7 Things I Wish I Knew When I Started YouTube
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 1 มิ.ย. 2024
- Some myths I wish I knew when I started creating content over a decade ago.
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Ouch, 36 is not old. At 63 I do not consider myself old. Old will be when I no longer thrive at life.
Fair! My point was on TH-cam that's relatively old / long time to be doing content
@@kevinmespiritu you may "feel" old compared to the young up and comers, but there are a lot of youtubers like myself that wonder what you therefore consider us. If you are an old youtuber at the age of 36, what am I as a youtuber at the age of 63?
This is no different than what 30 somethings have always felt like in any industry. Yet it is only a feeling, not a reality.
Just my thoughts.
How easy/hard you think something is depends on how informed you are, not age.
@@JimboVikingo Yep, but there are bands of common threads that group around age
@@EvelynM-vlogs I would counter that your feels are just that as well - feelings :)
As another old man at 37 I can remember when TH-cam didn’t have ads. It was awesome
Nothing is free
TH-cam premium is soooooooooooo worth it
Great advice, Kevin. You are right that the truth of being a successful creator is to recognize it's not easy, it is a job, and it takes a lot of time to gain the proper skills. Age is relative and often irrelevant. Even old guys like me can feel young as I do well on TH-cam and enjoy it all.
You crush it Scott! Big fan.
Scott and Kevin in one place? That's a lot of gardening power.
@@erukaseveni know right!!!
Wonderful advice and food for thought, definitely taking some notes!
43 here and just quit my job to pursue TH-cam full time 😭 “Pretty good at” haha love that. Thanks for the solid advice!
Congrats! Crush it
I seriously dream of making a specific course on creating content when you're targeting people who live on their own, instead of another tutorial on cornering the massive 13 yr old market.
Seriously love how you teach and explain things, thank you for making this channel. Love how real you are, learning a lot from you about being a content creator.
Love to hear it
I just started making content at 38. Honestly, part of me wishes I had started earlier so I could be ahead of the game, but another part knows that I wouldn't have had the knowledge or the emotional maturity to deal with everything that comes along with being in the public eye. I think there's a lot of call out there for people who have actually lived life, know things and have done things. You just have a perspective that someone in their teens or twenties could never have
Wow. I could have written your comment! I was just having a conversation with my husband on this topic, verbally kicking myself for not starting sooner, but then I would have publicized the stupid stuff I was doing at 24 which probably wouldn’t bode well for me now… so trying to be grateful for doing ok on here at 34! 🙏🏼
Yeah, I probably would have been in therapy from people's comments 😉
Yeah totally agree - I'd love to see wise experienced folks crush youtube
This is incredibly helpful and encouraging! I've been working on my channel for 2.5 years and just taking little steps to continually improve to hopefully create a stream of income for our homestead! Thank you Kevin!
You got this!
Your honesty is not only rare, but it's also helpful. So thank you. 😊
Glad to hear
"..at least pretty good.." lol
So humble!
Gotta stay low to the ground baby
As a fellow ancient 36 year old, I’m loving this content! I feel both young and old enough to finally start my own business and TH-cam/online career. I’m still learning, as we all should, but I have enough experience in my “fields” as well. (Farmer/gardener/writer/houseplant enthusiast & soon to be TH-camr)
Love to hear it - best of luck
At 33 starting to do gardening/allotment TH-cam this helps alot. There was so much more to think about than record and post
Love these videos. Thanks for sharing. Feels like free mentorship from one of the TH-cam greats.
Glad you enjoy it
Great stuff man. Although I’m no Contant creator, I am in sales and this makes lots of sense. Some of the things you say remind me of my favorite human on this planet Tony Robbins.
He's got some good material!
The 3 year slog is worth sticking out, and a lot of people do not
Agree
Kevin over here giving great advice looking like Superman 🦸♂️
Clark Kent out hurr
You are fortunate, you have a great demeanor, voice, and you are able to give clear messages. Sone creators make you cringe to watch them.
All work in progress!
And he’s very good-looking! That helps 😂
@@nikkireigns Too kind ;)
I see two main modes of growth on TH-cam. One is from cultivating a loyal following and that usually entails frequent uploads. More and more I find this model less effective to channels as creators overestimate how interesting their lives really are. The other is punctual but extremely enjoyable content that is produced for a wider audience in mind having your base audience only as a springboard. This seems to be the preferred type by the algorithm. I call these these videos the engines of growth and even channels that rely on the first approach needs these engines here and there otherwise the momentum drops. Rare is a channel that can sustain a constant viewership around 100k without often releasing these “engine” videos.
By the way Kevin, I think your greatest talent as a communicator is your power of synthesis into plain language.
Yeah tend to agree, most people can't carry a lifestyle / frequent upload cadence. I personally struggle with that on our Epic Homesteading channel myself. Better at the evergreen educational / growth oriented ones. Appreciate the kind words dude.
We are 54 and are content creators. Our kids are not sure they like the influencer life. We raised them in Silicon Valley.They are liking the flexibility of working wherever. We started in person and took it online in 2017 with courses, TH-cam and Facebook. We are in all the places now.
Love to hear it!
Great Vid Kevin. Agree with all of these points.
Appreciate Brian - big fan
Proper proper advice, thank you. All taken on board 👍
As a small Gen Alfa / gen Z content creator TH-cam is not easy if u actually want to grow
This is a great vid and lots of great info for new creators!
Thanks dude - good to see you here!
Thanks for putting these out. I am learning a lot.
Glad to hear it
I like this hairstyle💚
🫡
Great info! love your growing videos too, "Cultivating kindness one seed at a time" Aloha and have a bless day sir.
Thanks! You too
I love this channel! I love listening to you share your knowledge! Longtime watcher and Customer of Epic Gardening xoxo thank you!
So nice of you!
37 year old here, commenting from my grave. I think one of the big things that goes with diversifying with platforms and products is the control it gives you. If your main product is a channel, even a successful one, could get hacked, banned or possibly even just pushed out by the ever changing algorithm. We have even witnessed platforms die off like Vine that many of those creators never recovered from.
Completely agree
Hey thanks so much for including the bits about sponsorships. :) The rest is also very helpful.
No problem!
Excellent advice. The "funnel" talk was very enlightening. You have done very well with using the funnel to promote your Birdies beds, seed company, etc. A lot of folks think they are going to make a fortune with ad revenue on TH-cam not realizing the true money is in the businesses you create. I have been watching your channels for a long time and it has been great watching you grow and branch out in so many ways. It's inspiring.
Glad it was helpful :)
Would love a video on practical ideas for more examples of monetizing your TH-cam channel especially for small channels. We’re almost at 2k subs and are 31 watch hours away from being monetized.
We own an online nursery and we ship Proven winners plants nationwide, but we only do that 5 months of the year. We have Greenstalks, power planters, and other “evergreen” products that ship year round along with merch but trying to learn more especially from bigger creators in the same niche (gardening).
Would love to see what you would do if you were looking to add different income streams to a newer channel.
I might do that - good idea!
@@kevinmespiritu that’d be amazing! I appreciate your great content!
My pet peeve is when people say “I’m a public figure” it just feels arrogant.
Fair!
Omg mentioning the old internet videos like charlie was a throwback. Anyone remember blacksheep flash animations site?
Shoot, yes!
Kevin! You're not in the garden?!? lol! It was so weird, this pulled up on my feed and I was like, that guys looks a little like Kevin, and then I saw the name. LOL!
Rare right?
You have to be a true fan to be here. ;-)
I'm 32, and just started my first season with a lot of help from yours and some other creators. Because of you, I got to eat potatoes I grew yesterday. You helped me grow, Kevin, thank you. 💚
No way - homegrown is so delicious :)
@@kevinmespiritu I have my first properly pollinated cucumber and I saw a tiger swallowtail butterfly the other day. I started in like, March? But I'm already sewing my own grow bags and taking classes to help me make feeding people something I could get by on.
@@kevinmespiritu Also, you're allowed to feel old. Your view is valid and idgaf what anyone else has to say against you accepting and voicing your feelings.
Good information Kevin! Thanks for sharing. I smiled at the old comment though - I understood what you meant but smiled because I am quite a bit older and started just a couple years ago...lol. It's been interesting for sure! lol. Good video!
Old in TH-cam creation, as in I've been doing it for a while!
@@kevinmespiritu I do understand...it just struck me as funny given my age and the few years I have been working at this. Thanks again.
Bro loved this video, I want to use TH-cam because I want to monetize the thing I'm already doing and love the platform and digital marketing. I agree with you that especially content creation is a skillset that lends itself to other business skills, especially in today's market.
I do paid ads as a media buying agency and so getting these skills will help me in my work.
Hope it helped!
Thanks for making these. A few times in life Ive had people exaggerate how perfect something was, as a result even though the reality was good I couldn't enjoy it. Only disappointed. Great to know what the full reality is.
Thank you for being so gracious with feedback. Sometime back, I gave some feedback about interrupting, and have felt a little bad about it. So am relieved to hear how you responded to it, from the initial reaction to the later reflection. I have learnt much from you for the past many years since subscribing to Epic Gardening. ❤ Thank you😊
You're not the only one to have done so LOL
@@kevinmespiritu😂❤😅❤
Haha being a TH-camr is definitely not an easy job! Content creation is such a fine art.
Agree!
HIGHLIGHT: gosh dang, the half-life concept of virality and how it has changed is WILD to think about....
Your voice really is quite soothing.
ASMR coming ;)
Rofl, are you serious? I was falling asleep to you last night, so back to actually hear words today. Lol. Could totally go for sleep meditations or something. @kevinmespiritu
@@GoingGreenMom LOL was a joke but...if there's a market...
Making gardening content has been a lot of fun. I can just pop out to the yard and make a video. I tried doing fishing 10 years ago and it was definitely less convenient having to get on a boat to make a video 😂.
My cousin had a fishing TH-cam - totally agree!
@@kevinmespiritu much more ready for it now than 10 years ago too 😂
Thanks Kevin., I’m a fan of your other channels as well and you’re inspiring. I’m considering starting a TH-cam channel, what would be biggest tip to get started? Can you make a video for how to get started
I may!
@@kevinmespiritu awesome! I also asked if you do 1:1 mentoring? Not sure where comment went..
@@growintogether627 I don't, no
Is that a peat moss living plant framed art thing? I always wonder.
Sphagnum moss!
Most don’t understand the grind. It takes a certain personality to continue the channel for years. I got so tired of it all. Easier to be retired and garden. lol Also, TH-cam & other platforms are not always reliable in their ad $$ distribution . I’ve seen them shut channels down for no good reason. It seems very subjective.
I haven't seen the shit downs but agree the money isn't great until you hit real scale
❤️ your behind the scenes on content -business. If “funnel” is the wrong analogy, what is a better one?
It's more like a chaotic web
@@kevinmespiritu soooo, funnel spider chaos?
@@kevinmespiritu four dimensions, five dimensions six dimensions?
Another great video Kevin! I have a question for u. I have a very small channel (2k) with not many views ( I think because I changed from candle making to kawaii diy videos). Anyway I really want to sell my own products to my audience and my question is: now, at this early stage of my TH-cam channel, should I focus on the business part and start selling some products, or should I focus on growing an engaged audience and when I have the audience, create products that they actually love and need? Cause some TH-cam gurus say "you can make money with a very small audience" but should I? Wouldn't be smarter to focus now on TH-cam and later on on the products? Thank you for your help 😊
There's no right answer here - you can start out selling lightly, but none of it works unless you have a passionate audience who cares about what you create on the content side
@@kevinmespiritufair enough, thank you :)
🤝
I have a hard time creating content that I’m happy with.
We're all there sometimes
hey kevin, are you saying that if you want to make a living on youtube that it really should operate around a service or product? i think it’s definitely a myth that youtube will work out for people when they get enough views and brand deals, but you’re saying no matter those - having a solid b2c structure is what will give you more of the “living” that people are looking for, long term, right? i’m sure it’s diff for everyone but just wanted to understand if that’s your perspective
B2C or B2B, honestly the latter is probably easier
First❤
Excellent content. Thank you. Maybe make a video about how to promote your products to your followers. How do you use stories, reels, DM, etc
Noted!
Ok Hair. Lol
Turning 34 this month. Old. Ouch. I agree though haha
You need to put in effort into videos for it to be sucesful
You clearly have some innate talent for business - and the interest to have developed that talent in running your businesses. That's the lesson a lot miss I guess.
This is exactly why I'm not "trying to make a living" using my musical and performance talents - because I do NOT want to run a business! It was clear to me even 10-15 years ago that one would have to in order to make money (I'm over 50!). There's no way relying on even multiple platforms would cut it.
Even being good at all the things to have a business supporting other creators is hard (I tried, I'm an IT geek). The main talent needed is marketing. And that's hard work. A blend of creative work and hardcore numbers geekery....
Being good at all the things needed to "make a living" as a creator is HARD work and I'm pretty surprised anyone would think otherwise. You will have to also become a manager and have either employees or employ freelancers. But I suppose if you've never tried it, you would not know!
So thanks for this video - very educational to those who are interested.
Wise comment! Best to know what you do / don't want to turn into a business, for sure.
Great content Kevin! My TH-cam channel with 14k subs has helped me to get gardening jobs for people. (Nearly making 500 a day)
Wow congrats!