On Becoming a Creator

I am now a YouTube content creator. The bar of entry is low. Anyone can create a channel and upload a video, but like running a marathon the hardest part is just starting. As of this writing I am a quarter of the way through my deck of many habits. I have posted a short youtube video each day since I started^* and one long video when I drew a six. I’m not going to get famous doing this and I don’t know if I will continue making videos after this weird habit challenge is over, but it is definitely fun and interesting to learn how it all works. The amount of data I have on just these few videos is astounding.

The combined number of views on all the videos is 658. Which seems like a lot, but the average percent watched is less than 20% which means that when the mysterious and all-knowing YouTube algorithm served up my goofy “Today I drew a Jack of Hearts…” video people swiped away to the next thing pretty quickly. If I wanted to I could create a graph on forty-five different metrics. There are almost one hundred metrics for people earning money from their videos.

Oddly enough about half of my views are from a single one minute video. It is the video I posted for the Three of Diamonds – which was about going out to eat. My current theory for why this got so many views is that my description for the video is longer than other ones or because I showed food and beer in the video. It will forever be a mystery. I also have a theory that even one person liking a video leads to more clicks, but I will continue collating the data to see if it proves true.

In addition to all of the data I am having fun learning the tools. YouTube Studio is where I manage all of the videos and among other things it allows me to add subtitles very easily. I let Youtube parse my words and then I edit them a little before hitting publish. The various cards and floating links in the videos can be added in YouTube Studio as well. For most of the video creation I am just using the YouTube app on my phone – if you have only used the YouTube app to watch videos before (like myself) you may not have noticed the large plus sign at the bottom which allows to you to create content. For the longer video I recorded it on my phone and then edited it with iMovie.

Several of the short videos have received one or two likes, and I sort of assume these are from friends. A few of the videos have gotten the thumbs down, which is a weird feeling. I realize it is mostly someone saying, “Please don’t show me more videos like this. I’m not interested.” But someone taking the time to say they don’t like a thing I made is odd. I do understand, I also dislike parts of the videos and I know they are amateur level quality, but that is sort of the point. Like or dislike I am going to keep making more. I’ve learned more about YouTube in the last two weeks than I have in years of just watching and reading about it.

And remember if you enjoy the videos please go like and subscribe.^**

*For you convenience I have created a playlist of all the videos so far add will add the new ones there as well. The phrase “for your convenience” means here “Look at another feature of YouTube Studio I have discovered.”

**After uploading some videos and working in YouTube Studio I get the whole “Like and Subscribe” thing. You need 1000 subscribers to become a YouTube partner which allows you to monetize a YouTube channel. There are other requirements, but that is the first step.