2025-11-29 15:18 Tags:Money
Your goal here is to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible. That’s the number one goal of this production company. It’s not to make the best produced videos. Not to make the funniest videos. Not to make the best looking videos. Not the highest quality videos.. It’s to make the best YOUTUBE videos possible.
I only want “A Players”
I can relate to that, a good team, a good team member, it’s so valuable. And the important thing, we should kick off C players as soon as possible, you will understand this when you come across this kind of people. Sorry I used ‘kick off’, but you know you literally really should do that.
Chapter 1: What makes a Youtube video viral?
The three metrics you guys need to care about is Click Thru Rate (CTR), Average View Duration (AVD), and Average View Percentage (AVP). Make sure you know those abbreviations because that’s how most people will refer to them
CTR is basically how many people see our thumbnail in their feeds divided by how many that click it. If 100,000,000 people see our thumbnail and 10,000,000 click on it then that means 10% clicked and we have a 10% ctr. This is what dictates what we do for videos. “I Spent 50 Hours In My Front Yard” is lame and you wouldn’t click it. But you would hypothetically click “I Spent 50 Hours In Ketchup”. Both are relatively similar in time/effort but the ketchup one is easily 100x more viral.
Titles are equally as important for getting someone to click. A simple way to up that CTR even more would be to title it “I Survived” instead of “I Spent”. That would add more intrigue and make it feel more extreme. In general the more extreme the better. “I Don’t Like Bananas” won’t perform the same as “Bananas Are The Worst Food On Earth”.
Now if you’re in production or creative you might be wondering, why does the title and thumbnail matter to me? Expectations is why. The title and thumbnail on the videos you will be producing set the expectations for the viewer for your video.
Imagine you clicked on a video titled “World’s Largest Bouncy Castle” and the thumbnail had a giant yellow bouncy castle beside a bunch of huge buildings. Then when the video plays it’s not a yellow bouncy castle, it’s red. It’s also not the world’s largest. It’s also in a field with no buildings like the thumbnail. You’d feel like you were lied to and click off because the video did not meet the expectations of the title/thumbnail. THIS IS WHY YOU MUST KNOW THE TITLE AND THUMBNAILS OF THE VIDEOS YOU ARE MAKING!
AVD. This is how long on average people watch a given video. As with almost every video on Youtube, the first minute has the most loss (go look). This is why we freak out so much about the first minute and go so above and beyond to make it the best we freakin can. Let’s say the start of the video wasn’t well-lit, I didn’t match the expectations of the clickbait, I didn’t pre plan what I’d say, and we didn’t front load some interesting stuff for the first minute of content. The first minute of each video is the most important minute of each video.
After the first minute of content you will have what we call minutes 1 thru 3. This is where you have to transition from hype to execution (generally). Stop telling people what they will be watching and start showing them. An example of a 1 thru 3 minute tactic we would use is crazy progression.
A re-engagement can be described as content that is highly interested that fits the story and makes people genuinely impressed. Another way to look at this is it’s a segment that “only MrBeast can do this”. It’s important to re-engage the viewer around this time because they could get bored of the story and click off.
Following the first minute, then minutes 1 thru 3, is obviously what we call minute 3 through minute 6 and is the next most important part of the video. This is where you plan out all the most exciting and interesting content that is also very simple. This includes lots of quick scene changes and highly stimulating simple content that reflects the story. The goal is to make them fall in love with the story, the people in the video and the overall video itself. If we can get them to watch the first half of the video there’s a very high chance they’ll watch to the end. Usually at the 6 minute mark we will include another re-engagement that is highly interesting but needs a little more explanation and will push the story in the back half of the video.
Many videos have been killed because the back half content was ass lol. But in general once you have someone for 6 minutes they are super invested in the story and probably in what I call a “lull”. They are watching the video without even realizing they are watching a video. Typically the not as good content would be in the back half of the video. Don’t ever signal the end of the video unless it’s to build hype for the prize or payoff at the end of the video. This is also where long explanation bits can live and if something unexpected happens or things don’t go to plan that can be turned into content.
Another non trackable thing about virality I’d like you to know is what we call the “wow factor” and it’s definitely the most subjective. You can check all the above boxes for ctr and avd, but the video still do eh for us. An example of the “wow factor” would be our 100 days in the circle video. We offered someone $500,000 if they could live in a circle in a field for 100 days and instead of starting with his house in the circle that he would live in, we bring it in on a crane 30 seconds into the video. The fact that we lifted a house on a crane didn’t add anything to the title and thumbnail. It obviously hooked the viewers and helped retention but there are millions of ways we could have done that easier. It’s arguably from a data standpoint illogical and a waste of time but the impression it leaves on the viewer is invaluable for us. Anytime we do something that no other creator can do, that seperates us in their mind and makes our videos more special to them. It changes how they see us and it does make them watch more videos and engage more with the brand. You can’t track the “wow factor” but I can describe it. Anything that no other youtuber can do. And it’s important we never lose our wow.
CHAPTER 2: Creating Content
A lot of things need to happen before you can start working on it. The big things would probably be you need a thumbnail sketch and creative on your team to write the video. DO NOT just go to them and say “I need creative, let me know when it’s done” and “I need a thumbnail, let me know when it’s done”. This is what most people do and it’s one of the reasons why we fail so much. I want you to look them in the eyes and tell them they are the bottleneck and take it a step further and explain why they are the bottleneck so you both are on the same page. “Tyler, you are my bottleneck. I have 45 days to make this video happen and I can not begin to work on it until I know what the contents of the video is. I need you to confirm you understand this is important and we need to set a date on when the creative will be done.” Now this person who also has tons of shit going on is aware of how important this discussion is and you guys can prio it accordingly.
Now let’s say Tyler and you agree it will be done in 5 days. YOU DON’T GET TO SET A REMINDER FOR 5 DAYS AND NOT TALK TO HIM FOR 5 DAYS! Every single day you must check in on Tyler and make sure he is still on track to hit the target date. I want less excuses in this company. Take ownership and don’t give your project a chance to fail. Dumping your bottleneck on someone and then just walking away until it’s done is lazy and it gives room for error and I want you to have a mindset that God himself couldn’t stop you from making this video on time. Check. In. Daily. Leave. No. Room. For. Error. 很能理解这一段必须必须 时刻提醒检查
Video everything
I really want us to see producing as a team job, not a solo thing. Which is why it’s important you video everything critical (and also anything you think people would ask about). Let’s say you go to scout a set for a video in a month while the rest of your team is working on this week’s video. Most people just go to scout the set, maybe grab a photo, and walk around and try to grab a good mental model of it. Then a week later when you’re back, this video is now Tyler’s main focus and he starts asking questions about the set, and you can’t quite recall. The questions get more and more detailed and all you have to go off of is what’s in your mind. The rest of your production team also needs to start planning bits but they don’t know what it looks like and it’s a shit show. This is why we say video everything. And the easiest way to bring your team up to the same page is to freaken video everything and store it where they can constantly reference it. A lot of problems can be solved if we just video sets and ask for videos when ordering things. Especially because I personally am a visual guy and I always ask to see what things look like so even for me videos are valuable. Video Everything.
SAY THE NEGATIVES
Title says it all. Don’t just tell people on your team or me why something is good. It’s infinitely more valuable to tell us why it’s not good. I FOUND THE CASTLE WE NEED FOR THE VIDEO! But it’s booked all year, overbudget, and someone died in it last week.
It’s your fault, track the contractor
know I already talked about this but if there is one thing I’d really love to impose on you from all this writing, it’s that you can’t just dump and forget your projects. I can’t stand when people dump and forget their project on a contractor and then the day before the shoot blame them when it’s not ready. That’s on YOU, not the contractor. Instead, you should really have it done a certain time frame in advance (you need to use your own intelligence based on the project to determine that) in case something is off we can make changes. And you need to then decide whether or not it’s a critical component. If it is, you should also begin working on a backup and while working on a backup you should check in with JB every single day. Ask him to send videos everyday to spot problems early, hell maybe talk to him twice a day. I don’t care just don’t leave room for error. No excuses, stop leaving room for error. Check in daily, receive videos, and know weeks in advance if you’re fucked. Not days.