If you are someone who works in a creative avenue or simply has a creative pastime, I’m sure you will know just how hard it is to stay original with your content.
There are more people than ever out there posting creative content and so there is more competition than ever before. This makes it much harder to post something that is original than it ever has been.
Yeah, tough crowd.
But, being original is so important, for two main reasons.
1 – Watchers, fans, viewers, enjoyers, buyers, and generally people don’t enjoy watching, looking at, or buying content/items that aren’t original. If they can get it somewhere else, they probably already have done so. If you post a lot of derived and unoriginal content, you won’t succeed in having a large following either online or in real life.
2 – When it comes to being creative online one of your biggest hurdles will be getting your content to the top of people’s search results. So, if you need to be seen in Google, you will want to be at the top of the first page. If you sell on Etsy, you will want to be one of the first listings that come up whenever people are searching for a product they want. If you make eBooks, you will want to be in the top lists recommended to readers. Search engines now are very very clever and they are able to scrape content for duplicate or unoriginal content. The kind of content being rewarded online is that which is original and adds value. If you want to be on top, you can’t copy. Essentially.
So, how do you do this all-important task?
Learn a new skill
Sometimes staying original isn’t just about being different from other people in the market, it’s about being different from your past self. If you stay stagnant in the same place and continue to churn out the same content/products for years on end, people will definitely get fed up.
One of the best things that you can do to break this cycle is to learn a new skill in your specific field of creativity.
Luckily, there are loads of ways that you can learn new skills online (sometimes even for free). You can do this in your spare time and it can be both enjoyable and rewarding.
Take risks
Sometimes our work is unoriginal because we aren’t willing to take any creative risks and we stay in the same place we always have been: our comfort zone.
Our comfort zone sure is comforting, but it doesn’t help us grow, thrive, and stay original.
In order to get out there and produce great content that people will enjoy, you have to take risks, you have to be you, and you have to put yourself out there. It’s easy to be someone else, but it isn’t profitable. There is only one you out there, and it pays to use that to your advantage.
Nothing great happens in your comfort zone, only the same things that have always happened.
And what’s fun about that?
