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If your idea of a room full of “content creators” conjures up images of livestreaming gamers and product-peddling social media influencers, you are not alone. That is along the lines of what Matt Briel expected when he set out to attend the inaugural Creator Economy Expo in Phoenix last spring.
“I honestly didn’t know what I would be walking into,” said Briel, marketing vice president for Lulu Press, a Raleigh, North Carolina-based online publisher, with a laugh. “But it was not like that at all. Most of the content created by these people is created with the hopes of helping someone else further themselves or their business.”
Briel was among nearly 400 content evangelists who followed the expo to Cleveland, hometown of CEX founder Joe Pulizzi, from Monday, May 1, through Wednesday, May 3, at the Huntington Convention Center. Briel said access to the expo’s “content creators and creative entrepreneurs” is tied to Lulu’s “future-proofing” strategy.
“We’ve always been skewed on the side of nonfiction content. That’s where a lot of our revenue comes from, and where the bulk of nonfiction content is really sort of happening, outside of academia, is in this emerging crowd of creators,” he said.
Several CEX attendees — creators and sponsors alike — echoed a similar desire to build and strengthen relationships within this somewhat unique gathering.
“Joe (Pulizzi) invented and developed the term ‘content entrepreneur,’ so it’s really the only place you will find this group of professionals,” explained StarkRaving Entrepreneurs CEO Gina Carr, who came in from Orlando, Florida. “The information is great, but I can get information at home. It’s about the people, the relationships.”
Jason Falls, a podcaster and executive producer for the Louisville, Kentucky-based Marketing Podcast Network, said CEX provides a connection space for individual creators as well as brands that want to partner with them.
“The creator economy isn’t an industry in the sense that there’s these big…
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