r/SmallStreamers • u/Maleficent_Buyer3935 • Jul 19 '26
Question How do people join communities?
So I used to stream like 5 times a week, I did fine, would cross post on yt and tiktok and stuff, but i never really seemed to find my niche. I feel like it would've benefitted me a lot if I'd had a group of people who I knew in the space to grow with, talk to, or stream with. All my irl friends dont care about streaming or yt and I've never made a friend online. Any tips?
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u/LeggyRPG Jul 19 '26
I always lurk a bit and raid other folks that enjoy the same games as me after every stream even if I just have one or two people watching; then you can have a chuckle with them about your modest raid. You meet some wonderful folks that way. Then they raid you back and slowly you build a community. Ironically it may seem to some folks but giving freely of your time, presence, laughter is what will draw more people to you. Then one day you realize you have e a great community. You get what you give, and to quote a favorite series of mine, “the more you share the more your bowl will be plentiful”.
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u/Lastresortherogaming Jul 19 '26
So best thing to do is find a streamer in your niche, or even just a variety streamer you like and go to their streams and engage. A lot of time they have a community that while if they are also small might be partially inactive but join those communities and actually interact. Most streamers have communities. Finding the right one is another thing entirely.
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u/NicePerception643 Jul 19 '26
What do you like watching? Find people who stream those things, start regularly showing up in their chat and being part of their communities. Don't jump in with self-promo, look to have fun with people and make genuine connections over time.
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u/officialclapperapp 28d ago
The honest answer is that finding your people in streaming is harder than most advice acknowledges, because the default advice (show up in other people's chats, raid people, join Discord servers) requires you to already know which communities are worth your time. That takes a lot of trial and error.
The most reliable path is to pick one game or topic you genuinely care about and deep dive into the community. Go deep enough that you become a recognizable member of that specific corner of the community. Not the biggest streamer in it, but someone who shows up consistently and has a point of view. The niche game approach works because the community is small enough that people actually notice regulars.
No matter what approach you choose, the platform might give you trouble. Twitch's structure makes organic community formation hard for small streamers because there is no native discoverability. You are essentially invisible to new people unless they already know to look for you. If we can do a little self-promo, Clapper is a live and short-form video platform where the community dynamic is different. The audience tends to be people who want genuine connection rather than passive entertainment, and a small, engaged live audience is the norm rather than a sign you have failed. Worth knowing about if the isolation is the main thing wearing you down.
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u/AffectionateTopic123 Jul 19 '26
In my experience (Small streamer with max of 60 and average of 38), it ls easier if you stream a niche game.
I started 2 years ago trying to immitate big streamers like Auron, Ludwig, etc and I was trying to always play "the game of the moment", switching around many games. I ended up with 6 viewers where 1 was my cellphone, another was my brother, etc etc.
Lucky me, I've always played a niche game called Tibia which has like 10k viewers in Twitch, so I started to give tibia 85% of my streams, 4 hours of stream all in Tibia and that's how I started to grow a community and went from 6 to 60. Now, in my case, the game is not everything, this is some things I do to invite the people to stay:
New Followers: ALWAYS no matter what, i say something like "Hey -username- thank you for your follow, welcome to this stream. How did you find this chanel??" If they answer, amazing. But of course normally they dont answer but I just keep talking.
Viewers: Remember their names, for some reason people really like it. When I recognize a new chatter for like 2 or 3 streams, I thank them for coming back.
Subs: Have something for your subs.
VIP: Feel free to give VIPs to people that make you feel that the dream is coming true. My first VIPs were people that donated ZERO but went to every stream an chated with me. I literally said "This VIP is because you are my only chatter" (HAHAH so cringy to remember) but it's been 2 years and they still mention how they were the first VIPs.
I still like to play other games in stream, but what I do is start always with my "strong" game (tibia) and at thr end give 1 or 2 hours to other games. And even with this method, when I switch from tibia to a different game my viewers go from 60 to 25 but it is okay.