“We’re putting people over profit and choosing the decisions that make the most sense for our creators in the long run. That’s where our loyalty lies,” says Kai Plunk, addressing the crowd at VidCon 2025 in Anaheim. As co-founder and Managing Director of Elevate, a talent management agency managing over 70 creators, Kai’s message resonated with creators of all sizes who lined the walls of his standing-room-only workshop.

The highlight of Kai’s VidCon experience came when he walked out to deliver his “Why’d They Click Off: A Retention Masterclass” session. “It was so cool getting to walk out and see so many people sitting there just expectantly waiting to receive value,” Kai shares. “That was the highlight of VidCon, but also like, my year.”

Founded in 2019, Elevate has generated over $15 million for creators with a combined 68 million followers, working on national campaigns across athletics, gaming, lifestyle, and beauty verticals. But Elevate’s value proposition lies in what Kai emphasized throughout his VidCon appearances: genuine creator experience at the management level.

Kai, who has been on YouTube for over a decade and previously worked as a creative producer for MrBeast, noted that management agencies are often run by people who are not creators themselves. “They’ve been around content creation, but there’s still something that you just don’t fully get until you make content yourself repeatedly, over and over again, try to build an audience,” he says.

Unlike agencies that might prioritize exclusivity and maximum profit, Elevate focuses on non-exclusive brand deals. “We focus on non-exclusive brand deals and helping creators, not tying them down,” Kai shares. “You can work with other people. Absolutely. We just want to be able to help you monetize if we can.”

The company’s philosophy is decidedly relationship-focused: “We want to be someone’s friend first and manager second.”

Psychology Over Analytics

At VidCon, Kai delivered what he called “a bit of a bait and switch” during his retention panel. “People thought they were coming into a retention masterclass. And I immediately started off by saying, ‘Hey, this is not going to be something where we talk about analytics,'” he explains.

Instead of diving into metrics like average view duration (AVD) or watch time percentages, Kai took an unexpected approach: “Retention is a relationship, not a race,” he told the audience. This perspective shift became the central theme of his workshop, challenging creators to think more deeply about audience psychology rather than fixating on analytics.

“I described it in my workshop as showing up to a pond, tossing your little toy fishing pole in with a little lure, a little worm, and going, ‘Okay, now how am I going to catch a shark?'” Kai shares. “No, you can’t do it in that order. If you want to catch a shark, you have to think about that before. Where are you fishing? What pole are you using? What bait are you using?”

As Kai reveals, this psychological approach resonated with creators of all sizes who attended his session. The workshop, which ran 15 minutes over its scheduled time due to the wealth of content he shared, emphasized that retention strategies should be baked into content from the earliest planning stages—not added as an afterthought during editing.

“Don’t start from zero,” he advised VidCon attendees. “Build off the shoulders of people who have studied this for their entire lifetimes and dedicated books and articles to it.”

Mentorship Through Shared Experience

Beyond his main workshop, Kai led a more intimate mentorship session on videography tips and tricks, limited to just 19 attendees in a roundtable format. This setting highlighted another aspect of Kai’s approach that informs Elevate’s business model: the power of peer learning and community.

“The mentorship series has always been very special for me because it’s such a smaller format,” Kai explains. “It’s not me talking to you for an hour, it’s us having a conversation.”

Rather than positioning himself as the sole authority, Kai encouraged participants to answer each other’s questions and engage in a dialogue. “I want to teach people that you can learn something from everyone,” he says.

During the session, creators opened up about their anxieties and insecurities performing on camera. Kai shared his own struggles with social anxiety: “I’ve struggled with social anxiety for years, but nobody’s alone in that. And it’s something that everybody feels.”

Industry Trends and Creator Challenges

VidCon provided Kai a platform to discuss the broader trends he’s seeing in the creator economy. Drawing on his decade of experience, he shared insights that inform both his management approach at Elevate and his advice to creators.

“I’ve long been a proponent of genuine, real content being the future of YouTube,” he explains. “Back when I first got into it, what was so incredible to me about the platform was being able to watch somebody in real time and watch them go through and discover something.”

As production values have increased and larger teams have become involved in content creation, Kai believes something important has been lost. “Things are becoming so produced that things are starting to feel fake again. More creators than ever are getting accused of faking and playing things up for the camera.”

This observation has led Kai to champion a shift back toward genuine content. “We’ve seen this in the last few years with the rise of streamers, which is, in my opinion, some of the most genuine, real content you can get,” Kai notes. “Even if you’re setting up the stream for six hours, you have to be yourself at a certain point.”

During his VidCon sessions, creators repeatedly approached Kai with questions about feeling stuck or how to break out of what he calls “100-view jail.” His advice consistently emphasized relationship-building over quick fixes.

Nurturing Real Connections

For Kai, VidCon’s greatest value lies in the connections forged beyond formal sessions. “The ability to network with a vast variety of people that work behind the scenes in the creator economy is so important,” he explains. “You’ll see the co-CEO of a major platform walking alongside someone who’s a channel manager for one of the biggest YouTubers.”

Kai particularly appreciates VidCon’s tiered structure, which allows for more focused networking on the industry and creator levels. “If you want to seriously work on networking, you can escape the hubbub and the lights and the shiny colors of VidCon and get into a quieter atmosphere at the top where you can actually have meaningful conversations,” he says.

Such conversations are precisely what creators need most, according to Kai’s observations at VidCon. “Every time I talk to creators, I hear how isolating it is and how lonely,” he shares. “Even if you talk to a random person who is a super good friend of yours or your family, there are just very specific struggles that you don’t [understand] until you’re a creator.”

This recognition of creator isolation drives another aspect of Elevate’s mission: fostering a sense of community among creators. Kai is passionate about encouraging creators to connect, regardless of their follower counts. “I’m so bullish on pushing people to talk to each other. Don’t just talk to people holding the microphones or those who’re currently the biggest on YouTube.”

Practical VidCon Takeaways for Creators

The most common question Kai received after his VidCon sessions was straightforward: “‘I have this great video idea. How do I get it to the next step?’” His advice, consistent with Elevate’s philosophy, emphasized thoughtful iteration over quick fixes.

“It comes down to the relationship building,” Kai explains. “If you’re early on and you haven’t been doing this for too long, keep going. Don’t throw stuff at the wall. Take notes. Write down what you’re trying.”

For creators feeling stuck, Kai offered the following advice: “Just start over,” he told a one-million-follower creator struggling with next steps. “It’s going to be a new audience, but if you’ve done it once before, you can do it again.”

To illustrate this point, Kai shared his own experience of starting a new channel two years ago, “for fun,” without attaching his name. “The first video got half a million views. The second video got 2 million views. It got 20,000 subscribers in the first month and a half or two months there,” he reveals. “It wasn’t built on my previous success. The videos were of top-notch quality, and it was what audiences cared about in the moment. That’s always been the case.”

He emphasizes to creators: “It doesn’t matter if you have 400 subscribers or 2 million, you can get a million views on your video if you post a video that deserves a million views.” This example crystallizes Kai’s message to VidCon attendees: success comes from quality content that meets audience needs, not from shortcuts or gimmicks.

What’s Next for Elevate and Creator Management

As Kai’s VidCon sessions concluded, his focus shifted to the future of Elevate and how the insights gained from these creator interactions will shape the company’s direction. “Elevate is continuing to grow at a fast pace. We’re hiring quickly and bringing on so many new creators. The space is just absolutely in a major uptrend,” Kai shares.

The company is expanding its community-building efforts beyond events like VidCon. “We’re doing Elevate-style pop-up events. We’re going to different cities and organizing creator dinners and networking events to build communities not based on follower count, but on perspective, energy, and location so they can keep each other accountable and stay motivated.”

Personally, Kai is returning to his roots as a creator. “I took a break for a couple of years as I was helping Elevate scale and grow because my team’s gotten to the point where they’re able to take a lot of the heavy lifting and the day-to-day off my plate,” he says. “But now, I’m diving back into content creation.”

The lessons shared at VidCon about creating real content, psychology-based content strategies, and community building aren’t just theoretical advice; they form the practical foundation of how Kai and his team operate.

“I want to work with creators who respect and value their audience,” Kai concludes.