- So, I've been on YouTube since September of 2014,
and during that time I've made over 500 videos
for my channel, and another channel,
and collaborations and things like that.
I've turned YouTube into a full-time thing,
like, this is what I do, and everything that I do,
everything else that I do, revolves around what it is
that I do on my YouTube channel.
I've met and gotten to know personally
tons of amazing content creators
of all different channel sizes.
And even my brother who, to be honest,
I was concerned about him even seeing
my videos in the first place, now has a YouTube channel,
now works with me all the time
on what it is that I do here on YouTube.
But all of that only became possible because of one video.
When I first started out on YouTube,
the very first video that I uploaded,
I almost didn't even upload it to the platform.
What we're gonna do today is, I'm actually going to react
to my very first video that I ever put up on YouTube,
and I'm gonna talk about some of the things
that I was talking about in this video,
and why I said certain things,
and some of the things that I did incorrectly,
or things that I was self-conscious about
when making this particular video.
And the reason I'm doing this is because
if you are a content creator
that's been putting out videos for a long time,
you are just gonna probably get a kick out of this.
But if you are somebody that is looking at YouTube,
and you're like, hey, I want to do this,
but I just don't know if I can?
Or, what if somebody thinks something bad?
Or whatever it happens to be,
I just want to show you this particular video
and basically show you the progression that has taken place
and just let you know that all kinds of amazing things
are possible if you can just push yourself to get over
whatever barrier it happens to be,
to do YouTube or any other massive change in your life.
So, I'm gonna react to that first video,
and we're starting right now.
Okay, so here we go.
(mellow techno music)
I'm gonna help you break through your camera shyness
once and for all, so that you can be comfortable
putting yourself in videos, starting right now.
So, as you can see there, that starting-right-now thing,
like, that's just been a thing since the beginning.
And I'll be honest, that was not planned.
It just ended up coming together,
and it sounded good when I was writing the script
and I was thinking to myself,
how am I gonna work this stuff out?
It just sounded good, so I was like,
yeah, this sounds good, let's go ahead and run with that.
And then it actually turned into a thing later
and then, in addition to it turning into a thing,
it actually evolved into a core belief within myself,
and something that I try to inspire other people to do.
So, it's just crazy how that ended up coming full circle,
but just wanted to mention that.
Showing yourself in online videos
can be extremely intimidating,
because, well, you're putting yourself on the Internet.
(laughing)
So, right there, just as an example, I'm like, because,
well, you're putting yourself on the Internet, right?
And that was scripted, right?
This is 1000% a scripted piece of content,
like, literally everything that I say in this video
is written down, and I might even mention it in here,
but everything that I say is written down,
and I literally would just look off-screen,
and I would look at my computer and see the little phrase
that I had to say, and then I would come back,
look at the camera, and then say it.
Even the little pauses and things like that.
Bizarre.
On the Internet, for every handful of cool people
that you connect with, there's gonna be somebody else
that's gonna give you a hard time.
That part is inevitable.
For everything else, here are some things to keep in mind.
Everywhere we look, we see other people.
Not bad on the video editing side, right?
Videos on the Internet, everywhere.
To everybody else, you are just one of those people.
A character in the background of their lives.
No one is trying to decide if you look like an idiot or not.
We do that part to ourselves.
Now that's true, but one thing I also want to bring
to your attention in this is,
basically, in this video I'm saying, like,
oh, well, you don't want to worry about what people think,
but the funny thing is, is during this video,
if you look at my face, I have foundation,
I have concealer.
Because of the saturation thing,
my lips are more red than I would like to prefer.
But I've got concealer on my face, I've got foundation.
And basically, I'm just trying to hide
the humanness of myself.
And I thought, hey, news people do this,
so maybe I should do this, too,
if I'm making YouTube videos,
just 'cause I didn't know at the time.
And I know some people still do that, and that's fine,
it's a personal choice.
But to me, I was doing it because I was like,
oh, I want people to think the best of me possible.
Wearing a collared shirt for that particular video,
same exact thing.
I was thinking to myself, like, hey, I should wear something
a little bit respectable for this.
In reality, I'm like a T-shirt type of guy,
or a hoodie type of guy.
But I'll occasionally wear button-ups and things like that.
But for the most part, I don't wear stuff
like what you see in the video right now.
I'd be willing to bet that most people
who are gonna be watching your videos
aren't even gonna be thinking about you.
Because they're watching your content to be entertained
or educated, not to judge you as a person.
Even if they did, you wouldn't know it unless they left
a comment, and you can delete comments.
If you're uncomfortable hearing or seeing yourself on video,
trust me, you're gonna get used to it.
After you edit a handful of videos starring yourself,
you're gonna be so used to hearing
and seeing yourself on video--
Now, here's the thing, this is legit.
So, basically, before I made this video
I actually made a handful of other videos
and I put those videos together, as well,
because I was like, let's just make some videos
and get some in the can, and all that stuff.
I actually had, when this video was published,
I actually had 10 videos ready to go into the future.
But I actually got into a motorbike accident
and broke the hard drive, and when the hard drive broke,
unfortunately, I lost all 10 of those videos,
and had to basically start at scratch again,
which kind of sucked.
But this came from just editing videos,
getting ready for doing the channel.
That you're gonna forget
that you're editing videos of yourself.
You can also use B-roll, or other elements
to take yourself out of the video.
Not bad on the editing side, though, looking back.
Or if you do something else that you're unhappy with.
If you're worried about sounding like an idiot
because of the things that you're saying,
all you have to do is write a script.
And then you're gonna sound like a genius.
With a script, you can revise it until you're happy with it.
And remember, you can do this as many times as you like,
until you get it right.
Writing a script for a video is not difficult at all.
But if you don't know where to start,
I've put together a template for you
that you can get down in the description.
Okay, so here's the thing with that is,
when I first started my YouTube channel,
originally, I was just trying to get email addresses,
because I heard that YouTube is a great way
to get email addresses.
I didn't see the bigger picture.
And because of that, you see in this very first video
I had an opt-in.
Like, hey, I'm trying to get something to people,
so they can opt-in to my email,
and then I can start sending emails to them
on a regular basis, helping them with YouTube, or video,
or just general marketing stuff.
I hadn't even fully figured that part of it out, yet.
Somebody that you know seeing your videos
and thinking that you're an idiot, well,
the reality is, they're gonna see the videos,
and you might be an idiot.
But if you've watched--
See, and here's the thing with that,
I'm sitting there and I'm playing around, I'm like,
well, maybe you are an idiot, right, just joking around.
But the funny thing with that that wasn't funny,
is that I was trying to be funny and it wasn't,
and I think that that was, in part,
because of the scripting.
It wasn't something I just came out with,
and I'm like, hey, blah blah blah,
and communicated it in the way that I normally communicate.
It was more of a, this is going to be something that people
might find funny, so I gotta work this joke in here,
and try to make it sound funny.
And I just sucked, right?
I just couldn't do it.
And you can also hear, in this particular video
that we're watching, you can also hear,
in terms of my voice,
and just how flat my voice is, through this.
And the reason for that is because
while I was going through this, I'm sitting there
in my head and I'm trying to communicate what it is
that I remembered from just reading,
instead of just communicating how I communicate.
And plus, I didn't have the practice.
This is my first video that I put up here.
Technically, it's in the top 10
of the first videos I've made.
But it was the first one that I actually published
to the channel, and I just wasn't good yet,
I wasn't comfortable yet.
And I think that that's where a lot of communicating
how you communicate comes in is that initial part of, like,
hey, I'm just trying to figure out
how to do all this stuff, and then, once you do do that,
then you slide into a place to where
you're a little bit more comfortable.
This much of a video about how to get over
your camera shyness, I'm gonna guess
that you really wanna make videos.
You just have to decide if what you wanna do
with your time and your business is more important
than the opinions that those people
that you're worried about seeing the video might have.
When it's all said and done,
the worst thing that's gonna happen
is a few people that are close to you
are gonna give you a hard time,
and that's only gonna be for a short period of time.
Then, before you know it,
making videos is just gonna be something that you do,
and nobody's gonna care anymore, not even you,
because everybody's gonna be used to it.
If making videos is something--
Okay, now that was something that I just thought through.
And I was thinking, like, okay, well,
basically this process, if I'm afraid of uploading videos
to YouTube, when I first start uploading videos, sure,
if people find out about it, sure, they're gonna give me
a hard time, it's gonna suck, and I really don't want that.
But, as a worst-case scenario,
as long as I do all the things right,
and I go through the process of learning how to actually
do this stuff, and I start doing it in a way
that starts getting results,
then there's a really good chance
that eventually nobody's gonna care
because I'll be the video guy,
I'll be the person that makes videos instead of,
oh, hey, good luck with your YouTube channel.
'Cause that's how it starts.
It starts with, oh, yeah, you have a YouTube channel?
Great, until you start doing well, and then it's like,
oh, that's awesome that you have a YouTube channel.
So, with that, that was also legit in terms of,
when you are first starting out on YouTube,
you have that, what if people don't like this?
But eventually, once you just keep doing it,
you just become that person that has a YouTube channel
around what it is that you do.
Thing you really wanna do,
the fun that you're gonna have sharing yourself
and your knowledge with the world is gonna far outweigh
the worries that you're having now.
Here's what I want you to do.
A little personal challenge for you.
As soon as this video is over,
I want you to set up your phone,
or set up your video camera,
and make a video about something.
It doesn't matter what the video's about.
If you wanna make skit videos,
then practice your jokes on camera
or go ahead and make a skit video.
That's funny, that I say practice your jokes on camera,
when I was horrible at making jokes on camera.
Wanna make a vlog, grab your camera
and make your first vlog.
If you want to make videos like this,
then turn on your camera and start practicing.
Remember, it doesn't have to go online right now,
and it doesn't even matter if it's good or not.
What's important is that you get in front of the camera
and you start practicing
so that you're comfortable being on video.
If you're at work, or somewhere that it's truly impossible
to start making a video,
then you can practice writing scripts.
If you don't know where to start on that,
you can download my template in the description.
The reason for doing this--
So, another thing that I wannna bring to your attention,
too, here is in terms of the editing.
So, if you notice, in terms of my pacing,
when I am communicating here,
and again, this comes down to the scripting,
and trying to communicate things that way,
you'll notice tons of space
in between how I'm saying things.
And it's not strategically placed.
It just wasn't taken out in the edit.
Is to get your ideas flowing.
And if you really wanna make videos, as cliche as it sounds,
there's no better time to start than right now.
As a matter of fact, if you don't start putting stuff
together for your videos--
If only I knew at that time how powerful that is,
and how powerful that start-right-now thing would become,
and how awesome that would be, and on brand,
and all that good stuff.
If only I knew that at the time, imagine.
Imagine how different I would have done this video,
and how differently I would have presented in this video,
if I would've came into it with the confidence
of knowing that, right?
Which, of course, there's no way to know that.
But one thing that you'll hear me saying in some videos is,
it's important to own the position that you're in
and try to think things through and all of that.
And part of that is from looking at these old videos.
When I was making this video,
I knew that I was gonna turn this into something,
I just didn't know what yet.
I was like, if I'm gonna do this,
I'm gonna try to make it work.
Within that, I didn't know how far it would actually go.
Video now, there's a really good chance
that you're not ever gonna make any.
So, now is the time.
Get out your phone or video camera
and create a video that you've been wanting to make.
Not bad on the edit, though.
Don't wait one more second.
Pause this video and do it right now.
(dramatic music)
So think about that.
Okay, so basically, in terms of audience retention,
I just said, "Pause this video and do it right now."
Which, nowadays, I would never say something like that,
just for the risk involved in terms of people just being,
like, okay, well, I'm outta here,
and then they end up just killing the retention
on that video.
Granted, it's later in the video, and it didn't actually,
it wasn't a huge detriment to the audience retention.
But that's something that I would never ever do now,
because I understand now how important it is
to keep people watching videos.
And then I literally just paused it.
Congratulations.
Now you should repeat that--
Another thing that's funny is that I actually expected,
in my brain, I thought, and there might have been,
I don't know, but in my brain I thought,
okay, I'm gonna pause this here,
and then tell people to go make a video,
and then come back to it.
So, I was trying to be motivational in a way,
and trying to encourage people to go and start whatever
it was that they were gonna do in their video content.
But I did it in an inappropriate way.
Every single day, until you're comfortable enough
to put your videos online.
Now, I have something special for you.
If you put your first video up on YouTube,
I'm gonna give you my YouTube graphics kit for free.
Which, by the way, is not available anymore.
But that was my first thing for Internet marketing.
It was called a YouTube Graphics Tool Kit,
and with this thing, it was basically
like a thumbnail builder and a channel art builder.
It was just tons and tons and tons of templates
that were customizable, and you could go in
and you could make your own stuff out of it.
It was really cool.
It did well, for the very first product.
I normally sell these kits for 20 bucks each online,
but I wanna reward you for having the courage
to get over your camera shyness and put your videos online.
All you have to do is post a link to your video
down in the comments.
As soon as I see it, I'm gonna contact you here on YouTube
and send you a link to download your kit.
Don't forget to hit that subscribe button down below.
I've got a 35-second in-screen on this,
but this is old-school YouTube.
This is old-school YouTube where you could actually
draw a box around this, an annotation box,
and this would become linkable.
You would do it around the subscribe button,
you would do it around the actual video itself.
And it you have any questions
about making your first video,
feel free to leave them down in the comments.
See you next time.
And one more thing.
Remember my script template is down
in the description if you need it.
So, all the way around, you can see the huge difference
that's taken place if you're a regular subscriber,
if this isn't your first time watching my content.
You can see the huge difference that's taken place
since that time.
Now, some people are gonna watch that,
and they're gonna be, like, wow,
I actually liked your presentation style better then,
but the thing is with that, is that's not me.
Right, that's not the authentic version of myself.
That's not just how I communicate in general.
So because of that, it's a big disconnect
from who I actually am, and I wasn't being myself.
Now, the funny thing is, when I actually went off of script
and I started making videos using bullet points only,
to where that allowed me to communicate in the way
that I communicate anyway, then what happened is,
people started responding more.
And Brian G. Johnson, I'll put a link to his channel
at the top of the screen right now.
When I published that first one,
Brian G. Johnson hit me up and he was like,
"Dude whatever you just did in this video,
"you're on to something."
And he noticed and identified right away
that style of presenting was a better fit for me.
Of course I realized it, too, after I did it a few times.
But it's one of those things that where,
unless you experiment, hey, I'm doing scripts now,
maybe I should try bullet points.
Or, hey, I'm doing bullet points,
maybe I should try scripts.
Unless you experiment with different things on your channel,
and how you're making your content, you'll never know.
To learn about YouTube, how to grow your channel,
make videos, and all types of other YouTube-related stuff,
make sure you subscribe and click the bell
so you don't miss any videos.
Thank you so much for watching.
I'll see you next time.