I made 301 YouTube videos and learned this

have you ever wondered if there's an easier way to get views on YouTube well after making over 300 videos and generating hundreds of millions of views I discovered one thing that changed everything it keeps people watching gets you more comments likes and shares and ultimately it blows up your channel so to help making growing your business's YouTube Journey 10 times easier here are some quickfire storytelling lessons I learned that will help you do just that so to understand why storytelling is so powerful on YouTube answer this why do you keep watching a movie after it

starts well it's because you want to know what happens at the end of it right now compare that to YouTube where we know that the secret to getting more views is keeping people watching as long as possible that means stories are the perfect tool to achieve this because that's kind of their whole point getting people to the end so lesson number one is just to understand that if you use stories in your content you can build more watch time simply because people want to find out what happens next but what is it about stories that

make people Glu to the screen for longer well I'm going to show you listen to this clip and then I'm going to read your mind and tell you what you're thinking so in 192 to archaeologist Howard CER stood in front of a sealed tomb in Egypt untouched for over a thousand years he opened the door and stood in silence and his trusty companion asks what do you see and he paused and whispered wonderful things all right mind reading complete oh Jenny Jenny you are foul I can't say what you were thinking Jenny but also thanks

for Ling I've been working out the rest of you though you were thinking well what's inside the tomb right and that's why stories are so powerful because they make people curious and then that then keeps their attention and makes them watch for longer so when you're telling a story The first thing you ask is how can I make people curious so they want to keep watching this is why so many YouTube videos start with a question like how do this YouTuber go from zero to a million views a month because simple questions that lead into

your story can hook the viewers instantly and make them care about listening to it but what kind of stories can you tell in a video to get big views well the first one works like this years ago I was seen as a joke nobody took me seriously because I was talking about making videos and trying to go on YouTube but I didn't really get many views so to prove that I knew my stuff I told a story about monetizing a brand new channel as fast as I could and it went viral the result wasn't just

the views though suddenly people started to take me way more seriously and my business grew so much faster as I now had this big proof of result so if you want to build massive credibility in your Niche tell a story about how you achieved a result your viewers want too but how did you come up with one well just try telling the story of the first failure that comes to your mind that relates to the problem your channel solves and say what you learn from it the thing is even with proof I wasn't a phony

I still got a ton of hate in the comments people saying if you're that good blow up someone else's Channel thanks guys so I did I made a video documenting how I blow up someone else's Channel and then that built even more proof and credibility and mega views again so this lesson is all about telling stories that show how you got a result for someone else a result your viewers want to and to do that you just ask yourself this question what's the fastest or biggest result I've ever gotten a client and just tell that

but what if you don't have any success stories well don't panic because after spending months working on these videos I wanted to find a way that was wai easier to get big views in less time so I found a very big problem my viewers had and then told someone else's story about how they solved it and Wham it worked so if you don't have a success story don't worry use this lesson to tell someone else's and then use it to raise your credibility and keep people hooked the thing is for all of these you kind

of have to be aware of one thing has anyone ever told you what happens at the end of a movie before you've seen it and then you watched it anyway it's not quite the same right it's a little bit boring so this is why you always want to find unique stories to tell that people haven't heard because if they don't know ending that always keeps them more interested so another story about Elon Musk doing something cool that everyone knows it's just not that effective but how do you tell unique stories well you can go to

chat GPT and just tell it the point you want to make and then ask it to tell you some real life true stories about people who have solved that problem it's usually going to fire out stories that you've heard a million times before but keep doing it until you read one and go oh that's interesting I didn't know that that's your story the thing is if you tell your own story about you having a problem doesn't that wreck your credibility because you're supposed to be the expert right well I once made a video where I

traveled back in time with a bucket on my head to watch myself making dumb YouTube mistakes and when I posted it I was scared because I was openly saying I sucked at this but the response it got was unbelievable the video did amazing I got emails from people saying Ed seeing how you struggled in the same way I do makes me feel so good about myself and because the response was so strong I just kept making videos in the same way which generated millions and millions of views when viewers see you as someone who's on

their level who's been where they are who's now where they want to be and who understands what it's like to be where they are you become much more relatable and relatable characters build amazing Stories so use your mistakes to your advantage whil everyone else in your Niche will try and look perfect it's a winner winner chicken din that one but does that mean your entire video has to be a giant story like the three examples I've showed well have you seen Finding Nemo Marlin's son Nemo gets taken by a diver so he then roams the

ocean trying to find him and along the way he has to face sharks and put up with like a forgetful fish navigate a jellyfish Forest until he eventually finds his son and the two are reunited so looking at that I just told an entire story in two sentences yet Disney turned it into a 90-minute epic and that's the thing about storytelling you can make an entire video that tells one story from start to finish or you can use very short ones to help you make your point like I've been doing this entire video now if

you really want to go deeper on this I've highlighted every example of Storytelling in the script that you're watching right now on a document you can download it below and that means if you're new to storytelling just keep things very simple to start and tell a story in a few before you jump into more complex beasts but how will you structure that story well have you ever seen the movie Taken Brian's daughter's kidnapped so he goes an adventure to rescue her and they end up back together it's basically Finding Nemo but with more guns and

that's the truth about stories they often just follow a very similar structure and you can follow it too by making your intro firstly set up the hero so who is this story going to be about in Nemo it's Marlin and then set up the problem they have which in Nemo was Marlin lost his son and then set up why they need to solve it and in neemo it was so his son doesn't die and I guess they can see each other again and then after that you move on to showing the problems they came up

against along the way trying to solve their problem in the middle so Marlin had to deal with like sharks and forgetful fish and jellyfish and all sorts of other sting it's quite the adventure and then after that you move on to the end and just reveal what happened so this lesson here is really you just need to have a beginning a middle and an end and you're off but then you want to make sure there is a turbocharger just wrapped to this for epic watch time so let me show you how this works with a

story as an example so in 1970 Apollo 13 was on its way to the moon when it struck disaster an oxygen tank exploded it quipp the spaceship and it left the astronauts stranded in space suddenly their mission wasn't about landing on the moon anymore it was about survival and now just imagine this story was just NASA's trip to the moon and they took off and they floated to the moon and they got there and then came back would anyone still be talking about that in the same way as they do Apollo 13 probably not so

when you're story has stakes and they rise people care about it if it doesn't have any they don't so what you want to do is at the very beginning of your story when you're planning it clearly define what could have been gained or lost by the hero for example if Pat didn't make $110,000 in 30 days their business would shut down then just say why it matters that they fix it which I've kind of already done there but we can raise the stakes and say and with only $40 in his bank and a family to

feed something had to change fast the thing is how do you know if a story you're going to tell is actually going to be interesting because stories are not powerful if they're dull well in the film The Pursuit of Happiness Will Smith's character is homeless and he's sleeping in a Subway bathroom and he's struggling to feed his son because he spent too much time messing around with a Rubik's Cube by the end of the movie he has achieved his dream of becoming a successful stock broker now imagine if the whole movie was just about him

and his Rubik's cue doing okay making steady progress of the career ladder until he eventually got the job he wanted be boring right like that's not interesting so really the contrast between the depths of Despair at the start and the heights of his Triumph is what makes a story so powerful so a question you can ask to work out if your story is actually going to be that interesting is how much of a contrast is there between the beginning and the end and if there's not much I probably wouldn't tell it but contrast is just

one part to this the real magic happens when you bolt on this next lesson so do you want viewers to not just remember your video but hit them so deeply it changes their life well to do that let me tell you a little secret Finding Nemo isn't a story about Nemo the fish it's not even a story about his dad and what makes stories incredibly powerful is depending on who's watching that film it's actually a different story being told so for parents it's about how overprotectiveness can stifle a child's growth for children it's about learning

that while Independence is important understanding and appreciating parental concerns helps them have a stronger Bond and for everyone else it's about trusting others embracing collaboration and stepping out of your comfort zone so the real magic of Finding Nemo isn't in the finding of the fish it's in how Marlin the overprotective father changes by the end of the movie he learns to trust his son so he lets go of his fears and he grows so here's the lesson your story needs to show a transformation in your hero and the cool thing about this is if your

hero fails to achieve their goal it doesn't matter if they've learned something or grown or changed because your audience will feel that and they too will learn the same lesson and that's what makes a really powerful story especially for businesses because it hits people on an emotional level but here is the tricky part how do you craft a story that makes that transformation clear keeps viewers hooked and avoids unnecessary fluff well you just start with the end and the transformation that you want to show happen in your story and then you plan your beginning and

middle if you do it this way it means you only ever include critical information in your story that drives people from the start to the transformation this also means you won't waffle or Golf and tangents because it's so clear where your story needs to end up and to really level this up try this have you seen the TV show penguin oh my gosh if you've not you go to check it out I finished it a month ago and I think I'm still thinking about it and that's what this next lesson's about the penguin six sense

Fight Club Primal Fear the Red Wedding and Game of Thrones all of these are famous for one thing the ending but why well it's because if you want to tell an amazing story that people don't forget then a totally unexpected ending will do that so when you're looking for your stories to tell if you can find one that has a big twist at the end you got to tell it the thing is even with a unique story and your structured sorted and an amazing transformation you can still screw all of this up with the way

you write your story so here are some lessons to help you master that okay so imagine listening to a story that was like this this story is about success it's a great story you will learn from it success is possible for everyone just do the work keep trying versus a story like this this is a story about success which is possible for anyone but only if you're willing to do the work sentences of the same length create a predictable Rhythm that subconsciously bores your viewers meaning that the rhythm of your writing can really make massive

difference for retention but the cool thing is there's a really easy way to keep track at this so look at this document on screen right now by simply breaking up your script you can see when sentence length is the same and repeating over and over again making it easier to spot and fix repetitive Rhythm but rhythm is just one part to this you also have to fix this let's just rewind this video back a little bit and look at a sentence I just said which was this sentences of the same length can create a predictable

Rhythm that subconsciously bores your viewers meaning that the rhythm of your writing can really make a massive difference for retention if a sentence is so wordy it's hard for you to say which that was by the way it's going to be hard for the viewers to listen to so when you write you really want to simplify your language down so that everything is just incredibly easy to understand that means dropping long words industry terms and that means the sentence should have really sounded like this using sentences of the same length can bore viewers so mix

them up to keep their attention so muchat easier right the cool thing is if you struggle to do this just whack your sentence into chat gbt and ask it to simplify it for you like I just did right then but writing is just the start now I'm going to give you some lessons that are a little bit more advanced but will transform the experience of the viewers all right so watch this clip a snake's eyes aren't very good but they can detect movement so if the hatchling keeps its nerve it may just avoid detection now

it should again oh wow check out this little blighter is going to get annihilated the reason people love atom and Morgan Freeman isn't because of the words that they say it's the way that they say them what that means is when you're telling your story you need your tone to complement the situation because if you're all happy clappy when the hero's at their darkest moment it's going to kill your story and it's going to put off your viewers but how do you put all of this together to tell an epic story we'll watch this video

next where I break down exactly how I told stories about solving my own problems that generated millions of views