3 Things About Content Marketing I Learned Growing a YouTube Channel

Todd Clouser 2 min

3 Things About Content Marketing I Learned Growing a YouTube Channel

I learned most of what I know about marketing building a YouTube channel.

We started it in 2011 when "YouTube was for cat videos."

We had multiple pivots, nearly failed and shut it down dozens of times, and added four SMEs over the years.

I stepped away in 2021, but the channel continued and just earned their gold play button.

So I thought I'd use this week's newsletter to celebrate that and also share some of the biggest learnings (that most people don't talk about) I had from growing a channel to millions of monthly views.

1. Relationships With Your Audience Aren't Built Through a Screen

Building a relationship with your audience is more than sending a newsletter and creating content on a regular basis. It's meeting them where they are and creating memorable experiences. We used to make this our mission when building the YouTube channel. We would visit trade schools, announce where we were on Instagram and invite people to join us for dinner, and take every opportunity to meet our audience in person.

Get out and meet your audience (and share it with the ones that you can't meet).

2. Don't Be a Robot

In B2B we love to present ourselves as experts. But experts make mistakes too. We released two YouTube videos a week for almost ten years, we got a lot of feedback and heard a lot of the same things over and over again. One of the most common pieces of feedback was that people loved seeing our mistakes.

"A lot of channels only show the proper way to do things, I like when you guys don't edit out the mistakes because a lot of times I make the same mistakes and want to see how you fix/avoid them."

That's paraphrased, but we heard it over and over again. Show the good, the bad, and the ugly. It makes you relatable and helps build stronger relationships.

*One of our most popular videos was a compilation of our most common mistakes.*

3. Just...Wing It

I was talking with one of my old hosts last night and he said something that I never really thought about,

"You know we created hundreds of videos and not a single one was scripted?"

Obviously take this one with a grain of salt based on the situation, but in my time with Weld.com we created over 1,000 YouTube videos and over 1,000 of those videos didn't have a script.

Sometimes when you just spit out a topic, don't prepare, and hit record; beautiful things happen. (Sometimes they're crap too, but that's the beauty of pre-recorded content).

Give unscripted content a shot. See what happens.

BONUS TIP: Don't Think Too Hard

Content is everywhere. Back in my welding days we would see a broken handrail or loading dock and turn it into a YouTube video.

This week my friend sent me a picture of his newly received Gold Play Button and that's what inspired this newsletter.

There are learnings to be had in the little things. Everything you create doesn't need to be a new framework or playbook or ultimate guide. Teach through doing.