Creative Output
Get weekly insights from an artist who's built a career on social media.
One simple CTA changed my business
This week I have a quick, actionable tip that's increased visitors to my site by ~100/day. If you've ever checked out a YouTube description, you might be familiar with the 'wall of text' approach. This is dozens of links to related videos, affiliate products, digital offerings, and profiles on other social media platforms. I was guilty of this. My video descriptions used to have 10+ links (left side). Now, they have just two: one for learning from me and one for contacting me (right side)....
My artist YouTube formula worked
The results from How Artists Can Win on YouTube are in: my latest long-form upload is my best performing video of the past year! It has 47k views in the first week, compared to my typical range of 11k-22k views. (If you didn't read that previous post, make sure to check out the formula I followed) Here's the video, followed by a look at YouTube's insight of why it's performing well: (click the image to go to the full size) Key Takeaways ⬆️ Because of my approach of bombarding with expertise,...
The video was a hit (and what comes next)
Lots of new folks on the mailing list! My goal every week is to provide a bit of insight into being an artist with a career on the Internet. I'll keep things simple today for all of the new readers with a catch up of what I've been doing and what comes next: 🎯 I correctly predicted that my latest video would be a hit ✏️ That was based on my approach to creating shareable videos 🎥 I just filmed a full breakdown of how I made the chair animation to test my theory about how artists can win on...
How artists can win on YouTube
Despite having 3.6M subscribers on YouTube, I've always struggled with long form videos. My audience largely comes from my short, magical clips. But! This year, I’m experimenting with a new approach that feels far more natural—and it might help other artists who struggle with long-form content. (Check out the simple 'recipe' at the end to get started.) Present Tense Videos I've often gravitated toward vlog-style videos when documenting projects. Probably because they're relatively easy to...
My holiday money-makers
Ever wonder how creative ideas evolve into something that pays dividends years later? Here's the story behind my most successful holiday videos: 50 Ways to Open a Gift (9M views) and 50 Ways to Wrap a Gift (2.9M views). I made them in 2018, and even after 6 years, they still make a few thousand dollars every holiday season as they spike in viewership throughout December. They're very evergreen in the sense that a lot of views return to them every Christmas. (Admittedly, I find it really...
How I pitch to brands
I spent November working with Sony to produce this magical transition video featuring their products. I thought it'd be fun to show the initial pitch I presented so you can compare it to the final video. I find that taking pictures of myself is the easiest, most efficient, and clearest way of communicating my ideas. If I can make the idea work like this, then I have a lot of confidence it'll work in video. And it's also really understandable from the client side (need to make sure the...
This video will be a hit
I typically stick to reflecting on past videos, but today I'm going to make a bold prediction that what I'm currently working on will be a hit. I'm locking in this prediction as a way to put my money where my mouth is before the video is even made. I previously wrote about a simple formula for shareability (the dinner table test): did you see that video where [blank] does [blank]? This is one of those awesome ideas that neatly fits into that formula. Family and friends have been asking what...
What's your toothache?
I recently read The Search: Finding Meaningful Work in a Post-Career World by Bruce Feiler. Among hundreds of interviews with people who had taken unconventional paths to career fulfillment, the author found that one of the most direct ways of determining someone's passion as an adult was: What was your toothache as a child? The term is inspired by Hans Christian Andersen's story Aunty Toothache, where a boy suffers an excruciating toothache at the cost of his talent for writing great poetry....
Beginner's Guide to Stop-Motion Animation
While I'm knee-deep in production on a new brand partnership, I wanted to share a guide I've just made live on my site: the Beginner's Guide to Stop-Motion Animation. I've found that newcomers to stop-motion (and their parents) are often confused by the initial steps of getting started, so I've made it easier by listing learning resources and product recommendations. I'll definitely be adding more over time, but it's off to a good start. And if you dig that handmade, wiggly clay font in the...
Little effort for an extra 5M views
(I'm going to write this post like a robot so that it's efficient and easy to follow.) The Plan Two weeks ago, I posted a compilation of 5 tricks where I'm magically vanishing. Last week, I posted 5 behind-the-scenes (BTS) edits - one for each trick. You can watch these videos in this playlist. The Execution I specifically made these BTS edits low lift, essentially reposting each trick and including some phone clips of how it was filmed (example above). It was very little additional work. I...
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