level of success as a streamer, even just having 10 or more concurrent viewers, you’ve probably had someone come into chat and ask you for tips on how to grow. Starting out as a streamer can be really tough, because it’s not a matter of “Go Live and they will come.” The reason for this is because there are thousands and thousands of channels that are live all the time. And since anyone can start streaming for free, there’s always going to be an exceeding amount of competition. In fact, if you consider the statistics calculated by Twitch Tracker, even just having an average of 10 concurrent viewers, you are in the TOP 3% of Twitch, and that’s the top 300,000 channels. Given that size, and the number of people that are trying to start out as a streamer, it’s not at all a surprise that these questions get asked.
Why Would Someone Choose You
Before any other tip is going to matter or be helpful, you first have to be able to answer why people are going to want to choose to watch your stream instead of someone else’s stream. One of the best ways that you can answer this, is by streaming a game (or other content) that isn’t over-saturated. You’ll hear that a lot. It’s really hard to succeed in streaming the top games, because they already have a ton of competition, so it’s going to be very difficult to stand out. For me personally, that isn’t something I could choose. I stream Fortnite, and I pretty much only stream Fortnite. I honestly don’t want to play another game. I want to play Fortnite. So I have to work even harder to stand out. So aside from choosing a less-saturated game, how are you going to provide something that people will choose over their other countless options? For some people, it might just be that you are REALLY good at the game. That can be enough to get people to stick around once they manage to find you. For others, you’ve got to have something else. Maybe it’s that you play with viewers, or your personality, or whatever, but there needs to be a way that you convince yourself you’ll draw people to hang out in your channel instead of going somewhere else.
How To Get Found in the First Place
If you can answer that question, of why you’re confident that someone will choose to hang out in your channel instead of somewhere else, then you have to figure out how to get people to come by in the first place. If you are hoping people will just stumble across you on Twitch, you’re going to be very disappointed. While that can happen, it really only happens once you’re already established. Twitch does have some discoverability features built in (like “Recommended Channels”), but it only knows to recommend your channel to someone if others are already watching it. So that means you need to put in the work to get people to come to your channel.
Become a Frequent Member in Other Communities
One of the best ways to get people to learn about your channel is to be a participant in other channels. That does NOT mean go in and tell people you stream, or ask for followers, or hint that you want people to check out your content. Everyone recognizes that as being fake, and you’ll likely get timed out or banned in those channels. Instead, actually become a part of that community. Watch the streams, participate in chat. Over time, probably months or longer, circumstances will come up that allow you to mention that you stream. Even besides that, when people see that you are always around, they are going to click/tap on your name and they’ll see you have followers and that you have views, and they’ll go check out your channel because they didn’t know you streamed. If you’re a genuine person, people will want to support you naturally, especially if it’s clear you aren’t outwardly promoting it.
Use Every Other Social Media to Get Your Content Out There
The absolute best way to get exposure is to make content and put it out in the world for people to see, outside of Twitch. One of the primary ways I’ve grown is by posting a lot of my gameplay clips on TikTok. I also post them on Melee, Twitter and Instagram, but TikTok is the one that gets the most traction. Nearly everyday someone new comes into the stream and tells me they saw me on their FYP. In addition to posting your content there, you need to be very active on each of those as well. You should be looking for similiar content and liking, commenting, following, etc. You have to give support to get support.
Have a Website for Yourself
This is probably the LEAST followed tip, but in my opinion it’s EXCEEDINGLY beneficial when combined with the above. Now, you can’t just make a landing page, or use something like LinkTree. This needs to be your website (like this one I have), and you need to put content out there. Why is this so important? Because all of these things work together to get your name, your BRAND, out there. You want people that search for your name to find you. Of course you want them to find your channel, your socials, but if you also have your own presence, that’s going to help you rank higher on search engines. It’s also going to help people learn about you and it helps to establish how committed you are to this pursuit.
Raid Other Streamers When You End Stream
This can seem a little counter-intuitive at first. Once you’ve started to get a few viewers, you might be afraid that raiding someone else will allow for the potential of those viewers to like the channel you raid more, and you’ll lose them. This is almost never going to happen. When you raid someone, your sharing your community with another streamer, and they will appreciate it. Most of the time they will shout you out and/or ask their community to go check out your channel. But do be aware, you want to be mindful that you are raiding appropriately sized communities, or ones that you are already a part of, otherwise it can be seen as an attempt to self-promote your channel. For instance, if you have 3 or 4 concurrent viewers and you’re raiding a channel you’ve never been to that has 40 or 50 or hundreds of viewers, you’re more likely to get seen as trying to mooch off of that channel’s success. However, if you’re raiding smaller communities, they are in the same boat as you, and would be just as likely to appreciate the raid just as you would be if they raided you. When you’re part of a larger community, however, raiding them, even if you have far fewer viewers, is still seen as supporting them. I routinely raid larger communities than mine, but only because I’ve very active there, people know me already, and they know I’m not doing it for the sole purpose of trying to grow my community.
Give Viewers a Reason to Stick Around
One of the things you can clearly see with successful streamers compared to unsuccessul ones, is how they interact with their community. If you aren’t interacting, then people will get bored and move on to somewhere else. So make sure you give adequate attention to your chat, and that you involve them in the stream. Your viewers, at least a good portion of them, want to feel that they are a part of your journey, not just a spectator in your journey. They can only feel this if you interact with them. This means making time to read chat and respond. This means being open with chat and not just trying to put on a performance. In addition to just reading and responding to chat, you can help viewers engage more by using features like Channel Points, Predictions, custom bot commands, clips, etc. All of these things help people to join in on the fun. Also, of course, if you are playing games that your viewers can join in, that helps as well.
Takeaways
The first takeaway you need to know is that even with all of these tips/strategies, there’s still some luck involved. BUT, the good news is that the longer you work at it (and I don’t mean streaming 10 hours a day everyday), over time you give yourself more chances for that luck to kick in. You just have to remain determined, and make the most out of every opportunity you get. Regularly you need to reflect and even watch your own VODs to see what you’re doing that might be working or hurting you. And adjust based on what you see.