While it’s still in invite-only mode, the sudden growth of audio social has seen Clubhouse accelerate its growth plans, which includes support initiatives for broadcasters, in order to keep them running rooms in the app.

Along this line, Clubhouse has today announced a new Creator First accelerator program, which will see the app provide financial support and expertise to a selected group of creators, with a view to helping them build their audience, and ultimately monetize their Clubhouse efforts.

As per Clubhouse: 

“We are looking to support and equip 20 creators w/ resources they need to bring their ideas and creativity to life.” 

In the app’s weekly town hall session, Clubhouse co-founder Paul Davison said that the company would support the selected creators by sending them equipment (if required), providing assistance in developing concepts, and matching them with relevant brands for sponsorship opportunities. Davison also said that Clubhouse would ensure that those who are selected for the program are provided with at least $5000 in guaranteed monthly income.

And it may look to provide other, additional features at some stage, based on this question in the application process:

Ensuring it keeps its top creators around will be an important measure for Clubhouse, because as Twitter continues to rapidly develop its Spaces option, it will increasingly provide more people with more audience reach, and further opportunities to get more out of their audio social efforts with a broader audience.

Thus far, Clubhouse’s invite-only approach has added to the FOMO factor of the app, and helped fuel its growth, but as more broadcasters realize that they can broadcast in much the same way, to a much larger audience on other platforms, that will put more pressure on Clubhouse to provide a viable, valuable alternative. 

Most broadcasters have already built audiences on Twitter, where all of them can tune in. Along with programs to provide support, and incentive to keep people creating in the app, you can also expect Clubhouse to open up to all very soon, in order to stay competitive with Twitter’s growing Spaces push.

And this is before Facebook comes out with its Clubhouse clone. Definitely, it makes sense for Clubhouse to be providing more support measures to keep its broadcasters aligned to the app.

In addition to the Creator First accelerator program, Clubhouse has also announced a range of updates to improve the app, including:

• Link sharing – Users can now share a link to their profile or club
• Language filtering- Clubhouse has improved its Rooms recommendations based on the language/s you commonly tune into
• Invite via phone number – Users can now invite others by manually entering their phone number

On the latter point, Clubhouse has also removed its requirement to access your phone’s contacts to invite others, addressing a key privacy concern with the app.

As noted, the sudden rise of audio social has been both a blessing and a curse for the app, with the larger players now circling, and looking for ways to capitalize on its functionality. Clubhouse does, however, have a strong and dedicated user community, and it may well be able to weather the challenges and continue to grow, if it can continue to compete with challengers by providing highly relevant and engaging rooms.

The Creator First program is another element within that.

For those interested, you can learn more about the program here.