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If You Work in Mainstream Media But Want to Understand YouTube, Watch This · Gimbal Podcast

• 0:00
  How would anyone have a clue if they've never been on a set in TV what actually is happening?
• 0:04
  What about fun or career fulfillment?
• 0:07
  They're away from their kids for months, they're on the brink of divorce.
• 0:10
  Was there a specific story or experience that triggered it?
• 0:13
  The reason that all of these people coming from Hollywood are looking to work in YouTube
• 0:16
  is because...
• 0:18
  My guest today transitioned from traditional media aka Hollywood to the creator economy
• 0:24
  a few years ago, and now she has become the industry leading expert for people who are
• 0:30
  interested in following that path themselves.
• 0:32
  This is a very informative episode.
• 0:34
  So if you
• 0:35
  are someone who's worked in Hollywood or traditional media, and you're thinking about
• 0:38
  getting involved in the creator economy, and you want to set yourself up for success,
• 0:42
  this is a good episode for you.
• 0:44
  What are the harsh realities that people who work in Hollywood
• 0:47
  have to take in mind as they move over to the creator economy?
• 0:51
  Coming from traditional, if you're used to working for a production company that produces XYZ genre, you can easily transfer to go work for another production company and make things in that same documentary style.
• 1:06
  Or if you work on a Bravo reality show, you can go work on an MTV reality show, and it's very similar experiences.
• 1:14
  YouTube and YouTubers and creators are so vastly different and the way that they operate the
• 1:23
  team sizes the processes the kinds of content the locations they're in when I say oh working for
• 1:31
  YouTubers like this like they're just I can't say one thing and I can't even say 10 things there's
• 1:36
  like it's so unique across the board so then it's like if you work for one creator in this niche or
• 1:42
  this style, you know, challenge style content.
• 1:45
  If you then go work for a food creator with half as
• 1:49
  many subscribers, it might be like the most different experience possible.
• 1:54
  You know, one
• 1:55
  creator might have 50 employees and another, you're the first hire or the second hire, you know?
• 2:02
  So,
• 2:02
  and that's a whole different experience.
• 2:03
  And is the YouTuber themselves, are they a 40 year old
• 2:07
  or are they 20?
• 2:08
  And that's such a vastly different experience.
• 2:11
  And so I think that's a huge thing
• 2:13
  that makes it difficult to really give the best advice across the board.
• 2:18
  You know, what I've tried
• 2:18
  to tell people is to just be aware of all these things that I'm talking about and to kind of,
• 2:23
  if you're not so desperate, I just need a paycheck, like be a little bit more intentional
• 2:29
  about, I really like this creator, but they've never hired someone before.
• 2:33
  So do I want to be
• 2:34
  that first hire?
• 2:35
  Am I willing to step into that type of role and take on what that entails?
• 2:41
  Or
• 2:41
  do I really like having, you know, more of a structure?
• 2:45
  I have kids to support,
• 2:48
  so I'm going to go approach like Dude Perfect and work in more of that environment.
• 2:52
  So one of the harsh realities that you just mentioned was the age gap.
• 2:55
  What about salaries?
• 2:57
  Yeah.
• 2:57
  Another challenge for people coming from traditional to work with YouTubers and creators
• 3:02
  is definitely pay and rates.
• 3:05
  Again, there's just no across the board standard for salaries.
• 3:09
  It's so dependent on so many things.
• 3:12
  Again, it's not even, oh, this person has a million
• 3:15
  subscribers.
• 3:16
  This other person has a million subscribers.
• 3:17
  Then their rate must be the same.
• 3:19
  No, absolutely not.
• 3:20
  They might have a totally different business structure, be bringing in
• 3:23
  totally different money, have a whole different structure of teams.
• 3:26
  Brand deals look different.
• 3:28
  You know, it's niche dependent, how much money they can bring in, all of those things, especially if you were at an executive level or a producer level that you might have gotten used to a level of pay that just cannot be provided by a creator that is not at the level yet of having that budget.
• 3:46
  At the same time, you know, when I transitioned, I was I made more money making this transition.
• 3:51
  So that's possible as well.
• 3:53
  And yeah, so that's definitely something to keep in mind, especially for crew members, you know, sound engineers and grips and the people that were like in union positions.
• 4:03
  camera operators is a huge one where, you know, a day rate might be $650 to $1,000 on a show.
• 4:11
  And that is not happening for a YouTube team to be able to pay that.
• 4:16
  What about working conditions?
• 4:18
  Really depends who you're working for.
• 4:20
  But in my personal experience, way better life experience.
• 4:25
  Once I transitioned out of TV, I was working 16 hour days, six days a week for three months at a
• 4:30
  time.
• 4:31
  You don't get paid time off, at least as a producer.
• 4:33
  There's no union.
• 4:34
  You don't get
• 4:35
  sick days.
• 4:35
  You don't get a break, a mandatory break the way that the union workers would get.
• 4:40
  So that was just not sustainable.
• 4:43
  And that's why I left.
• 4:45
  I have observed that across the board,
• 4:47
  unless you're working for a Mr.
• 4:48
  Beast, where it basically is a reality TV show set at this point,
• 4:52
  It should more so be a manageable system where you might have long shoot days, like the one-offs or a couple of days of really long days.
• 5:03
  But if you can set up the right structure and system, there shouldn't be a need for having that situation that was in TV.
• 5:13
  What are the good things that people who work in Hollywood can expect as they transition over to the creator economy?
• 5:18
  Yeah, I think a big one for me is ownership, really feeling like you are having an impact because the teams are so small and there's no network to sign off and give notes and approve and manage the budget.
• 5:33
  It's so internal and up to the creator who you, in theory, would be working pretty closely with.
• 5:39
  The final product feels way more like, okay, I had a tangible part in making this happen
• 5:46
  versus working on a big show.
• 5:48
  By the time it even airs, it's like months after you've worked on it.
• 5:51
  The whole editing team has had their hands on it and it's a different product than what you even
• 5:55
  filmed.
• 5:56
  You know, it's like, you're so not a part of that final product.
• 6:00
  What about opportunity, job availability in both markets, both Hollywood versus
• 6:05
  creator economy?
• 6:06
  The reason that all of these people coming from Hollywood are looking to work in YouTube is because that's where the opportunity is now.
• 6:13
  The reason that so many people in television are not working is because there's a lack of opportunity.
• 6:18
  So on a macro level, there's way more opportunity in YouTube.
• 6:22
  I think it's just a matter of, again, getting your foot in the door.
• 6:25
  How do you start to find those opportunities is the hard part.
• 6:28
  But like I said, I think every single creator I could think of right now that I've interacted with, teams that I know that work for creators, they are hiring in some capacity.
• 6:39
  So there is demand.
• 6:40
  It's just a matter of finding those opportunities.
• 6:43
  Okay, what about fun or career fulfillment?
• 6:47
  Yeah, I think the beauty of YouTube is there are so many niches that can be so specific.
• 6:55
  Like there's so many successful channels.
• 6:58
  Like I'm thinking about Law by Mike where he's a lawyer and he just makes content about the law.
• 7:03
  But he's averaging like I just looked today, I think like three million a video on average.
• 7:09
  And that's such a specific niche that I don't think would ever be a TV show.
• 7:13
  Like I don't know a network that would have said yes to that, but he just has his own.
• 7:18
  He made it his own.
• 7:19
  And if you have a passion for something specific, there's probably creators out there making content around it.
• 7:26
  So you can make that your life.
• 7:28
  You know, my last job was very fitness focused and I was a fitness enthusiast.
• 7:33
  And so that was a really cool aspect to be able to, like, create content around the gym, which is a part of like I go to the gym all the time.
• 7:40
  And that was a part of my life.
• 7:42
  It really is more accessible at the end of the day.
• 7:44
  it's more accessible to work in YouTube versus TV because of the systems and the traditional sense
• 7:50
  of there's decades now of that system working that it's like who you know and your friends hiring you
• 7:56
  and that whole thing where YouTube is still so new in the sense of creators having teams that
• 8:03
  there isn't a level of like oh you knew my last person or my cousin knows this person and that
• 8:09
  person and that's how you got the job.
• 8:11
  It's like more of an accessible, just we're all starting
• 8:14
  from more of a scratch in a sense.
• 8:17
  What about like living location where you live?
• 8:20
  There definitely is still that element of New York and LA being the hubs, specifically LA more so as
• 8:26
  I live in New York and I definitely, I know creators here and teams here, but I do think
• 8:31
  there's more in LA.
• 8:33
  But that said, you know, I had worked remotely for two years with the creator in
• 8:36
  a different state.
• 8:38
  I know other people that do the same.
• 8:39
  I know Austin is becoming a big hub
• 8:42
  for creators.
• 8:43
  I know people in San Francisco, a lot of the tech creators are there, of course.
• 8:47
  And then a lot of, I'm thinking of so many random people that are in like Florida or Oklahoma,
• 8:53
  like creators that just, they live there, they got successful and they live there.
• 8:57
  I mean,
• 8:57
  look at Mr.
• 8:58
  Beast, he's in the middle of nowhere and he just can't do that and people are moving
• 9:03
  there.
• 9:03
  So and then across Europe and and elsewhere, there's little hub, you know, Dubai is such a hub
• 9:09
  now.
• 9:09
  The UK has so many big creators now and a whole network of people behind the scenes there.
• 9:16
  So I think across the board, there is definitely more opportunity for like not being
• 9:20
  needing to stick to the big two cities.
• 9:23
  What are your friends in traditional Hollywood
• 9:27
  asking you about the creator economy?
• 9:29
  Yeah, I think there's just a base level of understanding
• 9:31
  that this is the new thing.
• 9:34
  It's the evolution of the medium.
• 9:36
  And so they know that they should
• 9:38
  get into it.
• 9:39
  But I don't think that there is a base level of ability to do that yet.
• 9:44
  Coming from traditional, there's not yet known rooms to go to or people to reach out to.
• 9:50
  Yeah, when I went into the industry, I started in traditional as well.
• 9:53
  I worked on shows like
• 9:54
  Big Brother and MasterChef and The Bachelor, albeit the Canadian version, so scaled down a lot.
• 9:59
  But when I got involved in the creator economy, there really wasn't the infrastructure that kind of exists now.
• 10:05
  It was really tough.
• 10:06
  Like you had to follow people you were interested in on like Instagram or something and just wait for them to say, hey, I'm hiring.
• 10:12
  So now it's cool because it's not really like that anymore.
• 10:14
  You can go to Y2Jobs.
• 10:15
  You can go to Roster.
• 10:16
  You know, creators are much more open to having teams compared to back then as well.
• 10:21
  From my experience, I still think there is very much that level of needing to be just following people and reaching out to them directly.
• 10:28
  And my mind always just also goes to the fact that there is a generational difference that is very hard to bridge in terms of, you know, so many of these creator teams are super young, early 20s.
• 10:43
  And so many of these people in traditional are 30s, 40s, 50s, 60s.
• 10:48
  and it's just it's a harsh reality but it is the reality that you know even that is very difficult
• 10:55
  to then approach a team of made up of 20 year olds as a 50 year old so it's a real reality and
• 11:03
  and that's what makes it also difficult for traditional people because of course you know
• 11:07
  given the history of traditional and how long that's been around and and these veterans from
• 11:12
  there it's like they do tend to be a little older and the creator economy and and the creator
• 11:18
  tend to be younger.
• 11:18
  So is there anything they could do to not be overlooked, I guess?
• 11:23
  I mean, I think that leads into the event that I've created, you know,
• 11:27
  fostering spaces where people can meet in real life.
• 11:30
  I'm glad you brought this up.
• 11:31
  So wait, give me the what's the foundation of the event?
• 11:33
  Tell me like, when, where, and then let's get into the why.
• 11:37
  Okay, so yeah, my event, it's called the industry shift.
• 11:40
  It's happening on March 20,
• 11:41
  in Brooklyn, New York, still landing on a venue.
• 11:44
  I'm not concerned, though,
• 11:45
  we're definitely going to have one.
• 11:46
  It's just a matter of a couple options where we're going to
• 11:49
  land.
• 11:50
  The basis of it is to bring together people from traditional television with people in the
• 11:54
  creator economy.
• 11:55
  Every single YouTuber and creator company is hiring.
• 11:59
  Across the board, you know,
• 12:01
  maybe not the same roles, but they're hiring in some capacity.
• 12:04
  And tons of people in traditional
• 12:07
  are desperate for work right now.
• 12:09
  Levels of desperation differ, but a lot of people need work
• 12:14
  and are aware of the fact that YouTube is this next wave and they want to get in the door,
• 12:19
  but they don't know how.
• 12:20
  And so, yeah, I just want to create this environment where in real life,
• 12:24
  people can connect from both sides and have conversations and start to learn, you know,
• 12:30
  how do the people from traditional position themselves to actually be considered and how
• 12:35
  do the people from the YouTube side, how can they reframe maybe their mindset of it's not so risky
• 12:42
  or scary to hire someone from traditional understanding on their end, what traditional
• 12:48
  roles do and like how they can apply them to their companies, businesses, channels.
• 12:54
  And yeah, so bringing those sides together to create those conversations.
• 12:59
  I mean, there's a lot of good to come from people who have worked in traditional because
• 13:03
  in the creator economy, the majority of us have learned on the fly, like learned as we go.
• 13:09
  And there's much more infrastructure in traditional media.
• 13:11
  Even just like a conversation I had earlier today with a client about lighting position.
• 13:15
  In traditional media, like this is very, very common.
• 13:17
  You either go to film school.
• 13:18
  In the creator economy, nobody has a gaffer.
• 13:21
  Nobody has a, maybe Mr.
• 13:22
  Beast, you know?
• 13:22
  Yeah.
• 13:23
  Yeah, I learned that very fast, you know, getting into this side of the industry of
• 13:28
  the terms that I knew are unnecessary now.
• 13:31
  And there's different versions of those terms that now, you know, the way that like lingo
• 13:36
  on the Northeast is going to be different than lingo in California.
• 13:39
  It's literally the same thing of we're referring to the same person, but maybe calling them a different thing or referring to the same process, but calling it something else.
• 13:48
  You know, maybe people won't find a job that day at my event, but the goal is to start to have more understanding, start to, again, bridge that mental gap that I think is there of a lot of YouTubers and their teams being apprehensive because they think, you know, they're going to be too stuck in their ways or they're not going to work as fast or whatever it may be.
• 14:09
  But at the end of the day, if you work in traditional and you're really good at it, you're going to be able to transfer it.
• 14:14
  Maybe they've had a bad experience with one bad egg because they couldn't transfer it, but that doesn't then equate that the whole industry can't then work.
• 14:23
  and it might take some time to, you know, train that person to the YouTube of it all and get them,
• 14:29
  you know, understanding that.
• 14:30
  But, you know, not to toot my own horn, but like I did the work and
• 14:34
  I did it well.
• 14:35
  And so I was able to transfer it and I took it upon myself to teach myself on the
• 14:39
  job how to transfer my skills and then the landscape of YouTube and what packaging is.
• 14:45
  And,
• 14:46
  you know, I did that work behind the scenes to be better at the job when I transferred over.
• 14:50
  So,
• 14:51
  you know you just have to find people that are good at their jobs and they'll be able to do it
• 14:54
  what's actually happening in the room or um is it like is it just networking is it panels the goal
• 15:01
  is to mix and mingle a bit and then yeah have people get either on a stage or just in front
• 15:07
  of the crowd in some capacity with a mic and um people a few other people like myself who had
• 15:13
  have made that transition from working in traditional now work on youtube teams speak to
• 15:18
  their, you know, a quick little brief on their transition and how they made the transition,
• 15:24
  maybe some insight as to what they see the differences are.
• 15:27
  And then we're going to have
• 15:28
  a keynote longer kind of speech or, you know, talk from Josh Mattingly, who is a recruiter and
• 15:36
  consultant in the space so that he can really speak tangibly to what these creator teams are
• 15:41
  looking for and how people on the traditional side can position themselves.
• 15:46
  For both a creator
• 15:48
  and a traditional media person, like what is the value of them attending?
• 15:52
  So for the traditional person, the value is going to be one, meet real people that are doing it.
• 15:59
  A lot of people just literally have never met someone who's working in YouTube.
• 16:02
  Two,
• 16:03
  it's to understand, again, how to position themselves.
• 16:07
  Like what is the wording of how
• 16:09
  you're speaking to these creators of what you've done before?
• 16:12
  Stop using the lingo that's not
• 16:14
  transferable, but explain it in a way that makes sense.
• 16:17
  Listening to people that I've said have
• 16:20
  actually done it before and like learn from their experiences and understand how they position
• 16:25
  themselves or maybe what their journey was that this was the first step they took to make it
• 16:30
  possible.
• 16:32
  And hearing from someone like Josh who can speak to the hiring process on the creator
• 16:36
  side.
• 16:37
  And then for the creators, the YouTubers, the people tangential that are coming from, you know,
• 16:42
  we have people coming from different brand partnership companies or management companies.
• 16:47
  It would be for them to meet talent that they're looking to hire who have skills that can transfer.
• 16:54
  I also think there's an element that could be imparted onto the creator side where I see so
• 17:00
  many creators who don't have systems and processes and could really benefit from it.
• 17:06
  And they don't
• 17:06
  realize that there are people like myself that can do that.
• 17:10
  And again, maybe they're coming from
• 17:11
  traditional.
• 17:12
  So they don't technically have the title of channel manager, but they've managed a
• 17:18
  TV show of a hundred million dollar budget.
• 17:20
  Like I'm pretty sure they can handle doing what they
• 17:23
  need to do.
• 17:23
  Um, so it's, you know, becoming more aware on the YouTuber side of like what people
• 17:30
  can bring to your channel and actually help you with.
• 17:32
  Are these creators who are actually going
• 17:34
  to go to the event?
• 17:35
  Do you expect them to have open positions right now?
• 17:38
  And they're going to
• 17:39
  fill slots?
• 17:40
  Like, oh, I need a producer instantly.
• 17:41
  I need an editor right now.
• 17:43
  I need a creative
• 17:43
  director.
• 17:44
  Or is it for creators who are thinking about expanding their team, but maybe a position
• 17:49
  is not available now?
• 17:50
  Or maybe they don't know what the next role that they need to hire for is?
• 17:55
  Yeah, I think both.
• 17:56
  I definitely intend to, you know, start the night with broadly letting
• 18:01
  everyone know in the room who literally is here tonight and the types of people so that they can
• 18:07
  understand the opportunity in the room because, you know, at these networking events, you might,
• 18:11
  if there's, there's not going to be 500 people at this one, but if there's 500 people and you can
• 18:16
  only physically talk to 20, you really missed out on a lot of potential connections.
• 18:21
  So figuring out
• 18:22
  a way to like make those connections happen that you actually do want.
• 18:26
  And yeah, so if it's, if
• 18:28
  it's someone that right now needs an editor, hopefully there's someone in the room, you know,
• 18:32
  I can't guarantee who's going to be there, but hopefully there's someone in the room that can
• 18:37
  be hired right now.
• 18:38
  And if not, there will be people who are editors there.
• 18:42
  Can they be hired
• 18:43
  tomorrow for a creator?
• 18:44
  Maybe not.
• 18:45
  But if that creator is at the level of they're growing
• 18:49
  themselves, they're not at 10 million subscribers.
• 18:51
  So they have the ability and time to kind of take
• 18:54
  someone in and, you know, they have a base level of editing skills.
• 18:58
  Let's work together to like
• 19:00
  bring those to my channel, to my Instagram, whatever, and work together in that way.
• 19:04
  That's possible.
• 19:05
  Again, a lot of these creators don't even know what is possible as far as
• 19:10
  building a team.
• 19:12
  And so I've seen in my personal experience, I meet a creator and I tell them what
• 19:17
  I do.
• 19:17
  And then they're like, oh, I actually could use that help.
• 19:21
  So maybe like, let's stay in touch
• 19:23
  and maybe work together, you know, once they can wrap their mind around, like, what are the things
• 19:27
  I do need help with.
• 19:29
  And that's generally what networking is for.
• 19:31
  It's like, yeah, maybe not
• 19:32
  tonight I'm signing a contract, but now I'm in your mind.
• 19:35
  You know what I can bring to you.
• 19:37
  Let's exchange information and we'll stay in touch.
• 19:40
  So what was the moment that made you say,
• 19:42
  like, I have to create this event?
• 19:44
  Was there a specific story or experience that triggered it,
• 19:47
  or is it something that built up over time?
• 19:49
  So the real impetus was about a year ago now,
• 19:53
  I was connected to someone in traditional who wanted to start a call for women who worked in
• 19:59
  reality television and were interested in transitioning over to YouTube.
• 20:03
  Long story
• 20:04
  short, I became the like speaker on this call to share my experience and foundational knowledge.
• 20:10
  And there were 55 women on that call and that call was recorded and shared and I put it on my
• 20:17
  LinkedIn.
• 20:18
  And so more and more people started to reach out to me from that.
• 20:21
  And honestly,
• 20:22
  got to a point where it was like too many people were asking me for one-on-ones and I couldn't
• 20:26
  take my time to do that.
• 20:27
  Literally today, I got a message from someone saying she saw the call and
• 20:30
  wants to talk.
• 20:31
  And so, yeah, at this point, it's over 200 people from traditional that have reached
• 20:36
  out in all different capacities, different roles that want to know how to get into YouTube.
• 20:43
  So,
• 20:44
  yeah, I just saw a need and, you know, 200 people.
• 20:47
  I'm in a Facebook group of 25,000 women that work
• 20:50
  in reality television.
• 20:51
  So they're out there.
• 20:53
  That's just women, just reality.
• 20:54
  And so there's
• 20:57
  the need, there's the want, and I just figured let's put something together.
• 21:01
  Do you have a website
• 21:03
  or somewhere people can go to learn more or buy tickets?
• 21:06
  Yeah, it's a Luma link.
• 21:08
  It's on my
• 21:09
  LinkedIn.
• 21:10
  Just type in the industry shift, it should come up.
• 21:12
  What would be the first thing
• 21:13
  you tell a person that comes up to you on a call and asks how they can move into YouTube?
• 21:19
  Yeah.
• 21:19
  So if someone wants to get into YouTube and just really doesn't know where to start, be open to freelance.
• 21:25
  You probably are if you work in reality TV or any TV.
• 21:29
  That's the nature of it.
• 21:30
  You're hopping around.
• 21:31
  So be open to that where, you know, maybe a creator is just hiring for very temporary work or they don't.
• 21:39
  again, the way I started is like, oh, we don't even know what a producer could bring to us.
• 21:43
  Let's just work on an hourly basis to start and go from there.
• 21:46
  So being open to that freelance
• 21:48
  slash short-term contract work.
• 21:50
  Another one that I think could be interesting to the more
• 21:53
  established people that have families to support and things like where they can't just take on
• 21:59
  the risk of working with a very young team, new and up and coming, is to maybe consider working
• 22:05
  in the tangential companies to the creator economy where it's like, you know, there's like
• 22:10
  accounting companies coming up now or creator management companies or brand partnership
• 22:15
  companies or the tech companies that are supporting the creator economy.
• 22:20
  Obviously, I'm biased, but
• 22:21
  it's like producers really are so malleable and really can fit into different roles.
• 22:27
  And like the
• 22:27
  nature of the job, especially in reality television, is like you are just constantly on and things are
• 22:34
  being changed and things are being thrown at you and you're just like rolling with the punches and
• 22:39
  that mentality and way of working is so transferable.
• 22:43
  And so, you know, again, it's then
• 22:46
  on the company, the onus is on them as well to be open to considering people like this, which is
• 22:51
  again, part of my mission and like bringing the two sides together.
• 22:54
  But yeah, I think that could
• 22:56
  be a really good way to approach this.
• 22:58
  Wait, wait, wait.
• 22:59
  Can you name drop a few of those companies
• 23:01
  for people who have no idea where you can look?
• 23:03
  Yeah.
• 23:04
  So I would start with companies like
• 23:08
  management companies like Knight or Space Station.
• 23:10
  There's capital firms like Spotter and Everbloom.
• 23:14
  There's influencer marketing like Aspire and Creator IQ.
• 23:18
  And then also another way would be
• 23:20
  like starting as a specialist where maybe as a producer, you do 10 things really well,
• 23:26
  but maybe hone in on one where you're like, oh, I love the aspect that I had in production where
• 23:33
  I would have to book people's travel and make itineraries and do those logistics.
• 23:38
  Well, a lot
• 23:39
  of YouTubers are traveling the world for their content.
• 23:42
  Maybe start to approach people and be
• 23:43
  like, I am an expert at travel logistics and finding fixers in these companies who can help
• 23:51
  you while you travel and things like that and start as that like specialist role.
• 23:55
  And then once
• 23:56
  you get the reps in of working with creators, you can go to another creator and say, I have this
• 24:01
  experience, but I want to work more within broadly producing or whatever it may be writing or, you
• 24:07
  know, but yeah, I think that's a good way to like get the foot in the door and start to get experience.
• 24:12
  What do you think is a mistake you see traditional people make when they're approaching creators or
• 24:16
  trying to make the transition?
• 24:18
  I mean, I'm not in the room where they're actually speaking and
• 24:21
  trying, so I don't know exactly.
• 24:23
  But my inference is that they're coming to the table showing that
• 24:28
  they're really unsure and don't know and kind of putting them in a position of being more inferior
• 24:35
  than they are.
• 24:36
  You know, you have to approach these creators confidently and like, I know what
• 24:39
  I can bring to the table and I know I can do this again.
• 24:42
  Not not guaranteeing that you're going to
• 24:44
  change their life overnight, but I know that I can successfully manage a production budget of
• 24:50
  $10 million and do it efficiently.
• 24:52
  And I know how to set up systems and that kind of thing,
• 24:56
  rather than saying an open-ended, hey, I don't know about YouTube.
• 25:01
  Can I work for you?
• 25:02
  I want
• 25:02
  to start working in YouTube, which I really do think people are kind of approaching it in that
• 25:08
  way.
• 25:08
  So it's doing the research on your end of understanding where these creators are,
• 25:14
  what they could.
• 25:15
  There's so many interviews out there now.
• 25:16
  There's so many of them on LinkedIn.
• 25:18
  There's so many people talking about how YouTube works and the needs.
• 25:22
  Do a little of that research
• 25:24
  and now think about how do you take what you've done and position it for what they need and
• 25:29
  approach them in a confident way rather than putting it on them to figure out how do you help
• 25:34
  them.
• 25:34
  I agree with that.
• 25:35
  I think there's also a need to demonstrate value to these creators
• 25:39
  as you come over from traditional.
• 25:41
  Like when I was working in traditional, I kind of remembered
• 25:43
  getting my next gig was usually revolving around like who I knew and what was available,
• 25:49
  they would come to me and they'd say, Hey, we need somebody like you on this show.
• 25:52
  Can you go
• 25:53
  over there next?
• 25:53
  And maybe like, okay, it fits my schedule.
• 25:55
  Sure.
• 25:56
  But I think in YouTube, there are
• 25:58
  so many people who are eager to work for every single position for every single creator, that
• 26:02
  it's very, very saturated.
• 26:05
  And I think the people who ultimately do get hired are the ones who
• 26:07
  demonstrate value.
• 26:09
  Does that resonate at all?
• 26:10
  Like, would you say someone who works in traditional
• 26:12
  needs to kind of do a little bit of extra work in their application to stand out?
• 26:16
  Yes.
• 26:18
  I'm stumped just because it's the classic case of you need experience first
• 26:24
  to get the experience.
• 26:25
  And I don't believe that.
• 26:27
  So maybe it's packaging yourself.
• 26:30
  How do you
• 26:31
  literally explain to them, I worked on Project Runway, I did XYZ for them, this transfers to
• 26:37
  you because you are doing XYZ and this could help you and maybe frame it.
• 26:43
  You just did 20 years of
• 26:44
  work in reality.
• 26:45
  Why are you now needing to do more work to prove that you can do it?
• 26:48
  It's again,
• 26:49
  the reframing, I think, and literally explaining again, these creators who don't come from
• 26:54
  traditional don't have a clue.
• 26:57
  How would anyone have a clue if they've never been on a set in TV,
• 27:00
  what actually is happening?
• 27:02
  So just be willing to explain it in a way and walk them through your
• 27:06
  experience and again, then offer that value in a way that you can bring it to them.
• 27:13
  Don't again,
• 27:13
  don't leave it then of like, this is everything I did.
• 27:16
  So what can I do for you?
• 27:18
  No, this is
• 27:19
  everything I did.
• 27:20
  This is how I can bring that and do this for you.
• 27:23
  And just present it that way
• 27:25
  as like not allowing for them to be confused and unsure.
• 27:29
  And oh, let me think about this.
• 27:31
  I'll get
• 27:31
  back to later, they're not going to because you just put work on them when they're already busy.
• 27:36
  And, you know, so like lead with what you can actually do for them.
• 27:40
  It sounds like if you're
• 27:41
  a creator, there's a huge opportunity to pick up these confused people right now and bring them
• 27:47
  onto your team.
• 27:48
  What's like a traditional role that most creators are sleeping on or underusing?
• 27:54
  It's funny because producer is such a vast term.
• 27:58
  Really, it's technically like a showrunner.
• 28:00
  from what I've been picking up from people's needs is like someone to really come in and
• 28:07
  have creative direction, ability, strategy, understanding of positioning yourself within
• 28:14
  YouTube and the niche that you're in, and then also execution of how do we make these now ideas
• 28:21
  and strategies happen.
• 28:23
  It's funny because in television to get a showrunner title is years
• 28:28
  of work and years of experience and connections.
• 28:31
  And so I'm kind of hesitant to say, oh, go try to
• 28:35
  be a showrunner.
• 28:36
  But that's what I was doing for the creator I worked for and what I'm doing now
• 28:41
  for more creators.
• 28:42
  And so these creators and channels are like a startup in the sense of
• 28:47
  them building their business, building their brand.
• 28:50
  And in the startup world, you are more
• 28:53
  likely to get a higher position, have more responsibility because there's so few people
• 28:58
  and you're all kind of in that like grind mentality and starting something.
• 29:02
  And that's
• 29:02
  really what you're doing with creators, again, unless they have a big team already.
• 29:06
  But if
• 29:07
  across the board, there's more creators that don't have anyone working for them yet than
• 29:12
  creators that do.
• 29:13
  So if you're really someone that wants to like get their feet wet and learn
• 29:19
  and grow a channel with someone, approaching it as a showrunner, if you're a producer,
• 29:23
  is a really great opportunity.
• 29:25
  And then, you know, a great resume builder that if you just
• 29:28
  built this channel with someone, other creators will want to see that.
• 29:31
  And then other otherwise
• 29:33
  editors across the board, every single person needs an editor, a good one.
• 29:38
  And so it's funny
• 29:39
  to me because like a lot of people might look at it as, you know, oh, it's going to take me so long
• 29:45
  to learn how to edit for YouTube or learn how to transfer my skills.
• 29:49
  But you keep saying that,
• 29:51
  keep saying that a year went by and you still didn't do it and now you could have been a year
• 29:55
  into knowing how to do it.
• 29:56
  Or on the creator side, I've heard so many people say, oh, I don't want to
• 30:00
  take four months to train someone up, take the time to teach them.
• 30:05
  I don't have time for that.
• 30:07
  Well, four months from now, you're going to not have an editor still and you're in the same boat.
• 30:13
  So if you took that four months and did give a little bit of time to this person, they could now
• 30:17
  be an expert at your content.
• 30:19
  So that's how I see it.
• 30:20
  And yeah, editing is across the board,
• 30:23
  the biggest need.
• 30:25
  And there's so many TV editors that could make that transition.
• 30:28
  It's funny that you mentioned showrunner because when I was in traditional, I was looking up the
• 30:34
  corporate ladder because I really had ambitions of being a showrunner myself.
• 30:37
  And I was looking,
• 30:38
  I was like, my goodness, there's so many rungs to this corporate ladder and I need to make sure
• 30:42
  Other people leave before that position even opens for me.
• 30:45
  Like I'm looking 20 years down the road before I finally reached my goal.
• 30:49
  What if the show ends, the show gets canceled,
• 30:52
  then you're planning to be the showrunner on?
• 30:54
  Yeah, yeah, exactly.
• 30:55
  I mean, by that point, it almost certainly will,
• 30:57
  unless it's like Survivor or something crazy like that.
• 30:59
  But when I looked at YouTube, and this was a few years back,
• 31:03
  I was looking at that and I was saying,
• 31:05
  oh, wow, the opportunity to become in a really, really strong leadership position,
• 31:09
  you know, that might only take two or three years.
• 31:11
  And so I made the jump because there was much more opportunity for me back then.
• 31:15
  And even that stays true today.
• 31:17
  I was like a producer, a challenge producer for Big Brother.
• 31:20
  That was like my big role when I worked in traditional media.
• 31:23
  And what was needed were video editors, which I had a little bit of experience with.
• 31:28
  And I had good taste, I like to think.
• 31:30
  But I just started applying and I took an editor position with the goal of ultimately becoming a showrunner.
• 31:35
  And I think it took two and a half years between being an editor and then being like a creative director, which is very, very similar role, similar responsibilities for Mark Manson, who is a bestselling author and now a YouTuber with almost three million subscribers.
• 31:51
  The runway was so much shorter.
• 31:54
  Yeah, the opportunity is there.
• 31:56
  That's one thing.
• 31:56
  There's no lack of opportunity.
• 31:59
  it's just a matter of figuring out how to get that opportunity how to position yourself to be
• 32:04
  capable of getting that opportunity but yeah there's there's so many creators so much money
• 32:10
  to be made all the advertising dollars are now going to youtube so it's possible i've written
• 32:16
  a playbook um to kind of set that foundational knowledge for people in traditional where can i
• 32:24
  get this?
• 32:25
  How can we get it to the audience?
• 32:26
  So it's not yet fully 100% done, but once it is,
• 32:30
  I will definitely be sharing more information on my LinkedIn.
• 32:33
  So everyone should follow me there
• 32:35
  and you'll see when I post about it.
• 32:37
  Tell us a little bit about your own transition from
• 32:39
  traditional into the creator economy.
• 32:42
  Yeah.
• 32:42
  So I worked in reality television for about five years,
• 32:47
  which I definitely recognize is not the longest time.
• 32:50
  So I don't claim to be an expert on that
• 32:51
  side of things either, but got a really good base foundation there.
• 32:56
  And I worked my way up from
• 32:59
  production assistant to producer by the age of 24 in four years about.
• 33:02
  And so, yeah, I really
• 33:06
  felt great there.
• 33:07
  And I thought I was going to be a showrunner one day and own a network or
• 33:10
  something like that.
• 33:11
  But I just realized that the people that I was looking up to at work,
• 33:16
  I actually didn't want their life.
• 33:17
  You know, they're away from their kids for months.
• 33:19
  They're
• 33:19
  on the brink of divorce.
• 33:21
  They're not sleeping or eating.
• 33:23
  And so I kind of really quickly was like,
• 33:25
  hold on a second.
• 33:26
  You know, once I got to that producing position, I was like, this isn't
• 33:29
  actually all it's cracked up to be.
• 33:32
  So I just started to consider what else is out there to
• 33:36
  be somewhere full time and have more of a work life balance.
• 33:40
  And it definitely took a while,
• 33:42
  but ultimately there was a YouTuber that was hiring for a producer and I was following him.
• 33:49
  And so I emailed him and started working with him that way.
• 33:53
  Also, like, I wish I could take the credit of there was some master plan behind.
• 33:57
  I knew the landscape and I knew I should do that.
• 34:00
  But it really was just a lot of luck and timing that I landed within this side of the industry now.
• 34:07
  OK, Jesse, I want to play a bit of a quick back and forth game where I name a traditional media role and you tell me what the creator economy counterpart role title would be.
• 34:17
  Okay, let's start with the top showrunner.
• 34:21
  Showrunner would be called a producer.
• 34:24
  Gaffer.
• 34:25
  Crew member.
• 34:27
  Production assistant.
• 34:29
  Production assistant.
• 34:30
  Production coordinator.
• 34:31
  Channel manager, maybe.
• 34:33
  Colorist.
• 34:34
  Editor.
• 34:36
  Sound designer.
• 34:37
  Editor.
• 34:38
  They'd have to transfer into being a full editor.
• 34:41
  They can't be that specific.
• 34:43
  What about a VFX artist?
• 34:46
  Same thing.
• 34:48
  No, again, it's hard to answer because, yes, these roles exist exactly as you're saying them for some creators.
• 34:55
  It's just the odds of finding consistent, well-paying work being that specific are low.
• 35:01
  Okay, who are some that I missed?
• 35:03
  Well, I look at it more from the reality TV lens of titles.
• 35:07
  So, like, you know, segment producer or story producer, creative producer, all of those are just producers.
• 35:15
  A story producer is a creative role, but then like a technical producer is a producer role.
• 35:21
  But in the creator economy, they're just producers.
• 35:23
  Yeah, again, Mr.
• 35:24
  Beast's team calls them specific roles.
• 35:28
  Sure.
• 35:29
  He's an outlier.
• 35:30
  Yeah.
• 35:31
  But I think from my experience, as you get lower on the totem pole of creators and their teams are more broad, they're going to have more broad titles.
• 35:44
  I was a story producer in reality, but that did not make sense to call me that when I was work, you know, when I work with a YouTuber.
• 35:53
  So there are like hundreds of different roles in traditional media, and I feel like there's not as many different titles in the creator economy.
• 36:01
  How do people who work in very specific roles position themselves as they transfer over?
• 36:06
  If you approach creators with a more broad labeling of what you do, I think that that's the best way to go about it for them to understand.
• 36:16
  They don't need to have that understanding of what specifically a challenge producer does or a story producer does or even a script writer.
• 36:24
  Keeping it more broad to just, I am a producer, I'm a writer, I'm not a VFX artist, I'm an editor.
• 36:31
  to at least start the conversation there.
• 36:33
  You can then explain that you have certain specialties within that.
• 36:38
  But if you can keep yourself as broad as possible to begin with,
• 36:43
  I believe that's the best approach.
• 36:45
  Got it.
• 36:45
  Okay, Jessie, who is a creator on your radar right now that is worthy of a shout out?
• 36:51
  Who comes to mind is a creator named Meredith Mansfield.
• 36:54
  She creates adventure kind of content where she'll go up to strangers
• 36:59
  and ask for an experience unique to each episode.
• 37:03
  So highly recommend you check her out.
• 37:06
  I love that she's a female in that kind of space.
• 37:09
  Shout out to her.
• 37:10
  Thank you as always for watching
• 37:12
  or listening to this episode.
• 37:13
  Please consider subscribing or giving us a review.
• 37:16
  It's really, really critical
• 37:17
  during these early days of the podcast
• 37:19
  because our entire sustainability
• 37:21
  is built on growing an audience
• 37:23
  big enough to pay for this stuff.
• 37:24
  And we're not there yet.
• 37:25
  So please go ahead and do that.
• 37:27
  If you want to check out another episode,
• 37:28
  please visit the channel either on YouTube or on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or however you listen
• 37:33
  to your podcast.
• 37:35
  One episode that I would like to recommend is the one from last week with Hunter
• 37:38
  Peterson.
• 37:39
  He was the head of production for Beast Philanthropy when they first got started.
• 37:43
  Okay, we'll see you in the next one.
• 37:44
  Take care.