Companies are acquiring creator media brands. It’s a model offering financial stability for creators without sacrificing audience trust.
Our guest this week is Jonathan Hunt, VP of Media at HubSpot, where he oversees an operation of around 60 people reaching more than 50 million people a month across newsletters, podcasts, and YouTube. HubSpot has been one of the most visible practitioners of the creator-media acquisition play since acquiring The Hustle in 2021.
Over the course of his career, Jonathan has been one step ahead of every major shift in media — from social media at VICE to editorial talent at Vox, to National Geographic’s digital reinvention.
In this episode:
🎯 The three intent signals that matter more than follower count
📈 Building audience development systems that attract acquisition offers
📊 How to diversify distribution to survive platform changes
— Natalia Pérez-González, Assistant Editor
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Hosted by Francis Zierer
00:00 Introducing Jonathan Hunt
01:20 The 3 pillars of audience development
04:16 For the independent creator
07:32 Marketing through content creation
14:10 The most sustainable monetization models
18:18 Building a brand voice
21:00 The need for diversification
23:41 The ever-evolving definition of 'creator'
26:50 The most shocking recent changes in media
28:27 When to sell your business as a solo creator
🎧 If you prefer a podcast platform other than YouTube, we’re on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you tune in to your podcasts.
The futurist inside the media machine
Jonathan Hunt has spent his career riding the wavebreak of new media. At Vice, he anticipated that social media would upend publishing. At Vox, he helped turn editorial talent into brands. At National Geographic, he proved legacy institutions could reinvent themselves for digital. And now at HubSpot, he's betting that the future of the creator economy lies in company-owned media.
As Vice President of Media at HubSpot, Jonathan’s team of around 60 people generates over 50 million monthly impressions across newsletters, podcasts, and YouTube channels. That scale builds on HubSpot’s DNA — the company pioneered “inbound marketing” long before “content marketing” was a buzzword, and its 2021 acquisition of The Hustle folded new, creator-led media into that leading content strategy.
The sale represented a fundamental shift in how creators seek funding. For decades, creators had two main paths: chase advertisers (with all the uncertainty that brings) or build subscription audiences (limiting growth potential). HubSpot remains a pioneer in the rise of a third model: company-backed creators who maintain editorial independence while converting audiences into qualified business leads. The Hustle shed external advertisements post-acquisition, for example, replacing them with HubSpot ads.
Advertising in these acquired media brands is working. Jonathan shared with us that Q2 2025 was the company’s best-ever quarter for both YouTube and newsletter-driven leads, respectively up 98% and 50% year over year.
When HubSpot bought Mindstream, the approximately 200,000-subscriber AI-focused newsletter co-founded by former Spotlight guest Adam Biddlecombe, nothing about the editorial changed. Only the business model did — shifting from chasing advertisers to converting qualified leads. "We're acquiring them for their editorial and their audience. We don't want to change that," Jonathan told us. The creators continue to create while HubSpot handles monetization. It’s a model designed to protect what audiences value most: the authentic voice of the creator.
"In the AI era, trust is both becoming more and more of a scarcity but also essential. Humans trust other humans for information."
That conviction — that trust and authenticity are the true currency of media — has been a consistent ethos throughout Jonathan’s career. When he started at VICE in 2007, Facebook was just beginning to gain traction, and Twitter was still in its experimental phase. He became the point-person for social, and instantly pivoted from ad operations to social and marketing — foreshadowing how platform-based community building would soon become central to the industry.
Jonathan quickly understood that social platforms would fragment traditional media's distribution monopoly, and began creating opportunities for individual voices to build direct relationships with audiences.
At Vox, he joined as the company scaled a new model: distinctive editorial voices, such as Ezra Klein and Kara Swisher, backed by sophisticated distribution and marketing. His role was to help those voices grow into brands with real reach. At National Geographic, he faced a different challenge — a legacy brand with relevance among younger audiences but failing to realize its full potential online. Jonathan's team unlocked the value of the publication’s 130-year archive through Instagram, YouTube, and podcasts, transforming coffee-table nostalgia into digital content that could compete with creators on TikTok.
The throughline across each stop is clear: companies that fail to diversify distribution and revenue don't survive. The same lesson applies to creators.
As traditional media grapples with sustainability, Jonathan predicts that the company-backed model he and his team practice at HubSpot will become more dominant.
"We're not an impressions-based media model. We're trying to develop really high-quality, high-intent audiences that we can put resources in front of that feel editorialized and utilitarian."
Nat’s notes ✍️
A few things that stuck with me as I listened through this week’s conversation:
Trust is scarce in the AI era, but so is editorial distinctiveness. As AI commoditizes information synthesis and distribution, we're witnessing mass-market content producers competing with increasingly sophisticated AI, and expert creators whose analysis commands premium valuations. The creators who survive this shift will be those who can't be replaced by automation — those whose unique perspectives, lived experiences, and analytical frameworks create content that only they can produce.
Building independence creates better partnership opportunities. Jonathan advises creators to "go solo as long as possible,” and build profitable, sustainable operations with loyal audiences. The focus on business fundamentals (profitability, audience retention, scalable systems) naturally leads to more strategic options, whether that's investment, partnerships, or acquisition.
Connect with Jonathan on LinkedIn
Learn more about HubSpot’s creator programs.
Building high-value audience development systems
Sustainable creator businesses are built on diversified distribution, editorial distinctiveness, and systems that generate consistent value for specific audiences. Here's a framework for creating lasting growth and attracting high-value partnerships.
Create an omnichannel content strategy
Treat each platform as a distinct product while maintaining content consistency. Jonathan's team operates newsletters, YouTube channels, podcasts, and websites as separate entities that cross-promote each other.
This diversification signals that you've built a healthy, durable media business, not just a social media following. When Jonathan's team acquired Mindstream, they were buying a multi-platform operation that could weather industry changes.
For example, if you have a newsletter, it isn't just an email collection for your YouTube channel — it's a standalone product that happens to drive YouTube subscribers, and vice versa.
Focus on intent signals, not vanity metrics
When Jonathan's team evaluates creators for partnerships, they ignore follower counts entirely. Instead, they track three intent signals that creators can optimize for:
Search-based intent: Are people actively looking for your expertise?
LLM-based intent: Do you appear in ChatGPT and Claude results for your niche?
Influence-based intent: Are other creators in your space referencing your work?
"We're able to identify partnerships with other relevant publications that share similar audience interests and work with them to build together," Jonathan told us. For creators, this means prioritizing content that answers specific questions your audience is searching for, rather than chasing trending topics that drive empty engagement.
Create content that companies can't get elsewhere
The difference between creators who get acquired and those who get ignored isn't the size of their audience — it's their editorial distinctiveness. When Jonathan's team acquired Mindstream, it was due to their unique approach to editorializing AI news with actionable business insights.
"A lot of them are very much like [an] RSS feed news of the day, quick hit. Whereas with Mindstream, they're editorializing, providing expert-driven perspective on what you're hearing within the news cycle, then providing you with the agents, the prompts, the tools to be able to take that information and turn that into strategy."
Think like a media company, not an influencer
HubSpot’s most successful creator partners understand the difference between content creation and media operations. In addition to producing content, they analyze performance data, test various content formats, and develop systems for consistent production.
"Operating like a scrappy, small marketing team," as Jonathan describes it, means treating your creator business like the media company it actually is.
Track which content drives the most qualified audience growth, not just engagement.
Build relationships with other creators in your space for potential collaborations.
Most importantly, create content that serves a specific audience's need rather than chasing algorithmic trends.
The creators HubSpot works with long-term understand that sustainable growth comes from solving real problems for specific audiences, not from viral moments or vanity metrics.
The four stages of creator community building (Creator Spotlight)
The end of handwriting (WIRED)
7 of August’s top social trends (Instagram)
