Many of you may have heard me speak about Jimmy Donaldson, aka MrBeast, before, but for those who don’t know, MrBeast is a macro influencer with a huge YouTube community of over 100M subscribers. Last Wednesday, Business Insider reported that Beast passed on a $1B deal to hand over his channel and related companies to an undisclosed buyer. In fact, he said it would take over $10B for him to sell.
While MrBeast’s decision might be surprising to many, it makes perfect sense to me. Here’s why.
Source: MrBeast Instagram
Why I think MrBeast passing on $1B is actually a great move
People are freaking out at a billion… I think even $10 Billion is not enough. Here’s the thing. People aren’t getting the macro picture of what MrBeast and other influencers and creators – like Emma Chamberlain or Logan and KSI – are doing.
This is about the people that are creating content and building actual community.
These creators put out content, begin to build actual scale, and then they’re able to deploy the commodity of t-shirts and juices, chocolates, cereals, burgers, etc. These commodities are being built on the back of actual audience and affinity, and these influencers really caring about the communities they’ve created.
For more context, watch my full take below:
@garyvee My take on @MrBeast ♬ original sound – Gary Vaynerchuk
Why people are laughing
I really believe the people who are laughing at MrBeast right now can’t see the difference between thoughtful business strategy – which I think this move is – and a flash in the pan, aka a brief moment of success or relevance that will soon fade away.
Creators, influencers, entrepreneurs are building massive, humongous audiences, and THAT’S the actual asset.
This is very real, and it’s something that will continue to become more obvious to everyone out there really paying attention.
A final thought
I’ll end this blog with one last thought. What MrBeast understands and what I’ve understood my entire career is that attention is the game, and content at scale with real community building is how you win. Content on social networks is the single most important and most achievable way to build demand for whatever the fuck you want to do, and MrBeast is doing just that.
So, in my opinion, passing on $1B isn’t a flash in the pan… it’s just a good decision.
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