Should I sign up for TopBuzz? Here are five things you need to know before getting onboard!
I am a portraiture/fashion and event photographer. My video channel is designed to showcase short videos of photoshoots I shot, as well as events I got involved. TopBuzz reached out to me and invited me to monetize my content on their platform. I checked out their main app – TopBuzz – and the BuzzVideo app, and was surprised at the fact that this 2-year-old platform has already gained 18 million monthly active users (what!). I decided to give it a try.
This young platform raised conversations and doubts about their service and the legitimacy of their practices, even Reddit called it out. However, personally I enjoyed my interactions with the TopBuzz staff in general, and I am not concerned about the republishing right issue, which is not a new thing since YouTube, Vimeo, Dailymotion and other video platforms all have a similar practice.
Becoming a fan of this new platform and its monetization policy, I decided to write this piece and share my experience with fellow creators, explaining exactly how TopBuzz works and its content policies, especially regarding the main concerns and issues many creators had raised about TopBuzz across multiple social platforms. Without further ado, here are the 5 things you should know before signing up for TopBuzz imo:
- Username, avatar, and account bio: what to do and what NOT to do
Having an eye-catching username, avatar and an intriguing bio can get you a lot of clicks and followers. Spend some time grooming your account before you start publishing content.
A couple things you should not do, otherwise you will have your account shut down:
- Don’t fake your identity or try to impersonate others, institutions or businesses using your username. You don’t have to use your real name (I didn’t), but try not to sign up as CNN News, Harvard Business Review, or Donald Trump, etc.
- Don’t put your private information like your phone number in your avatar, or things that might be considered to be “promotional”. I mean that do not try to advertise for a specific product or use a QR code in your avatar. Inappropriate content will also get banned, of course.
- Do not use TopBuzz/BuzzVideo-related usernames and logos. This is pretty intuitive in my opinion; the platform has its own staff to run those official accounts and they don’t want to possibly cause confusion. This may be in the same category as point 1 above.
I mean, getting your account closed down by the platform is not fun, especially after you spent time and put in efforts setting it up and maybe have gained plenty of followers, viewers, readers, and likes.
And you can also read more about these restrictions on their Account Policy page.
- Publishing content: how to pass the TopBuzz publishing review
You can post articles, gifs, pictures, and videos on TopBuzz. For photos, you can upload an entire album and add separate descriptions to each, which is pretty neat.
While you edit your content, you can refer to the “Posting Standards” on the top right in case you’re unsure if your content aligns with TopBuzz’s community guidelines or can pass their review. TopBuzz published a post on its review standards as well, listing out several possible reasons why your content was rejected from going public. Generally, if you stick to healthy content and steer around obvious red flags like racism, hate speech, abuse and so on, your content should be accepted easily. Personally, I think their editorial team is pretty solid and overall, my publishing experience is smooth.
TopBuzz also allows creators to upload content from their mobile phones. I use my phone to record many videos when I am at a photo shoot. It is very convenient to upload them to my TopBuzz account! If you need more guidance on how to publish from your mobile devices, you can read this for more information.
- Recommendation algorithms: How do they work?
Algorithms! The root reason why people ditch or flock to a content platform. I can give a general clarification on how TopBuzz’s algorithms work as their staff once explained to me.
Basically, TopBuzz’s machine learning technology and algorithms study content and users on the platform. They integrate indicators related to content, users and other factors into their algorithms to predict which piece of content you might enjoy. If a post has gained high click rate during its first round of distribution, the machine will mark it as a piece of good quality content and distribute it to more users who have similar attributes to be the first group of content consumers.
Insights which we, as creators, can take away from this is: to gain more traffic and clicks, we can come up with catchy titles and use intriguing images, moreover, provide high-quality content so people would ultimately like the post or video and share it. As for writing titles, TopBuzz also has a dedicated post.
- Account management system: What calls for account suspension and punishment
TopBuzz has a content review team dedicating themselves to content quality control on the platform, and TopBuzz users can also report content which they believe is violating the rules.
What is interesting about their account management has TopBuzz introduced two account status indicators: Copyright and Conduct. You have 5 points to start with for each indicator when your account is first created, and various violations will subtract different amounts of points from your base score. If you want to know more about this points calculation system, you can check their official guideline. Your account will be closed by TopBuzz if you’ve run out of points.
Sounds scary? But the silver lining is, you can get most of the lost points back into your account if you make amends and take down flagged/reported content. But if you published copyrighted content or used others’ trademarks without their consent, your points are NOT recoverable. If your account is suspended, you can message TopBuzz through the feedback portal to appeal and dispute as well.
- Compensation: How payments are delivered
The easiest way to receive payment is through PayPal. You can also change it to your preferred payment method under “Earning Settings”. Be careful with this, as you won’t be able to change your country and currency once they’re set up. TopBuzz calculates your earnings based on how many clicks your content receives. Once you’ve hit 100USD, you can request a withdrawal under the “Withdraw Earnings” tab between the 2nd to the 6th day (GMT/UTC) of each month. If you choose to receive the payment through PayPal, you would receive it within a week following the request. TopBuzz talked about payments in this post.
Alright, I think that’s about all the information I know! You can leave a comment if you have any questions, and I will try my best to answer. You can also hit up TopBuzz for an official explanation and instructions. Hope this post helps your journey with TopBuzz! Enjoy Buzzing!
About Me: Theorina Li, Founder and CEO of Theogenic Photography and Theogenic Strategies, is a portrait, fashion and event photographer. She enjoys making photography a fun experience for clients. She is mainly focusing on portraiture and events, but also engages in bridal and wedding photography, as well as commercial photo shoots. Aside from being a photographer, she is a marketing and public relations consultant, focusing helping small business to improve their business operation and marketing practice.
You can find her on TopBuzz and other social media platforms. Her TopBuzz username is theogenicphotogrpahy.
