Growing... No thanks.

SmartTheDumb

SmartTheDumb

Loving YTtalk
Make no mistake, I hate it when I lose a sub, and absolutely adore when people follow my channel and comment my videos. But, the incessant thought that growing my channel was something I HAD to do, was nothing but poison.

I see this too often in here....
"-Oh you gotta do videos every day, you gotta do this, and then this, and then that, and then this, SEO, content, the channel must focus on one single subject, blablabla...."

What about just having fun?


I'd rather do whatever, whenever.
 
It depends what your goals are, and that's different for every individual. Some people just want to do Youtube to relax and have fun and if this is you, then of course you don't need to follow any of the SEO and basic fundamentals on how to grow. But some people want to grow their channel to supplement their income. Some want it to become their full time income. Some just want to become popular or a combination of many things. For these people who want to grow their channel as it is essential for their goals, then it's to their best interest to learn SEO, how Youtube works and all that stuff.
 
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I'm not denying that I wouldn't like to earn my life doing youtube! That would be a dream I've never even considered to have. But, worrying about it sucks the life out of me, and it blocks my ideas.
I've figured that I won't spend much more time spreading links and trying to get people to watch my videos. Even if my traffic lowers, as long as I can have fun, I'm good. I see too many sad millionaires around.

Plus, youtube success is all about standing out from the crowd. So, taking advice from the crowd, pretty much guarantees failure.
 
SmartTheDumb said:
I'm not denying that I wouldn't like to earn my life doing youtube! That would be a dream I've never even considered to have. But, worrying about it sucks the life out of me, and it blocks my ideas.
I've figured that I won't spend much more time spreading links and trying to get people to watch my videos. Even if my traffic lowers, as long as I can have fun, I'm good. I see too many sad millionaires around.

Plus, youtube success is all about standing out from the crowd. So, taking advice from the crowd, pretty much guarantees failure.
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Well, if following all these "best practices" that everyone keeps flaunting around isn't bringing you happiness, then go for it. I mean if uploading every day is stressing you out, then the quality of your videos is going to decrease anyway over time. Keep in mind that everyone's situation is different and it's okay to do your own thing in achieving whatever it is you want out of your channel.

Personally, I also find it pretty stressful adhering to all these "best practices" that everyone keeps talking about, and as a digital marketer I know that "success" can be achieved in many different ways without having to sacrifice your peace of mind. Even when talking to clients I tell them to consider their resources and capabilities before deciding to go all out on their content creation and social media plans or follow what all the other popular brands are doing. My mantra on content creation is that you need to sit down think about your capacity and figure out how we can maximize the energy you CAN spend on content creation.

And I like the way you think about how taking advice from the crowd pretty much won't guarantee that you'll stand out from the crowd. But I do think that there's value in at least listening to some of what they're saying and figuring out what you can integrate into your work without sacrificing your creativity. Because at the end of the day, isn't the crowd still part of the audience you're trying to reach?
 
The beauty of Yt is you are free to do what you want. Those who want to do it as a hobby and for fun, have the option to not enable monetization, upload whenever and whatever they want, and don't bother with t/t/d/cc or all the other backend stuff. Those who want to build a successful channel and business, and derive their income from Yt, need to do all the backend Seo stuff. Seo has been around for a long time, '96 I believe, when Google first started. Seo practices are well established. If you don't want to follow the crowd and find your own angle, that's awesome, but the algo is fairly well hard-coded in what it looks for! You can find success with some viral content (that shark attacking the diver in the cage), but it's usually short lived unless you can maintain viral momentum.
 
Some people really want to build a big audience, to make YouTube into their career, or to help a business that relies on videos to keep in contact with customers, or whatever, and that's absolutely terrific. I think there are a great number of articles and tips about how to do this.

I always find the advice interesting, because my channel doesn't follow all that many best practices. I have different types of videos every week, and three of those series involve puppets. So it's not exactly...mainstream?

I'm always glad when people find my channel and am honored at whoever subscribes, but I am under no illusion that I'm going to become a full-time YouTuber, and that's fine. And I don't begrudge anyone who wants to do it, because it's a hard road and if you make it, it's usually because you busted your butt trying to get there.
 
If you're not having fun and it's just a chore you may as well just give up anyway. You have to at least be having some fun or enjoyment out of it to keep going with it otherwise it'll catch up on you one way or another.
 
I agree with this so much. I've thought like this about YouTube recently as well. It's like we put so many rules in place that sometimes we neglect having fun. The truth: content gains subscribers. If enough people like your content, they will subscribe to you. The rest of the stuff is about getting your content out there, but it's the same concept: if someone wants to share your video, they will. As a creator, I want the freedom to do what I want to do with my content. I don't want a niche. I want to be able to do anything and everything I want to do. The exposure will happen if it's meant to happen (I know- it sounds philosophical, but it really is true).

Thanks for you post! I guess I'm not the only one thinking about things like this.
 
I'm like you, have fun with it and enjoy what you are doing. If you can do this with what's a trending thing, even better! That's what I'm trying to do now!
 
velocity said:
If you're not having fun and it's just a chore you may as well just give up anyway. You have to at least be having some fun or enjoyment out of it to keep going with it otherwise it'll catch up on you one way or another.
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This applies to any dead-end job or a job you just hate.
 
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