This was so interesting! Both to hear your perspective, which I relate to in so many ways and to read what you broke down about YouTube. Got my own wheels turning and I sent this to Sammie! I’m excited to see where you go too!
Nice break down. I've got two channels with ads turned on and it's not even covering my costs right now. I'm in for the long haul though, and it's always encouraging to see that I'm not the only mad bastard out there eating shit sandwiches while waiitng for a payday.
Ali Abdaal also talked of selling stuff to an audience, but that you need to build the audience first. That's how he was able to launch his YouTuber Academy and be successful right off the bat.
You're right to be thinking strategically though. That's where I'm weakest and I could do with working on that.
Hahaha you're in good company, we're all mad bastards.
I think Ali Abdaal is a special case because I've listened to a lot of interviews with YouTubers who got some traction and they tried to monetize but found it really hard for a number of reasons (e.g. the audience is broke, the audience is low engagement, wrong audience, wrong product, etc). A lot of that can be solved by being intentional from the beginning, so I'm trying to be as intentional as I can without boxing myself in =)
Sucky part is that I have to regularly have my shit sandwich to support my wife and kiddos.
To your point, I love making videos. I get paid to do it. But it’s not making me enough money. So now I’m having to fake interest in leadership roles, project/product management, etc. because I have to make more money.
This was so interesting! Both to hear your perspective, which I relate to in so many ways and to read what you broke down about YouTube. Got my own wheels turning and I sent this to Sammie! I’m excited to see where you go too!
PS: I'd love to catch up with you at some point! I'd read the hell out of it if you wrote a similar reflection 👀👀
Thank you so much Michelle!! literally the two most rewarding things a writer can hear: got the wheels turning and it was shared with someone else!!!
Nice break down. I've got two channels with ads turned on and it's not even covering my costs right now. I'm in for the long haul though, and it's always encouraging to see that I'm not the only mad bastard out there eating shit sandwiches while waiitng for a payday.
Ali Abdaal also talked of selling stuff to an audience, but that you need to build the audience first. That's how he was able to launch his YouTuber Academy and be successful right off the bat.
You're right to be thinking strategically though. That's where I'm weakest and I could do with working on that.
Hahaha you're in good company, we're all mad bastards.
I think Ali Abdaal is a special case because I've listened to a lot of interviews with YouTubers who got some traction and they tried to monetize but found it really hard for a number of reasons (e.g. the audience is broke, the audience is low engagement, wrong audience, wrong product, etc). A lot of that can be solved by being intentional from the beginning, so I'm trying to be as intentional as I can without boxing myself in =)
but it also means I need to get my ass to work!
Love seeing your thought process written out.
Sucky part is that I have to regularly have my shit sandwich to support my wife and kiddos.
To your point, I love making videos. I get paid to do it. But it’s not making me enough money. So now I’m having to fake interest in leadership roles, project/product management, etc. because I have to make more money.
Keep on keeping on, love to see your progress!!
Arrgghhh that's frustrating!! How regularly is regularly? Are we talking 80% shit sandwich? :(
And thank you! I hope to one day write a substack about how I hit 100k subs and here's what it's like