Marketing is an old and ancient art. Even the Produce Vendors of the 16th Century needed a way to Market themselves and sell their Tomatoes more efficiently. Your Twitch Channel is no different.
Branding is one of the more important ways to begin marketing yourself. It creates trust. It signifies to the viewer that you believe in something, and they in turn will ‘trust” you with their viewership, but be careful that you don’t end up doing something to defame that hard-earned trust. This is a big reason even some Partnered Streamers fall out of the Streaming Game. Trust is a hard thing to win back for most people.
So you decided to start streaming huh? Well, you need a Long-Term Goal. It may be Twitch Partnership or it may be developing a group of loyal fans. Determine a long-term goal that you will be able to see through to the end. Dream Big as it were.
Once you have your long term goal, how are you going to get yourself there? With shorter term goals! Marketing yourself is a huge step in almost any streaming related capacity. Branding is going to help that reality come true.
Let’s face it, most Small Streamers who start streaming don’t have a lot of extra cash to invest in their streams right off the bat. Most are probably in their early 20’s and we all know that not of a lot of 20 something year olds have a lot of disposable income. It’s a good thing that most of the tech tools we use for streaming have a freemium option to them. First let’s talk Twitch Channel Graphics.
Stream Overlay
I would recommend first for Stream Overlays: Strexm. These guys are really incredible. They’ve made a variety of customizable and interactive overlays, many of them free of use! You have the option of adding elements, like your Social Links in the Overlay, Custom Text, and even a Logo in some of the overlays. Everything is modular and easily replaceable (however moving some elements to other places in the overlay will sometime cost money). You can even integrate the overlay with Streamtip, allowing Donation and Follower Alerts to show up through the overlay. All this for free is a pretty killer deal. If you aren’t satisfied with some of the Overlays they have available, there’s a bunch of overlay templates you can customize yourself with Photoshop or other Programs like here for example, and even some online Overlay Makers from sites like http://nerdordie.com
Twitch Panels
These panels basically are basically the Website of you as a Streamer. They communicate information so you don’t have to repeat yourself on Stream with your Twitter account or your Donation link all the time. There’s a variety of ways to make custom Twitch Panels. For some awesome examples of some really well made twitch panels like here. Since most of the Panels you will use are generic terms, there’s a lot of pre-made ones made available to you by very generous graphic artists, like here for example. There are also a couple online Twitch Panel makers that will make different panels with different fonts and colors and designs(like here). All this is pretty basic, but will serve you just fine until you have enough money to spend on a Graphic Artists who can rebrand your entire channel for you (Here are some of those people for when the time comes: https://twitter.com/DrTechMD/lists/twitch-gfx-artists)
Overall Branding
Branding yourself is difficult, but definitely worth it. If you watch some Popular Twitch Streamers, you’ll see each and everyone of them has some kind of unique ability that their viewers fall in love with. Are they a Pro Gamer, capping noobs like it’s nothing and dealin’ some sick plays? Are they just hilarious in practically everything they do? Are they fun to talk to and interact with on Stream? Do they make you feel welcome and invited pretty much all the time? Well young Padawan, its time to find out what you’re all about. The best way is to watch some popular streamers and emulate the ones you admire and would like to aspire too. Once you have that unique flair you’ve been searching for, go to your target audience and straight up kill it!
Consistency in a Brand is essential. How do you know that eating in a McDonalds in California is going to be the same if you ate at a McDonalds in New York? Well, you just know! Mostly because of that Logo! It verifies that no matter where you go, McDonalds is a brand you trust and you can expect what to eat when you get there. Even given the hate McDonald’s gets (and probably deserves) they are still one of the most powerful Brands in the world. Most everyone knows who they are and what they stand for.
Colors and Fonts and Logo Consistency is also very important to your Stream. If a viewer trusts the Brand you’ve made, they will be loyal to that brand, and come to view your stream over and over again. Pick a Font you like, that looks good and is easily readable. Use it on all your Logos, your Twitch panels, your offline banner, everywhere you can. Pick a Color or Colors from this Color Palate Browser. Use your Custome Color Palate everywhere you can and stick with it! Don’t deviate from your color codes if at all possible. (Mine’s #9854A1 or DrTech’s Purple as I like to call it, Purple is my favorite Color, it’s the Color of my favorite Ninja Turtle and it’s synonymous with Twitch, which is a bonus.)
With this mentality, you need to try and make it a priority to market your brand, to everyone and everything. No one likes Spam, sure, but what are the people who think your Twitch link is Spam going to do with it? They are going to throw it away and complain about it on the way out and never watch you again! This is VERY important to remember: You aren’t trying to win those people over! You are trying to find those one or two viewers every streaming session that DO want to see you stream. Trying to find those that ARE interested in being entertained by you, and will then become loyal followers and viewers to your stream from then on. Those are the people you’re looking after, any criticism about the Spaminess of your Twitch Link from all others is utterly irrelevant.
I hope this has given you a better sense of why branding is so Important to your Twitch Channel. Keep on keeping on young Streamer!
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