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Hey, so there seems to be a question every week or so of someone starting a new channel and looking for tips so I thought I would go through all the things I've learnt over the past 8 months, I always had the dream to want to create YouTube videos but never had the kick to get started and now that I have I love it. So I hope I can be that kick for someone.
Tip 1: Don't go into this thinking you're going to be making full time income
As a side thing the money can actually be pretty nice, I basically bought a very nice new Computer with all of the YT Revenue I've gotten so far. But when you're relying it for an income it can be extremely daunting and pressure filled to make videos and make videos that get views and with how small the RS3 Community is, you're going to struggle making a full time income from YT alone even if you upload consistently good videos each day.
In fact, I believe Maikeru is the only full time RS3 Content Creator that still uploads content regularly
Not saying that it isn't possible, but with the current state of the game you won't see the 100k+ sub channels that a place like OSRS gets.
Tip 2: You're gonna hate your voice at first.. but you'll learn to tolerate it
So this is a thing that pretty much everyone deals with. "I sounds like THAT??!!" You'll get used to it, but just power through and listen to it. By the 10th or so video you'll be used to it and by the 50th you'll actually kind of think its good. Its all about familiarity.
No you don't sound cringy, no you don't sound lame, you sound like you. Just speak confidently and people will like your voice, people can hear when you aren't sure of your voice and that makes them think that you aren't sure of what your saying in your video.
Tip 3: Fix your Audio
Now if any of you have been watching me, you'll know my struggles with audio, so do as I say not as I do. Audio is probably the most important thing in the actual video, people will watch a bad video with great audio much longer than a good video, not saying you should invest boatloads of dollars into a set-up. But something like a Blue Snowball and a Desk Mount, you can probably get that for $80 or so. Brillymister uses that exact set up and his audio is perfectly fine and if YouTube isn't your thing, you now have a desk mic for discord or streaming.
Tip 4: Do not try to be a Variety Content Creator when doing RuneScape
So this is just something that doesn't work with RuneScape, with the way that the YouTube algorithm works its best to pair down as far as possible instead of catching a wide net. If you want to do variety, streaming is a much much better option, because streaming is less about the game than it is about the personality of the person streaming.
If you want to have a variety channel; make a 2nd one instead of throwing it all into one
Tip 5: Your subscriber count doesn't matter
Subscribers on YouTube are very overrated, its like followers on instagram its mostly just a bragging point rather that anything that actually helps your channel.
Most people think that a subscriber means that that's 1 view for every video in the future, but not every sub watches every video, from my rough estimation with my analytics I've found that each subscriber watches about 10-20% of my videos on average, so that's 400-800 views from subscribers per video on average... which is a small portion of my views.
Its mostly used to determine quality, because unlike views people have to click on the button to do it so it means they must have liked the video/there wasn't anything majorly wrong with it, but once you get past that initial burst there is no difference. Protoxx has 80% of the subs of Maikeru but has been outpacing him on views for the past little bit. Wazzy has 90% of the subs I do and he gets more views per video and more views overall that I do.
Tip 6: Pick a good name
Little bit of personal regret here, but Waswere, while unique isn't the best name for YouTube. Its hard to find on the search as its 2 common words and they are commonly put together in video such as "What's the difference between was and were?"
That makes it much harder to actually find me, I think the best name has these qualities + 3 Syllables or less + English Sounding + No Numbers + Doesn't autocorrect in google to something common + Easy to spell
Most people just take their RSN, but think about it for a while, re-branding is annoying and tough to do. RSCC Interviews recently went through a name change and it was long overdue, and he re-branded to Eddie Moo (good name BTW) and even though he's my friend I still make a double take every time I see his videos and am like "Oh Ya that's Eddie"
Tip 7: Gobble up the username on twitter/twitch/instagram any other platform
This is something that a lot of people (myself included) don't do, they just make a YT account and when they want to involve the other platforms they make an account. Unfortunately Waswere was taken on both Twitch and Twitter, so I had to settle for Waswere_RS on both of them. Still good but not ideal.
Consistent branding is important, I was recently streaming under the name "was_rs" and had about 5-10 people come in and say woah you're the waswere guy, didn't even notice. Since then I changed my username to be more consistent and my YouTube brand recognition should help me out in the streaming world.
Tip 8: Consistent uploads
This is probably the hardest thing for anyone to do, but basically the algorithm loves when you do this. It doesn't matter how often you upload but rather that you're consistent, not only with the days between but also the time of day.
I've settled into a pattern of mostly Monday-Wednesday-Friday while uploading between 1 PM - 2PM my time (Eastern Time Zone). Some time I move it a day in either direction but it works This is the best time to upload in my opinion as it catches the Europeans (~40% of viewers) around dinner time while getting the North American crowd (~50% of viewers) in the late afternoon slot.
Its incredibly difficult to not just hit publish as soon as the video is ready, you want to see peoples reactions, you want to share with the world, but its only going to hurt you in the long run. Schedule the video and look away, then come back when it goes live.
Tip 9: Don't do premieres
Premieres suck, they are the worst, they are bad for the viewer and bad for the content creator, don't do them.
People really don't like seeing a premiere because it shows up in their recommended 100s of times before it actually goes live cause you can set it about 12 hours in advance
The only exception is for a series that is highly anticipated and you would have people want to wait for it, if you have that, set it to a premiere about 15 minutes before you want it to go to live let the people come in and experience the show. The main benefit is interaction with your viewers as there is a live chat and as a content creator you can get donations via super chats during these, but that's basically it.
Tip 10: Only do new content if you think you can provide something the top YouTubers can't
So with the monthly cadence its pretty easy for Maikeru or Protoxx to make a video on literally every single update that Jagex brings to RuneScape. They are better than you and have the years of practice of making videos quickly, they are also European so they will be guaranteed to be awake when the update goes live.
Make release day content when you have something to add that they don't, I've done it on two updates so far.
- The Essence of Finality, Having a PvM series gives me a level of "respect" as a PvMer so people trust my opinion more than someone who doesn't PvM as much so I can test the specs give my results and upload a video, most of the top PvMers (Lucario, Couchy.. etc) mostly focus on streaming and don't provide much guide based content so it was a good opportunity for me
- Archaeology Guide, Maikeru being the only other content creator that was 200m gave me the opportunity to make a banger of an Archaeology Guide. Mind you I had 500 subs when that came out, and the overall quality of the video is not the greatest, but the reason why it gained traction was "oh he's in the top 50, he must know what he's talking about" to this day it still gains ~600-700 views per day
I didn't make a video on the new effigy because it would just re-hash the exact same things that Maikeru and Protoxx did and most people who watch me probably also watch them and would have already seen it and led to low views. Desperate Measures is my lowest viewed video in quite a while and that's because well everyone and their mother did it.
Tip 11: Understand the YouTube Algorithm
So this is a really tough one so I'll break it down as simple as I can.
Basically how it works is that each viewer has a certain score on how well they are tailored to your videos, lets just say ranging from 1 to 10. What YouTube will do is that it'll show your video to all the 10s, and then if it performs well in the 10s, then it'll start pushing it to the 9s and then so on... until it stops performing well.
I've noticed in my own videos that once the Click through rate (CTR, percentage of people that click your videos that see it) gets below 10% YouTube will stop pushing it to people and then views it'll only come from suggested videos and search results. This normally happens at about the 24-48 hour mark for RS videos but for some wide reaching ones it can be up to a week.
So with that in mind you want to be successful with your already successful group, so any major changes in upload time, content or game can potentially lead to lower views. I experienced this with the UIM series, most people who watched my videos watched me for boss man (PvM) but now that I'm also producing ironman content its a big difference from what I was doing before the early CTR was much lower leading to the algorithm pushing it
Bonus Tip: Have fun and take care of yourself
At the end of the day this is a hobby and if you aren't enjoying it take a break and keep yourself above board
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