Matthew Cotter
The young American content creator on what makes good content, living in Scotland, and studying abroad.
Matthew Cotter, 27, was born in Missouri, USA, and is currently living in Stirling, Scotland. He is a Digital Media and Communications Master’s student and Pennyslvania Bloomsburg University alumnus, documenting his life as an American Master’s student studying in Scotland. With 1,222 followers on TikTok and a peak of 104.9K views, Matthew is climbing the TikTok ranks and gathering views at a rapid pace. He is passionate about content creation and social media, always thinking about the next video he can make, even in his day-to-day life.
“Since I came here and decided I wanted to make content, I don’t have a calendar, but I am constantly making mental notes of possible pieces of content.
I always say I got into content creation back when I got my first camera, when I was 16, and I had this DSLR, Nikon camera that my parents bought for me because I was going through my photography phase. And from there, I just started making videos of whatever I wanted to do.
The last two years, I worked for a company making content full-time, so I was really able to turn ‘let’s just have fun with this’ into a full-time job. And then I literally quit that job and then came here to do a master’s.
School is always a first. When I was looking to do my master’s, I knew I wanted to do it in the UK, because I would like to stay here. I want to get my graduate visa, this kind of gives me two years to figure out the next step on staying here.
I was so stoked about getting my bike. There’s this kind of whole journey that I can kind of manufacture through just the point of view that I have as a student, who doesn’t have a car, only a bike, living in a foreign country, and I use that to then craft the narrative. Buses and public transportation aren’t very popular from where I’m from. So that’s like, a whole video in itself that I could do.
If there’s something I could make a video about, I’m on it. I have a bunch of footage, and I can put it together and put a little voice over, and it’s done.
If I hear that there’s something on in town, I make my day about that so I can film it. There’s a farmers’ market in town? Okay, let me try to go and do something. I’ve seen the boring content works. So even if I’m just going to the grocery store, I see that as an opportunity.
The other day, we went bowling as a little fun class activity. Our professor cancelled class, and we were like, ‘Let’s go bowling.’ Let’s go to Hollywood Bowl and see. So, I made something out of that.
Another night, I went out with the volleyball team for their Wednesday social. We played pub golf. I was like, ‘This is fun.’ Like, this is unique. I want to kind of show that perspective online.
When thinking about the everyday life content, I have to think about how much it will cost. So, for my video about going to the farmers’ market, I thought, okay, I’ll spend 20-30 pounds, and I’ll get something that’s useful for me, but also, it’s for the content. I’m also thinking: how do I get there? What is the story? My story for going to farmers market was supporting small businesses, highlighting that aspect of daily life.
With the American political climate, there’s always a spotlight on America, so I say ‘as an American living in Scotland’ at the start of my videos because that works. That keeps people at least watching for the first couple seconds, and then also they get to see their basic daily lives, showcased on a platform with so many people watching. Ninety-five per cent of my viewers are British, and the UK audience like to see this American-fish-out-of-water experience.
Ninety per cent of the time, I push editing off to like another day because the videos are very evergreen. The content that I’m doing doesn’t need to get posted tomorrow; it can wait.
I’m mostly trying to balance the whole content creation with my studies. I want to make sure that I’m not forcing myself to post immediately and constantly. I want to make sure that I’m motivated to kind of get this done, and that way I don’t feel like it’s just more work that I have to do on top of my schoolwork.”
Featured Image Credit: Kerry Lloyd
Braw Magazine co-editor for Stirling University’s Brig and a third year English and Journalism student.
