Audience First or Business First? How to Build a Following You Can Actually Monetize
Should you build an audience first or a business first? Patrick Israel of Xtend Creators on why content built around a clear offer converts, and how to monetize the audience you have.
Storyy Team
Storyy
Some creators build a big audience and then try to work out how to make money from it. Others start with an offer and build an audience around it. Both happen. One tends to work much better.
On Episode 002 of The Content Corner, Aaron asked Patrick Israel of Xtend Creators directly: should you focus on building an audience, or on building a business that happens to have an audience?
Patrick's answer: business first
"In my world, I would always look for the business first. For me, the business model is fundamental, because you can adapt the creative accordingly."
Knowing your business model gives you a clear definition of success. If you know you want brand deals, you know to focus on audience retention. If you sell a service, you know every video should attract the people who'd buy it.
Here's how that plays out for the most common business models:
| Business model | What your content should do | What to track |
| Brand deals | Hold attention and grow a loyal audience in a niche brands want to reach | Retention, watch time, audience size |
| Service business | Attract the specific people who would hire you | DMs, inquiries, booked calls |
| Product or course | Teach around the problem your product solves | Link clicks, sign-ups, sales |
| Brand partnership | Build trust in a niche that fits the partner | Engagement from your target audience |
Patrick is careful not to call it the only way: "Some of the best creators started just creating content, and the business side came along." Still, if you're choosing deliberately, start with the business.
Why audience-first often stalls
Aaron has seen both versions play out. In his experience, when people grow fast without a business in mind and then try to monetize, "not only do they lose some of their audience, it just doesn't go as well, because the audience was built based on their content. It wasn't built with this future business in mind."
His example: friends who went viral, gained 20,000–30,000 followers almost overnight, and then asked, "How do I monetize this?" The followers came for the entertainment, not for an offer, so there was little buy-in.
Why business-first converts
Compare that with another friend of Aaron's who works in tax, accounting, and finance. She built her Instagram and TikTok audience on financial advice because that's the business she wanted to grow.
"When she started offering services related to that, her audience was like, 'Yes, absolutely. This is why I follow you.' And she had a really good conversion rate."
Every video built trust around the exact problem she solves. When the offer arrived, it felt like the obvious next step rather than a sales pitch. That's compounding trust: each relevant post makes the next ask easier.
This approach drives effective B2B content marketing and small-business video. Your content isn't separate from your business. As Patrick puts it, content is the distribution channel for what you sell.
Already have an audience but no offer? Start with their problems
If you built an audience first, you're not stuck. Patrick's advice is to go back to the basics of business:
"If you understand who your audience is, you know the problems that they're facing. And at the end of the day, that's what business is all about. You solve problems consistently."
Practical steps:
- Ask your audience. Polls, comments, DMs: what are they struggling with?
- Look at what your content implies. "If you create financial education content, chances are the people on the other side are looking to understand and grow financially."
- Build or partner on an offer that solves that problem. That could be a product, a service, a course, or a brand partnership that fits.
- Keep making content around that problem so the offer feels like a natural extension.
General entertainment is harder to monetize this way because the shared problem is less clear. That's one more reason to choose a niche early.
The creator economy is the economy
Patrick's bigger point is that this applies to every business, not just influencers:
"No matter what business you're in, the creator economy is the economy. And content is just an incredible way to validate, to get distribution, and to market your product or service."
Whether you're a dentist, a SaaS founder, or a fishing guide, video content has become how customers find you and decide whether to trust you.
Curious what your audience is actually worth? Enter your follower count and engagement into Storyy's free Social Media Growth Calculator to estimate how many customers your audience could bring in.
Related: 5 Content Creation Mistakes That Keep New Creators From Growing
🎧 Watch the full episode: The Content Corner, Episode 02 with Patrick Israel
Frequently asked questions
- Should you build an audience or a business first?
- Patrick Israel of Xtend Creators recommends starting with the business. Knowing your business model gives you a clear definition of success and lets you shape your content around it. Audience-first can work, but it is harder to monetize later.
- Why is an audience built on viral content hard to monetize?
- Followers who arrive for entertainment didn't sign up for an offer. When a creator later tries to sell, there is little buy-in, and some of the audience may leave.
- How do you monetize an audience you already have?
- Start with their problems. Ask through polls, comments, and DMs; look at what your content implies about your viewers; then build or partner on a product, service, course, or brand deal that solves that problem, and keep creating content around it.
- What is compounding trust in content marketing?
- Compounding trust is what happens when every post builds credibility around the same problem your business solves. Each relevant video makes the next ask easier, so the offer feels like an obvious next step instead of a sales pitch.
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