How This YouTuber "Accidentally" Made $60k On YouTube!

I expected maybe a couple hundred people would watch it and accidentally passed 15,000 subscribers made 60 Grand last year my number one thing I wish to knew about YouTube is the easier you make it the more likely you are to actually do it the exposure on a larger channel is more likely to grow your channel than having a big name on a smaller Channel how did you get on other people's channels so the easiest way that I've found to get on people's channels is welcome back to the think media podcast we've been doing a series with with tips for starting YouTube Right avoiding pain avoiding mistakes and what we wish we knew back when we started our channels today I got Dion talk who's an expert in helping people reach Financial Fe freedom and shout out to Michael Zuber and the one rental time Community we're here in Las Vegas at the event we're all speakers and we are capturing some content so we can share it with you here on the think media podcast and so we're going to go through five tactical tips that you'll be able to apply but uh Dion thanks for coming on and tell people a little bit about when you started your YouTube channel and what it's all about well I appreciate the chance to be here I'm actually fan Watcher show all the time and actually live not too far from you Sean uh I was answering real estate and Financial Freedom questions on you uh Facebook Instagram and I kept having to answer the same questions over and over and over so I made a YouTube channel just so I can make videos to send to people and saying you know hey do you need an LLC how do you get your first property here's a short video on that and I expected maybe a couple hundred people would watch it and I started watching think media got a little bit involved in how YouTube works and accidentally passed 15,000 subscribers made 60 Grand last year off of you know Affiliates and course and stuff uh so thank you yeah it's crazy it's it's very inspiring and uh talks about the power of the Creator economy and um great job so we'll go through your five tips here first you had just some easy ones like some some things to focus on go through this list because this is a powerful list of just a checklist of things to improve if you're starting YouTube right so the idea with the the easy ones is if you go on YouTube and you search how do I grow a YouTube channel there's a thousand channels that say these basic things they're going to say your thumbnail than your title just an order of operations right and and followed by sound sound most people don't realize is more important than video and then the topic and then your um video and then your con your consistency and those they'll pop up over and over and over so I came up with five that some of them are right from your channel so if this sounds familiar that's why um but so I'll C back through those you said video but also lighting so video lighting as well yes and those those Basics you know Michael Jordan says Master the fundamentals and everything else you do will rise so even just saying those and I know people are like maybe I've heard those before well yeah but those we want to master them and continue to improve them but keep going I yep totally agree so in real estate and reaching Financial Freedom the only reason it worked for me is because it had to be easy or as easy as it could be I'm I'm what people call called The Lazy investor I don't want a lot of properties I wanted the right amount of cash flow from the least amount of units and so my my number one thing I wish to knew about YouTube is the easier you make it the more likely you are to actually do it and so I started out with I want to be the next Graham stepen kind of edit the videos and work 10 hours a day on it while I was working full-time buying rentals raising three kids as a single parent and uh so I transition to uh instead of 10 hours to make a 10-minute video I take 20 minutes to make a 20-minute live and the easier I made it the more likely I was to do it and the lives for me worked better because I can interact live in real time with people's questions so explain your schedule now what is a week in the life of your show look like so um I retired I retired in 2022 from my full-time job and I every day is Saturday so I never really know what day of the week it is except I do a live stream every Tuesday afternoon at 4 P p. m. Pacific so I know I'm doing my live stream today must be Tuesday and then on Thursday I will release either a short and in my live stream on Tuesdays this is how excited I get about the subject it's two hours long and at the end of it I think oh it's over till next week so on Thursdays I'll do a short live where I don't answer questions and then on Sundays I release one-year-old video where I take the intro to my live and I cut it out so something I took from one of your podcasts was uh you know to to recycle content repurpose the content and so I'll just take that intro where I'm I'm giving people a chance to get their questions in the comments put it out as a standalone video wow so and this is very minimal editing or none either live or repurposing the intro how do you do that so if I repurpose I'm doing some editing so I'm not the Michael Zuber of putting out videos that you don't edit but my live there's no editing I don't I don't use I use zoom I don't even use any of the fancy stuff I'll probably go to streamyard at some point I can edit and when I edit people realize oh if he's that bad at editing he must be able to do real estate which makes it simple so I can probably do it too that's uh what's inspiring about again uh I think this whole Community especially Michael Zuber he goes the extreme no editing and look what he's done but even you breaking this down I hope that this is inspiring for the think media podcast because there's this whole segment of YouTube that almost is defeating don't you feel that way like the level of editing the level of the way people look how they're communicating you know maybe the appearance of their team you take it all the way to the MrBeast level and you're like how am I going to compete with 500 people in a Million budget this that spectrum and so you're making this really practical that's very inspiring well I don't think we need to compete with MrBeast because we don't need that many um followers fans supporters right from your content you just need your core thousand yes you can get a thousand people interested in your Niche um which is uh my fifth Point okay we'll get there let's hit number two so you said the goal is not to get big names on your channel you the goal is to get on other channels break this down so a lot of people that have reached out to me and said hey you you've got around 15,000 people on your channel that's great congratulations can you come and talk on our Channel and their channel has 200 subscribers or 2,000 subscribers and I'll say absolutely I love to get my my information out there but how about I help you out and get you on my channel because the exposure on a larger channel is more likely to grow your channel than having a big name on a smaller channel so I'm trying to get on Michael zuber's Channel and share information with his subscribers and uh I have a episode of real estate rookie I'm I'm a teaching assistant for the Bigger Pockets real estate boot camps with Ashley car who puts that together and so getting on a channel that's bigger than mine has a bigger impact on my channel than having them which they have I've had some names from YouTube like Mindy Jensen and Scott J Scott on my channel and uh I get the same amount of views as when it's just me so that's that's big so sometimes people think man if a celebrity guest or micro celebrity within your Niche said yes to come on your channel that would be the thing no getting on somebody else's Channel why how did you get on other people's channels some credibility did you reach out cold Reach Out events networking how' it happen what advice would you have for people so the easiest way that I've found to get on people's channels is to interact on their Channel answer questions talk to the other listeners when your name is in the comments of a Content Creator's Channel over and over and over and I don't mean you don't go in there and put in here's my channel I talk about the same stuff you actually giving a thought out answer to other people comments as often as possible I say thing I say this in almost everybody's Channel that I watch to support I'll say an angel gets its wings every time you hit the like button and so I get kind of known for that and so when I reach out I say I'm the angel guy and they oh that's great can you come on and talk we've been interacting for two or three months but never met strong okay number three the core audience is more important than the growth audience it's nice to find a new person but it's more impactful to interact with somebody over time you only need your a thousand true fans break it down would you like a free copy of the number one bestselling book for growing a successful YouTube channel if you want to get a copy of the new and expanded second edition of YouTube Secrets just go to yts.

com and if you'll cover shipping and handling I would love to send you this book for free and the cool thing is when you place your order you're also going to get access to some bonus resources like our 1,000 subscribers Club our 7 C's framework our perfect video recipe framework as well as some bonus videos that will help you get results on YouTube faster so to get your copy just go to yts. com or click the link in the podcast show notes so if you grow a YouTube channel and you have hundreds of thousands of people who watch one video a week and they only know you for that video are they going to want to meet you are they going to invite you to come and present as the as the closing speaker at their event are they going to want to take your course or buy your merch versus the person that you interact with maybe do live streams answer questions go on their smaller Channel and have that I think I gave my personal cell phone out to about 50 people today I will be texting people back and forth in interacting in my Niche because that interaction of those core thousand people will make you a lot more impact on their lives than the people you can impact by growing a channel really fast but it only has a touch point of them watching your video depth versus width and your thing is going deep and the a thousand true fans if you've never heard is Kevin Kelly's famous article that to sustain a Creator business a Creator economy business an entrepreneur creating content and for professionals like you and people in this community you got multiple flows because you got the cash flow from Real Estate you've got but you're also tapping into this incredible Creator economy you only need a thousand true fans but it's going to go a lot further I love that you say this because sometimes I know even for me I think about what's how do I get the how do I go viral is is virality really what you want or is death impact in a strong Community really what you want I love your emphasis on going deep with a core audience I actually kind of have a fear of going viral because then I have to be narrowed down in my Niche to what went viral instead of being able to talk Financial Freedom real estate making work optional because if I have do you need an LLC or not video that goes to millions of views now I'm the LLC guy and I don't want to do that wow we could go deep on that but for we'll keep going number four what is the exit strategy why why do people quit like recently not many people were quitting but now it's been trending so break down number four here I don't think a lot of people are quitting YouTube I think the algorithm picked up people quitting YouTube so we started seeing a lot more of those videos and this I actually put this one in here because I'm cheating and being selfish for myself what is the exit strategy this comment starts with a question um I I could retire from my W2 which I did in 2022 um but I love YouTube and I like helping people what is the exit strategy on a successful YouTube channel I don't know yeah so I'm going to keep watching your content because I expect a video in the next few months how do you leave YouTube yes if it's successful well the conversation here was it was Matt Pat and a couple other large creators and the and the quitting YouTube thing was also a little bit overhyped because for some of them they just quit being the face but they're going to stay in the company for some they were quitting and then it's also the idea of I mean they're quitting with millions of dollars liquid in the bank on the other side of a very successful YouTube career it wasn't like quitting like giving up necessarily but there was it brought up questions of burnout I completely agree with you the algorithm was trending and what was I tweeted I made this tweet that was like the number one strategy for getting views early 2024 is make a why people are quitting YouTube video because it wasn't even the people that were quitting everyone jumped on the trend of here's my take just too funny but it is a really great point and you know personal I'm just waking up every day and trying to do my best and trying to Steward that's how I see it we used to not have a team now we do I used to not have a wife now I do I used to not have kids now I do I just think how do I be the best leader how do I just do my best with what I have today but one of the things I have been intentional on is trying to design a self-managing company trying to eliminate founder dependence and trying to build a media brand not a personal brand I would say I'm trying to build a personal brand but what we've been trying to do with think media and we're about to go probably into another era because we have creators like Omar elori who's launching out and couldn't be more proud of him and more excited about what he's doing and we're seeing is it possible and we've here's our analogies we've talked about SNL problem with SNL is I don't think it's funny the good thing about SNL is it's still here and they've had multiple comedians come through multiple people come through so I think yeah if you if how do you exit a personal brand I don't think you do unless you're Tony Robbins and you have packaged your IP Zig Ziggler Earl Nightingale unless you can actually package your intellectual property and it has value in and of itself Beyond let's say your death but I think I don't know if you exit a personal brand but I think the question becomes what could you build that is excitable and that's how I've been thinking at think media is okay thank God I didn't name it Sean canel actually named a think media which was just a random name to pick and but here we are and so now could we build something I'm learning a lot from Dave Ramsey who's actually one of our speakers at grow up video live because he's built Ramsey Solutions he has Ramsey personalities which is a succession plan that he started 16 years ago I would argue for some of these media companies if you are not planning your exit strategy a decade out a decade before you think you need your exit strategy you probably are it's probably too late which that's that was heavy like shoot but but I think that again I don't even plan on going anywhere I just turned 40 I'm I'm changing my time a little bit because I got a three-year-old a one-year-old but I'm I am thinking about fullon exit with zero plans of exiting and I'm aggressively pursuing the elimination of founder dependence simply because if I don't start now my thought is I won't be ready when the time comes it really shows to me how much I watch your content because as you were speaking I was thinking well it's like Dave Ramsey before you bring it up Dave Ramsey went from Dave Ramsey Show to Ramsey utions and I was thinking how smart you were going think media instead of the Shan canel show and the mistake I made which hopefully the person watching won't make in their first year mine is deont talk Financial Freedom so when I start thinking of exiting about a year or two years before that name is going to shift away from my personal name to whatever would be their off and yeah I think that I think build a team think about media brand or or think about unwinding I with respect to everyone who's quitting I think it's overhyped in some cases why not it's like it's like it's actually kind of like sports like and then can you do something after of course maybe you public speak maybe you can you leverage brand deals on and where haes if that is relevant you know like some athlete but but a quarterback in the NFL has a limited career and media might be similar to that unless you think media brand company brand conversation for another time didn't expect us to go deep but here we go number five other content creators aren't the competition they are funnels no Niche is 100% of the platform we grow the niche and each of each of us add to it you got some rich nuanced points that you've shared today I love this conversation breakdown number five so I'm I'm in real estate and financial freedoms so you would think I wouldn't want somebody to watch somebody else's Channel because they are competition and when the truth is we all bring something unique to our Niche like I'm known for being two things one lazy and two I have this thing called the binder strategy I made a free course called the binder you can find it at deont talk.