TubeTalk: Your YouTube How-To Guide

Is YouTube Getting Rid of Shorts?

• vidIQ • Season 6 • Episode 16

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Check out the video version here: https://youtu.be/0HPucaCMwrQ

Join Discord: https://www.vidiq.com/discord

We dive deep into the complexities of YouTube growth, from networking with larger creators to understanding the platform's evolution as "the new television." Travis shares his personal success stories of collaborating with million-subscriber channels by making participation easy and relevant.

• Discord community becoming an essential lifeline for creators who need to connect with like-minded individuals
• Sponsorship opportunities exist for all niches - even cooking channels can secure relevant brand deals
• How to network with larger creators by bringing clear value and making collaboration effortless
• YouTube positioning itself as "the new television" doesn't mean abandonment of shorts
• Subscriber plateaus are completely normal, even after initial growth
• Finding community is crucial for weathering the emotional journey of content creation

Join our Discord community at vidiq.com/discord where you can connect with other creators and participate in our monthly live podcast recordings.


Speaker 1:

Welcome back to the only podcast that's now 70% less peeps. Thank the Lord for that. I'm Travis and I'm here with Jen again.

Speaker 2:

Does that mean we have 30% peeps in this episode? This is the 30% peeps.

Speaker 1:

If you missed the last episode, shame on you. First of all, you need to go back and watch that. Yes, less peeps this time through. I'm Travis. I'm here with Jen. If you've never watched us before, you're welcome.

Speaker 2:

Now's the time to start.

Speaker 1:

This is definitely the time to start. We're here to help you grow your YouTube channels and answer your questions and have a secret candy podcast somewhere in between.

Speaker 2:

Although I have something secret that's not candy, but it is something that we've talked about, but it's not candy for the end of this one.

Speaker 1:

We have talked about it.

Speaker 2:

We have talked about it. Oh okay, I thought maybe you just tried to sneak some in.

Speaker 1:

We've actually gotten a couple comments about it, but it's not candy, so I'll give that spoiler, but I'm not giving any other spoilers. I also want to say that I noticed when we came up that in the bag you had, like, some things.

Speaker 2:

I thought I was getting my water. Travis was snooping. There was syrup. What was that about? Snooping in my bag is what I'm hearing.

Speaker 1:

I think we'll get back to that later. I think I'm a little worried, shame. Anyway, we have a lot to talk about today and one of the things I do want to talk about is our Discord. And the reason I want to do that is because recently but I do kind of merge Discords and we actually recorded an episode which by the time you watch this you would have already seen, where we got to talk to you, the listeners and film the.

Speaker 2:

It was so fun.

Speaker 1:

It was so fun and we're going to do it again, and again, and again and again. Yeah, we are.

Speaker 2:

Because it was great to actually talk. The emails and the texts are really fun, but to have a conversation, that was a treat.

Speaker 1:

That was so much fun and you can join it for free. It's vidIQcom slash Discord and come check us out.

Speaker 2:

Now, and if you're a member of one-on-one coaching, you have access to the special area. Yeah, yes, there is a special area. There is a special area, there is it's locked off unless you're in booster. Well, that's what I'm saying.

Speaker 1:

So if you're already a member, you have even more than you knew but there's a section just for podcast listeners which is free, so you can go to that and watch that for free. And uh, someone was in there. Um, j Jerry was in there talking about his channel and I answered him and he answered. Since we've been recording, I kind of just wanted to answer here. I know it's probably like a week later, I'm answering one of the podcasts a week later.

Speaker 2:

All right, well, the Discord.

Speaker 1:

Listen, it's all about the thought. It's a thought that counts.

Speaker 2:

It's a community in the Discord.

Speaker 1:

That it's all about the thought. It's a thought, it's a community in the discord. That's the tree. Yes, so Jerry talks about how you know. He said I know the boost, talked about it before, but I have a and it was a question on podcast about sponsorship and secondary revenue. I know sponsors can help or Patreon or something like that, but he feels certain niches, let's say cooking, are a bit harder for a sponsor. It's not like pots and pan. Pots and pan brands would sponsor and I'm like why wouldn't?

Speaker 1:

they why they absolutely literally every single one, like joshua weisman's video is like sponsored by yeah cookware so I kind of said that and I talked about affiliate sales would be good too. And he says um, because the way I think of it, you just go to the market and buy them. I might know one brand, they might sell things. That's kind of the reason of wondering, like, do you know, for example, a potter brand or do you walk into a random store and buy one? So, in other words, if you, when you go in the store, are you thinking of this brand? Well, if I saw gordon ramsey use it, heck yeah yeah um, like 100, like you make laundry content.

Speaker 1:

I think the chances are small. You would get a brand sponsor from bosher or whirlpool, for example, which are pretty big, not saying it's impossible, but very unlikely.

Speaker 2:

So I've been sponsored by laundry detergent and I'm just a regular person everybody does laundry, that's what you're not thinking about everybody does laundry. It's not as everybody cooks it's so overly.

Speaker 2:

It's not as complicated as people think it is yeah, I think that he was thinking it really to the next level and like that's the only type of sponsors you can have on your channel, like no, I'm sure you've watched channels that, even if you say you're like an outdoor, you're an off-grid channel, you can still have a sponsor. That's cookware like you could have cast iron cookware like you can. That can still be relevant in your life. It's relevant to your audience. You still have that laundry sponsor because people still gotta to wash their clothes.

Speaker 1:

You better wash your clothes.

Speaker 2:

It's about you standing behind a product and delivering it in a trusting way to your audience if you recommend it. Yeah, that's the way it's supposed to be done.

Speaker 1:

That's the way it is. You'd be surprised. You'd be surprised.

Speaker 2:

How many creators have AG1 sponsors?

Speaker 1:

and it's like they're not nutritionists, they're not health gurus, bro, that would be the logic well, it's like a little bit like saying uh, all those gurus that uh like marriage counselors that have never been married, or, you know, kids experts that don't have kids they're selling divorce attorneys.

Speaker 2:

What are they selling I?

Speaker 1:

have zero idea. That's actually not a bad idea. I would love to be sponsored by a divorce attorney, because I'll tell you right now I can get you divorced for sure All right.

Speaker 2:

Just click the link for Johnson Johnson Click the link.

Speaker 1:

If your partner is terrible and you can't wait to get out of the house and you want to just listen to us, click the link in the description below to 1-800-DIVORCE-HER-NOW. Okay, Anyway if you're listening to this podcast, you're trying to grow your YouTube channel. I don't know what you just heard, but let's just assume that you are trying to grow your channel. Yeah, you can send us an email at theboostvidIQcom. Or if you're listening to the audio podcast, of course you can click the link for the text message.

Speaker 1:

But of course if you're listening to the audio podcast, watch this episode you probably want to go check it out we're literally here live, so jen now is going to read all of the emails. I know people love when jen reads the emails I am going to read.

Speaker 2:

So this one is, let me just give a little. So this one's from orlando and he says a couple of days ago I found something interesting while exploring the internet, so did I that's, that's a solid hook.

Speaker 1:

Not gonna lie.

Speaker 2:

According to YouTube CEO, YouTube is not just a video platform, it's a new television. So this is what we've been chatting about. This was a really big, really hot topic from when we had our episode with Benji.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

And it carried over into Discord and it's still so relevant now. So, orlinda, we're here for this. Uh, this melds perfectly with my channel statistics incredible. I cater to the 45 plus crowd, which I don't think that there is a tv watching demographic.

Speaker 1:

To my knowledge, I don't. I haven't correlated the two, but I think he's just saying this is what his his avatar is, his viewer avatar is. I'm just I don't know if there is. To my knowledge, I don't I haven't correlated the two, but I think he's just saying this is what his his avatar is, his his viewer avatar is.

Speaker 2:

I am just, I don't know if there is. To my knowledge, I don't think we have like. Oh, it's the, you know, gen z yeah, that's, I don't think that we have. At least I don't know that information, yeah, yet um. So this is his demographic 45 plus crowd, 60.4 percent. Uh, watch on tv, that's a lot that's amazing 70.7 percent of which are male and watch from the united states cool. This is, by the way, is exactly who I set out to attract which is perfect.

Speaker 1:

You're a genius amazing.

Speaker 2:

However, all this got me thinking being the new television and going after the shorts market are two things that don't meld very well.

Speaker 1:

I agree, this is interesting.

Speaker 2:

Most tvs are 16 by 9 landscape and shorts are 9 by 16 portrait. What's more, shorts look terrible on widescreen they do wait.

Speaker 1:

Have you watched?

Speaker 2:

yes, and I immediately stopped okay, I've had shorts that do play on tv, because they will play next. Of course, I have something else we have to call out too.

Speaker 1:

Uh-oh.

Speaker 2:

Finally, shorts are well short and the TV crowd favors long content. This is an interesting part, because you remember in the meeting maybe it was just in Slack, but I think it was sorry, I'm going to call you out Dan said that he watches shorts on his TV.

Speaker 1:

Well, he's a weirdo.

Speaker 2:

That's not nice. Dan's weird he watches shorts on tv. But I reached out to a creator when I was still doing coaching who was had a lot of shorts traffic and they also had a very high percentage of tv traffic for their shorts. They have a younger demographic and we had people that who commented that it was their kids watch shorts only on TV.

Speaker 1:

Interesting.

Speaker 2:

And I remember we laughed about it because we were like that's psychotic, that's literally psychotic.

Speaker 1:

So there are some TVs that will rotate. I don't know if you knew this. I've never.

Speaker 2:

I think you made that up, super dumb.

Speaker 1:

No, literally true, actually true. Alright, let's try. Yeah, can you do it? No, I don't think that's going to work. I think it's silly. I think these people are sociopaths, but I can be wrong.

Speaker 2:

They're ready for the future. They were ready for YouTube to release shorts on. Tv. This is wild. I, this is wild, but I think so I see where this is going, but I think there's a lot of things to counter this argument so pretty much it says.

Speaker 1:

if YouTube is going after living room views, are we losing interest in the shorts world? So yeah, so essentially, are we having to choose between shorts and long form TV viewing versus shorts? And I think later in the message he said something about Google is very fast to close things down. There's an entire website I don't know if you know this is dedicated to all the different programs google has shut down.

Speaker 1:

I think it's called the google graveyard or something like that. Adorable, um, because they they shut a lot of programs down. They'll bring them up and then they shut them down if they don't work, goodbye. Um. So I mean, do you remember google hangouts?

Speaker 2:

yeah, are those not alive anymore? Oh, they haven't been for a very long time really I used to google hangout all the time, yeah, of course you haven't in a long time, because it doesn't exist anymore well, I guess so among other things well then, you could. Well, the thing was that you could facetime with like non yes iphone users which you still can.

Speaker 2:

Now, I don't know well, I'm saying that's like, what kind of changed it for me? Yeah, that flipped, yeah because I would only Google hang out with those people you don't want to do that.

Speaker 1:

That's ridiculous. Are you Green Bubble people?

Speaker 2:

Not anymore. I've cut those friendships.

Speaker 1:

We can't talk to Green Bubble people. No, I'm just kidding. So let me ask what he's basically saying here. Is he thinks that, because the Instagram, what are we really trying to cancel ourselves, aren't we? What he's basically saying is he believes that there's probably going to have to be a choice being made and he thinks that YouTube is going to say well, you know, we're seeing TV grow, so shorts are going to have to go away. I think that that's a thinking that is not what YouTube is considering, because they want to be a platform for everybody. They've said this before. They want all the content right there. We want you to be able to upload vertical, to upload vertical, horizontal, sideways, diagonal, whatever's next right? Uh, I don't think that they're that this means that, all of a sudden, shorts are going to go away. I don't think shorts are going away for better or worse. I think they're here I agree people's attention spans are short.

Speaker 1:

Now they're much shorter. Yeah, even mine, which is crazy. I hate that, by the way wow, wow, like it's happening. Like what am I even talking about right now? I forgot what I was talking about.

Speaker 2:

Which is welcome to the party to join the rest of us.

Speaker 1:

Where am I Okay?

Speaker 2:

I think that what you're saying is true, though, and it's just looking at it from like one single type of channel, one single type of creator with one single type of audience. And maybe for Orlando, it doesn't make sense to do shorts, right, which is fine, right, if that's not something that is going to work for the audience and it doesn't work for the channel. Like there's no reason you have to make shorts, but there's going to be creators who aren't prioritizing tv views, whose niche and space doesn't necessarily allow for longer content like that.

Speaker 2:

Like there's not every space you can just push to hour-long content right and it's just when you do that it's going to be bad content yes so I would say we're in a smaller percentage of people that can successfully make that transition to prioritize tv, sure, and then we think of the rest of the world. They're still doing like regular youtube I'm.

Speaker 1:

I'm still caught back in the people watching shorts on the television, that's Sure.

Speaker 2:

And then we think of the rest of the world. They're still doing like regular YouTube. I'm still caught back in the people watching shorts on the television. That's to me still. This is where it's breaking my brain and it's I think it's a young. I think it's a young thing. Based off the information we've heard, I think it's a young thing. So for Orlando's, what is it? His? 65 plus 45 plus crowd TV shorts probably not a thing.

Speaker 1:

No.

Speaker 2:

If you have a young audience, then maybe the shorts doesn't matter. Maybe they perfectly coincide together.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, but I think one of the things we talked about was like how do you shoot for a television right? And it's one of the things that one of the things we talked about was the length of videos can be longer, of course. Shorts that's not the case. The way you present needs to be something that makes sense for a television right. I think all of these things still apply, but not as much for shorts. I think you just do shorts the way they are, I guess, right. Would you shoot them any different? Because you still only get a max, three minutes Max.

Speaker 2:

That's actually really interesting. I'd be curious to see the correlation between the length of the shorts. Are we talking like short shorts or are we talking like new long?

Speaker 1:

shorts. Are we talking Daisy Dukes, or are?

Speaker 2:

we talking the jorts, that's what we got to get.

Speaker 1:

The jorts versus Daisy Dukes. Which person is?

Speaker 2:

being watched on TV Right.

Speaker 1:

The Daisy D watched on tv right the daisy dukes all the time. Uh, so we got. We got daisy dukes, we got jorts, we got mids. I think we had, we have short longs, long longs. The mids, the bermudas we're gonna get canceled for sure now um. So what were? We talking about now we have a secret fashion podcast.

Speaker 2:

Um, yeah, so you worry about it or do you not worry about it?

Speaker 1:

This is always the big question.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, because there's a lot of things we tell you not to worry about because you have no control over them. You do kind of have control over this because it's your content. I feel like you just make good content based on the format that you want to make it in. You could shoehorn something into something else, but I feel like it would be disingenuous and people will see that at that point. What's the point? And you're probably not enjoying it either. Right, so easy to burn out, quicker to burn out probably not as good content. Um, unless you have a team behind you, you have a big team and you're like oh, we gotta do all these things. Okay, okay, fine, fair. But if you're just a creator starting out like, just do your now, right.

Speaker 2:

Do we think that this is the secret to growth on YouTube? Now I feel like this is a big thing that was interpreted from the past conversations that we have Like. Is this the new hack?

Speaker 1:

To do television type content.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, Is that how people are taking these conversations and thinking like this is the way I'm going to get ahead. I'm going to grow my channel from the start. I'm going to be at the forefront of this trend.

Speaker 1:

So, in fairness, what we're shooting right now is basically for television. Yeah, the way we're doing this, you know our other podcasts and stuff. You could watch them and it'd be fine on television, but this is definitely more for a television type crowd. The way we're here. We're both here. We can say hi, we can, we can high five, like all the cool things that we can't do normally right.

Speaker 2:

I was like what if we just like fake high fives like we? We're not actually here.

Speaker 1:

We're green screen, we're not actually here. Um then, yeah, of course, like, uh, I think we are doing the thing that we've been talking about and we're trying to double down more into that. Um, but not every piece of content. Every niche needs that, do you? Which ones are they? And I just think, if you look at who the trailblazers are in your niche and you go, does that make sense? Like food channels make a lot of sense.

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Right, yeah, that does Make a lot of sense. As a matter of fact, to be a really good food channel, you almost have to look like a freaking television show now. Have you seen?

Speaker 2:

some of those big channels. That's true. They're really high quality. The studios are crazy.

Speaker 1:

And the kitchens are amazing.

Speaker 2:

Like it's ridiculous yeah.

Speaker 1:

Unless you went full left and were like I don't want it to look professional, I want it to look homemade, okay because. But then again it might not.

Speaker 2:

That's an intentional approach though, where you're trying to stand out and you're trying to be like no, I'm just cooking from, like my house right, like this is just low budget. I'm just like cooking good stuff but then will you really?

Speaker 1:

so there's this whole thing, um and I think we talked about it in a meeting, uh where people are like fully produced or more authentic, and I think there's, I think, that line.

Speaker 2:

The space in the middle of that is getting wider and wider. I think we're just going so full send in, either direction yeah, yeah, yeah, Like I just don't see a middle ground, because I feel like that middle ground where you're doing, you know, I would say not highly produced content, but highly edited, Like so many jump cuts and punch-ins and things I'm like, that to me is like pick your side, You're not wrong, choose your fighter.

Speaker 1:

You're not wrong. That's how I see, though, just as more of a viewer of YouTube, and what my just viewer preference has changed so for orlando, I guess what we're saying is I think your type of content isn't necessarily things you would be doing for shorts anyway although you could and I also disagree that youtube will be getting rid of shorts for that reason.

Speaker 2:

So I guess that's not when all the kids are watching them on tv which is wild.

Speaker 1:

These kids are crazy. All right, let's get to the next.

Speaker 2:

We're gonna have a bunch of parents being like yeah, no, no, it's true.

Speaker 1:

I don't understand this. It's kids nowadays. All right, read this next one. What do we got?

Speaker 2:

Benjamin, oh, I love this. What's the best way to network with YouTubers? Okay, youtube community is everything. I love that we're focusing on this. A lot of them have their Discord DM closed so I can't DM them there, and when I click on the show email thing on their channel, nothing shows up. That's interesting. How do you network? I'm currently at 700 subscribers, but is there a size I'd be able to work with? I guess my first thing right from this is why Is he trying to network with other creators?

Speaker 1:

Because the funny thing is is my mind was like going back to my experiences when I was a smaller creator and how I managed to collab with large creators, but that is actually a thing we should talk about first.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, I think this is the way. So the first part of the email made me feel like he's trying to form a community, get in touch with like minded people and just have. I mean, YouTube is super lonely. I don't feel like we have to tell you like YouTube is the loneliest job in the world. I mean YouTube is super lonely.

Speaker 2:

I don't feel like we have to tell you like YouTube is the loneliest job in the world, that's true, and you try to talk about some of these things with friends, a partner, your parents, and there's like I don't know what you're saying.

Speaker 1:

Right, right, right. Tell me more about your one attempt. I don't know Exactly.

Speaker 2:

So I think there's the desire to have people to chat with We've seen this a lot in coaching and in the Discord and just to have this community of people. But it's really special when that community of people are creating the same space and there's collaboration in the sense where you're prioritizing discoverable video concepts together and you're talking about your titles and thumbnails together and what worked for you and what didn't work for you, and a true collaborative effort, and then we have actually doing collabs.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Which is an entirely different thing than what we're just talking about.

Speaker 1:

Yes, so here's the interesting thing about that. So the reason that vidIQ even has a Discord is I hate to say this because of me.

Speaker 2:

Oh Travis.

Speaker 1:

And here's why I hate to say this, because of me, oh, travis, and here's why. So, when I was coming up, I had a little group of friends that we had a little private discourse, like five or six of us. Jeff was one of the people in there as well. Jeff from El Jefe. Review is also one of the coaches. There was about five or six of us and as we would learn things, we would share things.

Speaker 2:

Yes.

Speaker 1:

So when I came to vid iq, I thought that was a really cool idea and I really wanted that to be a thing. So in 2019, we launched a public one and then, later on, launched the group coaching one, and now it's. It's all this thing. So now, when you go to our discord, you now have a place on the internet where you know for sure that it's not just like new tubers or reddit or something like that, which can be hit or miss. You now have a place you can go where you can find people not only that are creating just like you, or small creators just like you, or even established creators, but some people are taking it very seriously. They can really give you great advice and is, you know, part of the vidIQ community.

Speaker 1:

So we know like, and Jen and I are there and like we're all there, we're all having a fun time, so this thing exists, that you can go to anytime, and it's free.

Speaker 1:

Previous to all this, you had to find your group, which was very difficult which is why things like VidCon of the summer were so cool because you go being around people that speak the language, because inevitably, no one that you know understands what the hell you're doing. You mean, you're talking to a camera for what you? You need to go get a job. Huh, no, this is a job. What are you talking about? What's going on? So I feel like having that ability to be with other creators can be greater than the sum of its parts. Now, what this creator is asking for specifically is larger creators, but I think it comes back to why are you asking for that?

Speaker 2:

Yeah.

Speaker 1:

Now it could be for a good reason. Are you asking for that? Yeah, now it could be for a good reason. It could be like no, I actually just want to be a bigger part of the community and I know this creator just does content that's similar to mine and I really just want to, you know, vibe with them and stuff. I can tell you how to do that because I did it as a smaller creator. Um, but I want to assume I don't want to assume anything, but anyone's watching this just understand that you have to have a value that you're bringing to that larger creator, otherwise this is not going to work.

Speaker 2:

Yes. So everything I'm about to tell you only works I mean this goes for collaborations in general, whether it's with another creator or if it's with a brand. Yes, like you have to bring and pitch the value. Yeah, like you're not, like, hey, let's work together. And this million-plus channel is like why?

Speaker 1:

Right, if they even answer you. I don't know.

Speaker 2:

Right. They look at their email and they're like huh. No.

Speaker 1:

Yes, so I've collabed with some of the biggest creators in my niche Millions upon millions of subscribers and all that sort of stuff.

Speaker 2:

So what was step one though?

Speaker 1:

So in my first year, when I didn't even have like 1,000 subscribers or 5,000 subscribers, you know, first I wanted to. I was like how do I do this in a way that makes sense, because I knew that I had an affinity for certain creators that I wanted to work with and stuff. I'm like, how do I make it easy for them? So my first thing was okay, I'm going to reach out to this person and I'd like for them to be a part of my video. But I need to make it so easy for them because I don't have a lot of value to bring them. In other words, my, I don't have an audience that's going to help. You know, help them with anything. So I just want to reach out and go I love your stuff, which I did. It was all genuine stuff. I would love if you could be a part of one of my videos. Here's my channel and here's what I would like other person to do, because people even ask me this.

Speaker 2:

They're like, oh, I'd love you to collab on my channel. I'm like sure, whatever, what do you want to do? And they're like I don't know what. Do you think I'm like? You asked me no, no, no, how I? I don't want me to come up with the idea. You want me to come up with the idea. What?

Speaker 1:

home, so it was always very simple. I was like I just need you to do this. If you wouldn't mind doing this, you can even do it on your phone. You don't need to set up your thing. I always try to make it super easy and it every single time worked, that's amazing. With some of the millions of subscribers.

Speaker 2:

That's literally amazing. What do you think it was specifically about, kind of your pitch or your idea in general that could work for other creators?

Speaker 1:

It was relevant to something that either they were already doing or were going to do, and it was easy.

Speaker 2:

I think, like I couldn't think of two better things that you would need. I can't even think of anything else you would actually need.

Speaker 1:

I mean, you could pay them, but I didn't have to do that.

Speaker 2:

Okay, which is understandable In a situation like that. You probably don't have the funds and it's probably not a good idea and a collab is like a fun thing.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

I don't know any situation that I'm aware of where it was a paid creator to creator type of situation. At the end of the day, we're all here for like the same thing, like we love YouTube.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

And if you have a good idea, it doesn't matter how many subscribers you are, because now I want your idea.

Speaker 1:

Yes, and that's the thing.

Speaker 2:

Like I'm, probably not buying you. I'm buying your idea and you come with it.

Speaker 1:

I'm shocked at some of the people I was able to get to collab with. Like now that I think back to it, I'm like how the hell did I do that? There were some creators that didn't collab with anyone else and I somehow got them.

Speaker 2:

You're an idea man.

Speaker 1:

That's why I it was relevant.

Speaker 2:

It felt right to them, it felt like you probably catered that idea for them. And it was easy because if you're reaching out to larger creators, they're doing things a lot different.

Speaker 1:

Right.

Speaker 2:

So easy is going to be the number one thing and have a plan.

Speaker 1:

So this specific creator also said well, their DMs are closed and all this other stuff that's going to make it more difficult. If they're on a social media platform you interact with them on and they've seen you around, then you're probably more likely to get a response than if you just randomly come out of nowhere, especially if you don't have their email address. So definitely engage in their community, not just for the, the try to get the collab, but like to be a genuine part of their community. If you can do that and it's actually genuine you'd be surprised what you can do. But if you're, doing it for strategic purposes.

Speaker 1:

I feel like if you don't come absolutely correct with everything they need like I don't want to take any of your time. Can you please record this? It's for this video idea. I'm going to put it out this date. I would love to have you be a part of it. That works a lot more than you might think.

Speaker 2:

That's pretty cool. I like that advice. As far as getting in touch, I completely agree, show up in the comments. And touch, I completely agree, show up in the comments and I mean you can try other platforms.

Speaker 1:

You can try other creators too. Yeah, it doesn't have to be a specific, so they have a specific creator they like, but it can be anyone in that niche. By the way, if you work with another creator in the niche that that big the one creator you really want to work with and they've seen you work with the other person they're much more likely to work with you it's weird people amongst.

Speaker 2:

People amongst niches are friends Like you might not know their friends, oh, yes, but like they're friends, and this comes back to like the first part, which is like creator community.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

And like, eventually, whether you're a small channel trying to grow together or you're even larger channel still trying to grow together, but more relate and kind of strategize together, yeah. Like you all know each other. Plus, when you're just on the platform, like you know who your similar creators are. Like you know who you support or you know who you should support just being a member of a specific community yeah so I mean funny have you ever seen a collab where you're like oh my god, you're friends right, you're like wait a minute?

Speaker 2:

how do you know each other? Like us I love when that breaks my that's still to this day, breaks my head when I watch youtube and I'm just like see two people in the same room and I'm like you know what I did.

Speaker 1:

So here's an interesting thing I actually got two large creators to collab. I did like I was the the whole reason it happened okay and to this day. When I see one of them wear the merch of the other, it just makes me smile. I'm like that's amazing.

Speaker 2:

That's another one, too Merch. I feel like that sells out people who know each other too. Like you see someone wearing the merch and you're like not only do you watch them, you support them.

Speaker 1:

Support them. Yeah, yeah, yeah, 100%. And for a fact that they had never collabed before. They never thought about it, um, and now they're like I, I love that. I love bringing large creators together, but and then I made a video of it behind the scenes stuff, so it was fun that's amazing, fun stuff.

Speaker 2:

I think the takeaway is like be a member of the community yes show up in a positive way yes and do it because it's coming from a good place. Good things will come from that yeah but I think, is you know, maybe not just try to be going after the immediate reward, Not just instant, like we're going to collab, make an awesome video. I'm going to get like a thousand subscribers from it.

Speaker 1:

Yeah.

Speaker 2:

Like no. Show up in a genuine, authentic way and doors will open, I agree.

Speaker 1:

And if you're authentically watching this, make sure you hit the subscribe button. If you're on YouTube, or if you're authentically watching this, make sure you hit the subscribe button. If you're on YouTube or if you're listening to the audio podcast and you love us that much, you should just leave us a five star review.

Speaker 2:

Only five stars.

Speaker 1:

What's the next one, jen? I think this is an email.

Speaker 2:

I think you're just putting these are very large fonts at this point and I think you just don't want to read them.

Speaker 1:

I don't want to anymore.

Speaker 2:

I'm done with it. Hey, vidiq team from Judah. I have a very small channel 14 subscribers. Hey, you started your channel. That's what we're counting as a win here. I started about two months ago and slowly got to 14, but then stopped and I've not gone anymore for the past three weeks. Is this normal? Also, I hate candy corn. Goodbye, judah, your question is not warranted here anymore. Bye, your question is not warranted here anymore.

Speaker 1:

Bye-bye, love it? No, oh my gosh, so I guess I have to answer this end. Yeah, I stopped talking anymore in the last three weeks. It can be normal, depending on the content you do. I think also small creators sometimes forget that it ebbs and flows. Sometimes your first subscriber takes forever. Sometimes you get a bunch and then all of a sudden it stops.

Speaker 2:

Yep.

Speaker 1:

Totally normal. It's just part of the thing that you don't see on YouTube, because, for the most part, you watch channels that are quote popular. That's how they came into your purview in the first place. The home feed showed them to you and those channels are doing well, which is the whole reason they came to you.

Speaker 2:

I like what you said there. They came to you because they're doing well at the moment. That's a good one that's a gem.

Speaker 1:

How smart I am. I'm so smart, big brain moment there. Big brain, so smooth brain. So I think I feel like it's important to remember that what you're seeing is the tip of the iceberg. I've talked about the iceberg uh meme before, where you can see all the stuff's underneath the water. You're just the tips. So you're seeing all these successful channels going. Oh, they're doing so well. What you don't see is the millions upon millions of channels that aren't doing great, that aren't killing it and crushing it like Donald Trump.

Speaker 2:

It's true, though, because they're not surfaced either, because they're not, they're not doing great, right you?

Speaker 1:

just don't realize they exist, and you're one of them. Normal average channel yeah, yes, absolutely normal experience yeah. Does that mean that it's always going to be that way? No, if you continue at it, put out good content, you'd be surprised. Yeah, you'd be surprised, but there are people who have thousands of videos that are at a subscribe base that you would think they they should be bigger, but there's reasons behind that, typically, we, we, we even see those from time to time.

Speaker 2:

You see like an awesome video and you're just like why aren't they bigger? Right or maybe you're someone who's left one of those comments before. That's like you deserve a hundred thousand subscribers like what I can't wait to see when you finally take off I love those comments uh, those are like the sweetest comments ever very sweet yeah, but it is totally normal and the crawl can feel very slow in the beginning.

Speaker 2:

But you have nothing else to compare it to and you probably don't have someone that also started to channel at the same time to be like, yeah, no, we both only have 14 subscribers, it's normal like listen it comes down to how many videos are you uploading and how long you know. It says you've stopped. Um started two months ago.

Speaker 1:

I don't know what the upload has been for yeah those two months, but that's not bad for two months, sure, yeah. How many videos like doesn't even say so, yeah, yeah, we have no idea like, and two months is like nothing. You, baby, baby, nothing. You're like the babiest of babies like so, so nothing.

Speaker 2:

I'm excited for those pop-offs that are gonna come because it's really exciting. It's really fun even when you wake up one day and you got like 10 subscribers overnight.

Speaker 1:

Well, we know that's going to happen because they listen to the podcast. We know it's going to happen 100%.

Speaker 2:

You just don't know when it's going to happen. I mean, we don't know when it's going to happen and it's like the best feeling ever. It's like, oh my God, what is going on? And then you have no one to text about it.

Speaker 1:

So you have to go on our Discord.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, go to our Discord and there's a brag about it channel in there. You can literally leave your brag about moments. Here's the other thing. Sometimes people pop off and they don't know what to do with it. You and I looked at a couple different channels. We haven't talked about this on the podcast specifically, but we looked at a couple with a specific title and thumbnail style. One channel knew how to double down on it because the rest of the channel made sense. And then there was another person who literally had. They weren't expecting it because what they did was they took the idea from a video they saw that popped off. They did it. It popped off, yes, as they hoped it would, but had no idea what to do with it after that. And now their views are back.

Speaker 2:

I think this is a very relevant conversation because when I was coaching, this very specific video that you're talking about was a very hot take.

Speaker 1:

Yes, for people to send me.

Speaker 2:

Everyone was sending me this video and they were like I want this to happen to me yes. I want. It was like, oh my gosh, it was like 3 million views in like a. It was ridiculous. It was one of those moments that this doesn't happen. This is so uncommon Right. They were like I want that to be me, I'm going to make the same video, and I said, okay, well, here let me show you three channels who did this and ruined their channel.

Speaker 2:

Right and obviously we're not going to talk about those channels, but you have to know how to do it right. You do and you have to trend jack the right videos.

Speaker 1:

The ones that are in the niche that you're in, at least what you're trying to accomplish. Why would I, if I was a racing car channel? Why would I bake the hottest sandwich? Now, I mean, why am I doing hot ones?

Speaker 2:

The hottest sandwich. I like that. It feels like you're gearing up for our game. You thinking of titles.

Speaker 1:

I'm so hungry right now. You have no idea Like I haven't eaten all day you were thinking of titles. I'm not even thinking about anything other than food. Wait, do we have more emails, or was that the last one? I think that's it. Do we have one more, or is that it? Oh, we do have one more. Let's do one more. Oh, we have, sean. Okay, we have a fun game that we're going to play after Sean's email. Yeah, yeah, yeah, go ahead, sean.

Speaker 2:

There are so many others out there that have the thou shalt do this, or else out. Can we get a very strong Travis?

Speaker 1:

Thou shalt not use thumbnails with red text.

Speaker 2:

Okay, I love that and it comes across very ick. Yes, sean, yes, I started my podcast. Ooh, barbells and Bourbon.

Speaker 1:

That's a cool name.

Speaker 2:

Subbed. Yeah immediately Strengths and Stories in January 2024. I interview anyone and everyone, allowing them to tell their life stories, shared experiences and open their hearts to sensitive topics. Love it, this is very sweet. My guests have included business owners, recovering addicts, single mothers, models, musicians, athletes the list goes on. For this reason, every episode has a different topic, making it impossible to narrow down my niche right, I see where this is going.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, you can see. Yes, I do. Um, each of my episodes gets a few hundred to about a thousand views in a few month period. I have 35 30 subscribers currently. Um, as a fun tradition, each show, I arm wrestle each guest and ask them a question while doing so. A spin on hot ones, relevant. Okay, you guys are synced up in a weird way and my guests having to think under pressure. With that said, my niche is literally unbeatable Anyone. No topic is off limits.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

Is this hurting my potential to grow my channel and reach certain audiences? So here's the thing.

Speaker 1:

Here's the thing Ah, this is Hot Ones. In and of itself is that same thing, but the hook is that it's Hot Ones, right it's?

Speaker 2:

a celebrity.

Speaker 1:

That is the thing. The niche is kind of the food. The celebrity brings in new people who maybe have never seen the show before or if they have, they're interested in that particular person. But what people coming back for over and, over and over again isn't necessarily than that person it's like the situation right yeah you need some type of hook.

Speaker 1:

Maybe you are the hook. Maybe you're so good and so interesting interviewing these people and then arm wrestling them for some odd reason. That that's the hook. Is it going to slow your growth? It might be harder to grow. Yes, however, my expectation I am starving right now, by the way. My expectation my stomach is growling. It's terrible.

Speaker 2:

Can you hear it?

Speaker 1:

I'm glad. Um, my expectation would be that the people that do stick for you, stick around, are going to be a an incredible community that you're going to be able to leverage in every single episode, which is cool yeah, you're building a channel a different way.

Speaker 2:

Oftentimes I've had this conversation with creators where they want to upload something on their channel. That makes absolutely no sense. Sure, go ahead, nobody's stopping you that's true there are people who have channels for that.

Speaker 2:

Exactly like how you're describing your podcast, it's a creative, just experiment yeah you want to talk about what you want to talk about, who you want to talk about and do what you want to do. And we're here on youtube for that creativity too. Every single channel doesn't have to have like a really defined target audience and a set growth strategy and having you know your content buckets in line and maximizing discoverability, like you can totally just make whatever you want. And when you get views and you get subscribers, they're like far, far exceed the other time, but they're truly there for what you're doing. And it's going to come slower and it's going to take more time, but there's no rule that says you have to maximize growth in every single exactly you possibly can, like you, just chill and do creative stuff right, there's the two for one, one for you, or two for them, one for you.

Speaker 1:

Idea which is like you make two videos for the audience and one for yourself.

Speaker 2:

Keep you from burning out yeah, like there's, there's no rules here. If the goal, though, is to grow the channel faster, like travis said, you gotta, you gotta have something there has to be some reoccurring theme, a variable that is just people know what, what you're gonna do absolutely, and they have to know what they're coming back for yeah, uh maybe, maybe it is arm wrestling segment, who knows?

Speaker 1:

I feel like I need to arm wrestle you now, but I'm not going to.

Speaker 2:

I don't know where we would arm wrestle. I have zero idea. You're hungry and weak, though I am very weak right now.

Speaker 1:

And you know I keep thinking about so when we came in down the street from this place is a place called it's like Burger and Seafood and we, about this walk and I'm like, anytime you have two wildly different foods, that restaurant doesn't do either one of them very well, like it's impossible we're both amazing because, like you'll see, like a teriyaki place with like steak and I'm like no, I don't know, it's not a seafood burger that's that's. This is not the underwater with.

Speaker 1:

Spongebob Squarepants, salmon cakes or something you're just trying to make me throw up here and now, aren't you? You just really want it to happen here on camera.

Speaker 2:

Like we've made crab cakes and we put them on burgers.

Speaker 1:

That is a Krabby Patty, that's Spongebob and Wendy's Is that?

Speaker 2:

actually a Krabby.

Speaker 1:

Patty Kind of, but did you ever?

Speaker 2:

have a Krabby Patty. Wait, is there a defined recipe for a Krabby Patty? There is.

Speaker 1:

And here's the funny thing. So Wendy's did a special a couple months back where they were selling Krabby Patties. All right, Now for those who don't know, spongebob SquarePants right.

Speaker 2:

It's a great show and you're supposed to put it on in a specific order.

Speaker 1:

Oh, this is like a big match. It's a real thing. Yeah, and I guess they weren't actually putting it in. You hear my something? Now? I think they were actually putting it in the wrong order and people, some people were getting livid about this because you know, hardcore Spongebob, squarepants people, I will be honest, and I ate it, and it was just a burger, but for some reason I really liked it. I kept buying, I couldn't stop buying.

Speaker 2:

If they had it in the proper order, it would probably taste better.

Speaker 1:

Maybe here's the thing I don't normally eat raw onions on burgers.

Speaker 2:

Okay, but I liked it. Burgers okay, but I I like patty. The crappy patty was different. Do you know how the order was wrong?

Speaker 1:

I'm not that much of a nerd, but it was. It was different. I remember reading about it.

Speaker 2:

I could tell you the order of a big mac, because I have a christmas ornament bro, I love things, do it do you want me to sing the song, please.

Speaker 1:

Big mac filet fish quarter better.

Speaker 2:

No to all the patty special sauce, lettuce cheese, pickles, onions on a sesame seed bun yes.

Speaker 1:

Yes.

Speaker 2:

You deserve a break today at McDonald's. Let's go.

Speaker 1:

What is going on?

Speaker 2:

You pulled the-.

Speaker 1:

Does that happen when you pull the thing you pulled?

Speaker 2:

the string on the Big Mac. It's literally a Christmas ornament that goes on my family tree to this day, but why? I have no idea.

Speaker 1:

Where did they get it from? I literally couldn't tell you. This has been like in my family forever and everybody knows the words like never forget. Okay, so you may not remember this because you maybe I hope you were born by things. It makes you feel real old, but many a year ago mcdonald's had a oh, now I'm really gonna do myself here.

Speaker 2:

I just realized how are you aging yourself?

Speaker 1:

I'm in the middle of saying this and I'm like holy crap, when you would buy a sandwich, they were giving away like a million dollars and the way that they were, you would find out if they were, you're going to win. It is. There was this song and it went through the entire mcdonald's menu. If the song completed, that was the thing. That's how you knew you won. The song was a record, but it wasn't a real record. It was like on a, like a plastic thing that they gave you with your meal and you had to put it on a record player and listen to it. And if they sang the song all the way through, you won like a million dollars, but always it would end like like they get halfway through how much mcdonald's I would buy I literally I went hard in monopoly when that was oh, my god, I'm competitive, though, like I can't like monopoly ruins lives, we know this.

Speaker 2:

It ruins families I'm very competitive for monopoly in general like monopoly is terrible and you want to take his mcdonald's like I will destroy monopoly is a hate crime I win monopoly, so what's there to be mad about?

Speaker 1:

I, I would definitely would never be friends.

Speaker 2:

I think we would stop being friends, it's funny because I can't play any other game, though like any other game, I'm your worst nightmare person. We're like janet, your turn. Oh my god, where's janet's her turn? Like I'm that person, but like monopoly you're on it, I'm locked in well.

Speaker 1:

Speaking of which, why don't we play a quick game?

Speaker 2:

we have a couple minutes, let's do a couple rounds all right do?

Speaker 1:

we want the bell yes, just because randomly here give me the bell, let me be in charge of the bell, you be the bell. Because you know that's going to go well.

Speaker 2:

Well, I feel like I need to hit the bell, so here we have random words from a card game.

Speaker 1:

And where did the card game come from? Jen, I borrowed it. You borrowed it from where?

Speaker 2:

I borrowed it from my hotel room, Okay all right, just checking. I will return.

Speaker 1:

Which is going to be an odd situation, because you can't get back in your room. You've already checked out.

Speaker 2:

I'm going to just bring it to the front desk and be like, oh my gosh, I found this outside. Hey, that's fair, does?

Speaker 1:

anyone want it? Does anyone want it?

Speaker 2:

Yes, okay, so these are just random words and we're going to see who can come up with the better YouTube title using the random drawn word.

Speaker 1:

Okay.

Speaker 2:

Do you want to?

Speaker 1:

pick first what are you? A magician? Now I am.

Speaker 2:

I'm really allowing you to. So are we going to ding when we have?

Speaker 1:

it. This is so fun.

Speaker 2:

Or who's the better. Well, you already cheated, I already looked at it. So how are we doing this? You already cheated.

Speaker 1:

Well, take a look at it. Look at the word. I think it's funny, because we burrito okay, we'll do a test one burrito.

Speaker 2:

So what would your title be?

Speaker 1:

uh, six amazing ways to cook a burrito in under five minutes okay all right, what would yours be?

Speaker 2:

I mean a burrito two times the size of chipotle.

Speaker 1:

Here's how you might have won that one. Okay, okay, I'll give you that point. All right, what's the next? You were crushing them.

Speaker 2:

before in the test I was, but I'm so hungry I can barely think straight.

Speaker 1:

But okay, all right, diaper, diaper. Okay, go first, go first. You got to think. You don't have enough time to think.

Speaker 2:

I stopped using these diapers for this reason impossible to beat.

Speaker 1:

That I can't. There's no way I can beat that. You stopped using these diapers for this reason, I don't know. I was wearing the diapers when I stopped using them. I can't beat. I literally cannot beat that and I think I'm pretty okay. I'm funny. I cannot beat that how I don't know the hard thing about this.

Speaker 2:

like you have to come up with the title so fast, damn.

Speaker 1:

Hair.

Speaker 2:

Hair.

Speaker 1:

This is how I lost all my hair. I mean, that's easy, right, you're not beating that that's an old man. All right, that's an easy one. Next one that's an old man. You're delirious.

Speaker 2:

Oh my gosh Chicken Chicken.

Speaker 1:

How this chicken lost its hair. Oh my gosh.

Speaker 2:

Chicken, chicken. How this chicken?

Speaker 1:

lost its hair. Oh, okay.

Speaker 2:

That's a callback. Have you seen those hairy chickens? No, that's a story structure and a half though those are some hairy chickens.

Speaker 1:

You've seen those exotic chickens with like all the that's fur no, Not fur it's still feathers, but it looks like hair.

Speaker 2:

I was going to say raising chickens in my backyard for the first time.

Speaker 1:

But don't you already do you, really do it?

Speaker 2:

you don't have I lived on a farm does that count, my backyard?

Speaker 1:

why chicken tastes great. All right, you want that one. Okay, real quick.

Speaker 2:

Let's see this I feel like I had a little extra time to think about it picnic.

Speaker 1:

I wish I was on a picnic because I'm hungry. I'm really so freaking hungry. I want a picnic basket right now. I want, want a picnic. This is a big waste of time, but I love it, do it again.

Speaker 2:

Do another one. Five weird things I put in my picnic basket.

Speaker 1:

Why, Jen? Why are you doing this to yourself?

Speaker 2:

I'm getting all the clicks today.

Speaker 1:

This podcast is a dumpster fire. We got a dumpster Dumpster fire.

Speaker 2:

One more.

Speaker 1:

That's amazing, okay, I think I obviously won that one. All right, last Jeans, that's almost.

Speaker 2:

Let's do another one, that's a tough one because I'm like the only thing I can think of is like five jeans you should buy.

Speaker 1:

No, I feel like I'll end up in HR if I try to come up with something so all right, here we go. Last one, leprechaun.

Speaker 2:

Leprechaun. That time I found a leprechaun under the bridge.

Speaker 1:

That time. It was only the one time, though. Right, what's your leprechaun title? It would be. Why are they always after me? Lucky charms, that's good. The leprechaun story.

Speaker 2:

There's leprechaun on the thumbnail, we'll give you that.

Speaker 1:

Oh, my God.

Speaker 2:

I'll have to put one in. Oh, that's funny. Okay, look.

Speaker 1:

Okay, this has been this has been an episode, it's been a thing and, uh, I can't thank you enough for coming all the way up to seattle to come see me again and have a great episode we had another episode before this, so good we're gonna do it again. Try to do a lot more of these many more to come and if you want to interact with us, uh, get on discord, because we're recording one time a month through Discord, talking to people just like you.

Speaker 2:

You got to stay in the know also.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, stay in the know.

Speaker 2:

The know is no, just say no.

Speaker 1:

Just say no to chicken. No means no.

Speaker 2:

Let's go get Travis some food and peeps, all right.

Speaker 1:

Anyway, thank you for joining us. Of course, leave us five stars. If you're on the Apple Podcast, hit that subscribe button.