The 1 Inevitable Event Businesses Don't See That Kills Social Growth

Written by Nishayne Lowe
(3MIN READ)

You don’t see assassinations coming.
They just happened.

The president, high profile individuals or a Tiktok page, nobody is safe.

In most cases, a single human orchestrates the execution. Online… it’s millions of humans taking the shot.

Okay, the online version isn’t as violent as it sounds.

Let me explain myself.

People constantly crave new content, allowing the war for attention to be a fair fight. Which is why we see new creators and brands pop up every year. Viewers get exhausted consuming the same thing constantly and move on to the next thing — some cycles longer than others.

This gives new content the chance to emerge but also leaves accounts with the “exhausted” ideas in a tough spot having to deal with a drop in views, engagement and momentum.

Market Exhaustion is the world’s most notorious online assassin.

Most recently, a car dealership posted a video taking the first half of a viral fail clip, then cutting flawlessly into an employee recreating the second half, while promoting their location. I audibly laughed… the first time.

Within weeks, every business used this format, beating it to death with a stick. Early adopters capitalized on the novelty and brought attention to their business.

Those who were late ended up with nothing, due to our assassin, Market Exhaustion.

But what if creators, brands and businesses could predict and evade Market Exhaustion?

Well they can.

By looking for the signs that hit right before exhaustion.

 When the world craved less theatrical videos in the long-form world, Mr.Beast was forced to slow down and focus more on emotion. Even the biggest creators in the world are susceptible to Market Exhaustion — proving once again that the market is always right.

A critical signal to watch for is a Rapid Increase of Supply.

Using the car dealership example, the first account saw the most benefits with the “fail format”. Every other account’s upload thereafter had diminishing returns. The rapid increase in supply of these fail clips simply exhausted the audience and the once novel idea turned into an everyday occurrence.

There are nuances to this with every platform and niche but would take ages to explain in this post.

The simple viewer cycle goes like this.

This is cool → Oh it’s the same thing again → Is there anything new?

The fail video was easy to recreate, so everyone did it. Mr. Beast videos take millions to make, not everyone can do that. Which is why it took years before the market got exhausted, compared to the weeks it takes for simple viral trends to die.

The solution?

Live in the trenches of your niche to spot rapid increases early and pivot. Essentially becoming your viewer and seeing what they see, to keep track of the dynamic landscape.

• What kind of videos are being put out in your niche?
• What’s gaining traction and what isn’t?
• What makes viewers happy and what infuriates them?
• What do the comment sections look like?

If you have the budget, I’d hire someone with a deep understanding of content to spend all day consuming content and reporting back to you (I may or may not have a position like this lol).

Rapid increases in supply are just one of many early indicators of exhaustion.

Dwindling interest of the niche and ideas are another.

Micro-Exhaustion within the account’s content ecosystem is common as well.

At the end of the day, market exhaustion comes for everybody like the online grim reaper.

But it’s your job to plan ahead so you get a chance to live to die another day.