0 to 1000 Subs in 9 Days (Here's How)

imagine reaching your first 1,000 subscribers in just 9 days being monetized in 15 days and getting your first brand deal within two months we've got Marco from just dream Italy you hit a th000 subscribers in just N9 days got monetized in 15 can you walk us through some of the key strategies or decisions that contributed to such rapid growth right so at the moment when it occurred I wasn't expecting it what happened is that there was a nich Niche there there was a demand for the type of content that I produced the combination of elements

that are in my video yes the way they're presented yes but I think the really quality that I provided was missing in kind of the other competitors in in that Niche so I really focused on the the video quality the almost storytelling quality of my episodes and it connected it was a home run on the first video and you know I I was expecting you know 100 views or something then I you know the first day it was just like going up going up and then it just exploded and I'm like wow what's going on

this is amazing and really yeah I I I think it worked because of of the the quality the way that I had put everything together which was in the end a work of of an accumulation of efforts leading up to that point so I I had a vision in my mind when deciding to make this Channel and it was a vision that I had about a year earlier me and my wife we kind kind of embarked on this journey of of buying our own home in Southern puya and this was during the the pandemic with

this kind of urge to go get out there do something different with your lives travel and obviously during that time period nobody could travel you couldn't go to locations you couldn't go and view homes to buy in another country we're like okay well how do we see it how do we do it and you know we kind of worked with a local agent who was able to do it with his cell phone give us his you know Impressions really walk us through everything and this is the power the connection of a video right you know

he was able to to share me that home via his cell phone walking through it the idea kind of picked up from there saying like you know if we're in this position there are others in this position who would like to view properties remotely and it was right around that time when I think a couple other channels which are are the other kind of like main channels in this niche of like Italian home tours open their channels and started to get a lot of views and and they really focused on showing the home so like

this is a beautiful home let me show it to you and I would see those and I say you know these are nice homes but like where are they what's going on around them because when you buy a home in Italy as a foreigner you're not just buying a beautiful home yes you're buying that but you're you're buying a the location that it's in the culture that it's in and of course the amazing Italian food that you would have while you're there and so the idea just after you know a few months of our experience

of going down there it just clicked I was already a huge fan of like Casey niat a huge fan of other YouTube channels where you know they're creating this engaging content where you can you watch one video and then you click on the next one to kind of follow the story you know in this package the Cinematic package of their dayto day and I I was thinking well what if I apply an idea like that to the idea of like this Italian home tour but it's not just a home tour like I'm taking you to

the place then we're going to get something to eat then we're going to go view the home I'm opening this window for you to enter in on this experience with me that's how the formula was made so it's going to be a travel Vlog a food Vlog and a real estate Vlog allinone now how do I do it and so I kind of started thinking about well how do I do it right this is just kind of this pipe dream at the moment this is probably 20121 and I just started researching right I researched well

how do you make videos like what what do people film these things with how does editing work how how does this magic of this real life end up being appearing on your screen the way that we and it led up to that point okay this is the the first video that I'm going to upload I've got some takeaways from your story number one it's still possible to start and grow fast you're proof of that question is how number two you identified a niche and there was demand I think supply and demand is one of the

oldest principles in business it still exists everywhere on YouTube but some areas are maybe more saturated some areas are less and you're content resonated to that demand number three find your difference from your competitors you looked at what some of the other real estate channels in Italy were doing and you saw a gap in the market of difference number four quality if people have not seen your videos I think quality one visually you have high production value color grading shot composition kind of firstperson point of view as well as drone footage establishing shots so really

creating these beautiful and wellp put together artistic videos but also along long quality number five is storytelling and I love the fact to use the word experience while maybe someone's approaching a tour with a phone it's practical it's utility and that's a massive opportunity on YouTube to just do utility based videos but you said okay what's my difference storytelling experience really taking people along a journey number six strategy matters though and this didn't just come together like you had all of this idea day one and then day two this came out for about a year

and a half you were kind of researching prepping and that led you to figure out okay what kind of gear do I need and the mindset of also investing in the Mastery of a new skill and a hobby what did the the day-to-day or the week to week look like of skill building for you to to learn this Suite of YouTube storytelling content creation skills so the way I approached it at the time was skill by skill so let's say the first skill was working with my first camera so the first camera that I bought

was an a7c a Sony a7c with a couple of Sigma lenses and it was okay how do I learn I need to learn how to use this camera how how do I learn these settings what are these different settings for so on any particular day you know I would dedicate an hour to I would call them experimentations just experiment with different videos in my house in my study room outside in the yard with my kids you know I love using my kids as subjects and to kind of Master that so I focused on the technical

first mastering this equipment I'm not learning this all at once every single day I'm practicing and every single day like I learn a new concept and I start to experiment with that concept and during the course of that year I did two things and it was very strategic and very purposeful I said I'm going to start making Vlogs family style Vlogs which nobody's going to see except for me my family my really close friends and my parents and so I opened a private YouTube channel that nobody's ever going to see except for them and I

said you know what these are starting to look decent and my friends are saying wow these are really nice you sort of also just ped peeled back the curtain that your first public video on the channel you wanted to share publicly blows up Channel grows super fast monetization 15 days brandal 2 months but there was a hidden practice Channel which sort of reveals that many creators have done a lot of if you will bad videos or practice videos before they get to good videos in your case you did them privately and for your family but

nevertheless you were practicing experimenting and getting experience and even the mindset of doing free work I think that holds a lot of people back that they're you know they want to get paid instantly without putting in the time or the skill development one of our core values that think media is the pursuit of mastery and I see in this entire thing that your mindset was this pursuit of Mastery I think that's a big principle we as creators can learn from modeling the Masters Casey neistat has given us examples and you're like okay here's a master

that I could try to Vlog like Casey and if I what what's cool when we model the Masters in music or content or videos is some people they might be uncomfortable with the word copy but this is actually a proven principle in apprenticeship that when you're apprenticing under somebody you should copy them like you copy what they do you copy their methodologies and in doing so that's how you become a master yourself at first when you're Apprentice It's best practice their shots maybe even can I match their color grade can I match their editing can

I match that when I watch one of your videos you have your own unique style but you were modeling the Masters on the way up absolutely absolutely I think that's really a key for anybody who wants to start YouTube is don't be afraid to look at what channels that you admire what they're doing you'll never end up copying them and if you think you are you won't be like you're in your own Niche you're looking outside the box from where you are the area that you're in and in my case it's outside of my Niche

what are people in other niches doing I was looking at you know what are the people other nich is doing at that high cinematic level what are they doing and how can I apply that to my videos and so really understanding who's your who are your model channels for specifically for YouTube what are they doing and asking yourself how are they doing it are you thinking about starting growing a YouTube channel this year and you're wondering what's working right now not just to get views but also to grow your subscribers if you'd say yes then

I'm excited because coming up soon we are hosting a free 5-day YouTube challenge where I'm going to be teaching through my seven step YouTube success system entirely for free over 10,000 creators have used this system to start and grow successful YouTube channels and to monetize them in many creative ways and we're going to be taking five days to go through the best strategies that you can apply whether you want to start a brand new channel or grow your existing channel so if you want to join me for the free 5-day YouTube challenge just go to

tube 1K challenge.com to register or click the link in the description all right let's get back into the video now one of the other things I'm curious how your process leading up to your first video and second video which your first video was the best undiscovered town to buy a home in Italy and your second video spectacular Italian townhouse tour and the breathtaking Coastline of Nardo now you're in our video ranked Academy program and part of at least what I observe from your videos is you're backing it up with the great content we've established that

so that's going to get the average view duration that's going to hack the algorithm no title or tag makes the video go viral independent of itself however it seems that there is some research and strategic positioning that came with your first videos and your current videos that whether that's a searchable area whether that's something like to buy a home which is a specific question how to buy a home in a specific area and town home townhouse tour in a specific area so some very searchable audience desire elements there how did you go about researching and

crafting your first video ideas and how you eventually turned the packaging of those videos in in the titles you came up with so those first videos I really didn't know what I was doing the titles the thumbnails came at 1: in the morning right before I published them and I was sick of myself at that point I said look Marco like you've been at this for a year you've had I I'd filmed those episodes in February I think and I published them only in April and so they're on my drives for so long and I

was getting sick of myself I said you just have to publish just publish it even if you're not satisfied even if you don't think you know what you're doing publish it and so I I made my channel name at one o'clock in the morning when I published my first video I didn't know what my channel was going to be called I didn't know what my thumbnail was going to be and but at that point I said don't let Perfection be the the enemy of progress you know along those lines and so I I just I

said no let the video do do the work go with your instinct you know the title has to be relatable to the audience that that you want to see it it also has to describe what the video is about and you should also use attractive adjectives like the Undiscovered things like that the best place to just as principles of YouTube and those are those are principles that I did learn from from v um especially in discussions on the Facebook group where people were discussing titles and how to make engaging titles and so I I had

interiorize that that's great advice and I love that you said perfect is the enemy of progress I'm curious now talking a little bit about the financial side you get monetized in 15 days but you also got your first brand deal right when you were around 8,000 subscribers what do you think attracted Brands to your channel so early on and do you have any tips for how that came about or how you've continued to pursue brand deals and sponsorships since that time so I every sponsor that I've had has reached out to me which means they

see something good in my channel so I'm always flattered when that happens I think I have the privilege of being the only person in my Niche who has sponsors and I think that's because of the formats of my videos the other I don't you know I can't speak for their experience but when you're just filming a home and nothing else there's not you can't really insert a a sponsor in there just and doesn't work with the narrative and and so I I think I found out quickly that you know my format isn't only engaging and

nice because I thought it was but also because it allows like the sponsorship to be inserted into it and in organic and so I think that's why you know one of the big principles that I hear you say is that quality attracts opportunity and so many people are trying to email Brands and reach out to Brands and it's not necessarily a bad approach but the way you positioned your channel it attracted deals that you never had to reach out and this big idea of be sponsorable some channels are more sponsorable than others and the fact

that you were telling a story cultivating an audience giving a place where people could be integrated into the travel food as well as real estate aspect of your channel it's attractive to Brands and so I think as creators if we think about what would be attractive to Brands how could I make my channel more sponsorable as a very interesting Insight I am curious going full-time as a YouTuber is a big decision what were the key factors that influenced you to decide to go full full-time you mentioned you had a full-time job at what point did

you make that leap and what factors led to that decision so I I had decided that I was going to do it full-time probably around halfway 2023 uh I said look this is going to be the goal and then by about August September like I realized it's doable because the income was matching my professional income and I just knew that like I was I'm being held back by doing this other job more than anything else it just got to the point where it didn't make any sense like uh I was earning as much and I

can earn more make more videos like that's what I wanted to do I want to make more videos and um that's the only way that it that it can happen so speak a little bit to that eight months of of balancing both and the mindset it took and what was you know driving you and what was that practically the challenge of working full time with trying to build a YouTube business on the side it was incredibly difficult it got to the point of being very stressful and at certain points I was thinking of stopping doing

YouTube because of it and thinking that it was like a crazy dream and so I did Teeter even in that direction even though that the channel was successful there were a couple of videos where you know they weren't as successful as the other ones and so I said you know what if all of a sudden you know the views drop and I'm I'm stressing out we have two young kids both working and is is it really worth it you know and so I was able to make the decision luckily because the the income was there

it would would have been a much harder decision if the income wasn't there and me betting on the income being there in order to be able to you know support a family with it it was there and so at that point I said this stress is unnecessary um this isn't doable for any normal human being so I'm done with four hours of sleep at night because I'm editing until 2: in the morning there it's a period of of your life you know where you do a sacrifice because you have a vision to see if it'll

work and I said it from the beginning like if it doesn't work okay but I can at least say that I before I did it I was very much frustrated with myself for not trying yet and so the fact that I did do it I was already satisfied like okay you know I I I had this passion in my head for this project I did it and you know it didn't work you know or I chose to continue working for my job because I thought that was a better decision I was ready for that but

luckily it it turned out great and and I'm glad it did the law of sacrifice in order to go up you've got to give up and I love that you the Practical handles there's the finances but also I know like 100% of listeners right now can relate to the feeling of man this is hard this is heavy this is stressful especially when you're doing both and the two young kids and all of the pressures of Life finally let's just talk a little bit about the uh impact on life and family you mentioned in our pre-

emails that YouTube has changed your life and your family's life now when you like look back over the journey how has this impacted you and what do you feel like have been the most rewarding aspects of this Creator Journey yeah so beyond the sacrifice once you get over the hump there's there's Freedom there and so once I've gone now that I've gone full-time we have the kind of freedom to choose basically where we want to live and so we're we're moving down to Italy 100% now to to our home down there for me to focus

on on the project and my wife has 100% more flexibility now to choose to work what she wants to work any personal projects that she has um and we both have the flexibility of dedicating our time to our kids and we can you know spend time traveling going somewhere else 10 years ago YouTube wasn't like this but now it is you know this is an amazing opportunity that exists for us this day and age and it's been a blessing for us and so we're we're moving and this is my the house that we're selling that's

why it's all empty now and we're we have the freedom to go down and live in southern Italy which is a place we love so well Marco thank you for adding so much value appreciate you my name is Sean Kell you're guide to building a profitable YouTube channel like rate subscribe wherever you're listening and share this one out and we can't wait to connect with you in a future episode