YouTubers Don’t Talk About This — But These Are the Real Secrets to Growth

We've already heard motivational speeches from major bloggers a million times about what needs to be done to be successful on the platform. All these tips seem like meaningless empty phrases, but we disagree — each one is actually right.

First, because every successful blogger goes through their personal journey and, upon reaching their goals, shares their simple truths that they learned along this path. Well, where's the lie in that if it's their personal life experience?

And second, practically everyone shares very general points about their success without going into the details of what they said. And the devil, as we know, is in the details. And it's precisely these details that we want to examine in this article.

Success on YouTube is simple!

Here's the very first thought that those who have already achieved success on the platform convey to us. Actually, this is partly true. In order to achieve something on the platform, you need to at least simply start creating content.

It's simple, but if you close your eyes to the details, this is really the secret to success — make videos, then you'll definitely achieve something on YouTube.

But we've gathered here precisely to dig deeper and finally understand — what stops millions of creators from simply taking action and starting to film and becoming successful?

First, the question is — How do you yourself characterize success? For one blogger it's 1000 subscribers, while for another this same number is a worthless result. But you won't determine your success by numbers alone.

Second, for a huge number of creators, simply starting to do something is an impossible task, as they're stopped by internal psychological limitations.

A large number of creators suffer from their own perfectionism: I need to first come up with a cool idea, then perfect it and check a hundred times that it's cool; and I also need a good script, preferably ideal, at the level of a Hollywood, and then I need to film it perfectly... And this chain of perfections can continue infinitely.

Of course, it's not related to everyone. Looking at some channels on the platform, it might seem that the person there doesn't suffer from anything at all. But those who are captured by the disease of perfectionism don't accidentally have such inflated requirements for themselves.

The entire media space is filled with specialists who constantly talk about needing to be the best version of yourself, that you need to try, learn, and reach ever greater heights.

They don't forget to remind you that there are a million competitors around who have long surpassed you, and in general everyone is already earning billions and buying themselves villas, while you're still just some loser nobody.

And after this flow of information, it's no surprise that many don't even want to start anything. It's very difficult to descend into realism in such moments and remember that we're on the Internet, which means there's a huge probability that you won't learn the truth about how these mouthpieces of achievement actually live, and it's simply impossible to verify most successful successes.

And however difficult it may be, the main thing in such moments is not to forget that we're all people, including those who tell us about successful success. And there's no magic, and no secret knowledge either, and actually everything, in most cases, lies on the surface.

Especially when it comes to platforms, social networks and algorithms. So just accept that everything is much simpler than it seems, if you're ready to work.

And where would we be without our favorite — but that guy's video went viral, and he instantly became popular and other songs about the main thing.

Success — is rarely something instant, we can't rely on isolated cases as statistics, it's just survivorship bias.

But absolutely nothing and no one stops you from sitting and waiting for your moment of glory and success. So you can ignore us.

Just do what you love!

Once again, this motivating advice evokes mixed feelings.

Of course, first and foremost, you should enjoy what you do. But if you want to achieve something on YouTube, you'll have to learn the rules of the game that are established on the platform. And we're talking about far more than just the platform's actual rules.

When you start working on YouTube, you realize that initially you'll have to be a specialist in everything at once.

You need to shoot a video — that's for a cameraman, you need to edit it — that's for editors, for channel design and video thumbnails you need to work with headers and covers — that's for designers, and inside the video you also need SEO optimization and a script! OMG

So many different skills need to be learned at least a little bit just to work on a single platform. And only after you will start getting some response from YouTube viewers.

At a certain point in working on your channel, you realize that working on YouTube is nothing more, nothing less than creating and developing a business.

You have to come up with development strategies, analyze successes and failures, work with your audience and their interests. So at some level of growth, your channel stops being just a beloved hobby where you do what you like.

You develop responsibility toward your viewers, form new, more ambitious goals, and in connection with this, both income and expenses for running the channel will grow. And this is ok, you just need to be prepared for it.

Creators are businessmen — everyone who has a working channel essentially owns a business.

Another secret that few successful bloggers share is the ability to be flexible.

This simple truth probably isn't shared much because most major bloggers simply don't analyze this skill of theirs. Some just have it naturally, while others will have to train it.

Among us are plenty of those who struggle with change. You can easily recognize these people by phrases like "it was better before" and "back in my day..."

And this is normal, there's nothing wrong with it, but in any endeavor, especially in something as changeable as working with video content, you need to be very flexible and learn to easily adapt to everything new.

Successful bloggers don't wait for the perfect moment when they can start doing something or try something new — they just do it, even when they're not ready.

The perfect moment, idea, or format doesn't exist— you can think of  an idea endlessly or wait until you get old for the right moment, but all that will happen is you'll just lose time.

The same applies to those creators who paused their channel activity for any reason, whether searching for genuinely interesting topics or filming something large-scale.

If you're not uploading videos — then you're no longer running a channel. Even if you took six months off to create a masterpiece, you've already stopped being a blogger during that time.

Of course, you'll now cite many examples of major creators who spend a long time preparing videos, but then they turn out to be masterpieces. But the nuance is that all these examples are tops in their niches — viewers are willing to wait for them for a very long time. But still not forever.

Another important point — your tastes and interests will change over the years, while viewers may be completely unprepared for you to start doing something on your channel that they didn't subscribe for.

Stability in your own image — this is what your viewers want. They already chose you because you are you, so if you suddenly start changing drastically, your existing audience will most likely drop off.

This doesn't mean at all that you shouldn't change and should give up on growth and self-development, it's just that let's return to the thesis that a YouTube channel is a business. And if a toy store suddenly starts selling orthopedic shoes, then probably your regular customers will stop dropping by.

It's the same on the platform: if you were a kind fairy and then suddenly decided to become a sarcastic old woman, then don't be surprised that these changes might not appeal to your audience. Just start a new channel in such a situation and do what you like now there.

And how do you like that bloggers rarely talk about how much work with psychology is in their success formula?

The ability to make an attractive thumbnail and catchy video title — this isn't just about your design skills, but also about the ability to manipulate people's consciousness. Remember how much depends on having a so-called charismatic personality at the head of some idea.

We don't need to look far for examples, it seems to us you already understand that even the most insane ideas can attract attention and be successful with an audience if their speaker properly knows how to work with people.

Just try to analyze the behavior of some personalities popular with the masses at least once, and it will become clear to you that what unites them all is precisely the skill related to mass psychology.

But don't think that charisma is an innate skill. It's not — like any skill, it can be developed. It's just that some people start with it already leveled up to 5 out of 10 points, while others get a maximum start of 1 point.

Believe in yourself — that's the key to YouTube success!

And this, of course, is very important, like any other abstract motivating thesis. But let's detail it.

Of course, a huge number of barriers on the path to YouTube success exist only in our heads.

As we figured out above, the ideal is a lie, a trap, because it simply doesn't exist. And if you have to choose between doing something somehow or doing it perfectly, choose the first option.

If you start throwing yourself excuses like "I don't have good filming equipment" or "I know too little to tell anything on YouTube," then, of course, you need to reduce the number of excuses that prevent you from doing something and truly believe in yourself.

But there's also a flip side to such motivations from established bloggers — believing in your abilities can be completely insufficient when you face real problems.

Most major creators simply overlook the fact that typically an entire team works for them, helping to deal with problems of time shortage or skill level that solo creators face.

So you should of course believe in yourself and your abilities, but at a certain stage of development you'll have to delegate part of your responsibilities. Otherwise, you'll simply stop growing.

First of all, they delegate some very time-consuming processes, for example, video editing or creating thumbnails. If you give these to professionals for money, you'll have more time for experiments or higher quality work with ideas or video content.

And this is necessary precisely so that you yourself can expand and earn more.

This is what we meant when we said that as the channel grows, both income and expenses grow.

Throughout our time on YouTube, we’ve run into three different kinds of creators:

• one-man orchestra: this is typically any beginner, because they don't yet have either understanding of how the platform works or the ability to delegate
• meticulous perfectionist: their level and quality are amazing, but let's be honest — we can't afford to release five videos a year. And don't delude yourself that you can do the same just because some top creator in your niche can. First, we don't have a huge audience whose loyalty we've been developing for the last 10 years, and second, we don't have that level of skills either.
• teamwork: and this is the majority of popular creators. Their team typically includes editors, video editors, cameramen, designers, and all these professionals in their field give the creator the opportunity to simply become the face of the channel and the ideological inspiration.

Therefore, don't build illusions — running a top channel alone is unrealistic. Or it's realistic, but with five videos a year. Or you'll face yet another problem in the pursuit of a good video release pace while maintaining excellent quality — burnout.

How many incredible creators simply didn't even reach the concept of being "top" because they just gave up, got tired, and lost interest in their work.

And here believing in yourself and your abilities definitely won't help at all. What you once enjoyed and found pleasure in will simply stop evoking any feelings, or worse, will start causing negative ones.

Even considering all the nuances, you'll want to leave the platform more than once. In such moments, it's important to have a clear and understandable strategy where you have a goal and tasks that lead to it.

This way you'll be able not just to remember why you came to YouTube in the first place, but also to evaluate the path you've traveled so far. And this is exactly what will help you not give up. Loveya!