- A common question that a lot of people ask
is like hey I wanna reach a million subscribers
like Evan, but should I put a lot of time
into making just a few videos
or is it better to just crank out a ton of videos?
And today Evan's gonna talk with you about that
and how that impacted his growth
towards one million plus subscribers.
Hey guys, my name is Tim Schmoyer
and this is episode number two of how Evan
got to one million subscribers hearing all his tactics
and tricks and behind the scenes of what he did to grow
so that you guys can steal that information
and do it on your channel.
Go back and watch video number one
that you'll see pop up around here if you haven't already.
But Evan, one of the things that you did
is you focused on, you just publicized a ton of videos.
I think at one time you were doing like three videos a day.
- Yes. - Right?
So tell us about that strategy on your channel.
- So I'm a big believer first that the quantity
leads to the quality.
That when you start anything, it won't be very good
and the more you do it the better
that you're gonna get at it.
So if you're only making one video a month,
it's gonna be hard for you to get really good
at that thing.
Like if you only tried to tie your shoelace
once a month, you'd probably never learn
how to tie your shoelace.
So like any skill, you have to put in the work
to get really good at something.
What I want people to do is think about
how can I go daily and that might be really scary,
that might be like too crazy.
It doesn't mean it has to happen right now.
I mean, for me to make one video at the very start
took me two days just on camera,
just doing it again and doing it again
and just being totally embarrassed.
And now I could pop out the videos
because I've done five 6,000 videos.
So the more you do it the better you'll get.
So don't think oh my gosh this takes me a week
to make one video, how am I gonna go daily?
The more you do it the faster it's gonna become.
So it's just having a plan for how can you get
to daily content.
When I went from one video a week to one video a day
is when I started seeing my first big jump.
When I went from a video a day to two videos a day
I saw another big jump.
When I went from two to three.
- Subscribers or viewers or both?
- Everything. - Everything.
- Yeah, everything.
The most common way that I get traffic
is from my other videos.
So the more videos you have-- - Suggested videos?
- Yeah, suggested videos is the number one
source of traffic for my channel.
The start up wasn't.
The start is like search and people typing in
how do I raise venture capital or whatever.
But now people watch one video and then another
and another and another and YouTube continues
to recommend my videos down the side.
So the larger volume of data that you have,
assuming it's good.
Don't throw crap against the wall
just because you wanna go daily.
- A ton of crap means no viewers.
- Yeah, it's not gonna work.
But I would say, if I could do eight videos a day quality,
I would do it.
'Cause this is not a show, it's a channel.
You guys have YouTube channels.
So each individual episode might be a show.
So at the top 10 rules of success, that's a show
on my channel.
Now it's how can you come up with different shows
for your channel?
I wanna be like CNN or I wish 24 hours a day
there's new content coming out on my channel.
I just haven't figured out how to produce
enough quality content so that I could
put my name on it to say I'm proud of these eight videos
that I launched today.
But that's the roadmap.
- So to do that you're gonna need, eventually,
a team of people, you're gonna need to have
like different series of content
and like think they're just generating ideas for you
on a good basis.
I think what happens when you do that,
one is you start learning the process,
'cause you're creating a lot and so you get more efficient
and you get better at throwing out content.
Two, there's more videos that could potentially
get discovered from different things
and bring people into your channel.
Three, the suggested video traffic can go up.
Four, people just probably start learning
I can go back to Evan's channel anytime I want
and there's just gonna be something new.
Like it's just an easy part of whatever they're rhythm in.
Yeah, like they don't have to think of certain days
in the week and schedules and like (gasping)
they just know, Evan's always got something new there.
- So let me give some hacks on how to do it
'cause I think a lot of people who are watching
are like how do I get the daily content?
That sounds crazy.
First off, recognize that there's a lot of time spent
on setup and tear down.
And not just the gear, setting up in the lights
and like we're mic'd up and it took Tim
a good amount of time to set this up.
We're in a new space.
But once you set it up, you can go.
- Just leave it.
- Just leave it up, but it's also the mindset.
Like we're in video mode.
We wanna film.
I wanna make another one.
Like it's easy to stay in that mode
where it might be hard to get into that mode.
Like if you're coming from doing something else,
you're coming from work, you're coming from family,
you're coming from other situations,
it can be hard to like, it might take you half an hour
to get into okay come on, I'm trying to make
a good video here.
But once you're in it, it's easier to stay in it.
So what I try to do is encourage people to block off
big chunks of time.
So take that time that you're spending,
that's maybe two hours doing one video
and try to stretch it to three.
You might be able to just double the amount of content
that you put into it 'cause of the setup and take down cost.
I would also say as a test, instead of thinking daily now,
just think how could I double.
How can I take whatever my output is right now
and how do I double it in the next three months?
That might be an easier goal for some people
to get started.
So if you're making one a week, how do you to two a week
in the next three months?
It's a simple goal.
Ultimately, I want you thinking daily
or even like twice a day, even three times a day.
But how do you go and double it
within the next three months?
- So the goal here is to increase the amount of videos
that you're publishing, but also,
and maybe more importantly, to learn how
to make better videos because of the continual practice.
- And watch your videos back.
Whatever you just put up, it might be really embarrassing.
For me, it was 350 videos before I wasn't
completely embarrassed by my own content.
So watch your videos back and as you watch it
you'll be hard on yourself.
Use it as a kick forward though, not down.
Say okay, here's an opportunity for me to get better.
I don't like this.
I don't like how it started.
I don't like how I have this hair in my ear.
I don't like how, you know, whatever's happening.
I don't like the lighting.
How I stuttered there.
Great, that's learning to make your next video better.
And if you're watching your own videos back
it's an easy way to look at how it can improve.
- And YouTube's analytics can tell you exactly
like how to improve the audience retention graphs
and give you exactly what you need to know
to make the next videos better.
There's a lot you can learn in there.
What would you say to the channels,
like an animation channel.
And it takes them a good solid six weeks
to make two minutes.
Or some of these videos that, like the creator series
that I'm doing, that I'm working on, is 10 episodes
and it takes like a month to produce one good line.
I'm traveling.
I'm hiring like production crews that come do this
and what would you say to those types of situations?
- I would say a couple options.
One, look at you do anything behind-the-scenes
when you talk about this animation
that you're about to be coming up with
and show some sneak peeks, or tell me
about the story behind it?
Why'd you pick this character and that character?
What's the theme that's coming up?
Even maybe engage your audience.
Say hey, should they do this or that?
What theme do you like better?
How do you want the ending?
Like if you engage your audience
and it builds anticipation for the next thing.
- Q and A videos.
Live streams.
A lots of community-based stuff.
- I'd also look at can you involve other people
through the process either to help you with your animation
or to get other animators to create their versions
for your channel and you build this network?
Maybe it'd even involve you taking over
another animator's channel, like you closed on that channel,
you build up your own platform.
So just being creative.
I think as soon as you accept the question,
I think YouTube creators are super creative.
Like that's what we do.
We come up with creative videos.
We're artists.
As soon as you accept the question of how do I get
to a video a day, and you believe in that question
as opposed to how am I gonna get to a video a day?
Versus how do I get to a video a day?
As soon as you accept that shift,
your brain will start to come up with answers.
- You can even consider like making it really short,
like vine, which is only six seconds.
And a lot of people found success with that.
And there are successful YouTube channels
where the videos are maximum nine seconds long
and they just bank on session time,
but they tell a story in about five seconds
and then there's four seconds of end screen.
I'm not saying that's a solution for everyone,
but I think that's a creative, like we were saying,
just like think creatively.
- One other quick hack,
not for the animation side necessarily, but maybe
is using your old content again.
So mixing in old content. - Compilations and such.
- Compilations, mashups.
Super helpful, super important.
I think of, for example, Pure Fitness Channel
and you're doing mostly workout videos,
but every now and then you talked about your recipes
or your smoothies.
You could make a compilation of all the times
you talked about smoothies or recipes
and that becomes this super video
just talking about smoothies or recipes.
So I think a great test is to go look
at any of the previews that you loved.
Go look at Tim's channel.
Go look at the first video, it's pretty embarrassing.
- It's actually not that bad for an iPhone video shot
in my basement in the dark.
(laughing)
I got started right here.
- So there's like there's the gear, there's the tools
that you used, but then it's also you on camera
and how much you've grown in comfort level
being on the camera versus like okay, I'm making a video.
I keep up my old videos even though
I'm totally embarrassed by them
because it shows a journey.
So you might be looking at Tim or me
or any of your favorite YouTubbers
and say wow look at how good they are.
Just go back to their early days
and look at their first videos and you'll see how much
they sucked at the beginning too
and use that as some inspiration for you to know
that hey if I just keep at this, if I keep going,
then I can get better too.
- When you create content on an ongoing basis
like this though, you just don't wanna
keep doing it blindly.
You need to evaluate what you're doing
and Evan has a few tactics that really helped him
get to a million subscribers of how he evaluated
what he was doing on his channel
and he's gonna share those with you
coming up in episode number three.
So you click that on your screen and go click that video
and we'll see you guys over there.