What is the difference in strategy between a traditional YouTube channel and a YouTube automation channel? These distinctions has large implications for your channel strategy. In this article we will cover…

-Why your “why” matters for your strategy and goals on YouTube
-The difference between traditional YouTube channels and YouTube automation channels
-What variables matters for the different types of YouTube channels and why it has a large impact on your strategy and long-term goals

Your “why”

Your why is why you are doing YouTube. YouTubers have many different whys, such as...

• Passion for content creation

• Looking to make money

• Learning new skills

• Building a personal brand

• Wanting to make a difference

• Just wanting to have fun

• Etc…

YouTubers have very different motivations, ambitions and goals. Let’s take a look at the differences between treating YouTube as a passion/hobby vs treating it as a business.

There are three primary types of YouTube channels: Passion-driven (the hobbyist), Business-driven (the trader), and Combo-driven (the investor). Each type has distinct characteristics, motivations, approaches to outsourcing, and unique benefits and drawbacks.

1. Passion-driven (The Hobbyist):
These channels prioritize content that the creator genuinely enjoys making, valuing autonomy over commercial considerations.

• Typical Channel Approach: These are hobby channels focused on personal fulfillment, where creators produce content purely for the love of it.

• Motivation: Driven by intrinsic motivation, these creators find joy, personal fulfillment, and satisfaction in their work.

• Outsourcing: Typically, outsourcing is not common; creators prefer to keep control over all aspects of the content.

• Benefits: This approach fosters an authentic connection with the audience, allowing for greater personality and creative freedom. Passion-driven channels are often seen as meaningful and sustainable due to the creator's innate passion, making it easier to sell products to a loyal, trusting audience.

• Drawbacks: The main drawbacks are potentially lower earning potential and limited scalability. Growth tends to be slower, as there’s less focus on rapid expansion.

2. Business-driven (The Trader):
YouTube automation channels fall into this category, with a primary focus on revenue generation and rapid business growth.

• Typical Channel Approach: These channels often prioritize scalability and efficiency, seeking maximum revenue with minimal hands-on involvement.

• Motivation: Business-driven creators are focused on generating income, with their main motivation being revenue and expansion.

• Outsourcing: Outsourcing is standard in these channels, as it allows the creator to focus on strategy while others handle production tasks.

• Benefits: Business-driven channels have higher earning potential and are set up to scale quickly. This approach also encourages a "fail fast, learn fast" mindset, allowing for broader skill development and momentum.

• Drawbacks: These channels may struggle with a lack of personality or authentic connection with the audience, making it harder to sell products due to weaker trust. Operating costs are generally higher, and channels may have shorter lifespans because of a weak or transactional audience base.

3. Combo-driven (The Investor):
Combo-driven channels strike a balance between passion and business, aiming to combine personal fulfillment with sustainable revenue.

• Typical Channel Approach: These are often hobby channels that have become more business-oriented, prioritizing both enjoyment and revenue.

• Motivation: The creator is motivated by both intrinsic enjoyment and the drive to build a lasting, sustainable business.

• Outsourcing: Outsourcing is selectively used; creators might delegate certain tasks to stay efficient but retain creative control over others.

• Benefits: This approach combines the best of both worlds; creators enjoy what they do while benefiting from increased revenue potential. It’s seen as the ideal “YouTuber dream” scenario.

• Drawbacks: There is a risk of dampening passion due to the overjustification effect, where the focus on monetary gains can reduce intrinsic motivation. Additionally, combo-driven creators may have less creative freedom than if they were solely passion-driven, as they might need to optimize content for business success.
  
  It must be emphasized that this is a nuanced generalization, but it gives an overview of some key differences. There’s no right or wrong here, it all depends on your ambitions and motivations. For some it’s a creative outlet, for others, it’s their full-time business. Depending on your channel approach, the strategy you should pursue and the potential traps will vary. Identify which one of them you are, and let’s break down successful approaches for the different types!

Strategy for Combo-driven YouTubers

Combo-driven YouTubers often starts out with a hobby, and then proceeds to earn revenue since their passion and personality fuels their success. They can also be ambitious YouTubers that are not yet monetized, but that dream of living off their own YouTube channel.
The number one priority for such YouTubers should be to build a loyal and active long-term audience. This is done by being scaleable, having a consistent video offering and having a competitive edge. Let’s break it down.

I) Scalability

Scalability is the capacity of a YouTube channel to be able to grow and handle increased demand without compromising performance or efficiency. Operational scalability is crucial to maintaining the quality and frequency of content, regardless of audience size. That a Combo-driven channel is scalable means that…

-It can reach a large enough audience/market size adjusted to your goals. If market size isn’t substantial, it can be difficult to grow and monetize the channel sufficiently. By targeting larger markets, you increase the pool of people who might be interested in your content. This means a greater chance of getting more views (and also more competition).

Note that there are exceptions to this, such as real estate channels. Such a channel might only need a few thousand viewers and yet rake in lots of revenue from a house sale. In that case, the audience size doesn’t matter as much as the audience quality

-You can generate enough video topics for the channel over time and not compromise on a consistent video offering at the same time. If you can’t maintain a consistent channel offering, you can’t build an audience (more detail on this soon).

-It can make a sufficient amount of revenue adjusted for the channel’s goals, and attract lucrative brand deals, sponsorships or sell products. You want to make sure that the channel has a real potential to generate revenue from a multiple sources. If you are going to live off your YouTube channel, then this matters.

-The channel audience can be moved into other platforms (podcasts, merchandise, courses, etc). Your channel is not unique, your audience is. Having the ability to move your audience makes you less dependent on the YouTube platform in the case of black swan events (catastrophic unforeseeable events).

Noticed that a lot of people are getting demonetized lately? Black swans can happen when you least expect them.

-It has a competitive edge and it’s difficult to replicate. If it’s easy to replicate, it is easy to beat. If it’s difficult to replicate, it’s hard to beat (more detail on this soon).

-It will remain passionate and fun over a long period of time. If you lack passion and love, it will be difficult when it gets tough, and it will get tough. Passion is what fuels you when all other lights go out. You do it because you love it. While you will have to make sacrifices a hobbyist need not, make sure to still prioritize and value your passion highly.

These variables are all dependent on your goals of course, but be aware of this fact: if a channel lacks scalability, it will struggle to reach it’s end-goals. This is a checklist where all the points should be checked. The one’s that’s not checked, will likely be a potential bottleneck in the future. Know the limitations this bottleneck will have for the future of your channel. Bottlenecks are there to be resolved, and they are crucial to target. It’s even better if they don’t arise at all.

II) Having a consistent video offering

A consistent video offering refers to a channel's consistent production of videos with similar content, themes, styles, lengths, etc.

When a channel maintains a consistent video offering, viewers know what to expect from the channel, making them more likely to subscribe and watch regularly. This makes the channel predictable.

A consistent video offering also aids the YouTube algorithm in recommending videos to viewers who are already interested in similar content. The algorithm's goal is to predict what viewers are likely to watch next based on their previous viewing history.

When a channel's videos have a consistent content, theme, style, and length, the algorithm is more likely to recommend other videos from the same channel to viewers who have shown interest in those characteristics. This is due to the algorithm's attempt to find videos that have a similar "video offering.”

If you change your video offering too frequently, viewers who subscribed to your channel for one type of content may become inactive when you start producing a different type of content. This can result in a channel with a large number of subscribers but very few views per video (and an inactive audience). This comes from the fact that every viewer on YouTube is different.

When you get first-timers on your channel, you want to consequently convert them into die-hard fans, not inactives. That is done with a consistent video offering.

This point is incredibly important to emphasize when building a long-term audience. After all, combo-driven YouTubers wants to be able to sustain the channel based on the audience alone, and use that audience to generate revenue. If you build too many inactives, your results will plummet over time, and you end up with an inactive fan-base that are not suitable to carry your channel.

You want to be able to lean on your audience alone to generate views. You want to continually create a higher bottom (views-wise) over time, that’s the goal. As you can see on this graph, this channel will get a minimum of 1K views per day during the end of its first year, but a minimum of 10K views per day during the end of the second year.

Combo-driven YouTubers need to know that they are playing a long-game; it will take time, but it will be worth it. Growth is exponential the further along the way one has come.

These YouTubers must have patience, keep consistency and continually improve their content. They must be willing to experiment, but keeping the experimentation within their own video offering boundary. This means cautiously using trends, and rather opting for timeless content (evergreen content). There’s nothing wrong with using trends for such channels, but they must be compatible with the channel offering; otherwise they risk attracting inactives.

Note: this doesn’t matter as much until the channel has built a successful channel offering and has started attracting subscribers. What matters, is what your subscribers subscribed for, and whether you are offering more of the same video offering to satisfy that subscriber.

III) Having a competitive video offering

That a Combo-driven channel is competitive means that it builds a high barrier of entry. It’s difficult to replicate the same channel offering for other channels. Barriers of entry are built using the following variables…

-Personality (passion, authenticity and genuineness). People can sense this a mile away, and it really shines through. From your facial expressions to your voice; you can’t fake it. With the growth of AI content, I believe personality will become an even more important competitive edge than ever before. Everyone that has watched Mr. Beast will recognize these gentlemen.

-Audience building capabilities (the ability to attract, sustain and grow an audience over time). With personality and passion, this happens naturally. People are attracted to people

-Unique entry barriers that are difficult to replicate (skills, expertise, experiences, resources, partnerships, early-access, cultural access, locational access and more). If you have access to a unique entry barrier, and you have the optionality to use it in your content, do it. The more unique entry barriers, the better.

Why do you think Cristiano Ronaldo was able to build +50M subscribers in 2 months? He has skills and expertise only Messi can compete with. That’s a powerful entry barrier!

-Unique channel offering mix (a unique combination of topics, length, style, theme, information, etc). If you are easy to copy, you will not stand out among the crowd. Be different and unique! Experiment with different parameters to make something different

-Production quality (footage quality, footage uniqueness, video editing, presentation). This can dictate your branding. It’s like your signature, make sure it’s a good one.

-Video packaging (title, thumbnail and hook). Make sure to blend out against the competition in the packaging. You can substantially increase your views with better video packaging, and the long-term implications can be millions of views. Treat it seriously, and spend a large portion of your time on this process

-Scriptwriting (storytelling, information quality, information uniqueness). Humans love stories, and it’s one of the main reasons YouTube has grown big. Don’t underestimate the power of a good story or of unique information. Perhaps you have a unique entry barrier that can provide you with special information?

-Topic ideation (unique angle of topic, execution of topic, innovation on topic, etc). You can have the largest market, but if your ideas are thrash, it won’t matter. Make sure to find a good balance between passion and what the viewers truly want

-Upload consistency. This is not strictly necessary, but can be beneficial for creating habit patterns in viewers. Remember that YouTube is a constant competition between different creators. If a creator is habitually addicted to a channel, it increases their likelihood of choosing that channel

Strategy for Business-driven YouTubers

Business-driven YouTubers, most often enters with the intention to maximize their earnings. They are typically doing YouTube automation channels. The game for YouTube automation is very different than for more traditional creators.

For these YouTubers, a loyal and active long-term audience isn’t necessarily the most important. More often, these channels should strive to maximize views in the short-term. While consistency and building high entry barriers matters for such channels, they differ from combo-driven channels in a few ways…

-Your number one priority is always about a positive balance sheet. You will have to face a negative balance sheet to begin with, but you always want every project to be profitable enough to justify doing the project. You are doing YouTube automation for cash, not passion.

-Building a talented team is even more important for the quality and scalability. Don’t underestimate this. Treat your team like your family. Your team is your biggest competitive edge here, not the channel’s personality. If your team is thrash, how will you build an empire of multiple automated channels? A talented team boosts revenue potential and adds to the channel’s long-term value. Start simple with clear workflows, and as the team grows, transition into building a team that can keep up with trends, handle scaling, and ultimately, transform your channel into a lasting YouTube automation empire.

-Your channels can often be short-lived. Many channels are based on volatile trends that die out quickly. Be prepared to treat your channels like short-term trades where you attempt to make the most revenue possible during the life-span of the channel. Cut out dying channels if they take more money than they provide. Don’t fall in love with your channels, this is purely business. This is also why it’s important to diversify between different channels as soon as one channel goes positive.

-Trends and momentum matters much more. You’re looking to optimize for high views in the short-term. You want to squeeze the maximum amount of views while the trend is still trendy. Although a consistent channel offering also matters here, one should sacrifice it if it means they can utilize a trend and get lots of views. Use tools like Viral Dashboard to identify outliers (viral videos that perform exceptionally well compared to a channel’s average results).

The reason that identifying outliers can be valuable, comes from the fact that outliers works as a signal and shows what is currently in demand from viewers on YouTube; they essentially shows what is trending. If you want to identify trends, you can use Viral Dashboard which gives you a complete overview of hot video trends on YouTube; it’s a collection of thousands of video topics that are all trending.
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