I remember it like yesterday. My little publishing company’s rising star, Felicity Duncan, has just been named newcomer of the year at the Sanlam Journalism Awards. Other editors are fluttering around her, hinting at coffee dates. She smiles, politely declines and accepts a congratulatory hug. I couldn’t have been happier.
Felicity stayed with me and was soon running an editorial team whose members went on to become household names. She was the first SA journalist to win a Fulbright scholarship, found her American Prince Charming and moved permanently to Philadelphia. But we kept in touch and she found the time to help us get Biznews off the ground. Yesterday Felicity agreed to take over the editor’s role with Worldview. I feel like that night so many years ago.
Jackie, Chris, Quentin and I will still be contributing, but Felicity will be co-ordinating this daily missive. She will also be penning the occasional piece, like the excellent one that follows.
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Felicity writes: “It’s easy to get too excited about technology — this happened during the Arab Spring, for example, when commentators claimed Twitter would singlehandedly bring peace and democracy to the Middle East. But hype aside, we are living in exciting times.
This week, I had the privilege of seeing marketing guru Seth Godin speak about the digital economy. Godin has been on the vanguard of the digital revolution since Mark Zuckerberg was a twinkle in his parents’ eye. One of the points he made really struck me. He was talking about entrepreneurship and he said, “Today, the goal is not to go big. Think small. What is the smallest number of people that you can target and truly delight who can support your business.”
It’s an intriguing perspective. A few decades ago, scale mattered. You had to be the biggest to be the best. Today, thanks to technology, you can succeed not by being the biggest gorilla in the forest, but by forming deep, powerful relationships with a small group of dedicated customers. A small team or individual that works hard to make a small, defined group of customers happy can be successful.
For example, consider the platform Patreon.
Once, to make a living, writers would have to find a patron, a wealth noble usually, who would support them. Then, after the invention of the printing press and the spread of literacy, writers could make a living by selling copies of their books to large groups of people. Huge publishing companies emerged to support this, with thousands of employees.
Then came the digital revolution and writers, along with other creators like musicians, and the employees at those publishing companies, faced a changed world. Instead of huge publishing houses, individuals could create ebooks or produce albums in their bedrooms with a few strokes of a key and their work could be copied easily and given away for free. In the brave new world, how would the creators survive?
Enter technology in the form of Patreon. Patreon an online portal that allows “patrons” to support creators they love with small monthly donations, usually in the $1 to $5 range. With enough patrons, a writer or artist or YouTuber can earn a healthy monthly salary. In return for patronage, creators offer their patrons access to unique, special content and chats. Instead of looking for ways to make millions of people support them, creators can cultivate a small, dedicated audience that can sustain them and help them grow.
It’s almost an irony that the same technology that lets us talk to anyone anywhere in the world is making one-on-one relationships more important than ever, like the relationships between creators and their fans on Patreon. But in this new economy, sometimes small is beautiful.”
Nice one Felicity. As it happens, I spent a productive hour yesterday in the National Gallery overlooking Trafalgar Square, a ready reminder of how patrons of past ages have enriched us. Let’s hope Patreon takes off. No reason why it shouldn’t become the modern equivalent of the purses that launched Michelangelo and Co.
