Is It Impossible to Become a LoL Streamer in 2023?

Being a successful streamer is one of the most dreamt of careers in the gaming community because the idea of being rich and famous for playing video games sounds like the perfect lifestyle that a gamer can have. Since League of Legends is one of the best gaming categories on Twitch, many people want to start their careers there. While it’s not impossible for a regular person to suddenly rise in viewership, it’s not exactly easy for people to make a full-time career out of becoming a LoL streamer.

Becoming a LoL Streamer in 2023

Becoming a successful League of Legends streamer isn’t as simple as streaming your League of Legends gameplay and waiting for hundreds to thousands of people to start watching you. There are many aspects to becoming a successful streamer that a lot of aspiring talent overlook since they believe that being high ELO, having a great personality, or owning an awesome streaming setup is enough to draw in the fans.

The top-name LoL streamers today look like they take it easy but that’s only because they’ve already broken the barrier to success by working their butts off when they were starting out. Many streamers admit that it involves a lot of luck to get discovered by the community. It’s not easy to become a League of Legends streamer but if you follow these steps, you might end up becoming the next big name in the community.

Discovering Your Target Audience

There are two types of LoL streamers which are the entertainment and gameplay streamers. Entertainment streamers rely on their personality and ability to connect with the audience to succeed. Most of these types lean on comedy as their main source of entertainment. Successful names include people like Tyler1, Thebausffs, and Yassuo. Although, most of them are also high ELO players that provide insightful ways to play the game.

Gameplay streaming is the more difficult way to succeed on Twitch. Most of the successful gameplay streamers began their careers in esports as starting players who already proved themselves to the community. If you are planning to become a gameplay streamer without starting out as a famous esports personality, you might want to consider climbing up to at least Grandmaster but even that might not even be remotely enough.

Having a Proper Stream Setup

Believe it or not, nobody watches the top names in LoL streaming solely for their gameplay. People want to see the reactions (no matter how small they may be) of the players while playing the game, especially when they make a bad play or if they make a game-breaking moment. That’s why being able to show your face properly and being able to have smooth gameplay footage will be your greatest advantage when you’re trying to make it as a LoL streamer.

You don’t need to buy the most expensive equipment on the market. As long as your setup can do the job properly, you’ll be able to get a chance to succeed in this industry. Of course, having cheap equipment will only worsen your chances so make sure to invest in the proper gear. No career out there doesn’t require a good amount of financial investment so it might be a good idea to get a regular job on the side before your streaming career takes off. (actually, that might always be the case)

Self-Advertisement

The worst part about starting out as a LoL streamer is advertising yourself to the people. Don’t expect to get instantly famous when you’re competing against hundreds or even thousands of other people on the platform. The only way to garner loyal viewers in this industry is to recruit them by advertising yourself on social media platforms, forums, and even in the game itself. Just linking your profile link won’t always do the trick so make sure to add as much info about you as possible using as few sentences as possible.

The most important thing about advertising yourself is to make yourself appealing to the public. Don’t add a boring self-introduction about your rank or your life, that will just drive away potential viewers. Instead, try to introduce what makes you or your stream interesting to the people. Adding some highlights of yourself playing the game will also help give a good impression to the viewers.

Promotion & Giveaways

The most popular way to increase your viewership is through promotions and giveaways. This doesn’t always guarantee that you’ll get loyal viewers that like your content. The purpose of this tactic is to increase the number value indicated on your stream to push you up the algorithm. Once you’re on the first page of the streaming platform, you’ll eventually find people who genuinely like your stream.

Promotion and giveaways will cost you a lot of money. As we’ve indicated already. You’ll need to invest a lot of your own money if you plan to be a successful League of Legends streamer so if you’re doing this to get quick cash, you’ll be sorely disappointed. Great items to giveaway are League of Legends skins and RP codes. Avoid giving away that would give away your personal information as you might end up regretting that at a later date. There are a lot of dangerous people on the internet so don’t blindly place your trust.

Collaboration

Collaboration is probably the best way to promote your stream to the League of Legends community. While it’s not realistic to collaborate with the big names on the platform, reaching out to streamers with a couple hundred viewers might end up being possible. The key is to keep sending out business emails to the people you’re trying to reach in a professional manner so that these people or their agencies will take you seriously.

Keep in mind that more successful streamers might end up asking for compensation. Most people will reject you so be mentally prepared for that possibility but if you do manage to get a collab, make sure to take that opportunity to make a name for yourself. Remember not to give any bad impressions because that has a possibility of spreading quickly and ending up killing your career. It’s also wise not to outshine the host streamer or else they or their community will end up disliking you.