YouTube Creator Q&A: Niche, Monetization, Burnout & Going Full-Time

0:00Hello and welcome to this week's episode of the YouTube Creators Hub Podcast. As with every summer, I do about two or three Q&A episodes where I take all the questions that I've accrued over the past, I don't know, nine to 10 months, and I answer them. So if you'd like to ask a question to be featured in a future Q&A episode, you can do so by just emailing me, dusty@dustyporter.com, or some of the questions in the future will be pulled from our mastermind group, and you can check the links down below on how to join that.

0:31And speaking of that, we got a ton of things that we offer creators. I do coaching, YouTube channel audits, and a whole bunch more, so go check that out down below. So we're just gonna dive right into it. This is from Marcus D. Marcus said that, "I've posted 31 videos over the last year, and I'm still under 500 subscribers. Most videos get 40-some odd views. At what point is it fair to admit that this just isn't going to work for me?" So I'm gonna be honest with Marcus here and you guys that are listening Flattery is not gonna be something that will be helpful to you.

1:0531 videos in a year isn't really a lot of data, uh, but 40 views a year or 40 views per video, I'm sorry, is telling you something, right? And not necessarily telling you to quit or to stop doing what you're doing. It's either the videos aren't getting picked up, we need to find out why before you publish the next one, right? So it doesn't just repeat it over and over again and get the same amount of views. So what I'd do is I'd stop posting for a couple of weeks, pull up your 10 most recent videos, and look at the click-through rate and average view duration.

1:37That's it, those two numbers. If the click-through rate is low, this is kinda where I would start with people. This is kind of the baseline, but you'd obviously go much deeper than that, right? If the CTR is low, nobody's choosing to watch, so your packaging is the problem, and by watch, I mean click to even get into your video. So that's the title and the thumbnail and everything that is showing up on either the browse feed or their subscription feed, right?

2:00Uh, but if the click-through rate is fine, and by fine, I don't know, you be the judge. I like 8 to 12%. That's probably where I would be happy with it. Then you look at other stuff, right? And then people… If you see that people are leaving in the first 30 seconds, then your packaging is fine, but your hook is too slow or your intros are too dr- you know, drawn out, right? You never really, most of the time, have both problems at once, which is good, right?

2:27Because it means that you have to fix one or the other, right? It means you're only fixing a couple small things and not a ton of different things, right? The creators who make it, in, in my opinion, and from what I've had in my experience of working with creators, aren't the ones who never want to quit. At some point, you're gonna get to that burnout stage. I've been there. People listening have been there. But the ones that are successful are the ones who treat a dead video as data and information instead of a verdict, right?

2:55Like, you're not just automatically gonna be encased in this 40 view per video, uh, hellscape for the rest of your YouTube life, right? That's just not the way that it is. It's probably telling you that the packaging is unclear or there's something going on within the first few seconds of the video that's not capturing the audience. Maybe it's not delivering on what it was proposed to deliver. There's a lot of different things, but Marcus, I hope you don't give up.

3:22I think that with that amount of data, you got a long way to go to really determine whether this is right for you. Next one is coming from Priya, P-R-I-Y-A is her last name. She says, "Everyone says find your niche, and I've heard you talk about it in many episodes, but my channel is regional Indian cooking from a region most people have never heard of. Do I niche down even further or am I already too narrow to grow?" So you're not too narrow. I think you're early, but too narrow is kind of a myth that people come up with, right?

3:55They're com- com- these creators say, "Oh, it's, um, too narrow," right? Th- there really… I mean, there is, but there's very few niches that are too small on this platform with billions of people, right? There are only spaces on there that you haven't found that broad doorway to get people in, right? So I would keep the niche where it is, maybe widen the door a little bit. And what I mean is that your channel doesn't grow on the dish only 50,000 people have heard of.

4:24It grows on the video titled something like The Indian Cooking Technique Nobody Talks About, and then you teach it through your dish that is specific to your location, right? And that gives a wider door for people to get in, but it's still in that same small niche. And the people that stay are gonna be the ones that either they're coming and they knew about that location before, or they're like, "Oh, I've never been presented with this location before. I wanna stay here." The technique is the broad hook that pulls in the curious.

4:57And curiosity, uh, you hear me say curiosity inducing a lot if I'm working with a client or on the podcast. What I mean by that is that the thumbnail and title combination, when I scroll, it makes me stop. And you've been there, right? Where you're scrolling on the browse feed, and we've all been there endlessly, right? And that one thumbnail or title or whatever just makes you just pause, and you just, "I gotta figure out what, what, what in the heck this is," right?

5:19So I think for you, I, I wouldn't give up on the niche just yet. I wouldn't try to broaden it too wide, but I would open the, the door a little bit to where you're open to, to giving more eyeballs on what you're creating, but really good question. Uh, next one is from Devin. Devin says, "I want to go full-time on YouTube. I make about 900 a month from the channel right now," goes up and down depending on the month, "and my day job pays the bills.

5:43What's the actual number where it's responsible to jump?" So I just did a great interview two or three weeks ago now with a buddy of mine, David, um, who just decided to go full-time on his YouTube channel. I would go back and definitely earmark that one and listen through that. But For me, it, it's, it's more, it's less about a number and more about comfort in terms of where you are, right? Do you have kids? Are you married? Like, where are you in your life, right?

6:13A- and another thing is you don't need to jump specifically on just channel income or AdSense, right? You need to diversify, put your eggs in many different baskets. $900 a month from AdSense is one algorithm change away from, like, 200 bucks, right? Which is why when people come on my coaching calls and they're like, "Yeah, I'm making 10 grand a month right now on AdSense," that's great. I hope it keeps going and it goes up. But it may not, right?

6:36What I'd wanna see before you kind of make the transition is your monthly income from your creator business, and that is the AdSense, plus maybe a product, physical, digital, uh, service, sponsorship, membership, whatever, consistently covering your ex- essential expenses for, say, six straight months. And again, this is, these are all numbers that you can mold to your specific situation. But again, knowing that for six months you could have paid everything, especially all the things that are necessary, that to me is a telltale sign of you may be ready to do this.

7:08And by the way, guys, people think that when you make the jump to become a full-time creator that you can never go back. Man, that would be awful if, like, you could only go f- to this one direction, but you couldn't go back. It's like David said on that interview a few weeks ago here on the podcast, you can always go back to working a regular, so on, quote-unquote, "regular job," right? And the part that nobody tells you is the goal before quitting isn't that the channel can replace your salary, it's I have built more than one income stream so that no single one going down immediately can end you, right?

7:44You know, a channel is a top of funnel, right? Not a paycheck. You want your channel to be top of funnel, and yeah, AdSense revenue's great, and maybe that's where 60%'s coming from, but there needs to be another 40%, right? You wanna build that funnel first, then jump, right? I've got five kids, right? I promise you the math matters more than the dream, and the dream will survive the math just fine. I promise you that. Uh, good question though, Devin.

8:08Thanks for asking that. I would highly encourage you to go listen to the conversation I had with David, uh, Voorhees back a few weeks ago. Sarah asked this. She says, "I'm exhausted. I've been posting twice a week for two years, and I think I'm burning out." Everyone's burning out these days, right? "But every guru," I hate that word right now, "says consistency is everything. How do I rest without killing my momentum?" So look, I get it. You know, you're, you're on YouTube.

8:37You know, if you, if you even touch productivity podcast or YouTube, I mean, you know, they're gonna be like, "Consistency." And I'm, I'm right there with them. I agree, right? At the end of the day, if you burn out and you disappear for six months at a time, it'll do way more damage to your momentum than dropping to a once a week cadence ever could. So if you're posting twice a week, it's pretty simple for you. Drop down to once a week, do it for three months, a quarter, or six months, and see if that fixes it.

9:05You should know by month two or three if that, you know, reduced amount… I mean, you're reducing your workload by 50%, right? So here's the, the thing for you. The algorithm does not have a loyalty card that resets if you skip a day. Like, people think that, where they're just like, "Oh, if I skip this…" I feel that way about this podcast, and I'm like, "If I skip an interview, if I skip this, you know, the people aren't gonna listen anymore." That's not true, right?

9:29But there are things that you can do. You can build a buffer, right? The reason why consistency feels like a treadmill is that you're publishing what you made this week. But if you get a few weeks ahead, if you can, and then you suddenly have a sick kid or a bad week, and you just don't feel like doing it, you got one ready to go in the hopper, right? So rest isn't the enemy of momentum, right? Resentment is, which is what you're feeling right now.

9:53You're feeling burnt out. Um, and it says here you've got about almost 10,000 subscribers. Good on you, right? You cannot be there for your audience the way that you need to be if your passion wanes, if you are not wanting to create content. So if there's someone listening to this and you're where Sarah is right now, I encourage you to take a breather, maybe take a week or two off, and then maybe adjust your cadence. I promise nothing bad is going to happen.

10:20Um, this is Thomaz, uh, with a Z. That's a cool way of spelling Thomas, W. Um, he is in tabletop gaming on YouTube. Uh, he says, "How much of my growth is the algorithm and how much is me?" It's an interesting question. "When a video flops, I genuinely can't tell if I made something bad or if YouTube just didn't push it right." Well, first things first, the whole thing about YouTube didn't push it, and it's been said here on this podcast hundreds of times, I'm not saying it's an excuse, but honestly, this is a very useful question that you ask.

10:56The algorithm is not like a weather system that happens to you, right? It's a mirror, right? It's showing your video to a test audience and then reporting back what they did, right? That's pretty… And I know that I'm trying to explain it in the simplest terms. When you upload a video, YouTube's going to present it, and by present it, that's an impression, right? Now, whether or not people click, that's up to you and your packaging, and whether or not people stay, that's up to you, right?

11:22And then YouTube just takes those data points of, oh, they're, a lot of p- people are clicking. That must be a good thumbnail, a good title combi- combo, whatever it is. And then if those people are bouncing really quickly, then YouTube pulls back. But if they stay and they watch a good bit of the video and they see viewer satisfaction is good, then boom, that's when a video really takes off. So it's never really that the alg- I hate that, right?

11:43The algorithm just didn't push it, right? So the answer is almost always it was the audience, and the algorithm just told you fast, right? Which is good news because it means you have leverage You can go back what I said a few questions ago. You can look, is it a bad title? Is it a weak thumbnail? Was it a topic that no one was searching for or curious about? A payoff that came too late? These are all you. That's not an algorithm, right? Just, I, I think that's, that's the simplest way I can answer that question.

12:11Hannah K. asked this: "I can afford a fancy camera or a good mi- I can't afford a fancy camera or a good mic right now. Is it even worth starting, or will bad gear hold me back so much that I'm wasting my time?" This one's simple. This one's easy to answer. You have a phone in your pocket. I can almost guarantee that you do. The number of successful channels that start and are growing on a phone in a bedroom with terrible lighting is enormous, and the number that failed because the founder spent eight months and $2,000 assembling the perfect setup, right?

12:43I promise you guys- Just as many channels are growing with very simplistic tech and tools that you already own. And by the way, there are free AI tools out there now that will help you a- and, and allow you to set the tools you have up and optimize them better than ever before. So Hannah, very quick and small answer there. Camera doesn't matter. Y- you have all that you need to get going. You don't need to buy a fancy camera or a great microphone right now.

13:11Greg asks, "Everyone is telling me I have to be doing shorts or I'll get left behind." It's not true. "But I make 20-minute deep dive videos, and that's what my audience loves. Do I really have to chase shorts?" No. The simple answer is no. Your 20-minute deep dives are where the actual relationships are getting built. That's what your audience loves, and that's where they live. But if you want to capture maybe some eyeballs that would never discover those long form 20-minute deep dives before, then yeah, doing the occasional short, one, two, three a week that are low leverage, low a- as far as like time consumption for you or low barrier to entry, maybe that will get someone who would never discover your 20-minute deep dives to do so.

13:48And so yeah, using shorts that way are great, but it's never going to be something where, you know, you have to do them, right? Use them as trailers for those long form videos. It's a great way of doing it. Uh, I believe the next question asker's name is Aisha or Aisha. I'm not sure. She says, "I got my first sponsorship offer," congratulations, "$750 for a 60-second integration. I have no idea if that's fair or if I'm being lowballed." And you say you have 14,000 subscribers, and your views fluctuate from 2 to 5K.

14:25"How do I price myself without scaring them off?" First, congratulations. That offer means your audience is worth, you know, paying to reach, which is good. Uh, that's a great milestone. The rough kind of rule of thumb in the industry right now is somewhere around $15 to $30 per thousand views for like a sponsored segment. So if your videos do 20K views, that is 750. So for you, you're saying you're much lower than that. Now, there are audiences that sponsors know are what they call high ticket audi- like, people, like, uh, where they can convert them into a much higher ticket offer, and I've had clients get mu- double, triple what you're asking for the same amount of views that you're averaging, right?

15:11So the way I see is the next sponsorship deal, go up just a little bit, and then if they accept it, the next one go up just a little bit until you get a little bit of pushback, and then you're like, "Oh, I'm probably living where I need to live," right? Good question, and congratulations to you. Caleb J says, "I feel guilty spending so much time on YouTube when I've got a family and a, a faith that I'm trying to put my life into, 100 other responsibilities.

15:34How do you keep this from taking over your whole life?" Oh, this is a great question. Ooh, I love this one. It's all on you. What matters to you is where your time is going to go. Now, YouTube is wonderful, and it's obviously something I've created a career around. I advise people on how to grow on YouTube every single day or every workday that I'm sitting right here, you know, in front of this microphone. But here's the deal. What do you wanna be known for?

15:58What matters to you, right? So YouTube can and will take everything as far as your time if you let it. It's a bottomless pit of one more thing that you could optimize, and I've been there. It'll quietly eat all your evenings, your mornings, your relationship, and your peace of mind by tapping that YouTube Studio app and refreshing every 30 minutes, right? But you can't let it do that, right? So I put it in its own box, right? The work that I do serves the life that I have, right?

16:30So the, my life does not serve the work. So for me, what matters to me, right? So for me, what matters to me is my faith, my family, the things that are outside of YouTube, the things that you guys never really hear about or see here on this podcast, right? My five kids, my wife, the things that matter to me, right? So honestly, the guilt that you're feeling is probably a good signal for you, right? It's probably not something you need to suppress.

16:55It's your priorities telling you that they're still alive, right? There are creators who lose their families to this, right? They didn't feel that guilt. They just numbed it or put it to the side. Keep listening to it. A YouTube channel is a wonderful thing to build, and it can provide you with not just monetary benefits, but relationships, so many different things, right? But you can't put it as your number one, right? You have to know what's important.

17:21Now, you'll hear interviews with MrBeast and people like that where they talk about they don't have a life. They work 12 hours, 15 hours a day. That's great. Good for-- That's not the life I want, right? And that's why I h- you, you don't have the success that he has, and that's fine. You have to kinda put a cap on it and know, "Okay, today I'm working four hours." Put it in your calendar. Time block it, whatever you do, to make it e- you know, to where you're not letting it consume your entire life, because it certainly will.

17:51So with that said, these have been nine amazing questions. Again, you can email me. You can join our mastermind group to ask these questions. Really appreciate-- I, I mean, I h- I had a list of, I think, 39 that I could choose from. These were the nine that I thought were the most relevant to what we're talking about right now. Got a couple of interviews that I'm editing right now that I think you guys are going to love coming out next week and the week after.

18:14Uh, and with that said, don't forget to check out all of the offerings we have for creators, and we will see you guys next time.