My BIGGEST Advice for Starting and Growing a YouTube Channel

Figuring out how to grow on YouTube can be overwhelming, to say the least. There is so much information and advice being shared out there, and it's hard to know what's actually worth listening to. So, that's why I wanted to make this video.

I started this YouTube channel just over 2 years ago. And I had another channel 2 years before that. And in that time, I made a lot of videos, learned a lot of lessons, and eventually ended up here as a full-time YouTuber now making over $20,000 per month. Along the way, my videos have been used as training materials for the teams behind some of the biggest YouTube channels in the world, and my content even somehow became part of PBS's official training for digital creators. So, those are my qualifications.

Now, the number one question I'm always asked is, "How do you grow on YouTube?" So, I figured I should just sit down and share all of the most important things that I've learned over the last few years and what I would want to know if I had to do it all over again. And because the concept of growing on YouTube is quite broad and the advice changes depending on where you're at in your YouTube journey, I've broken this video into three main stages: Getting your first 1,000 subscribers, growing from 1K to 10K subscribers, and climbing from 10K to 100,000 subscribers and beyond.

And this video is a little extra special because look what came in the mail. It came about a month ago, actually, but I figured I would save it to unbox here with you guys because that just felt right. We'll just put this aside for later, but for now, we'll start from the beginning and break down my biggest advice for getting your first 1,000 subscribers.

All right, so this stage is by far the hardest to get through. Not because it takes the most skill, but because it takes the most resilience. Most people won't make it to 1,000 subscribers simply because they don't see the results that they want, and they just give up too early. And I don't say that to discourage you. I'm telling you this more so to prepare you so that you know in advance that this is less a game of perfect play and more a game of sticking with it even if you don't see the growth that you want. That being said, there are some things that I picked up that I think will help you get through the stage just a little bit faster. And it starts with overall strategy.

Now, when you're starting a brand new channel, the advice you'll usually hear is "Just start and keep experimenting until you find something that sticks." And I understand the intention behind the advice is meant to take off some pressure and encourage exploration. But I actually disagree with it. A bit of a spicy take, I know, but I think that following this advice sets people up to just post random videos, cross their fingers, and hope that one of them will just magically take off. And when that doesn't happen, they get discouraged, burn out, and just stop posting altogether. And even if one of those random videos does take off, it creates a different problem. Because now you have a new viewer, someone who discovered you and liked what they saw, then they go to your channel to check out what else you've made. But every other video is completely different. There is no throughline, no cohesion, so they just click away. And YouTube receives the signal that your channel probably isn't worth recommending to many others.

That's why instead of just experimenting and hoping for the best, every new YouTube channel should start with a lane, which is a combination of two things: your audience and your value. Who are your videos for? And why do they care? What do they get from watching your videos? That value piece is so important because, and I don't mean to sound harsh here, but the average YouTube video is not interesting. And no one owes you their time. I think a lot of people forget that a view isn't just a number. It's a real-life person who has intentionally chosen to spend minutes of their life watching your video. And as much as we want to believe that the simple act of uploading a video guarantees attention, the truth is that attention has to be earned.

Let me give you an example. One of the most common beginner YouTube video types that exists out there is a "let's play" video where someone records themselves playing a game that they love, like Minecraft, and then just uploads it. Now, I totally get the appeal. It's fun. It's easy to make, and it's probably something that they're already doing in their free time, but it's also what I call a selfish video. It may be interesting to the creator, but it's unlikely that anyone else would be interested in watching a random stranger play through hours of Minecraft. Unless you're remarkably entertaining or you already have a pre-existing audience who cares about you, no one's going to watch your video.

Now, this doesn't mean that gaming content can't work. It just means that you need to level up the value. Level one could be "chilling on Minecraft," which is a selfish video. We could then level that up to something like, "How I survived 100 days in hardcore mode," which is better. There is more of a challenge there, more of a story, but it has been done many, many times before. So, we could level it up one more time to something like, "Can I beat Minecraft without jumping?" There's clear value there. The viewer knows they're going to get a video where they see something they've probably never seen before, most likely with some creative solutions or hacks. There's a reason to care about this video, even if they have no idea who you are. That's the difference between making something for fun and making something that actually grows your channel.

Now, when it comes to choosing an audience and value of their own, there are three things that I recommend looking at to help you make your decision. First, there's your likes. What do you enjoy doing? What are your hobbies? What are things you could talk about forever? If you don't think you could happily spend the next 10 years talking about it, it's probably not the best fit for you. And second, there's your strengths. What are you good at? What skills, experience, or knowledge do you already have that can give you an edge? Early on, you're learning so many new things from how to edit a video to how to properly film yourself to how to structure a script. So, the more you can lean into an existing strength when it comes to the topic of the videos, the better. And finally, if you're having trouble coming up with what type of value you want to provide, I'd recommend looking for inspiration in existing established creators that you look up to. Why do people watch their videos? What was it that drew you to them in the first place? For me, this inspiration channel was Ali Abdaal. I really liked how he was able to convey real, useful information in a very down-to-earth, friendly, yet professional way. And it helped me think about how I could provide a similar type of value to my own audience.

Now, I know that deciding on and committing to a lane can be very hard. The choice of "What do I make a channel about?" is often paralyzing and stops so many would-be creators from ever starting a channel of their own. They'll spend months trying to come up with a perfect lane or a perfect positioning and they end up never posting anything at all. And I get it, the paralysis is so, so real. But a reframe that really helped me was viewing your lane not as a forever decision, but as a hypothesis. It's just a guess. A guess that's rooted in what you like, what you're good at, and what you admire from other creators. That's it. And that's more than good enough to start. You don't need to get it right on your first try. And in fact, you probably won't. Almost no one does. Take a look at your favorite creators. See what videos they make now and what videos they started with. Chances are they're probably pretty different. And even if they appear to be the same, keep in mind that many creators will unlist their oldest videos after the fact, or that the channel that you see might not be their first channel. So, choose a lane. Make a hypothesis and know that no matter how many lists you make or how intentionally you think, that first hypothesis will probably be wrong. But it's okay. You can only figure out what the right lane for you looks like by just choosing something, sticking with it long enough to get a signal, and then making adjustments from there. You can always change your lane later, but if you never commit to one in the first place, you'll never give yourself a chance to get there.

After you've chosen your starting lane, it's time to launch your channel. And while most people will simply make their first video and then post it, I recommend doing something a little different. And this is just about as close to a YouTube cheat code as I have ever seen. Don't launch your channel with one video. Launch it with four. And there are two main reasons for this. First, it increases your total watch time from the very beginning, which helps you get closer to monetization. As a reminder, in order to start earning AdSense revenue from YouTube, you need to meet the baseline requirements of 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours. So, these watch hours really matter. But more importantly, launching your channel with four videos helps YouTube figure out who your videos are for, which means that the algorithm can start showing your videos to the right people faster.

Here's how it works. At the end of each of your launch videos, include a clear call to action pointing your viewers to the next video. Even something as simple as, "If you like this video, you'll probably like this one about X, Y, and Z." And then link to that in the end screen. This creates a bingeable loop. If someone finds one of your videos and likes it, they're much more likely to watch another video of yours. That chain of watch time sends powerful signals to YouTube. If a viewer watches not just one, but two or three or even four of your videos back to back, YouTube picks up on that and thinks, "Okay, this type of person really likes this type of video, so let's show these videos to other people just like them." That's exactly what happened when I launched this channel. I started by releasing four videos at once. They're still by far the most watched videos of my first three months. And I'm not the only one who has used this strategy. The Theorist team has also said that they always launch new channels with more than one video to give the algorithm more data right off the gate.

"We have to launch with five videos, like, day one, five videos. It's not launch on an empty channel. It's not, 'Here is the only one.' It's five videos that within those five videos give you the thesis of the channel."

Whether you're launching with four or five videos, the way that you approach them should be the same. Think of them as your channel's foundation. If someone were to watch all four videos back to back, they should come away with a clear sense of what the channel's about and why they would want to stick around. What kind of value do you offer? What kind of topics do you cover? Even the process of planning out those four videos will help you refine your lane. So, instead of trying to make the one perfect video that will go viral, focus instead on building a small, cohesive world, one that invites a specific type of viewer to stay.

After you've launched your channel, the hardest part is over. You've overcome that initial friction to start, which most people never do. And now, in order to get your first 10,000 subscribers, all you need to do is just keep going. Your first few videos are going to be rough. That's just the reality. And that's okay. They're supposed to be. Mine certainly were. And yes, occasionally you'll see someone whose first few uploads look like Netflix documentaries and immediately take off. But that's not the norm. When it happens, it usually happens because they're already a filmmaker, or they've worked on other people's channels before, or this actually isn't their first time doing it. For most of us, though, it's a process of figuring things out in public. That's just the game.

And part of what makes this game tough, especially in the beginning, is the gap between your taste and your skills. You probably already have a good sense of what good content looks like. You've watched creators you admire and you have a vision of what kind of videos you want to make. But your ability to execute on that vision, that takes more time to develop. And that gap between what you want to make and what you're actually capable of making can be incredibly frustrating. But the only way to close that gap is through repetition. Better videos come from making more videos. Quantity begets quality. So, especially in the 0 to 1k stage, I'd aim to make at least one video per week. And if you can, twice a week. Think of it this way. If it takes on average 100 videos to get truly good at YouTube and you post once a month, that's an 8-year-long journey. But if you post once a week, it'll take 2 years. If you post twice a week, you'll get there in just one. And of course, we all have different capacities, different schedules, and different responsibilities. So, you have to pace yourself in a way that feels sustainable. But the important thing is that you're honest with yourself about the tradeoff. Less output means slower progress. And that's okay as long as you're aware of it.

And if you've been uploading consistently, putting in the effort, and still not seeing the results that you want, it's probably because you're making one or more of these common mistakes. Mistake number one is switching lanes too quickly. If you pivot your content every other upload, you're never in one lane long enough to learn what's actually working. I'd give your first lane at least 10 focus videos before making any major changes. You need time to collect signal. On the flip side, the second mistake is not changing lanes at all. Even when something is clearly not working. If you've posted 50 videos and they're all the same and nothing is working, it's probably because your first hypothesis was wrong and you need to make a new one. Each upload should be either better or different from the one that came before it. That's how you improve. Mistake number three is spreading yourself too thin. Don't try to grow on YouTube and TikTok and Instagram and Twitter all at once. Choose one platform to focus on and build momentum there first. If you already have a following somewhere else, that's great, but just don't dilute your energy trying to learn three brand new platforms all at the same time. And finally, one of the biggest and most dangerous mistakes is expecting too much from your early uploads. I can't tell you how many times someone has said to me, "April, I've been making videos consistently for 3 months. I'm still not seeing any results. What am I doing wrong?" Most of the time, the honest answer is, "You just haven't been doing it long enough." YouTube is a long game. So, if you can try to find a couple of creator friends to connect with, people who get what you're trying to do, who can help keep you accountable, who can check your expectations, and who can encourage you when things get slow. I would have definitely given up on this channel and my previous one if not for my YouTube friends. And if you're looking for people to connect with, you're always welcome to post in the community tab on my channel. I keep it open just for things like this.

The beginning is the hardest part. But if you can stick through this stage, if you can pick a lane, launch intentionally, and keep uploading consistently, you're in the top 10% of creators already.

Once you've crossed the 1,000 subscriber milestone, first of all, congratulations. That's huge. Most people never make it that far. It means that you've built the discipline required to stick with it long enough to see real movement. You've proven that you can show up. But now, if you want to get to 10,000 subscribers, it's time to level up. And at this stage, there are two very important skills that matter more than anything else.

First up, we have packaging, otherwise known as your title and thumbnail. Everyone knows that titles and thumbnails are important, but I wish I was exaggerating when I told you that truly better titles and thumbnails are the number one thing that can help you get from 1K to 10K. Because ultimately, no matter how good your script is, how strong your editing is, or how much effort you've put into your cinematography, if people don't click on your video, they'll never watch it in the first place. I only started seeing real growth on my channel when I started treating my titles and thumbnails with the same level of intentionality that I did for my videos themselves. The same goes for my friend Dea. These days, she literally won't make a video unless she's confident in the packaging because she doesn't want to spend a week's working on a video that no one will ever click on. And yes, if you look at our channels over time, you may be able to notice things like more consistent branding, higher quality images, and clearer text. But the real improvement didn't come from the design changes themselves. It came from the psychology behind the design. Because good packaging isn't really about what colors you use or what fonts you choose. It's about how well you understand people. It's about being able to evoke curiosity, desire, or fear within just a couple seconds. It's about the ability to open a loop in someone's brain that makes them need to click because they have to get the information or resolution that closes the loop.

So, how exactly do you get better at this? Well, it's a big topic and I've made a couple of dedicated breakdowns on titles and thumbnails that go way deeper than I can here, including useful frameworks, title structures, thumbnail compositions, and tons of real examples and case studies. I've heard from hundreds of creators that those breakdowns have completely changed the way they package their videos. And although I'm definitely more than a little biased here, I genuinely believe that that's one of the best places that you can start. So, if you haven't watched those videos yet, I'll link to them in the video description below.

That being said, I don't want to leave you with just nothing in this video. So, if I had to give you two packaging-giving related concepts to internalize, it would be the concepts of volume and leveraging what's already worked for others. Starting with volume, most of us will spend a ton of time building up a single title and thumbnail concept. But at least in my experience, your first idea is rarely your best idea. So, one of the best things you can do to level up your packaging is simply come up with more concepts. Personally, I try to come up with at least 30 title ideas for every video I make. And I know that that sounds like a lot, but I could usually knock it out in around 20 minutes of structured brainstorming. I'll use the first 5 minutes to brainstorm title ideas from my head. Then I'll use the next 5 minutes to look at what I like to call my "model 5 channels" or successful channels who target a different audience from me, but who offer a similar type of value as I do. And I'll see if they've used any title structures that I could apply to my own video idea. I'll use the next 5 minutes to search for outliers other people have made on my topic, videos that have way overperformed a channel's average, and I'll see if there's any phrasing or keywords that I could use. And finally, I take my last 5 minutes to take everything I come up with so far and put it into AI to generate even more variations. By the end of this process, I'll typically have a few title ideas in there that are way better than the original I had in mind.

And while ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini are great for this last step, I've been finding a lot of inspiration from a new feature that was just released from my longtime partner, Sprout Studio. In fact, Sprout Studio can help with the entire title brainstorming process. After you identify your model 5 channels, Sprout Studio makes it very easy to add them all to one list, creating a custom feed of videos you can look at any time for inspiration, as opposed to having to check each channel one by one. You could even adjust the filters to look only at their outlier videos or videos above a certain view count. When it comes to searching for outlier videos outside of your Model 5 channels, you can use the outlier tab itself, searching for your topic, adjusting the filters, and browsing the outliers surfaced directly to you. But I've recently been enjoying looking for outliers in a different way. Using a new feature that I've been looking forward to for a long, long time: Chat. Within Sprout Studio, I can ask the chat anything I want to help me come up with new video ideas, titles, thumbnails, outlines, and more. For example, when working through round three of my title brainstorming process, I can tell it in more detail about the video I'm working on and ask it to show me relevant outlier videos with over 100,000 views. Sprout Studio will search through YouTube and do all the hard work for me, serving me relevant, high-performing outlier videos that I can then use to inspire titles of my own. And after brainstorming a list of titles from my head, for my model 5 channels, and from relevant outlier videos, I can give the full list to Sprout Studio and ask it to give me even more variations. What I love about this new development is that Sprout Studio still leverages all the powerful ultra-personalization to your channel as it used to, being able to identify and replicate your own thumbnail style, and even identifying what your audience already watches, while packaging all of that power into a new way to brainstorm that's so much more intuitive to navigate and fine-tune to your liking. If you're already a Sprout Studio member, congrats. You already have access to Chat. And if you want to try it out for yourself, I'll leave a link in the video description below to try out Sprout Studio for 14 days absolutely free, which I highly recommend taking advantage of so you too can use it to have better brainstorming sessions. And I'll leave a link to my free title brainstorming template below if you want to try out this process for yourself.

And you may notice that a decent chunk of my title brainstorming time is allotted to looking at videos that have already worked well for others. That's because if a packaging concept has already worked well for someone in the past, even if they're in a different niche from you, there is a much higher chance that some version of it will work for you, too. And this applies to thumbnails as well. Recently, I wanted to make a video that was structured around a 90-day system. So, one of the first things I did when brainstorming thumbnail concepts was look for other high-performing videos related to sharing a system, a plan, or a 90-day framework. Even though the videos were in different niches, I could notice some similarities in how the thumbnails were composed and what elements were often the main characters and supporting characters. I was able to apply those insights to my own thumbnail. The result was a video that has overperformed the last nine videos before it. So, if you're in the 1K to 10K stage and you're wondering what's holding you back, chances are it's this. And if I had to go back and do it all over again, this is the area where I would spend the majority of my time improving. So study what's already working, brainstorm more concepts, and keep iterating until you land on something that earns that much-deserved click.

Now that you're getting clicks, the only thing stopping you from 10,000 subscribers is generating enough momentum. Because in order to keep growing, you need to be able to turn one great video into a second great video and then a third and then a fourth. And the easiest way to do that is by doubling down on what's already working for you. At this stage, you'll probably have a couple of videos that have overperformed. They don't need to have gone viral in order to count. If you normally get 300 views per video, for instance, and one video gets 1,200 views, that video is an outlier. And these outliers are absolute gold mines because they signal to us that there's something in there that's attracting a wider audience.

Once you've identified an outlier, the next step is to develop it into something that I like to call a "video recipe," which is a repeatable content bucket comprised of a consistent audience, value, format, and vibe. We've covered audience and value already. Who are you making your videos for, and what do they get out of watching your videos? Format is the structure through which you impart your value, whether it be through a vlog, a challenge, a breakdown, an interview, or something else. And vibe is the overall feeling your videos give off, which is usually determined by editing style, pacing, word choice, and environment. When those four ingredients stay consistent across your videos, your channel starts to feel cohesive. Viewers who like one video are much more likely to enjoy the next. And when this video recipe is developed from an outlier video, that's what builds momentum, effectively attracting new viewers and getting those viewers to stick around.

Now, I'm not telling you to make the same video over and over again, but there should be a clear enough throughline that ties your channel together. When in doubt, a good rule of thumb to go by is the 80% rule. Ask yourself, "Would 80% of the people who liked your last video be interested in your next video?" If not, you're probably making the wrong video. So, identify your outliers, turn them into video recipes, and keep creating within that framework. Because the clearer your recipe is, the easier it is to make consistent, repeatable content that actually grows your channel.

Now, as you dial in your packaging and start doubling down on what works, it's natural for your upload frequency to take a little bit of a hit. After all, you're spending way more time brainstorming title and thumbnail concepts. You're being much more intentional about the structure of your videos, and you're probably working on improving your production quality or editing quality as well. So, yes, it's normal to start posting a little less frequently. If you were posting twice a week, you might drop down to once a week. If you were once a week, you could stretch to every 10 days or so, but try not to slow down too much. Because here's what tends to happen at this stage. The growth kicks in. The stakes feel higher, and suddenly there's this pressure for every video to be better than the last. And that pressure can cause a kind of creative paralysis. I've been there. Right after my channel started gaining traction, I completely freaked out and went on to make only three videos in the following 7 months. I overthought everything. I wanted every video to be a masterpiece. And I've seen the exact same thing happen to so many of my other YouTube friends at this stage. So, if that's you, know that it's normal. But if you want to break past 10K, you also need to find a way to push through it because momentum can only build if you keep uploading.

Now, at this point, as your channel starts to grow and you start getting more visibility, something new tends to enter the picture: brand deals. And while it may feel like your big YouTuber moment, I have a potentially spicy take here. But it's a take that I do genuinely stand by. Don't take brand deals at this stage. Unless you're in a tight financial situation and really need the extra income, I genuinely recommend holding off. And I know it can feel really exciting to get your first brand deal offer because on the surface it feels like easy money. Just mention a product and get paid for it. But in reality, brand deals are a lot of work and they slow you way down. They make your production process longer. They add extra layers of back and forth and approval. And they can even hurt your video performance if the integration doesn't feel seamless and if it hurts retention. But more than anything, brand deals shift your focus. It's unlikely that you're going to get anything significant at this stage in your YouTube journey. And it's so much better to spend your time just trying to get to 10K through making better videos, through leveling up your packaging, or by doubling down on what works rather than spending countless hours juggling brand scripts and deliverables for only a few hundred.

Now, on the flip side, there is something that I would highly recommend starting at this stage: an email list. Even if you're not sure how you'll use it yet, start collecting emails. Because owning your audience off-platform is one of the best long-term decisions you can make as a creator. Why? Because it gives you direct access to your most invested subscribers. These are the people who want to hear from you. And if you ever want to launch something down the road, whether it's a product, a service, a course, it's so much easier to reach them through email than by hoping that a video hits their homepage. I put this off for way too long because I didn't want to give myself extra work. And yes, an email list is more effective if you're actually sending them emails. But if you're not ready for that, you can still just start collecting email addresses in the background. You can create a freebie like a checklist or a template or PDF that pairs with a video and then offer it as a lead magnet. Or you can just put a link to sign up in your video description or in your channel bio or in the occasional community post. Your earliest subscribers are often your most loyal, and setting yourself up with a direct connection to them now can be huge later on. When I launched the beta version of my coaching program this year, it sold out completely, and the majority of those sales came directly through my email list. That one decision to start collecting emails was one of the biggest factors that led to a six-figure launch on a brand new offer. So yes, first and foremost, focus on growing your channel. But as you do so, don't forget to plant the seeds of what can come next. Your future self will thank you.

Once you've crossed that 10,000 subscriber mark, you've officially found something that works. You've proven that you can get attention, deliver value, and keep people coming back. Now, it's time to scale. The game from 10K to 100K is all about raising your "view floor," which is the lowest number of views you get per day across your channel, regardless of whether you've uploaded that day or not. As your channel grows, that floor should rise. And the higher your view floor, the more discoverability your channel has on autopilot and the faster you'll grow. So, how do you raise your view floor? Well, there are three main levers you can work with: producing more bangers, producing fewer flops, and increasing your quality without sacrificing quantity.

Let's start with making more bangers. These are your breakout videos, the videos that bring in thousands of new subscribers and that keep performing weeks or even months after you upload them. And at this stage, creating more bangers isn't about working harder. It's about being more intentional in what you decide to make in the first place. Because when it comes to making videos that have true blow-up potential, the idea matters far more than the execution. Just take it from world-renowned YouTube consultant, Patty Galloway.

"I can't say it enough. Like, I'll be blue in the face saying this until I think the day I die is like, the idea is more important than everything."

So, what makes for a banger idea? In my experience, there are three main signals that can tell us if an idea has a high view potential. First, that some version of the idea has been executed before and has already gotten massive results. Second, that the topic taps into something that has broad appeal, what we'd call a high TAM or total addressable market. And third, that the idea profoundly triggers one or more of the three click-worthy emotions: curiosity, desire, or fear. When you're trying to grow from 10K to 100K, you have to be far more discerning about what you say yes to. If a video idea doesn't meet those three major signals, then it probably shouldn't get made. Now, not every single video you make needs to go viral. I do believe that everyone should leave at least some space for experimentation and artistic expression. But if your goal is to grow, at least 80% of the videos that you make at this stage should be designed to attract a wider audience.

To find those banger ideas, start ideating regularly. And I don't just mean whenever inspiration strikes. Make ideation a true habit. Some of the biggest YouTubers in the world aren't necessarily the best filmmakers. They're just the best ideators. Take Ryan Trahan for example. Every single day without fail, he'll brainstorm 10 new video ideas. It's a muscle that you can build. And while you don't need to write down 10 video ideas per day like Ryan, developing your own system to collect new ideas and inspiration is one of the best things that you can do. Personally, I like to take screenshots of videos that spark something in me. These videos don't need to be in my own niche. There just has to be something in the packaging or premise that makes me think, "Hmm, there's something good here." I'll drop them all into a running Notion dock, then reference them whenever I sit down to brainstorm.

After you've developed a habit of idea generation, the real growth comes from effective idea filtration. Not every video idea you come up with is going to be a winner. So, to evaluate the quality of my ideas, I run them through a set of pretty strict criteria: Is this idea feasible to execute within my current time and resource constraints? If someone saw this video but had no idea who I was, would they still be interested in it? Would at least 80% of my existing audience want to watch this? Does this idea have the potential to hit my view goal? Is there enough proof of prior success to make me feel confident? Does this idea fit within one of my existing video recipes? If not, does it have the potential to turn into its own video recipe? Can I come up with a strong title and thumbnail for this idea? And finally, the real kicker: Can I make this idea something that feels uniquely mine? Because if you truly want to make a real banger, you can't just copy someone else's idea. While proof of prior success is a powerful signal, a clone of a successful video will never perform as well as the original. So, while much of your growth up to this point may have come from studying what's worked well for others, if you really want to grow to 100K, you have to start leaning into what makes you different, what makes your videos special. For me, I realized that people responded most to the level of depth that I went into. The research, the case studies, the visuals I created to break things down. That became a part of my signature style. And once I saw that it was resonating, I made a point to double it down on it and apply it to nearly every video that I made. So, when you're evaluating an idea, don't just stop at, "Has this worked for someone else before?" Go one step further and ask, "How can I make it mine?" What makes your videos different from others in your space? What do most people comment on? What do you enjoy doing that others don't? The more you lean into your unique differentiator, the harder it is to compete with you, and the more likely your videos are to stand out and blow up.

With a focus on better ideas and leaning into your differentiators, you'll start to produce more bangers. But if you want to raise your view floor, you're also going to need to start producing fewer flops. Now, let's get one thing clear. No matter how good your ideas are and how much experience you have, flops will happen. So, when a video of yours inevitably underperforms, the first thing to do is ask, "Was this a click problem, a watch problem, or an idea problem?" If it's a click problem, it means that your packaging didn't land, the title and thumbnail didn't spark enough curiosity, or they weren't clear or compelling enough. In this case, you can often revive the video by reworking the packaging, whether it's a new title, a new thumbnail, or both. If it's a watch problem, you need to go deeper. Pull up your retention graph and take a look at where people are dropping off. Did you lose them in the first 30 seconds, or was it a steady drop throughout? Were there any particular sections that drove people away? If your average view duration is lower than it typically is, then there's something in your delivery that you can learn from. And if both your packaging and your retention look solid, it's most likely an idea problem, which means that the concept just wasn't strong enough to begin with. Maybe the TAM was too small. Maybe the idea didn't appeal to new viewers. Maybe it wasn't emotionally resonant enough. If that's the case, the best thing you can do is go back to your ideation filter and ask, "What could I have added to my idea criteria that would have stopped this video from getting made?" After a flop of mine that broke down how Mark Rober goes viral, I realized that it's quite difficult to generate enough interest for standalone case studies on any creator other than Mr. Beast. That realization led me to add a new filter to my ideation criteria. The more flops you have, the more specific your own ideation criteria can become. And that's a good thing because ultimately the goal isn't to avoid flops forever. It's to make each one count, to use them as data, to build out your own internal playbook. That's how you reduce your number of misses over time and steadily increase your hit rate.

As you start producing more and more bangers and fewer and fewer flops, your view floor will naturally begin to rise. And as it does so, there's one final lever to focus on if you want to scale all the way up to 100K: increasing your video quality without sacrificing your quantity. Never an easy thing to do, I know, but it's one of the biggest drivers for long-term growth. And the best way to make it happen is by reinvesting in your channel. This is a stage where I'd finally start accepting brand deals, not just for the extra income, but for the ability to reinvest that money into buying back your time and energy so you can create more videos without burning out. And to figure out exactly what you should be investing in, I'd highly recommend doing a time audit. Just open up a doc and list everything you do in your video creation process. Literally everything. Think through the entire journey from brainstorming to scripting, filming, editing, packaging, uploads, emails, everything. Then for each task, estimate how long each thing normally takes you. Once you've got that down, ask yourself four questions for each task: Could this be eliminated? Does it actually need to happen? Could this be shortened or simplified? Are you overcomplicating something that could be done faster? Could this be automated? Is this something a tool could streamline? And could this be delegated? Is this something a potential hire could help with? When it comes to that last question, it can be useful to ask, "In a perfect world, who would be doing this?" Even if that role doesn't exist yet, and even if you haven't made any hires yet, this will help you start building out an ideal vision of what your team and process could look like. For example, maybe scripting is something you love doing, so you want to keep that. But maybe editing takes forever. You realize that that's some place where you could really use some extra support. And maybe uploading is tedious and just eats up your time. Great. That's a perfect candidate for delegation. This kind of clarity gives you an exact roadmap of where to invest in your channel first and how to grow intentionally rather than reactively. I'll put a link to this time audit exercise in the video description below in case you want to try it out for yourself.

So, whatever your elimination, simplification, automation, or delegation looks like, the goal should be to reinvest in a way that helps you create more at a higher level and with less stress. Because ultimately, this stage is all about scale, and scale doesn't come from effort alone. It comes from building up the systems to support and compound that effort. So if you can consistently execute on smarter ideas, cut back on your flops, and increase your video quality without sacrificing your quantity, it's only a matter of time before you end up with one of these.

You ready? How do I open this? Oh, [Music] It's so hard to believe that we're actually here and that I'm actually holding this in my hands. Whether you've been a subscriber from before my first thousand or you've just now joined recently, truly, thank you so, so much for being here. And if I could leave you with one final piece of advice, it would be to never, ever, ever stop believing in yourself. People are going to call you crazy. People aren't going to see your vision, but you need to be there to believe in yourself. After every video that doesn't perform as well as you hoped it would, you need to be able to tell yourself, "This video doesn't matter. The next one is going to be a banger." And then you have to repeat that to yourself as many times as it takes before it becomes true. Understand that growth is not linear. It's like planting something. The roots grow first underground, building a foundation, but they're completely unseen. And then one day, without warning, the stem breaks through. Everyone sees it and celebrates when it happens. But the roots were there the whole time. So, if you're in the thick of it, whether you're psyching yourself up to finally start your channel, or if you're very deep in the grind to 100K, keep believing in yourself because as long as that's true, it's only a matter of time before you're holding one of these yourself.

This month's featured creator is Kayla Evelyn. She's an artist making these beautiful, soft, reflected videos about creativity. You can really tell how much effort, heart, and attention she puts into her videos. Let's be kind and supportive and go check out her videos and leave a nice comment. I know it would mean the world. Here are the rules to be chosen for next month's feature creator. Each feature creator is participating in the 90-day YouTube challenge. And if you want to join in, just watch this video to learn about the challenge and then post your video using #Arlinschallenge.