The Life & Death of Sensationalized Content
If you want a good laugh, scroll back down to your first few Instagram pictures. The absolute honesty, innocence and lack of vanity is both funny and intriguing. What happened to us that now even the wrong filter can “completely mess up our feed”? We were actually one of the first people to get to test Instagram when it was in it’s early stages, and what at first seemed like a watered down version of sharing Facebook photos quickly became something else entirely.
Over the last few years, the stylization of Instagram photos has taken on a life of it’s own. What first seemed like artistry and conceptual innovation quickly turned into excess and ugly sensationalism. What once was a, yes, highlighted version of lives has turned into something reminiscent of Hunger Games. People and brands are spending hundreds of thousands of dollars to “do it for the gram”. They are traveling to beautiful parts of the world only to spend the entire day taking the perfect picture and then editing it beyond recognition. They are ordering entire menus of room service and never eating it after styling it for a photo. They are willing to risk their lives to stand on the edge of a sunset filtered cliff. They are missing the whole point of what makes them as an individual interesting.
I won’t lie to you and say the first round of these kinds of pictures that first circulated weren't a little exciting. They were exciting because they were almost surreal and without knowing it, reminded us of traditional advertising seen in magazines for decades. The only difference is we are now seeing them in the palm of our hand from our phone screens. And once more, this seems like the new “normal”. It’s not just Victoria Secret models in a summer campaign shoot laying on the beaches of the Maldives.
It’s that girl you've been following for years that lived in her parents house until she was 25 and now casually wears Gucci like it’s from Zara.
I think what these kinds of influencers don’t realize is they are leading their fanbase to a place they didn’t sign up to go. Yes, nice pictures are well... nice, but they aren’t what built their following - their loyal following at least. The truth is, those days are coming to an end. In a flash they've come and gone and the reason for that is this:
Content has to be authentic to stay alive.
The players that are getting it right and connecting with their audiences with less commercialized content are being rewarded in big ways. They are the ones that are getting book deals, starting their own product lines and being invited to speak on high-profile panels. The value of a good creator is measured by how they take everyday life and make it interesting.
Anyone can make good content when they are staying at the most expensive hotel in Paris and bring a full production team with them.
That's all good & well but it's not interesting and it's not respecting the platform. It's far more intriguing to find yourself smiling down at a picture or video that's just a positive reflection of an authentic moment in another person's life. It's in the best sense, humanizing.
Trends are just that, trends, but content that has worth is always authentic and is never trying too hard. That doesn’t mean there is no effort, it just means the effort goes beyond perfection. Many have said it before but “perfection is boring”. Audiences are not as passive and are more savvy than most creators believe. We are seeing an uptick in them straying away from this kind of content at an aggressive rate. Something I read - on Instagram - really says it best… “stop following people that make you unhappy”. What these once “girl next door” creators don’t realize is that seeing them spend an entire trip to Shanghai complaining about jet lag and how tired they are from taking pictures all day is isolating and frankly — out of touch with reality.
There is no right or wrong way to create, but it’s always good to have the who, what and why you are creating at the forefront of your mind if you want to build a loyal following that lasts beyond the next change in algorithm.
- Kelsey Farese Stephens