Learning from my mistakes (good pun, that) (Patreon)

In this post, I share some of my thoughts about the channel - if only to have them leave my brain temporarily. If you trust the direction I’m taking the channel in, then you might not want to read how the sausage is made. But if you’d like to learn more, read on…

My Top 10 Mistakes video earlier this year was a revelation - one that I wasn’t expecting. It is now my most viewed video of all time, and it transformed the channel in terms of subscribers.

You can send yourself crazy trying to learn anything when the YouTube algorithm is involved, but the success of that video has changed my perspective a lot. These are the lessons I’ve learned:

1. Make it funny - There have been times I’ve shied away from the comedy because I lacked confidence, or I was trying to churn out videos quicker. I also worried that it alienated too many viewers. But this video proved that my comedy can help me reach bigger audiences, which made me really happy.

2. Bring back characters - The reason I made the mistakes video in the first place was to answer the Patron poll I ran, which made it clear that my character videos were most popular. Putting characters in videos is nerve-wracking and more time-consuming. They are harder to write, and to get right. So I often kept them out. My plan now is to bring them back much more often, when they fit the idea, but not let them take over the video too much. I think I found the right balance in the mistakes video.

3. Title and thumbnail is everything - I’ve always known how important these are to the success of the video, and I’ve been trying to improve on it in the last year. “Mistakes” was a common YouTube trope that I borrowed from a cooking channel, which the algorithm seemed to love. Making thumbnails is one of my least favourite parts of the job, but if it gets me tens of thousands more views (and therefore more ad money), it’s worth it.

4. Longer videos - In the past, I’ve tended to make videos that are ten minutes or less - but the Mistakes video (and my Top 8 Games) is around 20 minutes long. Another algorithm wives tale is that it favours longer videos, because they keep a viewer hooked for longer and can run more ads on them. My plan is to follow that trend, so as much as possible my videos will be around that length.

5. Don’t need slick b-roll - By chance, I wasn’t able to film fancy b-roll footage for the Mistakes video, because my videographer guy Bart went travelling in December. Unfortunately, he’s not come back, so I’ve gone back to doing it myself (see Top 8 Games). The success of the Mistakes video taught me that I didn’t need his help to prosper. I enjoyed the videos I made with him and would certainly consider using external help in the future, but the extra time spent on filming and editing them took away from time I could have spent elsewhere (see characters).

6.  Quality over quantity - This is the toughest one for me to swallow. To be a YouTuber is to worry about regular output - it is drummed into us at YouTube school (literally, I went to some classes at Google HQ). I’ve always believed that the algorithm favours more content. So it was a surprise to see my most successful video come after a quiet period.

In addition, more videos means more views which means more ad revenue - you would think. But in this case, I’ve had one video get more than twice as many views as two of my normal shorter videos.

What I’ve realised is that by making one, high quality, appealing, twenty minute video, I can make something better than I could with two ten minute videos. And you’re still getting the same amount of content.

In the past, I have rushed out videos to meet an arbitrary deadline I’ve applied because I was worried I would lose patrons if I didn’t. It is by far the biggest stress I get from Actualol - the feeling that I can’t keep up. All of my best videos took a lot of time to make. And I’m glad I took the time to make them. But while I was making them I was worrying about all the patrons I would lose because I’d gone quiet.

This month I was beset by a cold, some personal troubles, taking time off, and workshopping three different video ideas before finding the right one, and so I don’t have a video finished by my usual deadline. But I also didn’t want to rush a good video, so I’m taking my time to finish it properly. I think it will be worth it.

I’ve made prophecies about the channel in the past and I’ve often been wrong. As ever, it’s an evolving experiment. For now, I have a plan and I’m sticking to it. To make really good, classic Actualol videos, as often as I can make them. I hope that by focusing on the videos that were popular in the Patron poll, you will enjoy what’s coming up. And that it will be worth the wait.

Actually yours,

Jon