Hey YouTubers,
2024 is flying by, and if youâre not careful youâll end up reaching the end of the year without achieving what you wanted on YouTube.
But when youâre in the thick of it, itâs so hard to zoom out and see the reality of what youâre trying to do. You canât tell whether youâve got the right strategy or whether youâre doing the right things.
All you care about is the numbers, and they can either make or break you day.
So today, I want to share some clarifying thoughts for you in case your channel isnât quite where you want it to be.
Itâs a powerful technique that can help you cut through the noise and remind you what you should be doing.
â The Power of Inversion
When Charlie Munger died (Warren Buffetâs business partner) this quote appeared on my timeline:
âYou donât think of what you want, you think about what you want to avoid, and invert.â
Now if youâre like most YouTubers, you think about what you want all the time.
Views, subscribers and money.
You dream of all the nice things that success on YouTube could bring you. Then comes the crushing reality of how much work is actually involved. YouTube takes consistent effort, day after day, week after week. You realise itâs a lot harder than you thought. You struggle on and slowly stop at some point during your first year on the platform.
So letâs see what we can learn from Charlie Mungerâs lesson by applying it to YouTube.
Assuming the goal is to grow our YouTube channel, then we need to think about what we would avoid if we wanted to get that.
Here are 10 things you definitely wouldnât do:
Youâd avoid making videos that your target audience wanted to click on.
Youâd avoid making videos that your target audience wanted to watch.
Youâd avoid trying to master all the stages of the video production process: ideation, packaging, writing, filming and editing.
Youâd avoid getting help from others and outsourcing different parts of the production process to people more skilled than you.
Youâd avoid trying to stand out from other channels in your niche.
Youâd avoid iterating your content and strategy based on whatâs working and whatâs not, and not cater to your audience.
Youâd avoid creating a sustainable system that allowed you to enjoy the process, and youâd put so much pressure on yourself to succeed that you burnout.
Youâd avoid engaging and connecting with your audience on a regular basis.
Youâd avoid committing to YouTube for at least 2 years.
Youâd avoid trying to get 1% better with each video you make.
These are a list of sensible things youâd avoid doing if you didnât want your channel to grow at all.
Now, we invert:
Make videos that your target audience want to click on.
Make videos that your target audience want to watch.
Master all the stages of the video production process: ideation, packaging, writing, filming and editing.
Get help from others and outsource different parts of the production process to people more skilled than you.
Try to stand out from other channels in your niche.
Iterate your content and strategy based on whatâs working and whatâs not, and cater to your audience.
Create a sustainable system that allows you to enjoy the process, and donât put so much pressure on yourself to succeed that you burnout.
Engage and connect with your audience on a regular basis.
Commit to YouTube for at least 2 years.
Get 1% better with each video you make.
The Takeaway
Youâve probably heard a lot of this stuff before. But hereâs the thing, these are the things you need to be constantly reminded of.
Iâve seen so many YouTubers try to grow their channels and they do not have a knowledge problem. They know everything they need to know.
By far the biggest problem they have is with actually doing the thing and doing it for a long time without seeing results.
The tricks, tips and tactics to YouTube are important and helpful, but 99% of your success comes down to doing those 10 things above.
So the actionable takeaway for you today is to take an hour to zoom out from the hectic week to week of YouTube, and journal on a few of these points above.
Are you doing the thing consistently? How are you trying to stand out from other channels in your niche? Are you putting too much pressure on yourself to succeed? Are you thinking in terms of years not days?
In Aliâs team, every week we have something called âClarity Hourâ where we journal on our area of the business. We ask ourselves similar questions. What are we ignoring that we should be focusing on? Where is fear holding us back?
Iâd encourage you to take more time each week to reflect on the list above and whether youâre working on the right things.
Have an epic week making videos!
Tintin đ§âđť
đ§âđ¨ The YouTube Tin
Here are a few more ways I can help you progress:
đż My YouTube Channel: Join a whopping 500 other subscribers following my YouTube channel where I share unfiltered content about how to build a YouTube based business (Iâm currently pausing uploads whilst working on another project).
đŚ I also write on X posting more tips and behind the scenes content.
đ ď¸ My Favourite Tools
1of10.com (Paid) - Very useful tool that helps you find outlier video ideas. Itâs become a regular part of my workflow but it is expensive, so I only recommend it if you have spare money to invest.
Thumbnail Test (Paid)- This is the best A/B testing tool for titles and thumbnails on the market. I recommend reading my full post on A/B testing here before buying so you can decide whether you need to or not.
Thumbnail Preview (Free) - 1of10 also have a great free chrome extension to help you preview your thumbnails on YouTube itself.
âď¸ Popular How to YouTube Posts
To be read with love, care and retention.
Thanks Tintin I like the journaling regularly about what is holding you back based on fear and zooming out. I notice myself constantly gravitating towards the publishing schedule to optimise it. As itâs comfortable and controllable, but actually where my time is better spent is on planning the content more!
Hi Tintin - thanks for sharing the quote.
Please tell me if I am mistaken, but there is no real inversion in your YouTube example. The first list is simply a (double) negative of the second list - to succeed "don't avoid X", vs, to succeed "do X". I don't think this wordplay is very insightful. For example, no YouTuber is deliberately going to make boring videos for his audience, so it's a bit strange to categorise this as 'something to avoid'.
Perhaps a more useful inversion would be to "avoid giving YouTube advice to others, before you have checked that the advice works for yourself". Now I'm not saying it's necessarily hypocritical to make a video titled "How to Make a Viral Thumbnail" and not have a single viral video on your channel; all I'm saying is that people will not be convinced by it, even if your advice is right in theory. But then again, YouTube *is* a numbers game.
What do you think?