What's Working on Social Media Right Now? (14 Real Strategies)

The way that people are consuming content is radically different. Subscribers matter, followers matter, but it is not the crucial element for success.

Caleb Rston, he's the brand strategist behind Gary Vaynerchuk, Alex Herozi, and he's helped build brands that have reached over 30 million followers over the years. If you're a solo creator, I would argue that you're going to get the greatest returns not from trying to be omniresent, but dominating on one platform. So, pick one.

I don't believe anymore that everybody should make content. This is the trap that a lot of people in the entrepreneur space fall into. Everyone should start with the brand journey framework. It's four very simple questions.

First question, my guest today is Caleb Rston, a brand strategist that's worked with Gary Vaynerchuk and Alex Hermoszi. And he just grew his YouTube channel from 1,000 to over 37,000 subscribers in a few short months. And in this episode, he's going to be revealing a simple strategy that also grew his email list over 20,000 subscribers that anyone can steal. And today on the Fake Media Podcast, we're going to be unpacking the exact brand building playbook that's working right now. Frameworks, strategies, and the mindset shifts that are helping creators grow faster and business owners and entrepreneurs stand out in crowded markets and build something that lasts. Caleb Rston, welcome to the show.

Thanks for having me on. This is a wild moment. Yeah, I'm excited. And uh we're really going to be doing two parts and getting into some of the backstory because we go back almost 20 years. Yes. Which is insane. And uh I'm excited to get into some of that. But let's hit tactics and let's start with what has actually changed in social media in the past 12 to 18 months that most people haven't caught yet.

I think the majority of things have changed. I think the way that people are consuming content is radically different. I think, you know, you and I have been in the game for a very long time. And the majority of the time we've been in this, it's been uh I follow a creator that I really like and so I consume their content because I hit follow and it shows up in my feed. And you've talked about this a lot recently. I think there was a video you guys just uploaded the other day where you were talking about Gary's been changing how he refers to it from social media to interest media. And I think that is the biggest change that has occurred. And I think a lot of people don't realize that subscribers matter, followers matter. Anybody who's going out there and saying otherwise, they're just trying to get your clicks. It does matter, but it is not the crucial element for success.

Before when we were coming up, I remember the Sean thinks YouTube channel like it it took a while to get a hit in the beginning and now it's like you could have a hit at any point. And so I think the the emphasis on your pre-production needs to change because it's far less it's not gone, but it's far less just about the individual creator and how you communicate, but it's also your ideas and thoughts that you're communicating. And so your idea in my opinion becomes far more important in a world where it is serving or social platforms are serving interestbased content, not follow-based content.

Can you give an example of the just people are watching this happen in their feeds, but what does that mean and how is that showing up tangibly with these vertical videos or even long form videos that are showing up? Why is that happening?

It's just showing up because you are watching more of that content. So, anybody who complains about their feed, for example, the reason why your feed is the way it is is because you're engaging with that content. For all of us who are constantly seeing the pandas and gorillas uh vlogging in our feed right now, it's because we're engaging with that content. And so I think it's a very simple thing. Instagram, Tik Tok, YouTube, all these platforms, their main goal is to keep you on the platform. And so what they realized is, oh, if I just serve all kinds of content from all kinds of creators around this one or two interests that they have, they will stay far longer than if we base it just on what they've subscribed to or follow. Because I don't know if you remember this, but like, and I haven't actually encountered this on my feed in a long time. It used to be that you would scroll and you get to a point where it was like, "All right, you're all cut up." Yeah. There's nothing more. Yeah. I haven't had that in a while. Yeah. It's not possible anymore. There's endless content and endless interest loop.

Okay. So, when it comes to this term best practice, um, what's funny is if anyone's been creating content for a while, they maybe have some tattoos in their mind of what the best practices are. Sometimes these things can can be huge myths that either never worked or are now outdated. You know, one of those myths on YouTube is you need to rename the actual video file that you upload with the keywords. I forgot about that one. That that would re-emphasize your title to help your video rank. And maybe a decade ago, it was a metadata signal back to YouTube. But that is such an outdated and untrue myth. I'm curious, what's a best practice that you hear people keep parenting pariting around that's just not true anymore?

There's a lot of them. And something that kind of just immediately sparked in my head when you said this is like the moment that people are saying it's a best practice, it's probably too late. It's kind of like the moment that everyone's like, "This is a really good investment." It's probably no longer a good investment. you know, when everybody knew that property in California was very valuable, it was too late, you know, and so I think first of all, if you're hearing that, it means that you probably have a small window where you can take advantage of that. But what we're talking about is tactics, and I think those are really important, but those are constantly evolving. And I don't believe those are the biggest levers for your growth. M I think what we have right now is a shitload of creators that are giving all of these little hacks and they're these tiny little things that you're doing that will not move the needle the way you actually want. I think what people don't realize is the brands that really pop in the education space specifically, they don't pop because of their titles, their thumbnails, their hooks. They pop because they have a fundamentally different worldview on their industry than any of their counterparts. And that's why their content works. Their content will work. It's why they even pop early on before they have a team that's packaging their content well because it's not about the little tactics. Those are great. Those are awesome. And if you're not very interesting, that's where you got to start. But very quickly, you need to figure out what do you believe differently than most people, right?

like Gary, we both uh came up learning from Gary and he came onto the scene in a world where the majority of companies and this is shocking for the majority of people listening because they don't remember this. Fortune 500s and 100s were spending all their money on TV, newspaper and billboards, mailers, not social media at all. And he came onto the scene and was like, "Hey, there's this crazy thing called Facebook. I think it's going to be a big deal." And he was right. But the reason why he blew up wasn't because of the way he was packaging his content or his hooks. It was because of his fundamentally different world view than everybody else. And then he optimized from there.

What do you what what's a concrete example in the present world of a brand or a personal brand whose worldview is really cutting through the noise?

Another great example uh is Cody Sanchez. So around 2020, we were at the peak really I would say 2018 to like now even uh we were at the peak of the only way you get rich is by being a founder of a tech company. That was it. Yeah. Everyone was like I got the Uber of blank, the Facebook of whatever, right? Like the Airbnb of such and such. And Cody came onto the scene and was like, hey, there's actually this like crazy thing. You could become rich being a plumber. Boring businesses. Exactly. Wildly different than what everybody else in the market was saying. And it wasn't I really do not believe it was her videos in general. It was the videos wrapping over and over and over this fundamentally different worldview.

Yeah. Th this was a recent like unlock for me that I had. And it sounds so obvious, but I've been doing this for almost 17 years now. And it just hit me the other day because I was looking at our clients, the clients that are getting the best results and the clients that are getting good results, but not as good as I would like. And I realized the ones that aren't getting as good of results, it's not that they're not doing the right things, it's that they we haven't identified what their worldview is that is different than their peers. That is what will cut through everything else. Like I am not the most articulate person. I am definitely not the best looking person. There's that is not any reason to watch my content. Right? We are not titling and packaging our YouTube content with traditional best practices in mind. We're actually going the exact opposite. We're not doing the game of having, you know, I put out a 6 hour and 22minute free course on YouTube. All my YouTube buddies are like, "That's 13 videos, brother." Right? We're doing everything contrary. But the reason why I think it's resonating is because I'm coming onto the scene in a world where the majority of people in my space are saying one thing. I'm saying something fundamentally different. Yeah.

So, the power of having a real contrarian approach. Um, a couple challenges. What would you say though cuz Cody has this worldview, but what would you say to the person who does say, "Well, I don't have the looks or I don't have the vibe." Because you look at someone like Cody and people make the excuse. You go, "Okay, attractive woman, good communicator, well-dressed, well packaged." Yeah. That's an advantage. Mhm.

I think what I would interesting I I'll share I am not a life philosophy person and nobody should take life advice from me but my philosophy for life is and I I figured this out really early on uh because I have a lot of disadvantages. Um a lot of people would probably assume differently but I I have my disadvantages. Yeah. And I quickly learned that in jiu-jitsu, uh, there's this saying which is you roll then I roll. You roll then I roll. Whatever you give me, I'm going to use as my advantage. Whatever you identify right now as your disadvantage can be the very thing you lean into as your greatest advantage. my massive like brutal level of insecurity of being in front of the camera right now like this. I decided to lean into that and making content. I'm going to share that with everybody and I'm going to be very like anytime we're filming and I feel like I look fat on camera, boom, I'm going to call it out. Yeah. Right. Like I'm going to lean into the thing that could be a disadvantage for me and I'm going to turn it into my greatest asset. And one of the things that we're starting to notice is like people are resonating not only with the content we're putting out, but like and this sounds so weird to say about myself, so please hear this through a humble tone, but they're resonating with me, the human. Totally. As like a good human that they can relate to. Yeah. And the the comment that I'm getting a lot right now is like accessibility and relatability. And I think Yeah. It's because I'm leaning into what could be viewed as a disadvantage.

So, I mean, I want to unpack personal branding, but I think this gets into some of these nuances. I mean, number one, you're like, I'm not the best looking. And uh I I disagree. I think you're an incredibly handsome, you know, man. But uh but I also think but but you have a vibe. You have a you have a look. How important is that?

It's authentic to you. I've known you for a long time. You didn't make it up once you started to get on camera. It was not a phase, Mom. I've been wearing Bantes since I can remember. vanties, tattoos, your love for motorcycle culture, all this different stuff. Your love for heavy metal. So, but that actually help I mean that stuff connects. So, some people, what would you say to the person who maybe I guess my point is like, okay, Cody is the objection and the excuse someone might make which is just attractive female who have advantages on social media. There's no doubt. But then you Yes. But they also have it far more difficult than I do. I would argue everyone says that. Yeah. But like women making content publicly have it way harder than any man. I I'll I will die on that hill. Like so yes, I agree. But that's what everybody sees. Why would you die on that hill? Because I mean the kind of comments that you get as a woman versus a man. I didn't do my makeup before this and nobody's going to mention that. Yeah. You know, like uh I haven't been able to make it to the barber shop in like 3 weeks so my beard is looking a little scraggly. Yeah. I don't care. Right? Totally different as a woman, right? Because of the way that society uh engages with women publicly and the comments that are put on there. So, and I I say that because it's like there's the the assumption publicly of it being easier for her. Yeah. But, and I'm not on the back end. I don't know. But I can make some assumptions. So, so then you you've got a vibe though. You got your own thing. It's a unique and you actually you have a standout look like there and I guess that's kind yeah you have a standout look is that helpful in personal branding. What would you say? There's somebody listening to this right now. They work at Microsoft. They wear you know a blue button-up uh you know dress shirt every single day and that's just kind of the attire and they're like all right I am Mr. Average. How do they personal brand?

I bet that Mr. average or miss average has some secret obsessions that they're just insecure about bringing to light for whatever reason. We could go into this another day probably due to my insecurities. I bring out all my passions. And so like I don't hide the fact that I'm obsessed with Harley-Davidsons. Does that turn some people off? Hell yeah it does. How much I talk about it. Metal turns people off for sure. Like I would argue the things that I'm really into are actually pretty polarizing for the average individual. I think the unique part is the combination of them within one character. So I think for people listening a big thing is is like what are the things like metal has nothing to do with content strategy or brand. I'm not intentionally to your point of where I think you're going. Like I'm not intentionally crafting some image that I think is going to be better for I'm just authentically me. And so I Gary same way in a world where all businessmen and business women publicly would wear suits comes out with a [ __ ] hoodie and a you know a beanie and [ __ ] right? And I would actually argue if you're going into business content right now, a way to stand out is to dress up. A lot of people followed Gary and wanted to look casual and stuff. Yeah, but I think the the principle here is it doesn't matter what the look is as it is such a great reflection of who you are. And the more that you bring that out visually, the easier it is for the audience to identify things that they can either connect with or not connect with.

That's strong. I think we'll come back to some of those personal branding tips. But um, if a business owner came to you today and said, "I want to grow my brand online." What would you tell them? What would you not tell them anymore?

that you 100% should make content. I don't believe anymore that everybody should make content. I've gotten the opportunity over the last couple years to meet with a lot of business owners that have grown very successful businesses and they've never made a social media account in their life. Totally. And I think that's great. Um, I I think something that um, that Gary asked me when I kind of was deciding whether or not I was going to start making content. And I, you know, I'm unbelievably blessed to be able to like occasionally ask him these questions. And his response was so weird to me. I did not see it coming. He basically said like, "Make sure this is what you actually want and that this lines up with like the life that you want, the business that you want, all of that." And I was like, "Oh my god." From the man that tells everybody to make you just thought he'd be like, "Bro, you go all in, man. Post, you know, but but that was not his response." Yeah. And I think it caused me to sit back and go like, "Oh, yeah. There are ways that I could build out my consulting firm the way that I want to and never make content. But for me, what I decided is that the impact that I wanted to have for people that I know will never work with us would then not be there. And that's something that I've had ambitions around for a while now. And so I think that's why I chose it. But that would probably be the thing is I would sit down with the business owner and really find out why are you doing this? What's the goal?

What are a couple questions you would ask?

So, someone's listening to this because people listening to this are already creating content. They want to learn your tips and frameworks and we're going to get to those. Um, others are on the fence. They've been listening to the Think Media podcast. Maybe they're new here and they're like they're trying to explore if they want to start. So, this is a great question. And what is interesting is I'm I'm curious. You're really saying that like out of that exploration, it could be a very interesting conclusion. It's like canceled plans. like all of a sudden you're like, "Oh, great. I don't got to go to that anymore." And you might actually end up going down the road of of a different approach or maybe a different approach even to what creating content means. So, what is just like a couple framework questions to try to tap into that self-awareness?

Everyone should start with the brand journey framework. If you're about to make content or considering it, you should do this. If you're already making content, you should do this so you have more clarity moving forward. It's four very simple questions. Do not let the simplicity make you ignore the impact. The first question starts at the end. What do I want to have happen? What's my goal? Right? And with the context that you're giving me here, I would add a little caveat to that. So, it's what do I want to have happen and do I need to make content in order for that to occur? The second question though that I like to walk people through is once we know what we want to have happen, what would we have to be known for in order for that to happen? Okay. And then the third question is in order to be known for something, we got to do so. So what do I have to do in order to be known for that thing? That's three of them. But that doesn't take us to today. The fourth question brings us to today, which is in order to do the things to be known for the thing to get the outcome I want, what do I need to learn? Right? If it's building a business, for example, that's what you need to do. Well, there's a lot that I need to learn. I need to learn everything within HR, finance, marketing, sales, recruitment, all these different things. And within all those buckets, there's all these tiny little things that you can chunk down. And so, that gives you the exact path of where you're at today and where you want to be and how you get there. And then once you actually and it's not a five minute process that's like an hour easily like really really actually pressing on it. And once you figure that out then the next question is the the third question uh what do I have to be known for? Do I have to make content to be known for this thing? And the answer is for a lot of people probably no. Now will it accelerate it? Yes. Okay cool. Yeah, it's kind of like also at the end question is also at what scale because if you're also just known as like the greatest real estate agent locally, word of mouth might actually be pretty sufficient. But if you want to you want to impact a bunch of people even with free information, well, it's going to be pretty difficult to do that if you don't put any free information out there and impact people across the nation or around the world. 100%. Or if you have ambitions of speaking or writing a book or anything like that, then it it also makes sense. So, I just like, you'll notice if you consume anything that I say on podcast or content, I'm really big on being intentional. That's the big thing here. Why are we doing this? If we can answer that question, cool. If you can't, I would argue there's better things you could do with your time.

Your framework's kind of not just a brand framework. It's kind of a life framework. It's like a goal accomplishment achievement framework.

I have not reached the point in my career where I can talk about life things, but sure I think it would work very effectively because it's like yeah, it's what's the goal and what would help me reach the goal. Of course, you don't necessarily need to be known for something, but but I the reason I guess I bring that up is because you know Gary says document don't create or document he said is that's the quote, right? Document don't create. And you said, okay, if I'm going to I got to learn the thing first and then I what do I got to build the thing and then be known for? or I guess what point do you start creating content on that journey and are you hitting pause too much?

I would really one of the most powerful things I've learned about content is I think intuitively I've been using your framework and I've thought about certain things like especially because I've wanted to teach but I've wanted to teach with integrity. So I've never I've never wanted to be fake or teach out of a lie. So I'd always be like shoot if I'm going to have better stuff to teach I should accomplish it first. So I need to up my own game, learn my own game and go do it. which sort of puts a tension between what am I allowed to put out there and share today or how long do I wait because if I looked at your framework then I might be like well shoot okay I need to study for five years before I get started versus do I document right now and what's the tension of those two things so you can document honestly that like journey to a billion exactly and people go oh he's on a journey I'm not saying that exactly if you are not the expert yet aka Hey, you haven't accomplished the thing that you're talking about, then you're not an expert. Then what you are is you are a proxy or a guinea pig for your audience. You're taking us on the journey. You're making the mistakes. You're investing the money, the time, relational capital, all of it, and you're telling us this worked, this didn't. But you're never pretending like you are the expert because you're not.

You think the strategy still works?

Yeah. Oh, absolutely. Building in public is the like one of the biggest trends on Tik Tok and YouTube in the entrepreneur space right now. The youngsters especially Gen Z and whatever the I'm seeing like burrito shops. This is what we did and then our staff we had to get new staff and then like with the order was crazy and they're like local businesses doing this. Yeah. And I think it's a phenomenal approach. What it's doing ultimately uh we're seeing this every generation. Uh buyers prefer to know more about who's running the business. the CEO's views matter more today than ever before. And so think about that on a massive level. Sure. But then also on a small local business level, like if I know who runs the coffee shop, I am far more likely to want to go there. In fact, I know the owner of the coffee shop near our house. My girlfriend Cat and I, we hate the coffee, but we go there every day because we love the owner. Yeah. Wow.

Um, there's some big lies creators and business owners still believe about content. Uh, we could hit these rapid fire, but let me just feed them to you and expound on it. Number one, all views are good views. Excuse me. This is that whole uh excuse me, but [ __ ] that people have been saying for years of all press is good press. But like uh the example I gave in a talk recently is Pepsi did a campaign back in 2018 where they were trying to pair themselves with social justice. This was during a time that was very sensitive in America and they chose to have their spokesperson be Kendall Jenner. And uh anybody who wants to go watch it, they can watch it and form their opinions. I won't share mine, but what I will say is it had a lot of backlash. 1.6 million views later, Pepsi took it down, but the internet is undefeated. People downloaded it and reuploaded it. It got over 60 million views. That was not good. Yeah, that was not all views are good views, right? Uh, there's been a lot of other campaigns over the last couple years that have been referenced by a lot of people where brands went outside of their normal lane. They got a lot of viewership, but their sales went down. And so I I do not believe that all views are good views. I think uh this is the trap that a lot of people in the entrepreneur space fall into. It's the characters that in 2021 or whenever the vaccine came out, their main content was about their business and growing a business. And they suddenly felt the need to make content about their opinion on getting vaccinated. And I would ask them why, like why, you're not an expert on this. Nobody needs to hear your opinion. And they'd be like, but I know it's going to get views. And it's like I really I think that is such a that is an error in so many ways. But let's debate it because vaccines are very polarizing and and you might actually really polarize a lot of people to you if you jump on these different bandwagons and if they're true to you. And so that's thing one. thing too is this actually debate is very interesting to me right now because I'm I'm so big and have been and we do viral content like more curiosity based content but I've been so big in searchbased content that attracts the right viewer that's like pre-qualified because it's their exact intent and it usually leads to a much better business result. There's a lot of people, even guests we've had on the podcast that are expert at just getting videos to go viral and just getting views because of broad appeal. And then the argument is if I get that many views, not necessarily from any controversy, it may not be about vaccines, but it's like just general, if I just get a lot of views, then a percentage will go to my bio and it'll lift my business. And so, is that true? And what's that tension between, you know, just the idea that you don't I I mean, I've been trying carnivore diet. I've been getting jacked. I've been doing biohacking. I've been doing some other things. Now, those are interest based. Are you just saying avoid stupidly controversial, polarizing stuff?

Back to what we said, and I'm glad we brought it back cuz I was going to say this. You said, you know, it's important to have that contrarian take if you actually believe it. Oh, and the people that told you, they go, "Well, I knew it would get views." Exactly. So, it wasn't their actual like life mission. Like, no, I'm actually obsessed with this. I'll care if my business goes down. This is my conviction. Exactly. Sure. Yeah. But I think I'm not saying that going viral is going to be bad for your business. Yeah. What I'm saying is is if you make that your northstar all the time, you're going to make content that isn't relevant for your ideal customer and you're going to be attracting a whole lot of followers and audience that you think you're going in the right direction because you're getting more views and more subscribers. But I for me, and this is anecdotal and I want to call that out, by my observation, I've never seen it where that is happening and sales are also going up.

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If you're doing some viral stuff, some strategic stuff, maybe a whole funnel style of content, some stuff that's depth with you're staying intentional. If you start just chasing kind of like you get sucked into the viral loop, not all views are good views. Yeah. And like again, it's very important to understand what you are trying to accomplish. If you're selling, you know, nine months ago, you're selling lab boooos. Okay. Yeah. You want just virality on TikTok. Sure. Yeah. Right. Uh, but if you're selling, you know, a uh business consultancy program or whatever, I just don't I don't see the relevance in going viral for a toothbrush dance on TikTok. Got it.

Lie number two. I'll figure it out as I go. Yeah. Um, I love the attitude and what people say online about just start. And I I don't want this to come across like I'm anti that. Um, because I had to do that. You know, eventually Trevor and I were we were debating what was going to be the first content we put out and eventually it was just like screw it, we got to post it, right? Um, but I think that I've spoken to a lot of business owners and something that is so unfortunately common is I'll hear them say things like, "I've been doing this for 2 or 3 years. I don't know if it's working or not. like I I don't know why I'm doing this. I'm kind of just like checking a box." And what it comes from is lack of intentionality. They haven't figured out where they're wanting to go. This is where the brand journey framework comes in, right? The example I like to give a lot of times, uh, is the Alice in Wonderland moment, right? Alice comes up to this like fork in the road and Cheshshire cat, I've always called it Chester Cat, but apparently it's Cheshire Cat. Cheshire Cat basically asks or she says, "Which way should I go?" And the cat's like, "Well, where do you want to go? Where do you want to end up?" She's like, "I don't know." And he's like, "Okay, cool. Then either way, we'll take you there." You're going to end up somewhere. You're going to build a brand of some sort. I would just rather do it intentionally. And that way you can define what working is. So then you know if it's worth your time to be filming all these videos and posting them on Instagram or if man, we're 2 years in and we're still getting 13 views on every video. Maybe we need to figure out what we're actually trying to do here.

Then what is the opposite of I'll figure it out as I I go. Is it I need to figure it out before I start?

That's a really good question. I I think what it is, is it's and I I probably need to articulate it a little bit better. It's not a statement about your day one. It's a statement where I hear people say this a year in. I'm I'll figure it out as I go. Like, well, you've been going for a while and you haven't figured out. Yeah. And so I think what it is, I love the the question on that and I'm actually going to literally tonight work on how do I say that differently and articulate it in a way that doesn't come across like I'm discouraging people from like cuz I'm not the guy that's like you need to know all your content buckets. I [ __ ] hate content buckets. I think it's the dumbest thing that people like that it's all the different reasons to procrastinate. So yes, I believe in starting right now, but very quickly figure out why are you doing this? Where are you wanting to go? You don't need to do that day one, but I would argue if you're 6 months in and you still haven't done it, yeah, you're wasting your time.

So these are some of the worst lies creators and business owners still believe about content, and you might be able to hit this one fast, but three is if I keep posting, it will work eventually. Yeah. Um, this is kind of like what we see at the grocery stores here in Vegas, which was shocking when I moved here. People sitting at uh lotto machines or not lotto machines just like going for it. You're right. Yeah. Just it's your average grocery store. And that's your average person on Instagram, YouTube, and Tik Tok. They're just uploading [ __ ] and hoping that it works. And then the craziest thing is if they're a 2.0, O they are looking at their content and trying to evolve off of it, but they're looking at all of their content and evolving off of all of it rather than looking at the top performers and then evolving only off of that. Why would you want to evolve off of that isn't working, right? You want to iterate from things that you already have signal on. And so I think it's it's just that. Yeah. So if I keep posting it will work eventually. One of the biggest questions we get, Sean, I've been on YouTube for one year. I've posted 50 times. Do I quit or pivot? 50 uploads long form. Sean, I've been on YouTube three years. I' I've posted 300 videos. They're they're getting a few hundred views, but I'm wondering if this is sustainable. What's a framework for even measuring success and when to quit or when to pivot?

Defining it. see two steps ago. If you don't figure out what winning and success are, you'll never know if you hit it. And so for us, what we went for is instead of going for views and subscribers, things have gone a lot better than we expected. I I told Trevor my goal was in year one, maybe 5 to 10,000 subscribers tops. Yeah. Maybe one day. I don't even know if that was a year. I think that was like my all-time goal on YouTube. Our thing that we were optimizing around is and you know we're in less than year one of business. So we don't have some complicated CRM system and everything like that lead flow. I measure the quality of inbound DMs, emails, and text messages that I get when we put content out. And that I think is a good thing to do if you are a business owner and you're making content to grow your business. Yeah. Uh really good thing to do in the early days when you're less likely to get good views, right? So like I told Trevor with the 6 hour and 22-minute course, if we got a,000 views and we had three clients come through, I would have lost my mind. That would have been a huge W. I needed nothing more from that. And so I think it's defining what winning is and then measuring correctly based on that. So many people say they want to grow their business with their personal brand and all they track is views and subscribers. Okay. I know a lot of people that have less than 5,000 subscribers that are making millions. Totally agree. You do too. And I'd be And so now I'm fighting for really two audiences we have. and one is trying to go the creator path and they I mean they need to that's why they listen to this podcast they need to be thinking like a business owner but they're trying to make it even as like a small creator brand sponsorships that brands that will sponsor you know micro and nano influencers a little bit of ad revenue it's kind of feast or famine and I think there see there seems to be some proven wisdom is like if it takes you're striking the ground at year five you don't know if you're going to break through at seven. I'm just curious in that maybe you redefine and you get an entirely different pivot, but u it's just a huge question. I really want to serve that segment of our community that's like, yeah, do I pick a new niche? How do I triple down? And maybe it is just kind of rethinking everything. But you've heard the stories. I've certainly heard the stories when Benji and I were interviewing all the people for our book and video influencers. You know, people are like year seven and a half it it broke out for me. like there was actually a lot of times extremely long long time horizons for individuals. Um, but people get stuck because it's a really frustrating place to be at year four couple hundred videos some results but also being like man I don't know should I even be doing this and so I don't know maybe you're speaking to that person's heart and you've got the the brand framework but any other thoughts for them?

It's hard I'll give a couple of qualifiers. I don't typically work with people who are full-time creators and that's all they make their money off of. So, I spend less time thinking about that. Yep. So, I want to qualify that before I just talk out of my ass real quick here. Um, but if I was sitting down with Sarah and Sarah's describing this dilemma, I would say, Sarah, what does winning look like? Is winning getting a million subs? Like, is it getting, you know, a 100,000 subscribers and getting It's the silver plaque that you get for that, right? Mhm. Yeah. At at 100,000 silver gold is uh a million subscribers. Yeah. Like is your goal one of the plaques? Yeah. And and if they say yes, then I would double press. Is it really? Okay, cool. Well, then everything you're doing right now is not even close to what is required from that. Not mapping towards that. Exactly. I think that so many people have their ambitions effed up. There we go. We're trying to be a little bit cleaner there. like they have it messed up. They look at the top 0.01% of creators. It's the same thing with incomes in America, right? Everyone thinks that you got to be a millionaire to be rich and it's like, nah, dog. If you make 200K a year, you're filthy rich. Yeah, I just messed it up. I just messed it up. There we go. I'm just being me, y'all. Uh, yeah. I I think that like the expectations is something that like I really press on with people. Yeah. Like what are we really trying to do here? I'd say probably half of the people they're they have that ambition of getting to some certain number, but then it's like why? Got it. Then what happens? And so I like to really again intentionality. I'm really pressing on these things because I'm doing this with myself right now, right? And I don't have I genuinely have no subscriber or follower goal. I I have a views goal per video. That's it. And that's just me because my goals happen to be around my business. Now, one other real quick little thing that I would throw in there, too, is to your point of thinking like a business owner. Stop going for brand deals. Build your own brand and sponsor your own [ __ ] Yeah. If somebody's going to spend X amount for a 30 secondond spot, guess what? It's worth 10 times that. Minimum. Minimum. Yeah, I agree. No brand is going to spend money on a spot they're not going to get a 10x return on. Minimum. Think media podcast listeners know that basically our brand deals on the podcast is us. It's our own. That's Yes. That's it. Yes. Yeah. You own it. Yeah. Like what people don't realize is like these brand deals, you are getting underpaid for what you are providing the brand. Mhm. It's gotten better. It's getting a little bit better. Well, actually what's happening is on the high end it's getting better. On the low end, I actually think it's getting worse for people from what I hear. And again, I'm not super in that world, but yeah. And I think if you get I mean learning to negotiate we can link in the show notes to uh Justin u who's uh just dropped his book on I think it's called sponsor magnet to your point what do I need to learn and who do I need like that would be a whole skill set in of itself to to not let brands push you around but really like think about the brand you're building to and how you negotiate with them.

So if I keep posting it'll work eventually for if I make content for every platform. I can't make content for every platform because I don't have time. This is a 2026 quandry. There's this and the tension of the overplayed but very true top 1% of creators are making 300 pieces of content a week. They've got huge teams. They're everywhere. AI is having software like Opus Clip having people cut up their stuff and try to be everywhere. People are exhausted. that you say this is a lie. I can't make content for every platform because I don't have the time. Can they?

So, uh, it's a lie in two ways. One, it's a lie believing that that's what you need to do. And two, I actually think that you could. Gary Vee came out in 2018 or 2017, I can't remember exactly when, with uh, a project called 86 pages of insanity where he outlined the uh, content pyramid, right? the whole concept of you make pillar content like we're doing right now, podcast, and then you clip different moments. Uh, you can absolutely do that. Now, you know, if you only have one person, then you probably need to change your expectations on the subjective quality of these individual pieces of content, but you absolutely could. Uh, it doesn't mean that's going to be the best strategy or most effective, but you can. One thing I'll real quick add on and then we'll we'll go further on that is the I guess 2026 update that I would add to the content pyramid. And I guarantee Gary's operating this way. So like this is nothing that he isn't already doing. But uh, what what I like to do is I like to think of it like you're making your long form pillar content like we're doing right now and then you go and mine for moments that are good. And the traditional version is you clip that and then post it. My version is you take that moment and you figure out what is the best way to present what just occurred given the platform I'm posting on. Meaning maybe it's not a real maybe it's a carousel on Instagram. Maybe it's a written post, right? Like dialogue back and forth but in copy form on LinkedIn.

How would you identify pre-posting it or are you waiting until you post it and see like

An audience retention curve and a spike? This is where, uh, this will open up a whole another can of worms, just a warning. But this is why if you have a team, I like my editors to actually manage the platforms. I do not believe in a social media manager that posts for every platform. I want the creatives as close to the data as possible.

In a world where traditional advertising has had creative and deployment in different cities, Gary came in and was like, "Hey, let's put them in the same building." That's what Vayner, that was like one of the biggest craziest things about Vayner in the beginning that people don't realize is it was combining like paid and and the people that were pressing the buttons and putting the content out there with the people that were making the content. Sounds obvious to a lot of people, but that was revolutionary.

I want my editors posting on Instagram and seeing how it does. Like, when I look at my career, one of my biggest growth curves was when Gary was like, "Hey, let's take TikTok seriously." And I was not only editing for TikTok, but I was the one managing the platform. So I was making seven clips a day and posting 10. And then, and so you're staring at the likes, views. Why did that one? And and that just immersion is a feedback loop, and it actually transforms your psychology, your brain, and makes you a better editor, which makes you even a better poster, timing, copy, and just loops the whole thing. So it's just not an isolated editor, but they, they're in the platform. Correct. Which answers the question that you previously asked, which is how do they find the right moments? They've calibrated themselves to know what the right moments are based on audience insights.

So, at the high level, what you would say is you would review a piece of content and then just say, "Oh, that that moment was sick." Like, even here, and I'm, I stole your five lies from one of your talks. So I could already, I already know your five lies would do good as a carousel, and I could design that up in a carousel. Put that on Instagram and then have a call to action to the ManyChat trigger to this episode. Yes. And that'll probably happen, and now someone's here's listening to this episode and they're like, "That's actually how I ended up here." Yes. Um, and welcome. And so, yeah, thanks so much for being here. And and so, okay, and that would be from being in the game and and even my pre-research and knowing that you'd already crafted these five lies.

Okay, so, um, so you can make content for every platform. It might not be the best strategy for you right now. What's your research, uh, resources? What's your team size? Um, and then you could scale up. Last one. I can, real quick on that. I can give you the framework to know how to choose. Okay, go ahead. If you are a solo creator, pick one platform that you prioritize and a secondary platform that you repackage for.

Do you call this the, uh, Eye of Sauron method? I do. Yeah. Yeah. Uh, good old Lord of the Rings. Uh, so explain it. Basically, uh, if you're a solo creator, I would argue that you're going to get the greatest returns not from trying to be omnipresent, but dominating on one platform. So, pick one. Let's call it YouTube. All right? You're going to make YouTube long-form as your primary, uh, platform you're creating for. And then you pick a secondary one. Let's call it YouTube Shorts. You're staying on the same platform. The beauty of what I just articulated is that that YouTube Short that you cut, it doesn't take that much effort to then take the exact same clip, exact same caption, and post it on the other platforms. Is that the best version? No. We'll get to that in a little bit. But that's what you can do at this stage. That's what I would do if I was a solo creator. And then once you get to the point where you feel like, yeah, YouTube is dialed. I've got the process. Like, I'm ahead. And YouTube Shorts is dialed. I got the process. I'm ahead. Cool. You can add in another one.

For the individuals who have teams, I expect far more out of you. Pick three platforms that you're going to prioritize. For us, what we did is we went with Inst, or YouTube, Instagram, LinkedIn. Those were our three. And the Eye of Sauron comes into handy because we don't try to kill it on all three at the same time. We picked one. So, was YouTube. So, literally up until like four weeks ago, three or four weeks ago, all of our focus, all of our discussions on content was YouTube. That was it. We didn't give a [ __ ] about Instagram, LinkedIn. We weren't putting any effort there. That was catch-all. Then we now feel like we're at a point where we've got a pretty good process. Not at all where we want to be, but it's a good enough process that we can move the eye over to Instagram and LinkedIn, right? And so you get those. The others are on maintenance mode, and then you shift over again. And I like to do it that way because I believe you get far greater returns dominating on one platform than showing up me on a bunch. Yeah, you can actually stand out versus just looking like every other character in your space.

How deep are you in the debate of YouTube long-form versus YouTube Shorts and how angry creators are? I'll put it this way. I have been hearing creators complain about new features that platforms release and saying how it's pointless and it's not going to work, and then they become the biggest features on the platform and they're suddenly all about it. Meaning like anytime that a platform does something new, it's going to be clunky and there's going to be problems. I remember everyone was saying YouTube Shorts was a terrible thing to do and it will bomb your channel. Well, and that's well, some people, whether the evidence is actually solid or not, is they're saying it did bomb their channel. Yeah, it may have. I've seen a lot more channels that have gotten a lot of success off of YouTube Shorts than not. Um, and so, yeah, I I think the, the big thing to me is figuring out what does your audience prefer to consume, right? And, you know, what level of depth are you trying to provide? Like, there's only so much depth you can provide in two minutes. You know, I think that, you know, one thing that we're seeing is we're seeing shorts-only channels explode. People getting gold play buttons so fast. Then we're seeing those channels are like, "I should get into long-form," and they might be getting millions of views on a short and they'll post long-form and get 300 views. So, so I think there's this interesting disconnection. My personal opinion is if you're, especially for a video podcast like the Think Media podcast, it's it's kind of just a no-brainer because the content is aligned. Probably the best piece of advice I heard was if your shorts are just radically different and funny, or they're you're dancing to, you know, songs or following trends, and then your other stuff doesn't even the look of it or the studio or the vibe, like that dissonance can kind of mess the algorithm up. Two different kind of formats. You might do have long-form, but it's clips. So, for a video podcast, it's like a no-brainer. It doesn't hurt Think Media, but the math will also tell us, and this kind of ties into the big shorts channels, you also might not necessarily get crossover audience. You get two different audiences. Not necessarily a bad thing. You just kind of have a shorts audience, a longs audience, and some crossover. And you're going to earn people in both directions, which is ultimately a win. My final thought is this. I look at my analytics. Our long-form, we got subscribers, we got views, we made revenue. And then I look at the YouTube Shorts and we got views, we got subscribers, and those people are satisfied as well. And it's a net net positive. And I actually think our shorts suck. They're just clips of, and it sometimes they pop off. A lot of times they're just kind of average, but on a month, it's all up. We met new people, got new views. And so I'm like, I'm just looking at the data. It's we made progress. I don't see the harm. But I would love to hear if if people can comment on YouTube and if you're on audio, you know, leave a review, but you can't comment. But, um, I I am curious people's experience because it's an ongoing debate.

Yeah, I think something that is kind of an interesting strategy to put into place, and I'm curious your opinion on this, is if you think about your YouTube video the way that you think about your offers, which is having, uh, maximum clarity on what the outcome is that the viewer gets after consuming it. And then if you think of your shorts on YouTube as lead magnets that solve small problems and reveal a bigger one that your YouTube video long-form solves. Beautiful.

The final lie, and we're talking about the five worst lies creators and business owners still believe about content, is "I need to go viral for my brand to grow." Yeah. Um, super not the case. Uh, again, I I don't want this to come across like I am anti-virality. Obviously, that can be very, very good. What I am anti is having that be your north star that you optimize around. The people that I know that optimize around that, um, actually, I'll give an example here. If you have a creator who has been going viral on their own content for a very long time, and then they go into the world of educating people on how to go viral, right? It is my opinion that what got them the virality is not going to get them the trust as an educator. If Billie Eilish tomorrow was like, "Caleb, I will teach you how to be an incredible musician. You got to pay me X amount." I have zero belief that she's a good teacher. I think she's a great executor, but the difference between a great executor and a great teacher is like, or sorry, massive. It's huge. And so what happens is in these instances, because you called it up at the top, there's a ton of people that are doing this right now. They go viral and now they're teaching people. The problem a lot of them find themselves in is the content that is necessary to make and put out to build trust in them as an educator isn't going to go viral. They've set this bar now for themselves that they always have to hit that, but that's not going to convert. And so I think for a lot of people, I mean, we, I'm sure you have met plenty of these people that have one viral pop and now suddenly they're just trying to recreate that. Yeah. And that is the completely wrong strategy, right? Like that, that is the worst thing that you can do. The best thing that you can do if you have your 15 seconds of fame is not keep trying to go wide, but actually go deep with the people that came in and earned their attention.

How would you do that? I mean, it, what, what niche are we in? Like, is it, you know, this is how you would follow up on a viral video, which is a question that comes in. "I had a breakout video. What do I do next?" Yeah. What is your offer? I would start talking about that. I would just, I, I would just do what I'm doing. I would just give away all the game on how to do what your offer accomplishes without ever engaging with you. By doing this, you increase trust, right? Like, you guys have an extremely trusted brand. I search for anything having to do with video, and y'all are going to show up whether it's on the main page or I click on a video, you guys are suggested like everywhere, right? You've built a lot of trust in that. So then I have a high likelihood of believing that your offer is going to provide me even more value. And so that's what I would do if you're, if you have a viral video. But the thing is, is virality is not bad. Trying to optimize around virality in an educational space is the wrong thing to optimize around. You want to optimize around trust. It's not virality that'll convert. It's trust. Trust is what precedes the transaction, not virality. That's strong.

And you touched on one of the promises that I made during the hook of this episode, which is the strategy that anybody can do that not only grew your channel, grew subscribers, grew a ton of trust, has led to business, but also grew your email list to over 20,000 email list subscribers. Yeah. And that is you posted a six-hour long YouTube video, which is a free course on brand building. This unpacks a multi- it's just a wild strategy. Ultra long-form strategy, moving the free line strategy. How'd you even do that? Is it possible for a solo creator to pull this off or what might that look like for them?

Let's start at the top. How unpack what happened here? I have for the last four years now been getting a fairly high amount of DMs from people, uh, people with very small followings and people with insanely huge followings asking me if I have any resources online sharing my thoughts and views on brand building and content strategy to support that. Uh, or if not, if there's anybody that I trust. And there, I don't consume any content in this space. I don't watch anybody else. So I all I saw was like the obnoxious, you know, uh, hacky gurus showing up in my feed all the time. And so I would always tell people, "No, I don't know anybody that's going to share anything with you that I think is good. What they're going to do is they're going to share with you tactics that are going to cause you to do things that then they have to, you have to pay them for their core, like all these things, and they're not actually giving any real true value. They're not doing what you guys do, which is putting out free content that actually is useful and valuable and builds trust." Yeah. And so I just eventually got to a point where I was like, "Man, I got to one day figure this out. I got to put something out there." Uh, and then when I started my own thing and Trevor came and joined, it was like, "Wow, this is perfect timing to do this project that I've had in the back of my head for a while now." Um, and so, yeah, we we put it out there because genuinely, and some people will believe this, some won't. That's okay. The goal was not to get clients. The goal was genuinely to help people and to have a resource that I could just point people to. Now, we knew we would get clients as a byproduct, or we, we, I shouldn't say we knew, we hypothesized. We believed it, but we didn't know.

Did you know it was going to be six hours? Was it that mapped out or did it end up being that in the edit? Every time we were doing the estimation, it was somewhere between five to seven hours. We ended up filming 14 hours of footage, though.

And is there a reason you said, you know, YouTube experts told you it should have been multiple videos? Is there a reason you made it one instead of a series and put it in a playlist? I have a lot of friends in the YouTube strategy space. I don't have a lot of friends in the brand positioning space. And, uh, what I quickly realized is nobody gets what I was trying to do. I was not going for views. I was not going for any of that [ __ ]. It was a brand positioning statement. Show me another person in this space that will go on YouTube for free and talk about this [ __ ] for six and a half hours and isn't concerned about it cannibalizing their business.

Have you heard the term talking points? Yeah. Yeah. Like, like talking points, um, for musicians, like a talking point could be like the cyber truck, and their thing that, like the, what they're wearing, their opening line, and the more of them you stop, you, you stack, is like it's, it's something that could spread word of mouth. Bro, did you see that music video? Bro, did you see that? Like talking points. I was thinking talking points like, like politically. Yeah. So, so talking points being something remarkable, like Seth Godin would say, but almost something like, and, and you know, you articulating that it's, you're right, like in a world that's so noisy, to just have something, you just did something that was entirely different. That's a positioning move. And I, I would argue it's a talking point. Yeah, dude. He's the guy that did the six-hour. Yes. And think about things that your competitors can't do. Or maybe maybe some could, but how many of them would? How many would, right? Another thing that I was trying to show is like, you know, I'm working with actual clients, not just, and there's nothing wrong with what I'm about to say, but compared to my peers, I'm not just selling digital products. Yeah. I'm still in the weeds doing the damn thing, which is why I'm comfortable putting out for free what all of you make your money off of.

So, are you, how many hours went into it? To plan out around, I think 90 to 100 hours is what we calculated is. I think, and that's your guys's time combined. Yeah. Yeah. Okay. So I think it could have been, and it's more than that. It's over 300,000 views now. It was a lot more than that, actually. Trevor is correcting me. It was probably more like 120, 140, something like that. Yeah, we'll go with that. Um, and it's like 300,000 views, but it's also an asset. I, I don't see that thing slowing down. Here's what's wildly crazy. Uh, we have, I think around two months into it being live from then till now, I've seen it dip below in the last 48 hours below 5,000 views twice. Every 48 hours. Yeah. So like, it, there was like twice where I've looked at it and it's been like 4700 or 45, but then it goes back up. And I checked it like this morning and it was at like 6,800 views and it just is cranking. Yeah, that's sick. It's, it's a ranked video, um, that is, you know, continues to get views for weeks, months, and probably years to come. Oh, is it? You know what's so funny? I, I haven't even thought. Do, like, literally, it's a ranked video. That's how we teach. That's how we. Exactly. Well, and I mean, well, a ranked video by our modern definition is if you search for the video, but also if you express intent. So once it's getting suggested, it's just simple definition, a video that continues to get views for weeks, months, and years to come. How are those views happening? Either search or suggested, and it's being suggested to who? Someone who ultimately is searching. Their intent is searching. They have expressed to YouTube by what they watch that they would probably click on that, and then sure enough, they do. Okay. And so it's a ranked video. That's cool. That makes sense.

And do you have ads turned on of the video? Yeah. Oh, yeah. So how much ad revenue has that video earned so far? Five. What? $6,000. $6,000. That's cool. And so it cost us $20 grand, not including like salaries and stuff that it was $20,000 of like, and it's led to business, but actually fast forward in a year and maybe it's paid for itself for two years and you, you broke even and Oh, it's already paid for itself. Well, no, I know. I know it's paid for itself on the business back end, but the ad revenue. Oh. Oh, yes. Yeah. The ad revenue might you just go and eventually that asset actually broke even, but the business, the brand lift, everything else. Okay.

So then just break down a few of the tactics though. Here's another real quick thing actually, just for for everybody. So something that I'm starting to find is if you have a team, people are getting really freaking frustrated, uh, with their team drafting content on their behalf and them showing up and being like, "What the hell is this?" I would never say this. A magical thing if you put out six and a half hours of content is you've said everything. You've said a whole lot. Yeah. Trevor has a lot of source media to develop outlines off of. Yeah. You, you said that's like a manifesto. It's like your, your thesis. It's like your, it's a foundation that could be. You talk about pillar content. It's like a higher level than that. Yeah. I mean, not to get really like weird sacrilegious for a second, but like, it's my Bible. Yes. And then I'm preaching off of my Bible. That's what I think. Manifesto. It's your whole. Yeah. It's your whole values, your whole blueprint all laid out. So then, well, actually, it's only like a third. Yeah. But yes. Got you. Okay. So, a couple of the tactics around it. So, it leads to.

Are you a big believer in ultra long-form? Clearly, but I mean, you're seeing Diary of a CEO, two, three-hour podcasts. I mean, there's something about your average person maybe thinking about compilations and getting into just really long content. Mark Manson just started a series I think like six to 10 weeks ago and his podcast episodes are like four hours long. Yeah. Yeah. It's extreme. I, um, I think that, uh, durations don't matter. I think value per second in shorts, value per minute in long-form is actually what matters. So if you have a high VPM, cool. Go for 10 hours. VPS, VPM. Yep. Value per second, value per minute. That's my favorite way of thinking about it.

And is that actually quantifiable? No. Yeah. Like, I mean, you can look at like comments and sentiment on feedback and you can come to a subjective determination. I just think about like, uh, how do I jam the most amount of, and we're getting better at this. Like, I would argue that if we have a two-hour video on how to lead a media team, not how to build, how to lead one that already exists, super niche, it'll be our lowest viewed video ever. Um, I would argue knowing what I know now, because I've been doing this, you know, I've done two more videos since then, so I'm an expert at making my own videos. Uh, I could probably condense that down to 75 minutes and it'd be a way higher VPM. Yeah. And so, uh, we actually, this this would be a really good moment. Uh, and it'll be a vulnerable one for me. We sat down. What day was it? Last Friday. Last Friday, we sat down. We rented a studio to film a YouTube video. We had not respected the audience's time in our pre-production process. And 10 minutes into filming it, I was getting irritated at myself because I was like, "This is not a good video. We We had built this out and it's going to be an hour, hour and a half, and we'd be jamming it down the audience's throat. It should be a 20-minute video."

So, you canned it. So, we didn't film it, and we filmed a video about respecting the audience's time that's like two minutes or something like that. And if I watch it and feel comfortable with putting it out, that'll be our video for August. That's an interesting thing where I wanted to go that you just said, "That'll be our video for August." Are you on a plan to make one video a month? That's the goal right now. And this, that is that's also contrarian. I think, um, you're, you're, you're sitting here saying, you know, like at this point, of course, humbly and accurately, new to the YouTube game. You know, I'm not a video expert. However, over 30,000 subscribers off of just a few videos. That's the opposite of what most people think it takes. And and many people grinding. You've done how many total long-form videos? Five. So, five. So, five videos led to 30,000 subs. You also could stop uploading and you'll be at 50,000 subs just by a matter of time because they're so much higher quality. Huge debate. Quantity or quality? Your actions seem to say quality is what you think is working in 2026. Cuz I did my quantity for 16 years behind the scenes. I've spoken to thousands and thousands of business owners, and that's my target market. So I know what they need. I met with 2,000 of them alone in 2024. I, I have very clear understandings of the pain points that my desired audience has. So, we had a, from the outside it looks like a leg up, but I've been doing the volume game for just a very long time. So, I would argue I've been making YouTube videos for 16 years because I have. You absolutely have. But not under my name. Right.

So then, so then what is the application for someone listening to this if they're on a couple different paths? Like, you need to do high volume in order to determine, and high volume for you. If high volume for you is one a month, if one a month is high volume for you, it is for me right now. Like, I'm building a business. I'm not a creator. Like, I, and every month, Trevor just pointed this out. Like, every month I've had way less time to allocate towards these videos because the business is taking off. Yeah. And that's my priority, right? And so the number one thing is figure out what high volume is for you in a sustainable way. I recently hired a personal trainer, and if DJ would have given me Seabum's routine on day one, I would die. You know, I would not stick with it. And so figure out what you're going to do that is sustainable, and then pick an arbitrary amount of time. Two weeks, four weeks, six weeks. And that is how often you increase your volume. Arbitrary. But the key is, and and this is the key to volume. It's not so you show up everywhere. It's so that you acquire the data on what your audience is resonating with the most, and then you can make more of it. I call it the accordion method. In the beginning, you expand the accordion, and you do more volume so that you get insights on what your audience likes. Even if you're averaging 13 views a video, one of them is going to get 39. That's not a lot of signal, but it's a little bit. And so then you start doubling down on that. Eventually, once you have enough information, you can track the accordion and put the same amount of effort you were putting into, let's say, four videos a month on YouTube into one. And you'll, in my opinion, get far more in return. What I have found is one video, I'm going to use big numbers here just to make it easy, but just, you know, move commas around to make it relatable for you. In a world where you could upload four videos and all of them get 250,000 views, that's a million total. Or you get one video a month that gets a million. I, there's probably some nuance to this, and I'm sure there's a channel out there that doesn't follow this rule, but for the most part, I've observed that if you get the million view video, it's a lot of new subscribers. And so I do value that more. Now, am I aiming for virality? No. What I'm doing, if you notice, is I'm not articulating outcome. I'm not saying higher quality. I'm saying more effort. I'm talking about the input that you put in, the thing that you can control. The output we can't control. Yeah.

Hit the email list. So, how did this six-hour video grow your email list? 20,000 subscribers. Yeah. So, um, we created a workbook, 50 pages, that goes along with the, uh, course because I believe that if you are making educational content, your whole entire goal, the only thing you're trying to do is get people to take action on what you're saying and do things differently than they did before they watched your video. And so, every decision you make, graphics, lead magnets, downloadables, all those things, if it makes it easier for them to change what they do, cool. If it doesn't, you don't do it. A workbook is the ultimate version of that, right? There's better versions, but it's, it's the ultimate scalable version of it. And so, we put together a workbook that you can download for free on my website. All you got to do is enter your email, and then we email it to you. And it, it, it is insane the feedback. Like, I, to be very blunt, did not expect people to think that the workbook was as good as they're saying it is.

When, how many times do you ask for it and when do you ask for, you know, educate people about it in the video? How many times do we mention it? Like, maybe like four, I'm going to say four to six times in the video. It's the pinned comment on the YouTube video, and it is the top line of the description. A lot of you are burying your links. Yeah. Just like a good website has all the most important links to click top of fold. A good YouTube description has all, or the most important link, not all, the one most important link up at the very top. And that's what we did. And that's it. That's the only place. There's nowhere else that we have pushed people to sign up for the email list.

By the way, did you get the website, uh, the work, did you get the workbook done before you filmed and teach from it at all? Or you did it after? I did it after because, um, basically I took the transcript of everything that I said and I worked with Chad G2 back and forth on it.

Then did you shoot the call to actions later? No. You, cuz you knew it was going to make it. You knew it was going to exist, but it wasn't done. You filmed the video, then took the transcript, then finished it. Yeah. Cuz I knew, I knew what the exercises were. I didn't know how we were going to make it interactive. Yeah. So I didn't know how that was going to function, but I knew what they were. So, I was able to speak to it, like, you know, when I'm talking about because it goes through brand, content, team, monetize, and in the team section, I talk about job descriptions. It's super exhilarating, but it's actually like one of my favorite subjects. Uh, and I, I mention a job description that we actually built for a client who hired a director of brand for $245,000 a year. It's in there. Like a very high-level job description is in that you can just duplicate and customize for yourself. Like I tried to give away everything that we could. Yeah, that's amazing.

And by the way, we'll link that up in the show notes because if you like, are already getting tactics and so much value in this episode, um, for building your brand, building your channel, building your social media, but you want a cool resource that's free and it's here on YouTube. You have a six-hour deep dive, uh, branding masterclass with Caleb Riston. We'll link that up in the show notes. It's a long one. Be, be careful. Comes with a workbook, um, that you could check out as well. And then I do have another question for you, but anything else other than that that you want to, um, shout out?

No, no. I think, uh, that's probably the most valuable thing to date that I've put out there. And so I think if people consume that, the, the, the request I would have is if anybody watches it and takes action, just DM me and let me know the results. That that fires me up. It's my favorite thing in the world. I, I'm seeing a lot of people on LinkedIn talk about what they're doing, what they're taking, the results they're getting. I get a ton of DMs on Instagram about it, and like that is the coolest thing in the world. It's crazy. And so, uh, that would be the only favor I ask. So, find Caleb. We'll link it up in the Instagram. We'll link it up in the show notes and find him on Instagram. We'll link up his, um, account.

And then one other question for you, and I want to encourage listeners to check out part two of our conversation because what people might not know is that we have known each other for almost 20 years. Um, we've built a couple seven-figure plus businesses and we come from the same small town an hour north of Seattle, Washington, which is weird. And and have now traveled around America doing social media stuff, and that's strange. And so that could be an interesting conversation with a lot of the lessons. But one question for this episode, and we'll link that up or it'll come out in the future, is if you could give yourself advice 10 years ago, what would you say?

It's funny. I get asked this question a couple of, I'm starting to do podcasts and I get this question, and I think I answer it differently every time. So, uh, maybe one day we should just compile all the answers. I think you said 10 years ago, and normally it's like your 16-year-old or high school self. So 10 years ago, I would have been 21, turning 22. And I think what I would tell myself because I was just about to realize this the hard way is, um, being in motion and in action creates incredible serendipity. The biggest things that have happened in my career and my life have come when I have maybe in my, what I've been given, not feeling satisfied, aka my 9 to 5, and so I take action upon for myself and I pursue something outside of that. And in doing that, the action of it, uh, I'm not a woo-woo guy. I don't believe in any of that woo-woo stuff, but this is about as close I get. The more you're in action, the more strange things come your way. I don't know what it is. I'm not sure if it's a vibe that you exude or what, but I would tell myself to always be working on something that you are incredibly passionate around because the moments in your life where you've done that are when you have had the biggest outcomes.

Caleb, appreciate you adding so much value today. And, uh, for more lessons like that, subscribe because, uh, for part two. And this is the Think Media podcast. If you got value today, like, rate, share, review wherever you watch or listen. My name is Sean Kel, your guide to building a profitable YouTube channel. And I will catch you in a future.