Latest / Gimbal Podcast / What It's REALLY Like Being Head of YouTube for Ali Abdaal

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What It's REALLY Like Being Head of YouTube for Ali Abdaal · Gimbal Podcast

• 0:00
  What does a video look like from start to finish?
• 0:03
  Like, what? Oh my god, content creators need to make money.
• 0:05
  Is Ali reading word for word from a teleprompter?
• 0:09
  Okay, that's really, really good to know.
• 0:11
  Do you think that changing your strategy all the time confuses your viewers?
• 0:15
  Oh yeah, it confuses me.
• 0:20
  My guest today is Becky Iswara.
• 0:23
  She is the head of YouTube for Ali Abdal, who apparently is also a listener of the show.
• 0:28
  I'm excited for this one.
• 0:29
  We really jammed out about titles and thumbnails and what works and doesn't
• 0:32
  in the educational world here on YouTube.
• 0:34
  So please enjoy this interview.
• 0:37
  All right, Becky, welcome to the show.
• 0:39
  I'm so excited to have you for two reasons.
• 0:42
  Firstly, because you are the first person that we've met from producing this show.
• 0:48
  Like, you reached out to us after the show went live and so you are the first one.
• 0:52
  And now we're meeting through that,
• 0:55
  which just proves like this show is doing the purpose,
• 0:58
  it gets serving the purpose that we made it for, which is making really cool connections,
• 1:01
  meeting new people, getting our voices out there.
• 1:04
  And then the second reason is you're just like really impressively interesting.
• 1:09
  You have a lot of things going on.
• 1:12
  But at the forefront of it all is you are the head of YouTube for Ali Abdal.
• 1:18
  Yes, no, your show is great.
• 1:20
  Ali actually sent me your episode with Eric the same day it popped up on my feet.
• 1:25
  So what?
• 1:27
  Yeah, he knows you guys exist.
• 1:31
  That's exciting.
• 1:32
  Hi, Ali, welcome to the show.
• 1:33
  Thank you for watching.
• 1:34
  This is so cool.
• 1:35
  Tell me about how you got started working with Ali.
• 1:38
  I've read your sub stack.
• 1:39
  I found it pretty interesting.
• 1:40
  You've got a unique story.
• 1:41
  I'm curious to hear it.
• 1:43
  Yeah, that was such a happen sense kind of story.
• 1:46
  So I was maybe like many other folks curious about this online creator world,
• 1:51
  especially during the pandemic.
• 1:53
  I was working a very corporate job.
• 1:55
  I was a financial and banking reporter for S&P, like the S&P 500.
• 2:01
  That's who I was working for.
• 2:02
  And then Ali was like, if you create a video every single week for like two years,
• 2:07
  it's going to change your life.
• 2:07
  And I was like, yeah, cool.
• 2:09
  I'll take it.
• 2:09
  Whatever.
• 2:11
  So I started creating online and then I was publishing a YouTube video every week.
• 2:14
  Didn't get very far.
• 2:16
  Found this online writing course instead from David Perrell,
• 2:19
  who's also pretty much in this creator space.
• 2:22
  So I worked for his course, like kind of like on the side for about two years until it shut.
• 2:27
  And then Ali moved to Hong Kong.
• 2:30
  And I sort of kind of heard through the great fine.
• 2:33
  Well, he was looking for a YouTube producer in Hong Kong.
• 2:36
  And then this prolific online creator, Paul Millard,
• 2:40
  messaged me to apply.
• 2:41
  And I was like, I don't know if I want to quit corporate.
• 2:44
  Sorry, yeah, you were.
• 2:46
  The name is familiar.
• 2:47
  Did he write the other way or something like that?
• 2:49
  Is that the name of the book?
• 2:49
  The pathless path.
• 2:51
  The pathless path.
• 2:51
  Yeah, yeah.
• 2:52
  The pathless path.
• 2:52
  This is the book that convinced Ali to quit medicine.
• 2:55
  Like that guy.
• 2:56
  Yes, okay.
• 2:57
  Cool.
• 2:57
  Yeah, it gave people out of corporate one percent at a time.
• 3:00
  How did you know, Paul?
• 3:01
  He reached out to you and told you to apply?
• 3:04
  We knew each other through writing.
• 3:06
  Substack.
• 3:06
  I guess.
• 3:07
  Yeah, that that that whole online soft stack world is a lot smaller than it seems.
• 3:11
  I think everybody there kind of has an inkling of each other.
• 3:14
  It's just really great.
• 3:15
  Yeah, I love hanging out on soft stack.
• 3:18
  Yeah, Paul told me to apply.
• 3:19
  I was just like, I don't have already really corporate.
• 3:22
  And then I applied anyway for you to produce your role and got rejected.
• 3:26
  And then I just said, I just replied that person,
• 3:30
  she's in as she used to be head of content for Ali.
• 3:34
  I was like, hey, thanks for to notice.
• 3:35
  And if you're in Hong Kong, like we would love to grab coffee or something.
• 3:39
  And then she replied me saying, oh, actually, we're looking for a writer soon.
• 3:43
  So that job application will go up any minute now.
• 3:47
  And I was like, this is all the information I need.
• 3:49
  I happen to be going to an Ali event that evening.
• 3:52
  So right after he finished talking, I like made a b-line for him.
• 3:56
  And I was like, hi, I'm Becky.
• 3:58
  I work for David Perl and professional writer and permanent resident.
• 4:04
  I don't need a visa.
• 4:05
  And that's basically all I said to him.
• 4:09
  And then he was like, oh, okay.
• 4:12
  So yeah, long story short, that's kind of how I landed here.
• 4:15
  Three weeks in, he woke up at like 3 a.m.
• 4:18
  being like, oh my god, Becky should run the YouTube channel.
• 4:21
  And then that's how I got the job.
• 4:25
  Okay, let me just make sure that I've got things clear.
• 4:28
  So you actually applied for another position.
• 4:30
  It was a no.
• 4:32
  Yeah, I prefer YouTube producer.
• 4:33
  It was a no.
• 4:34
  And then he put out an application for writer.
• 4:38
  And then it was a yes there.
• 4:41
  And then I end up getting the YouTube role anyway.
• 4:43
  Because he realized between like all the roles that he needed in Hong Kong at that point,
• 4:47
  I was his first Hong Kong employee.
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  So he, I think he realized like, oh, actually the YouTube user role is a little bit more urgent
• 4:53
  than the writer role.
• 4:55
  And that's how it happened.
• 4:57
  What a cool story.
• 4:58
  You actually met him in person and then that's the connection how it started.
• 5:02
  Tell me about your job.
• 5:03
  Like you have the title of head of YouTube.
• 5:06
  Don't think we've spoken to a head of YouTube on any team so far.
• 5:09
  We've had heads of content.
• 5:10
  We've had creative directors.
• 5:12
  Where does your job title fit in the mix there?
• 5:15
  Yeah, I think what that means really is I look after the platform because we have.
• 5:22
  So instead of I'm guessing a creative director would also be like looking at all the other
• 5:26
  platforms as well.
• 5:27
  I'm correct me if I'm wrong.
• 5:28
  I'm still new to this face.
• 5:30
  Like I'm about like nine months in.
• 5:31
  But yeah, so how do you two means like I just look at everything on the platform?
• 5:35
  I think we still turn to Angus a lot as our like unofficial head of content.
• 5:40
  The way Ali's team instructor is actually really really fat.
• 5:43
  Like the whole team report to Angus and that's so he knows everything that's going on
• 5:47
  like both on the content side and the commercial side.
• 5:49
  So it's actually really helpful to ask him for some pointers in terms of direction
• 5:53
  because he knows what what the business side is.
• 5:56
  And we're not just like blindly doing content just based off of vibes.
• 6:01
  And yeah, so that's how it works.
• 6:03
  Like we kind of at the moment still independently run each platform.
• 6:08
  So like our head of social she's also based in Hong Kong like she runs our like TikTok
• 6:12
  Instagram.
• 6:13
  But we kind of sort of run independently.
• 6:15
  And we're trying to work together a little bit more to have a little bit more cohesion.
• 6:18
  We're not there yet.
• 6:19
  But I also look at the platform in terms of a business funnel.
• 6:23
  So I look after basically whenever we're doing campaign launches of what that strategy looks like
• 6:29
  on the YouTube side like what kind of content needs to go out for YouTube shorts,
• 6:33
  the YouTube long form, community type pose, like literally changing the links on like the banner
• 6:39
  and changing also the banner image and all of that.
• 6:42
  And I think that's how it may be a little bit different from just a YouTube strategy
• 6:47
  person that picks out long form content.
• 6:49
  I think because of all the business side that's involved as well.
• 6:52
  When you're managing the YouTube channel, how do you think about it?
• 6:57
  How do you separate it so that it doesn't feel like an ad?
• 7:01
  I think the motto that Ali has always had is like he wants to make the content kind of like
• 7:06
  free for 99% of his audience.
• 7:08
  And then maybe the 1% that wants to pay has like a digital support.
• 7:13
  So honestly, the stuff that he talks about, let me think about this.
• 7:18
  I'm asking this question because we're kind of going through a similar thing.
• 7:21
  We just launched a product and like, yeah, it just feels like,
• 7:25
  oh, how do we make sure we don't go?
• 7:27
  We don't turn in like the channel into an ad channel instead of like organic,
• 7:31
  which is what our audience is used to.
• 7:34
  Yeah, we do plugs on our channel.
• 7:36
  And you may have seen this here and there where like literally Ali would literally be like a
• 7:41
  sponsor integration, but it's us going in the middle and then Ali would just go like,
• 7:45
  oh, by the way, we're like launching something like really exciting.
• 7:48
  If you want to join the wait list, like the like is down in the description below,
• 7:51
  like it would literally read kind of like an ad,
• 7:53
  but we would try to keep it brief.
• 7:56
  And we also put it like somewhere in the second half of the video, usually,
• 8:01
  because the people that are interested in the program would usually be people who are like
• 8:06
  true core fans of Ali and would actually see it in the second half of the video.
• 8:13
  We don't push for the product so much.
• 8:16
  I think people also get mythed off by it.
• 8:18
  Like we would just see some comments on the YouTube community's app being like,
• 8:22
  oh my god, this is too salesy.
• 8:23
  Like you're such a sellout, all of that.
• 8:25
  So we try to be like, yeah, like what?
• 8:28
  Oh my god, content creators need to make money.
• 8:33
  It's such a mind-blowing concept that we can't just like live off of brand deals.
• 8:39
  It's a tricky balance.
• 8:41
  It's interesting.
• 8:42
  It's a bit of a like a song and dance when it comes to putting ads in the content itself.
• 8:48
  And I waffle back and forth between like what the right approach is.
• 8:52
  Because if you look at like a Johnny Harris video, there's always an ad.
• 8:55
  And it's always within like the first one minute of the video.
• 8:57
  And you kind of know as the viewer, like it's happening then.
• 9:00
  And you can choose to watch it or skip through it.
• 9:03
  But it sounds like counterintuitive to put an ad that early in the video.
• 9:07
  Yet he's still been doing it for the last couple of years.
• 9:10
  And I know Linus Tech Tips does something very similar.
• 9:12
  With us at the Mark Manson team, we tend to put it kind of in the middle.
• 9:16
  But that's not our own ad.
• 9:18
  Like you brought up an interesting point where it's like if you're promoting your own content,
• 9:21
  you want to put it in the latter half, you're not contractually obligated to put it
• 9:25
  earlier in the video.
• 9:26
  Mark Rober and Vsauce and Veritasium, they've always put it at the very end.
• 9:32
  Like Mark Rober has crunch labs and it's like a two and a half minute ad
• 9:36
  at the end of every video he makes.
• 9:38
  And it's just like it's just there.
• 9:39
  I mean, I don't know if people are calling him a cell at that point in the video.
• 9:43
  Like as you can choose to leave the video.
• 9:44
  Yeah. And we do things a little bit differently to depending on the product.
• 9:48
  So or what we're promoting.
• 9:50
  So for example, we're doing a productivity spark.
• 9:54
  And it's kind of like a two-day virtual summit.
• 9:57
  But it's completely free.
• 9:59
  So that we feel really comfortable plugging.
• 10:01
  Because we're like, hey, guys, enjoy this.
• 10:03
  It's free.
• 10:04
  And if you don't want to, you just don't sign up.
• 10:06
  So I think if it's something is free, we're a lot more comfortable doing it.
• 10:09
  Whereas if it's like a more expensive course,
• 10:11
  we're just like, how do we like present this?
• 10:13
  How do we position this?
• 10:14
  Like it's then a lot more thought goes into it.
• 10:17
  I think it still is, I guess fundamentally,
• 10:21
  we know that people on YouTube are watching it for free.
• 10:25
  And I think that's where like the tension lies.
• 10:27
  It's always just a little bit tricky.
• 10:28
  I'm like, how do you how do you pitch something?
• 10:30
  It's like easier to pitch stuff in an email.
• 10:32
  But when it's on YouTube, it just feels like, you know,
• 10:34
  you're turning on a camera and you're selling.
• 10:36
  I think that part is still.
• 10:37
  I think we're still trying to figure it out as well.
• 10:39
  We're just trying to go with like what doesn't feel icky.
• 10:42
  As non-scientific as that is, it is a pretty good
• 10:47
  parameter on like, when we know if we went too far.
• 10:50
  What would you put something out for free for?
• 10:52
  You mentioned doing like a seminar or something coming up.
• 10:55
  Yeah, so every, actually, every single quarter,
• 10:57
  we do a goals and reflections session.
• 11:01
  It's about an hour and a half to two hours every single quarter.
• 11:04
  And then during the beginning of the year, it's two days.
• 11:08
  So we have a bunch of guest speakers coming in.
• 11:10
  We have like Ali's wife Izzy, like doing a little bit of like a vision board
• 11:14
  and vision setting workshop.
• 11:15
  And then Ali's also doing like a little bit of a workshop.
• 11:18
  Last year, we had like 75,000 registrants coming to it for free.
• 11:23
  I think people just wanted to set nearest resolutions.
• 11:24
  And I think it's something that Ali's always enjoyed as well.
• 11:27
  It's like to do goal setting and such.
• 11:29
  So these sessions, the quarterly ones, I believe,
• 11:31
  he's been running for a while.
• 11:33
  They've always been free.
• 11:34
  I think they will always be free.
• 11:36
  I think it's one of the rare moments we get to go live with the audience.
• 11:42
  That is not paywall or, yeah, pay get it in any way.
• 11:45
  Anything we want to keep that element around.
• 11:48
  Got you.
• 11:49
  It's a bit of a philanthropic move,
• 11:50
  but it's also something that sounds like Ali really likes.
• 11:54
  And it's a way to connect with viewers on a deeper level.
• 11:56
  Yeah, people get to ask questions.
• 11:58
  We get to pull the audience as well and have like a little bit of understanding.
• 12:01
  So at the beginning of every session,
• 12:02
  we do a little like demographic check.
• 12:04
  And like, what are people working on?
• 12:06
  What are the goals?
• 12:08
  All of that.
• 12:08
  It's an interesting way to also, yeah,
• 12:10
  to also like understand our audience a little bit better.
• 12:13
  I want to bring it back to the YouTube channel.
• 12:15
  And I want to ask you, what does a video look like from start to finish?
• 12:21
  Oh gosh.
• 12:22
  Okay, so we're currently experimenting with it as we do.
• 12:26
  So we've tried sort of outsourcing different parts of the video prep
• 12:30
  to different team members, including the writing.
• 12:33
  And while objectively the writing is great,
• 12:36
  whether it's done by Ali, whether it's done by team members,
• 12:39
  there's just something special about Ali writing the script himself
• 12:42
  and preparing the structure of the video himself.
• 12:45
  Like when we go for a coffee or we're just having lunch
• 12:48
  or in between meetings and such,
• 12:50
  like he would have an idea and that we would like
• 12:52
  spar on it for a little bit.
• 12:53
  In the end of the day, it does seem like when he's the one
• 12:56
  preparing like the nitty gritty bullet points
• 12:58
  and the research material by himself.
• 13:00
  That's when the video really shines.
• 13:03
  So where the video prep comes in is we decide on a title first.
• 13:07
  Like we don't really work on a video unless we have a title for it.
• 13:10
  If we have a concept, an inkling of a concept,
• 13:12
  we really try our best to not get tempted to like
• 13:15
  to expand on the idea until we have a title.
• 13:18
  And it was reconvened that that's a good title.
• 13:20
  Then we would start talking about the contents and the outline of the video
• 13:25
  with the prep.
• 13:26
  Ali now has two filming days in his calendar.
• 13:29
  Everyone's on Thursday and those are his YouTube video days.
• 13:32
  He kind of doesn't think about any sort of content outside of those days
• 13:36
  unless I'm poking him with like questions
• 13:39
  and I need like specific answers to be like,
• 13:42
  for example, like hey, do we have the props ready for this weekend, all of that.
• 13:45
  So during that day, we start off with prep
• 13:48
  and then we kind of see where the day goes
• 13:51
  but the usually we're able to wrap up a video
• 13:54
  or maybe even two in a day.
• 13:56
  When you talk about going through prep,
• 13:57
  at that point the script has been written and you're just kind of like
• 14:00
  Oh, he's writing a script on the same day.
• 14:03
  On the same day.
• 14:04
  Man is really fast.
• 14:06
  Like he's extremely efficient and his endurance
• 14:11
  of like talking and just speaking to the camera.
• 14:13
  Like he could actually do it for eight hours.
• 14:15
  I don't know a lot of people who can do that.
• 14:16
  He is like, he could actually do that.
• 14:18
  He's turned on the camera on.
• 14:19
  You know, sometimes he might be like,
• 14:21
  I need a coffee and everything.
• 14:22
  And I was like, sure, go get your coffee.
• 14:23
  I'll like prepare all the camera lighting in the meantime.
• 14:26
  And then when he comes in, I'm like,
• 14:28
  right, camera's on, we're rolling.
• 14:29
  Like take your position and let's go.
• 14:31
  It's a tiny room as well.
• 14:35
  I guess that's like the downside of Hong Kong.
• 14:37
  It's like all the rooms are tiny.
• 14:39
  I'm actually sitting on like the window ledge
• 14:41
  is where I usually am.
• 14:43
  And I was just telling him like,
• 14:44
  I think your requirement for you to produce
• 14:46
  or is they need to be tiny enough
• 14:47
  to like be behind the camera in the window ledge.
• 14:52
  It's actually funny because our camera person is very tiny also.
• 14:56
  You would think you need like someone like,
• 14:59
  you know, a little bit, yeah, like a sturdier
• 15:02
  to like hold cameras and everything.
• 15:03
  But also we fit in like really, really obscure places.
• 15:06
  So it helps.
• 15:07
  When I'm in like, we can now have like semi-two filming
• 15:09
  so you just want is currently in his flat
• 15:12
  and then the other is we have a co-working space.
• 15:14
  But I'm also like in like a little tiny quarter
• 15:17
  behind a camera because that's all we can fit.
• 15:20
  And I was like, I think this is the best angle.
• 15:22
  Is yeah, just in a corner of a room.
• 15:24
  Is Ali reading word for word from a teleprompter
• 15:27
  or is it kind of like bullet points
• 15:30
  and then he goes and riffs?
• 15:31
  He does best with bullet points and riffs.
• 15:35
  But the hook we try to script our hook word for word.
• 15:38
  That is like the one part we try to put a lot of care into it.
• 15:42
  But it also helps to have something word for word.
• 15:44
  And then if he doesn't like it,
• 15:45
  he can just riff off a point by himself.
• 15:47
  He knows how editing works.
• 15:48
  So he knows that he can just say something
• 15:50
  and stop and repeat themselves.
• 15:52
  And the amount of time he does that throughout the video
• 15:54
  is actually pretty insane.
• 15:55
  He stops himself a lot
• 15:56
  and it will just repeat himself over and over.
• 15:58
  But I think because he does that so much,
• 16:00
  he's also gotten like a lot better at riffing.
• 16:03
  He can ramble and sound really, really coherent.
• 16:05
  But it's also because he's like ticket the time to like write out his thoughts.
• 16:09
  He times really, really fast.
• 16:11
  And it's just, for example, we shot a video yesterday
• 16:15
  and he took an hour and a half of prep of him
• 16:19
  just like writing word for word in on Ulysses
• 16:22
  and then just going back and forth with Claude.
• 16:25
  And I think by the end of the one and a half hour,
• 16:27
  he's had like a version six of the script
• 16:29
  and that's the one we use.
• 16:32
  That's interesting.
• 16:34
  While he was doing that,
• 16:35
  I was preparing some like thumbnail concepts
• 16:37
  and like doing a little bit of extra
• 16:40
  bracket research which is just going on YouTube
• 16:42
  and one of them just to see if that title is really the title we're going for.
• 16:45
  And then we sort of like confer at the
• 16:48
  and then I'm preparing all the camera setup and stuff.
• 16:49
  And then at the end, we just hit for court.
• 16:52
  So the new title split testing feature
• 16:55
  that YouTube has added, that's not something that you guys use.
• 16:58
  Oh man, we were trying to figure out how to use this properly actually.
• 17:01
  So yeah, at first we were using it and then
• 17:04
  like ask the video launches, but then we've been
• 17:07
  I've been talking to a couple of producers and a lot of them say like,
• 17:09
  oh, actually it doesn't really matter in the first 24 hours
• 17:12
  because it's only served to like the core audience anyway.
• 17:14
  So they would kind of click on it no matter what.
• 17:17
  We just choose. So unless we're like really
• 17:19
  unsure about the concept and it's like a really major variation,
• 17:22
  we won't really do a bit testing.
• 17:24
  Where a bit testing with the title,
• 17:26
  Fule is really helpful is when a video kind of like has is plateauing.
• 17:30
  And I bought this, I learned this from Saf,
• 17:33
  who also used to work with Ali and is now working with plans like Dan Presley.
• 17:37
  And what he said was basically if a video performance has sort of plateaued,
• 17:43
  the click to the right is kind of plateauing.
• 17:45
  But you can see that they're still getting a lot of views per hour.
• 17:48
  Those are like really good candidates for AB testing.
• 17:51
  I haven't figured out an automated way to do this or to like how to monitor at least like
• 17:55
  thousand like 1200 videos on his channel to be able to monitor every single one of them and
• 18:00
  figure that out. But that's when instead of like changing the title of completely,
• 18:04
  we would AB test it.
• 18:06
  Then one of the more successful cases of of the AB testing was the video,
• 18:10
  how to change your life. This is a video we did a couple of months ago.
• 18:13
  It's the one I'm most proud of because I pitched that video idea and and the whole content.
• 18:18
  But I think we were debating between how to change your life and then either you only need
• 18:24
  for hours or like the think day method or something because like XX method usually does well
• 18:28
  on Ali channel. And like we tested it a few times and it just didn't do well.
• 18:32
  That was really helpful and we wouldn't have like known that data point if not for AB testing.
• 18:36
  And now what we're trying to do is build a little playbook of like what works and what doesn't
• 18:41
  test out a few theories like, oh, let's do videos perform better.
• 18:44
  If Ali's face is in the thumbnail or do they perform better, if Ali's face is not in there,
• 18:47
  is it better as an overlay shot? What kind of thumbnail text works?
• 18:51
  You think like that. It's just it's just all data points that we're trying to
• 18:54
  systemize and put into a playbook and ever evolving playbook because see I'll go and audience
• 18:59
  behavior changes all the time. Yeah, it's interesting to hear your perspective on things because we
• 19:04
  have similar positions like I'm the creative director for Mark Manson and we make similar education
• 19:08
  content. And I think the title is obviously extremely critical. But I have had conversations
• 19:16
  around titles being less mandatory to like nail in education content compared to like entertainment
• 19:22
  content. Sometimes like the idea the concept itself is actually what propels the video forward
• 19:27
  and then we find a title after the fact. Oh, that would make sense. Yeah, I just like
• 19:32
  now YouTube is starting to send notifications around AB testing to mobile. And the
• 19:38
  notifications I keep getting are like they're inconclusive, inconclusive, inconclusive.
• 19:41
  Yeah. Take it. What am I doing wrong? Yeah, but all the variations are just so minor. It's so
• 19:47
  rare that we get a conclusive like 10% delta. Right, right, right. So I've kind of landed on this
• 19:54
  theory. If you're doing major changes because YouTube studio prioritizes watch time as the
• 20:01
  the metric for success. This is true for thumbnails, true for titles. That is, you know, if you're
• 20:06
  doing major changes, do it there. But I've actually been using TubeBuddy for like more subtle
• 20:13
  changes in thumbnails and titles because it uses click-through rate as its way of measuring success.
• 20:19
  And so, you know, if a title has the versus a or like a couple words that are different or if a thumbnail
• 20:24
  has, you know, mark or alley wearing a blue shirt versus a green shirt, that's not going to lead to a
• 20:29
  much wider, much longer watch time. But it might have a significant change if you measure by
• 20:37
  click-through rate. So that's what I've been doing. And sometimes with TubeBuddy, it will reveal like a,
• 20:42
  you know, a 10% difference, like something that dramatic. That's the strategy I use. And I like
• 20:48
  it. And it seems to work. It might not work next week. You never know. YouTube always changes.
• 20:52
  Okay. That's super nerdy question. But how is the TubeBuddy, how's TubeBuddy different from
• 20:57
  like ThumbnailTest.com or is it just like, because I know ThumbnailTest.com has like a lot of metrics to
• 21:02
  look at. I haven't tried the TubeBuddy A, B testing. Yeah. TubeBuddy was just the one that I learned.
• 21:07
  And as a result, that's the one that I've stuck with. But it's similar. Like it has a lot of stuff
• 21:12
  that I definitely do not use. Okay. That's really, really good to know. Because yeah, now I will,
• 21:17
  I think we've been optimizing for YouTube just because, yeah, we were optimizing for watch time.
• 21:23
  But now that you say that actually the more granular data, like those minor changes can have
• 21:28
  a massive or like give a massive significant delta in like CCR. Now I know to go to like the
• 21:33
  external sites for testing the minor changes. That's really helpful. Yeah. Yeah. I think it's very
• 21:39
  intuitive to use YouTube's platform for YouTube related things. But I've started to kind of come to
• 21:47
  the conclusion that YouTube doesn't do everything perfectly quite yet. And so there is justification
• 21:54
  for using third party tools or whatever else for other reasons. And that's just one of the tactics
• 21:59
  that I use when it comes to like testing stuff. Yeah. Okay. That's really, really helpful.
• 22:04
  Yeah. What was just even, even when we're like thinking about YouTube videos, for example,
• 22:08
  we're like, Oh, do we? Are we aiming for like watch time? Are we aiming for like views? Like
• 22:14
  it's always a really confusing like because it's, it's like two different metrics, like yes,
• 22:19
  directionally they're the same, but they can result in like really different videos. A video with
• 22:23
  it of Ali interviewing his friend who started fire cut. Yeah, we love fire editing. Yeah.
• 22:30
  Yeah. It's, is it a game changer for our editors? And I think like people I like the
• 22:36
  similar space, that video I think is like almost three hours. And the views are okay. But the
• 22:42
  average view duration on that is like insane. So I think it's like, so that kind of kind of
• 22:46
  kind of content would lead to like World War Two hours, for example. But it's also like,
• 22:49
  oh, do you want to keep creating those kind of content? Because they don't, they will not rack up
• 22:52
  as many views at least not at the start. It's a, it's a slow burn or kind of video. Yeah.
• 22:56
  Are you considerate of watch time when you are making standard talking head videos? Are you thinking,
• 23:01
  oh, this should be a 45 minute video versus a 20 minute video?
• 23:05
  I, well, we went through faces. There was a face earlier this year where we released like longer
• 23:10
  videos and we made it like 45 minutes and like we were like, okay, um, for it to be a little bit
• 23:15
  rambly. Um, and now we've sort of gone the opposite way. I think now we're trying to shorten it
• 23:20
  that current approaches that we want to increase like the information density is how Ali calls it.
• 23:26
  So now we're like pivoting towards doing like shorter tighter edits with like a little bit more
• 23:30
  visuals and a little bit more stuff going on in the video. And I think that's just a byproduct
• 23:35
  of seeing like people in the space doing similar things. I don't think there's a right or wrong
• 23:39
  answer because I personally believe like there's an audience for everything. Yeah, but if people
• 23:44
  are gravitating a little bit more towards tighter videos, then maybe we'll just, that's like the
• 23:49
  approach that we're getting. I think it's like we're, we're, we have a gut feeling, we test something
• 23:53
  out and then we look at the data and the results. And then we'll just get feedback ways of that.
• 23:58
  The way Ali always says is he's just like, well, I have a gut feeling, but I could always be
• 24:01
  convinced by data is what he always. Oh, I love that. Yeah. I feel the same way. Yeah. Yeah.
• 24:08
  Sometimes your gut feeling is like, it's accurate and you can just trust it. But then, you know,
• 24:13
  data is the ultimate decider. Do you think that changing your strategy all the time confuses your
• 24:19
  viewers? Oh, yeah, it confuses me. Yeah. So now what we're trying to do is, um, one of our priorities
• 24:29
  for sort of like the next quarter, and we've started this like maybe two weeks ago, is to really
• 24:35
  double down and work on our pre-production, filming, and post-production checklist and basically
• 24:40
  just having a system or like a playbook that we put together. Because what I realized is like,
• 24:45
  I've inherited like a checklist from I guess when Ali was in London and that was like a whole
• 24:51
  different team set up like YouTube was probably a different platform like a year ago. And
• 24:56
  a whole different team structure. This is when like some of its videos were written by a few
• 25:01
  team members. It was just a completely different system. And so in hindsight, what I should have done
• 25:05
  is like go through the checklist in the beginning. And instead of going like, this doesn't apply to
• 25:10
  because the team was different. What I should have done is like went to Ali and Angus and be like,
• 25:14
  okay, so what what is currently working? What is not working? And where do we need to fill in the
• 25:18
  gaps? So it was only in the past two weeks where we sat down and we like looked through the checklist
• 25:24
  and then like in the last two weeks we had like a one of 10 video and then the week after was a two
• 25:28
  of 10 just behind that one of 10. And then we were evaluating what did that video go well. And we
• 25:32
  were like, oh, well, unconsciously we were following this checklist. And therefore it worked.
• 25:36
  And now we're just like, oh my god, we should just stick to the dang checklist. It's so simple.
• 25:42
  But we should have just stuck to the system that we know works. Yes, so now we're like
• 25:46
  tweaking that. And hopefully we will experiment but like in the context of like we experiment but not
• 25:52
  so wildly. Like hopefully the the experiment includes like a like a stage where we iterate back
• 25:58
  on the checklist and then therefore we're we're continuing to refine the process instead of
• 26:02
  just blindly experimenting. We were missing pre-production stuff. So I think when I came in I was working
• 26:09
  a lot with like the team on like the post-production and the pre-production was a little bit all over
• 26:14
  the place that we didn't know where the ideas were coming from. We didn't know like how we were
• 26:18
  looking at our peers. We didn't know how prep the script should be. I think like a mistake that
• 26:24
  we've done was like, oh my god, Ali's busy. And therefore we should just like do the prep
• 26:27
  ourselves and like shove it to him and like have him read all the teleprompter. So we've done that.
• 26:32
  But I think what that resulted was like just like a disconnect between Ali and the script. And
• 26:37
  not to say that the script wasn't good. But I think it's it's just different when when the same
• 26:42
  person who's writing the stuff and doing the research is the one delivering the messages.
• 26:46
  They just have this like they're able to just connect the stuff in their head in a different way.
• 26:50
  So that was the major component of that was missing in the pre-production. So now we're just trying
• 26:56
  to take that back try to think of like title and thumbnail also in the beginning. And even just like
• 27:00
  thinking of a title and thumbnail without doing like any extensive like one off-ten or like YouTube
• 27:04
  browsing would already result in a better video. Yeah, pre-production is the big one that I think a
• 27:10
  lot of people gloss over and it's actually probably the most critical one because any problems
• 27:16
  that happen down the line whether it's when you're filming or in post-production
• 27:20
  is probably easiest to solve those problems during pre-production. But it's so easy to just write
• 27:26
  v1 and then be like well all right that's good and then we'll film it and then there's a common
• 27:29
  saying oh we'll fix it in post and as a former editor it's hard to fix everything in post you
• 27:34
  can't always pin it on the editor. You know we make sure to leave like extra amounts of time
• 27:38
  for pre-production for like roasting scripts going back and forth thinking about ways to make
• 27:42
  scripts more visual you know wait a way to tell a story first and then derive the lessons from
• 27:48
  the story rather than just spit the lesson out. We talked about titles a little bit you want to talk
• 27:53
  about I want to hear the two of you talk about thumbnails. Yeah it's it's a tricky one because like
• 27:59
  again like for an education channel like we try to be okay so there was a season sort of this
• 28:05
  year where we try to be like very wealthy creative with our thumbnails but then I think maybe
• 28:10
  that made the channel kind of look like an entertainment channel and it just gives off a really
• 28:15
  different vibe from what all these viewers are maybe used to so we actually don't know if it
• 28:20
  work we think that it might have like alienated a segment of our audience and now we're trying to
• 28:26
  pivot back to his like more conventional thumbnail. We also don't want to start off with like a
• 28:31
  completely crazy frame and then have the video just be him in the studio talking doing a talking
• 28:36
  yeah I'm in a similar boat I it's tough for YouTube education like it doesn't feel to me as
• 28:42
  critical to get it right as entertainment based content especially to audiences that are more
• 28:47
  mature like Alice con all these audiences relatively mature people who are looking to better
• 28:51
  themselves and it's similar with our audience team Mark Manson and we've actually found that
• 28:57
  simpler thumbnails are overperforming compared to like highly produced thumbnails so we always do
• 29:02
  try to keep it grounded within reality like if we elevate a thumbnail idea or if we kind of
• 29:08
  add a little bit of creative juices to it to make it more saturated or make it pop or look cooler
• 29:13
  we always make sure that it looks at least like it could exist in real life otherwise to your point
• 29:18
  it starts to look like an entertainment channel yeah I think Ali has specifically also said like oh
• 29:24
  we don't want to miss her beast looking thumbnail because that's not our audience so now this is
• 29:28
  a part of our pre-production process is like if we think that there is a specific pose or
• 29:33
  something that would work as a thumbnail we also try to shoot it on the same day there's just
• 29:39
  something about the thumbnail being like the first frame of the video that I think is quite powerful
• 29:45
  if if it works like if the first frame of the video is like Ali walking for example then that
• 29:50
  might not be the best thumbnail opportunity but or like somewhere in the beginning I think is
• 29:55
  what we found is like a very nice continuity and maybe this is just subconscious I don't know if
• 30:00
  that actually like impacts you. No I like it too and we've seen data where it's performed well for
• 30:05
  us as well wasn't always that way I think like in YouTube education right now authenticity is kind
• 30:10
  of like the winning ingredient whereas maybe last year or two years ago it was the information that
• 30:17
  was like the winning ingredient so you'd have like a bunch of valuable information you get it to the
• 30:21
  viewer as effectively and efficiently as possible and then the viewer would be happy having learned
• 30:27
  seven ways to be more productive but now it's kind of like it's rooted in story and it's rooted
• 30:32
  in authenticity because I think you could just go to chat GPT and say hey give me seven ways to
• 30:36
  be more productive and then it spits out seven ideas within one second you don't necessarily need to
• 30:41
  watch a 20 minute video anymore to learn those tactics right we're always looking for ways to
• 30:46
  introduce stories or authenticity or to tell something in a bit of a creative way now and I don't
• 30:51
  know if that's right it seems to work for us when we do it right but also it has it has gone
• 30:56
  belly up a couple times so yeah sometimes the videos you think are gonna do well don't and then
• 31:01
  vice versa it's just like we can test it out as best as we can with like the best high educated
• 31:06
  guess and then you just have to let the platform decide let the audience decide are you really
• 31:11
  observant of other channels and the types of titles and thumbnails that they're doing and looking
• 31:17
  for those kinds of trends and thinking how can we make a video with that same title yes and
• 31:22
  no in a sense like yes to just to know what the other people in this space are doing and I think
• 31:28
  we have seen like sort of this the shift where I'm sure you might notice it too on YouTube where
• 31:32
  everybody is making like the same kind of videos the exact same thumbnails the exact same titles
• 31:37
  the exact same thumbnail text someone sent to me have sent me a video the other day being like
• 31:42
  the title was how to change your life and the thumbnail text was you only need four hours and they're
• 31:46
  like hey that's yours yeah that's so true so I think there is like some part of us that also does
• 31:54
  that we also do the same to our competitors and the reason for it like as unoriginal as it seems
• 32:00
  it works like if you just use those thumbnails and use the thumbnail text combination your views
• 32:05
  just go up it's but I think we're careful of not doing it too much because then we start to lose
• 32:09
  our because then I feel like because now I see like five videos with like the same title and I kind
• 32:13
  of don't want to click on it like personally as a viewer I think that in that sense anecdotally
• 32:18
  we're also just trying to stray away from that to be not too samey to the other channels but it is
• 32:23
  a little bit tricky because it's like the views are there and at the end of the day it's also kind
• 32:27
  of the views kind of prop up the channel as well so we can't ignore it too much and I think it's
• 32:32
  always like a balance between like you said like authenticity because I think that's what a lot of
• 32:36
  people gravitated towards when it came to Ellie's content. Yeah I feel a similar sliminess
• 32:43
  when seeing other titles exist out there and getting millions of views and I'm like wow if we need
• 32:49
  a million views let's just make that video right then and there but I think if you balance it
• 32:54
  between truly authentic content original content I feel less slimy about it it feels like you are
• 33:01
  at least as the way I think about it I'm observant of what's going on in the space and then jumping
• 33:05
  on trends as they happen but I'm also very conscious not to just do that one tactic only over
• 33:13
  and over and over and over again there was a time where we put out a video called if you're ambitious
• 33:18
  but lazy watch this and that is such a popular title in YouTube education. Yeah not gonna lie we
• 33:24
  have a video with that title coming out too. Yes exactly. It's also like like the second we saw
• 33:29
  that title Ellie was just like what is this like why like what is lazy like I like he was like nobody
• 33:35
  is lazy what is going on what is the crux of it he was just like like is it like people want to do
• 33:40
  things but they can't like they don't have like the system to do it like what is it and he was just
• 33:44
  like I don't like the word lazy yeah I don't I try not to think about it too hard like why does this
• 33:49
  title work I don't know it's worked for five other channels so why not do it ourselves you know
• 33:54
  what it's interesting with that particular title though I did actually do a study and I pulled all
• 33:58
  of the transcripts from every channel that made that video and I used GPT to like figure out
• 34:04
  what the contents was and what was interesting was there was actually quite a large variety of
• 34:10
  of like what that means to each creator so even though the title was what got the click there was
• 34:15
  actually a pretty diverse range of just like tact like lessons or stories hidden within it.
• 34:22
  Yeah it was only when like Ellie started recording the video and then he started saying stuff that
• 34:26
  like felt really aligned to him that I was like okay I can forgive this title now because like
• 34:30
  what he's saying is actually it's very Ollie coded it's the same with like those videos that are
• 34:34
  like oh you're gonna find this at the right time or like you'll find this video at the right time
• 34:37
  that's also like all over the feed right now yeah yeah yeah and then I said that to Ali and he
• 34:43
  was just like oh my god that's such a catch all title I know that one for sure and it does work
• 34:49
  and I have I'm guilty of clicking on those same videos too I'm like oh okay interesting
• 34:53
  yeah I'm like what is the angle on this one yeah really curious I wanted to give you an
• 34:58
  opportunity to talk about your your personal channels your you have a newsletter your substack
• 35:04
  you have a podcast are you writing a book yeah so the book I wrote when I was so working
• 35:10
  corporate so right before this job I was working in an investment bag as part of their
• 35:14
  communications team and I was so bored so I wrote a book it is it's it's a little little
• 35:20
  mini book it's like 10,000 words but what happened was after I got the job with Ali just kind of
• 35:24
  went to the site but it takes some time off in October and I managed to finish it or finished
• 35:30
  like round three of the edits I finished like draft one in January and then it just fell off to
• 35:34
  the wayside it's currently with an editor I'm working with a good friend of mine that I
• 35:38
  met and write a passage and he's and it's I'm trying to think of it as like it's his job now to
• 35:43
  like it's sorry the responsibility is in his court now to wrangle it like it's no longer my problem
• 35:47
  until he hands it back to me and then because I problem again but I think it should be almost done
• 35:53
  I kind of told him like I'm kind of emotionally done with this project and I wanted published
• 35:57
  so he's like okay let me let me just tie up the ends on there it's called Bitesize Creativity
• 36:02
  and the thesis was that you don't have to quit your job to start a creative practice which I think
• 36:07
  is like how a lot of people were I think that's like a lot of people actually on like Instagram
• 36:11
  and who are creating content on like YouTube and Instagram and such like they're not necessarily
• 36:15
  full-time content creators but just doing it making time for it a little bit on the side
• 36:20
  is is enough to change your life at least it's how it changed mine wait how did it change your life
• 36:26
  was it because you got connected with David Perl and Ali Abdall tell me yes it did I think in that
• 36:32
  sense it put myself out there it exposed me to like this whole network of people that I wouldn't
• 36:37
  have been in touch with otherwise like thanks to the internet because it's just Hong Kong is not a
• 36:42
  place for a lot of creatives I think it's it's a really like financially driven city so like the
• 36:48
  financial industry is and all it's subsequent industry so like law legal accounting and all
• 36:52
  consulting all of that is what props of the city but it just was not what I was inherently into
• 36:58
  I really love like the creative part like writing stories and I think like being doing that on
• 37:03
  the internet sort of put me in a place where I get to be in touch with other people who are similar
• 37:08
  and like the it took the location factor out of it because just like realistically I was never
• 37:12
  going to meet any of these people like Ali moving to Hong Kong was such a a wild card that I never
• 37:16
  envisioned like had Ali not move to Hong Kong I probably whistle be in a bank like maybe doing
• 37:20
  content on the side you think that that was such a wild opportunity that could have not happened
• 37:26
  and then I think also just it's not like I knew anybody from back home as well who are like in this
• 37:31
  like educational content space like I was born and raised in Indonesia so I don't even speak
• 37:36
  English as my first language so it's just the internet just made a lot of opportunities happen
• 37:41
  for me that I wouldn't have had a chance like a shot otherwise and that's how I changed my life
• 37:47
  that's why I'm always just like you know just put yourself out there like literally once a week
• 37:51
  for three years and see what happens oh that's so cool the I mean it's very similar to what started
• 37:58
  this podcast I did a podcast episode for a friend of mine like a year and a bit ago and it was my
• 38:05
  first time being a guest on somebody else's podcast and I didn't have any high expectations or
• 38:09
  anything like that I just found it a fun experience and it eventually went live and it got seen by
• 38:14
  a hundred people like not a lot of people by YouTube standards that is a very very very small video
• 38:20
  but of those 100 people like six or seven people actually reached out and said hey I saw your
• 38:24
  interview I thought you did really interesting things and now that person and I you know we connected
• 38:28
  we talked through what's at you know there are strategies for someone else or they work somewhere
• 38:32
  else in the YouTube industry or we've met up with them at conferences or something like that
• 38:36
  actually got speaking engagement opportunity at a conference because of putting myself out there
• 38:41
  so I completely align with your messaging of you know bite size creativity this is what this podcast
• 38:48
  is about it's not going to get millions of views like there's not that many people who find this
• 38:53
  content interesting but of the people who do what's going to come from this like you reached out to
• 38:57
  us from this podcast existing and this is already a great little networking connection that wouldn't
• 39:02
  happen otherwise yeah podcast is such a good excuse as well to like it's it's a good setting to
• 39:07
  go deep into a conversation which is funny because this this could very much happen over coffee but
• 39:11
  like having it scheduled an predetermined topic for a podcast recording just means like you will
• 39:16
  talk about it and you will go deep yeah yeah I completely agree like I've been having these
• 39:22
  conversations with people for the last year year and a half and we just didn't record any of it
• 39:26
  and it was a very fruitful conversation that's led to friendships and all these other kinds of things
• 39:30
  so why not make a podcast out of it it's a great way to network with people it's free consultation
• 39:37
  in many cases yeah and it's really fun I find it fun to like we we have a small team that we work
• 39:43
  with they're all excellent people and it's fun to like learn how to manage a team like there's
• 39:47
  some good skills being built from this podcast despite it being still very very very small and just
• 39:53
  aside hustle for Olena and I right now I like completely I feel the exact same way about the
• 39:57
  podcast that I have actually in a really similar dynamic because my podcast co-host was like the
• 40:03
  head of operations for Ali for about four years so it's like a really similar like I'm coming
• 40:08
  at it from like a content angle and then my co-host Bob she's coming at it from like an ops angle
• 40:14
  I think she's also more willing yeah where she's just like okay but like what is like the email
• 40:19
  sequence that goes into welcoming a new audience into our newsletter and I was like I don't freaking
• 40:23
  know like I was like I just put the stuff that's like out there on the internet that people see
• 40:29
  and she's like no you need a welcome sequence you need a funnel like we need to start our
• 40:32
  newsletter and kid and I was just like girl what like I'm just on self-stack yeah it's just really
• 40:37
  interesting because there's just so much I think the creator industry has become like so big that
• 40:42
  now we are I think trying to like we're trying we're also trying to like operationalize
• 40:46
  ourselves like I think what started off as like a one person operation is it just grew so big that
• 40:50
  it's now just like impossible for it to be a one person thing and so so much more goes into it like
• 40:55
  the business side the accounting side the like pitching side the communication side um it's there's
• 41:00
  just so much to talk about and then um so my co-host and I we were like talking about it anyway
• 41:06
  and then I was just like you know what let's just do a podcast about it I think it'll be cool
• 41:09
  and then she was like I would only do it if it focuses on like smaller creators like people who
• 41:14
  want to start but maybe not necessarily make it their full-time job but yeah really we're just like
• 41:18
  having conversations and and hoping other people find it useful um I do think that working for
• 41:23
  Ali is uniquely good for bite-size creativity related stuff because it just seems like that team
• 41:30
  like Ali just really encourages everybody to have their own thing I know like Tin Tin has a
• 41:35
  newsletter and I know Saftas is consulting right he's left the company but he you know had his
• 41:40
  consulting thing and you don't see that everywhere on every team so I really respect your team
• 41:44
  for having that encouragement to like go out and do your own thing and have a side hustle and
• 41:49
  then everyone comes together for Ali's content I think that's really cool yeah that is like yeah
• 41:53
  that's actually really it's a really really nice thing to have because I I guess like having
• 41:58
  worked in corporate like they're always just like you have you better declare your site and
• 42:02
  come in fear of like insider trading or coffee but it's just one I mean I did work for like a
• 42:06
  couple of finance organizations I get it but it it really got me thinking and I never really
• 42:11
  thought I was going to be a person that would start a business or a side hustle like to actually
• 42:15
  make like because I was doing this bite-size creativity stuff and I was like oh these are all
• 42:18
  just creative expression but my primary income is going to come from my employer and then
• 42:23
  Ali just like no that's like kind of like you're you're putting yourself in a really risky position
• 42:27
  if your income is only coming from one person and I was like okay but and this is coming from like
• 42:32
  due to his employing me um so and so I was like really really like confused and and like
• 42:40
  and not skeptic but I was just like oh like questioning I was like is this how the world works
• 42:43
  but then just like seeing everyone like like actually talking to Tintin and actually talking to Saf
• 42:47
  and like talking to other people and the team who I think like more than half work for other client
• 42:53
  like half clients on the side I think they're just like normalize the whole like side hustle
• 42:57
  thing for me and that's when I started going like oh actually maybe it's not that scary actually
• 43:01
  when you have like a couple of people like doing the same thing like you really become the average
• 43:05
  of the five people you surround yourself with because there's like there's Tintin and Saf and
• 43:08
  we and then we know like they like talk together all the time but business and I was like okay
• 43:12
  we're the girls in the team like where where are we not like doing side hustle and stuff on the side
• 43:16
  so now there's a group of us that's like the girls of the team like and then plus like a girls of
• 43:21
  like the alums of the aliyah adult team and we literally have a meeting every two weeks to talk about
• 43:25
  side hustle stuff and like pricing proposals like how to how to deal with with like this client like
• 43:32
  oh I don't like this client what to do like what the packages look like and now that's the kind of
• 43:35
  stuff that we talk about it also like YouTube like should we be posting on LinkedIn what kind of
• 43:40
  stuff should go on there but now this is the kind of stuff we talk about because it's so normalizing
• 43:44
  like the Ali culture to do it and Ali knows about this group as well he's just like oh that's so
• 43:48
  cool that you guys do it like you guys tell me oh that's cool how's everybody doing doing well okay
• 43:52
  like and then when they get a chance to meet with Ali because like team members if they visit
• 43:56
  Hong Kong they still go to like the office and they still meet Ali and everything and then Ali
• 44:00
  would literally be like okay let's look at your offer and like like let's go through them like
• 44:04
  and then it would like give tips on how to do like sales calls and stuff like he's extremely generous
• 44:08
  with his knowledge and his his insights like he's never been like oh you must work for me and be
• 44:15
  only like I think from that angle he's such a good like person to be around and an even better
• 44:21
  person to like work for because he's so supportive of all of his team members like that
• 44:25
  Angus as well is also really supportive in quarterly reviews he does add like oh where do you
• 44:31
  want to be in like three years and what can this company do to help you get there so it's just like
• 44:36
  it's not just like a sentimental thing but it's like an actual serious conversation that also happens
• 44:41
  every single quarter with the person that essentially manages the whole company I think a lot of
• 44:47
  people get burnt out on the back end now I remember like five or six years ago it was very common
• 44:51
  for the creators to get burned out I still think that happens a lot too but I think it's also been
• 44:56
  passed on to people who work behind the scenes like the editors and producers and so I think like
• 45:01
  the remedy to that is having somebody like Angus or Ali you know check in you said on a quarterly
• 45:06
  basis making sure that everything's okay making sure that they're working to word their own goals
• 45:10
  I think that's something that is net positive for this industry as we continue to develop and
• 45:15
  and become more I don't know real I know we're real but like we're still early days this creator
• 45:21
  economy Becky who is a creator youtube or off platform sub stack wherever that's on your radar
• 45:27
  right now that you really respect and think is cool oh man this is a repeat of your previous
• 45:31
  gets answer but cold cure one I think is just absolutely smashing it I think personally for me when
• 45:38
  I started like when I was about to get this job I just saw him like when he was hustling and working
• 45:43
  for like Kelly Wakasa I think he probably still does but I was like oh my god we are like the like
• 45:49
  there's like the OGs of the YouTube that are like solo creators and then there's like us who like
• 45:54
  because now the those like first round of creators are able to like basically be their own platform
• 46:00
  like the second round of people like the second wave of people like cold and now me like who like
• 46:06
  work for creators and are also like creating on the side so like our primary income actually now comes
• 46:10
  from another creator and then we're also trying to make it on our own as a creator and I think that
• 46:15
  made me feel like okay like I'm in good company doing this whole like creator rethink working for
• 46:21
  another creator and the other is just like his storytelling and his like creativity on his videos
• 46:27
  it's just insane like it's so refreshing to watch his stuff and I think it's really hard now with
• 46:32
  like everything being like super optimized and like everything like everyone's trying to like gain
• 46:36
  views like for a good reason but I think just to see YouTube as that like pure form of like creative
• 46:41
  expression is just such a breath of fresh air excellent answer thank you for being on the show it
• 46:46
  was pleasure to pleasure to meet you thank you for reaching out being the first guest to message us first
• 46:51
  no thanks for as a replying to me I just I'm just really looking just to connect with other people
• 46:56
  in this space especially yeah being out here not a lot of people in Hong Kong but thankfully so
• 47:01
  many friendly people on the internet willing to just like jump on Zoom calls with me and answer
• 47:05
  my questions about A B testing thank you for watching and listening to this episode if you
• 47:13
  liked it and you're new here please consider subscribing or leaving us a review on the audio channels
• 47:18
  it really means a lot in these early days for the podcast it helps it make it more sustainable
• 47:22
  and if you are interested in checking out another episode and you're watching on YouTube I
• 47:26
  recommend clicking here because we've put up the Eric Villa interview which in my opinion is one
• 47:32
  of the best ones is certainly one of the most high performing episodes and he is the head of production
• 47:37
  for MKBHD sister channel the studio so you can check that out by clicking here it's in the
• 47:43
  description if you're listening on the audio channels thank you so much for listening or watching
• 47:46
  I will see you in the next episode goodbye