← The Think Media Podcast
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- [00:00]
Sean Cannell
Hey, before we jump into today's episode, I've got a question for you. Is your YouTube channel failing to bring in consistent leads and sales? If you'd say yes, then we are hosting an event that's probably perfect for you. I want to personally invite you to join me and the Think Media team this February in Las Vegas for an exclusive in person YouTube growth mastermind. Seats are limited, so make sure to secure your ticket today@thinkmedia media mastermind.com and over an intensive day and a half, I'll show you my proven strategies for creating videos that attract the right audience, generate real revenue and drive more sales. You'll craft your next winning video, learn the latest strategies for leveraging AI and attracting high quality leads, all without the complex funnels or expensive ads. That can be so frustrating. Since we keep this Mastermind small and intimate spots are extremely limited and and filling up fast. So secure your spot for February 21st through the 22nd, 2025, and you can apply for this event at thinkmediamastermind.com before the seats are gone. Now, as of recording this, we're looking for about 10 more people, so grab your seat now. All right, let's jump into the podcast. Today we're going to be learning how a medical professional turned boring eye content into viral videos, including his thumbnail strategy that took his shorts and his videos up to 7 million views on one video. He's also going to be breaking down the exact method he uses to structure videos to keep them watching. One of his videos hit 1.5 million views. Doing this and the content shift that helped him jump from a struggling creator to over 139 million total video views. But right at the start, we're going to cover the three biggest mistakes he sees people making on YouTube, which when they're just starting out, growing their channels. But if you're new to the Think Media podcast, thanks for being here. And today, I'm thrilled to welcome Dr. Joseph Allen, the visionary behind Dr. Eye Health. He has over 139 million views, and since launching his channel back in 2018, he's built an impressive community of over 1 million subscribers by breaking down I health topics in an accessible way that resonates with his audience. Dr. IHealth, welcome to the show.
- [02:22]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Hey, thank you, Sean. This is amazing. Longtime fan of everything. Thanks. You're doing so again. An honor.
- [02:28]
Sean Cannell
Well, I'm fired up to dive into a little bit of your story. Some advanced tactics as the conversation progresses. But let's start off really quick. What are the three biggest mistakes that you see creators making. We brainstorm these ahead of time. The first one is random content. Break that down.
- [02:43]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah, so I see even for myself, when I first started off, I wasn't sure what I was talking about. I wasn't sure really what to make. But over time really boiling down to what your audience wants, like how can you best show up for them and being very direct about how, what the problem is and how you're going to help them. I think having clarity on what you're going to be really focusing on can accept really put your content above everybody else's because you're really getting to the sharp pain point of what the keyword is, the key phrases and what the audience is looking for for that content. And even if it's not a hot topic, if you are direct about it, it will find an audience.
- [03:28]
Sean Cannell
So good. Number two is not getting to the point fast enough. What do you mean here?
- [03:32]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So at the beginning of the videos, if you spend too long not getting to the point or really getting the information or allowing the viewer to know they're in the right place, that the information that they click that they are going to get that information, then you see audience retention drop off way too fast. So you have to kind of figure out how to present yourself quickly and get kind of reaffirmed to the, to the audience that you are. The video is what it's going to be about. Right. You don't want to be just clickbaity enough so that people will be interested in it, but not too clickbaity that you're going to be taking them on a wild ride.
- [04:12]
Sean Cannell
I love that. And the third biggest mistake you see creators making is on their thumbnails. What are some of the mistakes there.
- [04:18]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Biggest thing is too crowded, right? There's. It's not. They got way too many words on the thumbnail. Perhaps they don't have enough emotion or enough color. I think sometimes simple is better than too complex. And so I've really started to lean into that myself and really analyzing. Okay, how do I better get this thumbnail to pop out and make it very simple? How do I draw eyes this direction? Because once I get their eyes on the, on the thumbnail, they're going to be able to see the title. And if the title's in alignment with that thumbnail and it's enough curiosity, they'll click through it. I'll see the click through rates improve.
- [04:55]
Sean Cannell
And those are some really powerful tactical tips to get us some quick wins on the next video upload that we do. But Now I kind of want to dive into a broader view of your process. Now, if people are new to your channel, I actually am certain some of the listeners have stumbled on your channel before because almost everybody in the world has eyes. A lot of people wear glasses. They're dealing with dark circles or contact lenses. And so over the years, you're all over the Internet and YouTube, you got a lot of videos, over 1 million views. And there's topics like Dr. Explains how to Get Rid of Under Eye Bags or Contact Lenses for Beginners, or how to Clean eyeglasses. What's your process for turning medical concepts into engaging titles that average people want to click on?
- [05:44]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Really good question. We, we have kind of a few different strategies, right? We have one which is purely SEO based strategies. So we use the algorithms to try to understand what are people really looking for, what's the search telling us? Because that's usually evergreen content, right? That's content that's going to last forever. We know everybody's asking those questions. So if we at least show up there once a month with an SEO driven video, we know that's going to have longevity. The other is kind of a topical. We know that if there's some topics that are getting hot in the industry, like recently, there are some publications showing that this medication, a very popular medication that people are taking, has a risk for permanent vision loss or blindness. Like that's a good topic. People want to know. And if we are an authority talking about that topic, there's a good chance that other news outlets may end up making a video on that or they may make a post about that. Well, guess whose video is going to be recommended next? After that, after that other big news outlet, that's, that's another kind of strategy we'll use. But I think definitely when making a video, finding something that's going to resonate with your audience, knowing what people are searching and knowing the top kind of popular topics, being able to kind of focus in on those and make sure you're hitting at least one of those top topics a month throughout the year because then you're always staying relevant to the audience.
- [07:17]
Sean Cannell
Man, that's a really genius way to break it down that we're tapping into both the evergreen search engine optimized type of videos. But if we're paying attention to our niche and our topic and trying to once a month spot something, you know, we call it trend surfing and, and ride that trend and having a, it's a system because in that case too, maybe it doesn't blow up. Do you have a story from that where maybe you try to catch a trend and you're like I did all right, but it didn't pop off. But then there's maybe an example where you're like whoa, we caught the right video at the right time and it really got a lot of views. Did you have a real breakout video doing that trend surfing?
- [07:54]
Dr. Joseph Allen
I, I have. There's a few times this has worked both directions. For example, this last year I did a video on castor oil, on its effects on castor oil. Because there's a lot of things on in the world of social media where people will kind of, they'll talk about benefits of something without having true scientific backup for it. I think people know that there's, there's just, especially in the diet world, for example, there's a lot of people just make claims. But I, I said okay, well people are asking about castor oil, they're making these claims that it helps with the eyes in these ways. Well, let me dig into the research on it and I've seen other videos by other eye professionals talk about it, but their videos did very poor. Like I'm like only 6,000 views on this really good video. So how can I spin it to really grab more attention? How can I teach this in a better way? And so I gave it a shot. I honestly thought it was going to flop. I thought like eh, we're going to get maybe 10,000 views tops. And it caught that wave along with all these other content creators making content about Castroil. And I got millions of views off that video. So it works. And sometimes it doesn't. It works okay, even if it only got 10,000 I would have been happy with it. Be like it's still good information, it's still going to help people. But you know, thankfully it paid off.
- [09:13]
Sean Cannell
It's a great mindset because if it would have only got 10,000, a nice mindset to be like yeah, help some people got the video out there. But I'm looking at it at the moment of recording. It's got 2.6 million views. It's getting 76 views per hour as we talk. So this, you know, hour long conversation, 76 new people still watching the video and the title ended up being castor oil for your eyes, dry eyes, eye bags, eye flowers, eye floaters and cataracts. So such a cool example of just being committed to the trend surfing strategy, knowing what's happening and, and then even it could be TikTok trends. I imagine like when something, because I Saw castor oil, my friend Chalene Johnson, people using it for face, anti aging, ingesting it, all these different things. You catch the right thing at the right time and think about how do I tie my niche into that? That's really powerful. How do you structure your videos once you get people to click on it from a good thumbnail and title to try to maintain high viewer retention and especially too, since you're communicating what could be complex medical topics. If professionals are listening to this, you know, there's this balance between if it's going to be accessible to the masses, it might need to be understandable, but yet you're also trying to convey information. If I was to read a medical paper, I might fall asleep. But you've done such a great job of building a brand and educating people well. What are some of your tips there for how you do your videos? And maybe structure things so they're accessible but still really deeply informational.
- [10:42]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So this has been, I think, work in progress for, you know, the six, almost seven years I've been doing this. I think there is a place for making very this cut and dry, informative videos, especially around a medical condition. However, they're not probably going to get much many views. One of the first videos I, I found success in like consistent audience retention was in fact my how to clean your glasses video. And I sort of just shot it on a whim one day. I didn't really put much thought into it. I honestly think I just got lucky and in how I, I produced it. But I recognized in the statistics afterward, like this video is doing well. What is different? And I noticed the audience retention stayed stable at like 60% viewership for like a minute and a half, two minutes into the video. And I think anybody who makes videos on a regular basis, they usually see that fast drop off in the first 30 seconds, right? So over time I've learned to improve storytelling and with more complex topics like how to clean your eyeglasses is like a tips video works very well. When you have multiple points, you're like, hey, here's six tips here, let me show you. 1, 2, 3, 4, 5. But when you're trying to explain a more complex medical condition, I try to use the but. And therefore, if you've ever heard anyone give that explanation, break it down. So you may have a point of like, for example, in the ICA world, astigmatism, a lot of people have astigmatism. There's maybe listeners and viewers who are hearing that term. They're like, oh, yeah, my doctor said that before, but maybe they don't really know what it is. So in a video that I've already shot, it'll come out here in some time, but that video will break down how astigmatism affects your vision. And I'll raise that up as a question. But I'll say, but first we should probably define astigmatism. And so then I'll be able to kind of pause that. Like the viewer thinks they're going in one direction, but I'll say, but let's talk about this first. So I'll change direction. That's still on the same topic. It's not in far left field, but it helps explain the story better. And so I'll try to use a couple of buts and change around the topic and answer other common questions around that topic just to keep viewers interested and invested in hearing the full story. It takes some time, but you can get better at it as you, as you continue to write and put, put in the skills and then what's there for. So that's still part of it. So you say, but this happened like it's part of the storyline, right? You're explaining the medical story, but there's something, it doesn't work out the exact way you thought it was, and therefore this happens. And so you start to explain what happens there, and then you add another but, and then you continue to kind of make this dance around the main point. And ultimately you still answer all of the questions in the point of the video, but it keeps you, the viewer, more invested in what you're explaining.
- [13:48]
Sean Cannell
I think this is so powerful and I think it's a skill that can take time to develop. So if you're listening to this, it might feel overwhelming. You know, you could you think of Dr. Allen doing this for seven years, still at it, sharpening his skills all the time. You know, it's a good reason to subscribe to the podcast. And even just repetition of this kind of information and learning is so important because these are high level skills. But I feel like I want to call this like the Pulp Fiction strategy, because Quentin Tarantino is famous, as many other directors are, for cutting to the chase with a scene in one of his films and then jumping back way in the past to give you some past context, and then jumping into the future and then jumping into the middle. And you actually will oftentimes see this a lot. Some great shows. You know, if you're listening to this right now, maybe you think of a show that was, will Bring you into a present conflict. And then after a bit, we'll go back to the past to lay foundation. And maybe it's even walking through that individual's childhood, which is now making all these correlations to what's happening now. Or they're jumping between characters that are all moving around this narrative arc. The punchline is it's not linear, as we would just think, like a lot of shows or movies, they don't just start with like in day one, the protagonist was born and then 10 years of a really boring life. But even the big idea of cut to the chase would be the idea of like, how does every James Bond movie start? It starts with a gunfight. He's like riding on a jet ski. There's helicopters. It actually is 0 to 100 real quick. Like Drake. There's massive conflict. And then it's like six days earlier. And so it kind of goes back. So it's kind of what I envision when you were saying that it's sort of like you're grabbing people in, you're bringing them here. But that storytelling now is jumping back. And it's funny to, to relate, you know, a Quentin Tarantino movie or James Bond to education about eye Health or YouTube. But this story, these storytelling principles are transferable. And hopefully listeners, maybe they'll never watch a movie the same. Looking at the storytelling arc from every film you watch and how could you maybe include that in your videos? That's a really high level of thinking. When did you start doing that?
- [16:02]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Only until maybe the last year or two. And I think I sort of stumbled onto it by accident. Like I just started watching some other creators and thought, you know, that's an interesting way to, to, to shoot their video, an interesting way to edit it. How would I incorporate that in explaining this more medical based topic? And there, there's times it's worked. There's times where I applied it more heavily just because it's easier with some topics. But for example, with the. If someone goes back and watches my castor oil video, you will notice I kind of tee up that there are concerns or risks if someone puts a hundred percent castor oil on their eye. But first, let me explain that this study where I was really surprised that there's benefits to castor oil. And so it kind of shifts a little bit. You'll. You'll see it a little bit in that video.
- [16:48]
Sean Cannell
And that was an open loop because there's some risks. I'm like, okay, I need to know the risk. You're like, but first, let's go back and give you some context. I'm like, okay, well, now I need the context. But you've still created a great open loop that I need now need to close to understand what those risks are that are coming later in the video.
- [17:05]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Absolutely. And so it's, it's. I think it's a higher for, for anybody who's maybe just starting out, it is a higher level of video writing, and it's something I'm still working on. But as I get more, I get more excited writing the videos myself when I start writing it in this storytelling way rather than just cut and dry.
- [17:25]
Sean Cannell
I want to talk about YouTube shorts. And not every creator embraces shorts. Shorts are probably one of the most polarizing and controversial topics on YouTube because some creators are saying shorts will destroy your channel, divide your audience, hurts your regular views on your main videos. When I look at your top shorts, you've got a short that has 7.7 million views. Now your most viewed regular video has 4.8 million views. Congratulations on both fronts. Crushing it. But I'm curious, when did you decide to embrace shorts and what have you learned? Has it been a positive neutral? Is there pros and cons that you've personally felt, and are you committed to still posting shorts?
- [18:09]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So when we started doing shorts, I think I came to it late. You know, I started just testing it out a little bit here and there. Wasn't really sure how to do it because I've never really gravitated toward TikTok or Instagram Reels too hard. But I thought, you know what, this is something. It's part of YouTube. YouTube's investing in it. I should at least try it, see how it affects things. And we had a little bit of success doing some reactions, but I started just kind of saying, hey, let's pick topics, especially even SEO, things that, you know, I can't make a full video on this, but I can at least make kind of a short and zoom in on that. And it's not going to hurt anything for me to try it. And what I've found, it actually has done nothing but help the channel because it's a lot of times these short videos go to people who are more interested in watching short content than just long form content. And it gets in front of people who've never seen my, my content before. So it ends up at least drawing them to the channel. And at some point, if they watch one or two shorts, the algorithm may learn, hey, this person might also like a long form from me. And they get shown one of my like top 10 video, they, they get more introduced to my, my world of eye care. And that's kind of the mission. I want people to learn about the eyes and take care of them better. And so the more people I can raise awareness to, then that accomplishes my mission. So what we're doing now, we are going to be investing more heavily in short form content for all platforms. Right. I'm not just dedicating just to YouTube, but I make it with the mindset that YouTube is still my priority number one platform. So we're going to be doing more, but we're planning our short content largely around our long form. And so when I plan out a long form video, like again, we have astigmatism. I'm remaking some of my older top 10 videos that I started with and that astigmatism video, wow, there's, there's actually like four or five shorts I can make all around astigmatism and, and I can post those a week before the main video, I can post those during the week of the main video, I can post those afterward and they all will feed back to that main video. And so we're going to continue kind of coming up with these strategies down the road and leaving room as a trend may come up, a trend may come up on any platform and we'll be able to comment on that or find places to fill that in with our content schedule.
- [20:41]
Sean Cannell
It's interesting for an established creator like you, I think I heard you say we're going to remake our top 10 videos. Break that down for maybe somebody listening, even if they're just starting. It might be a way to think about what if I run out of topics. Well, there's maybe the ability to repeat yourself eventually, especially if it's months or even years later, over your now seven years of building a channel. But explain your thinking behind looking at your top 10 and then redoing it. What is the mindset there, the strategy there?
- [21:14]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So we know that just looking at our statistics, okay, there's certain topics, like the topic is interesting. There's a lot of people asking about these hot topics in the eye care world. Of course there's things like eye bags, there's dark circles, there's floaters, there's contact lenses. There's a lot of these key common questions people are asking. In some of these videos I made back in 2018, 2019, I used older cameras that the information I'll be putting out may be very similar or the same because not much has changed about, like, astigmatism that hasn't changed, like what we know about it, but I have changed. The way I shoot, the style of how I, the way I communicate has changed. But in addition to this, I have grown almost a million subscribers since then. A lot of those subscribers may have never seen that original video from 5, 6 years ago on astigmatism. So if anything, I'm doing them a disservice. I should be talking about this important topic this next year and just getting that out to new people and maybe people who've already seen the old video, maybe they'd be interested in learning more about it from a different perspective. So I think there's, there's, it's an easy bet for me to say, hey, this is a good content that is going to be consistent and I can do a better job. And it's a way to show up for my viewers and future viewers.
- [22:46]
Sean Cannell
I think this is one of the most underrated strategies that creators miss because they're afraid of repeating themselves or, or they feel like I've already said that and that impression might come if they do repeat themselves. One person in the comments are like, haven't you already, like, talked about that? Or haven't you already posted a video about that? And then you know you've posted a video about that. So in your mind you're like, well, I've already talked about that. Even if you reflect back, you're like, well, I've already covered astigmatism, not realizing all of the strategic and logical reasons you've mentioned. Well, there's a bunch of new people that still need to learn about it. There's, you have new style and new gear. It's a new year. There's probably 10, 20% of. Maybe it's not even new information. Maybe it's a little bit of new information because maybe a few new medical break, you know, papers or something, but also just your ability to communicate it. What I want listeners to really take away is that I think a lot of people are missing out on the opportunity of repeating themselves more on the proven topics. They're constantly searching for something new. I heard one person put it this way, we shouldn't be constantly trying to say new things because if we are, then we at some point are making stuff up. Because in any niche there's probably like 10 core topics, 30 adjacent and like max 100 if you're really. And then of course you get into. But there's not that many things you'd ultimately be saying when you're covering those core topics, of course, different niches are different. The quote is, you shouldn't be constantly trying to say new things to new people. You should be trying to say the same things to new people. This episode is brought to you by streamyard. Streamyard is our go to platform here at Think Media for live streaming to Facebook and YouTube and for recording our video podcast. It has an incredibly easy to use interface for built in branding, transitions, text, lower thirds and seamlessly bringing on guests. And they just added an awesome new feature called local Recording. This allows you to take the quality to another level by separating out your audio and video from your guests, giving you more control over your content for later use. This feature is perfect for video and podcast creators. And so to get a special deal on Streamyard right now and to see all the features that are included, just go to stream with think.com that is stream with think.com. there's millions of people who still have not discovered you. Even though you have a million subscribers. There's. If any channel has a hundred thousand subscribers or 10,000, their videos aren't getting 10,000 views usually. So what 1% of your audience, 5% of your audience has seen it. And the myth is you believe you post a video and everyone sees it and then you believe they watch the whole thing. So you believe they've even got all the information. And then you realize too, you just, you have an entirely new strategy of viewer retention. So if you posted that before, and sure it did well, and it did incredibly well, but also if the average viewer duration was two minutes, there's a lot of information they need on a 10 minute video. I'm just giving a lot of rationale for the listener to do exactly what you're saying, that like remake your winners, repackage your best topics, don't be afraid to repeat yourself and don't worry about the 1 or 2 or 3% because the thank God for the 3% of people that go, you already talked about this. You should say like, thank you for being such a super fan. Because that is such that it's not the majority. That's one person who's like, they watch every single thing you do. It's like, all right, I appreciate you, you know, acknowledging that the 99% still need to be reached, even of your own subscribers usually. And so I really got excited about that strategy. Let's go a little bit broader and take it back now to your journey and what we can learn from that. You just said you Know we. One of the things we are working on, which speaks to the. The aspect that your channel has grown million subscribers, building a team, delegating things. But of course that's not where you started. So if we were to walk through the seasons, take us back to you getting started. Day one. What's your lifestyle? Working in a clinic, thinking about starting a YouTube channel and trying to figure this thing out when there is no we and there's maybe not an extra budget and there's not fancy cameras, but just what it really takes to get going as a busy professional. Back when you started.
- [27:25]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So when I had this idea to start a YouTube channel, and I won't get too into the romance of it, but I had this idea and I said, okay, it's New Year's 2017's ending, beginning of 2018, I'm gonna start a YouTube channel about eye care. Nothing really exists on this topic and I don't really have anybody to guide me. I didn't really have mentorship, so I gotta figure this out. I had no idea about cameras, no idea about lighting, video editing, nothing. So I go on YouTube and start typing in. How do I start this? Actually, that's how I found you, Sean, and found Think Media. So you helped me figure out what camera to get, what lenses to start with, how to set up the lighting. I basically studied everything Think Media, posted for about three months, trying to just even learn the basics because again, this is a new world for me. So it took about three months of me just, I was sitting on the bike in the gym, taking notes, watching videos on what I needed to buy, kind of strategizing, okay, how do I make content? And then I finally purchased all the gear, maybe two and a half grand worth of investment into different gear because I wanted a certain level of professionalism. I didn't want to come off like I'm a doctor. I don't want to be look like I'm just shooting off of my cell phone in a garage. So I did invest a little bit for higher quality gear at that time. In retrospect, I wish I would have invested more because I've prob. Probably wasted thousands of dollars on crappy lights that only lasted, you know, one year or something. And I should have just invested in something a little bit higher end. It took about six months of me studying content, practicing, learning how to edit before I had enough courage to post my first video, which came out in July of 2018. The first three, four months, again, I was just throwing stuff against the wall, like throwing Videos against the hall, hoping it would work out. I remember some tough days. I was, you know, working six, seven days a week in the clinic and spending my Saturday at the clinic when I could have been outside hanging out with friends. You know, they're going to movies, they're going fishing or boating in back in Minnesota, where I was living at the time. And I'm sitting there, I'm in here on a Saturday, sitting in front of a camera, re recording introductions and saying the same lines and trying to find better ways to explain things and getting frustrated at myself and because I think if you're not used to producing YouTube videos, if you're not used to making content, it can be a challenge. But I got into this mindset of like, you know what? Even if I'm struggling now, it's. I'm going, I'm building a skill set. I'm building a skill set of knowing how to produce videos. I'm developing a skinny. A skill set of how to talk and how to be a better presenter, how I can be a better communicator, which is a really essential skill for I think anyone, almost anyone, but certainly somebody in health care. I just kept on working. And that first year was really tough because again, I didn't know what is going on. And I almost had like a mental breakdown four months in trying to produce a video every week and, and learning all these skills at the same time. But one of my good friends encouraged me. He's like, you know what? You're doing great. You're making at least some core videos that you can share with patients. And then finally one of my videos did hit and got suggested again a little bit by luck, but I caught a topic which was on ifloaters, and I somewhat. I sort of. I can't say I fully copied a video from thick media, but again, I didn't know how to talk on camera. So I watched one of your videos and I remember writing out almost word for word script of one of your videos. And instead of camera lenses, I crossed it out in order to put contact lenses. And I would slowly kind of teach myself, oh, okay, I see how he's teaching this. And so I use that as kind of a framework to learn how to write videos. But that first year was really tough. And then finally, after having some success, I said, hey, I'm going to invest in this guy's course, your VRA course. And I took that. And. And I think when I finally had that course, it started to click. But I went through the course like Six, seven times I would listen to it on my way, on my commute to work. And so I think the fundamentals of what was taught in that course I was able to really apply. And that at least was proof of concept. And I started having success, success. And that was the first, the first year. In fact the first two years was a constant like skill building year. Solopreneur. I didn't get an assistant until 2021. So three years in and I was honestly kind of. I think any solopreneur knows that they get ragged. You're like working 80 hours a week trying to, whether it be full time with your normal job plus trying to build a YouTube channel. And then finally got to that point where I'm like, I can't do this on my own. I need someone to answer emails because there's 20 emails I'm not getting to every day. I need help figuring out content production. I need something. So I started. Thankfully I was able to hire an assistant to handle things, small things. And now we have two assistants and now we're looking to build our team more. It's a lot of twists and turns, man.
- [32:56]
Sean Cannell
It's inspiring to hear your story and humbling to hear how Think media and our program video ranking academy has been a part of your journey, but also just your hustle. I think there's a big lesson there too. Like we have a lot of VRA students that listen to the podcast and I just am so pumped that you said I went through it six to seven times. I want to challenge somebody that has invested in vra. They haven't been through it one time. And don't complain about the results you didn't get from the work you didn't do. Like there's something about it. It works if you work it. And I want to encourage you right after this podcast, dive back into your members area. And I love how you spoke to the emotions though, even the mental breakdown. I think people can relate to that. Especially when you add in kids or full time job doing this on the side pressures, trying to get this off the ground. And that's, that's the hardest season because eventually once you start getting margin and a little bit of money and you know, whatever else. But the result, the liftoff strength, it's kind of like a rocket ship. Elon Musk, SpaceX. They say that the rocket fuel, how much percentage? 50, 60, 70% is burnt just to get the thing moving and then it's a lot less once there's momentum at the beginning it's the emotional energy, it's the physical energy, it's the financial energy. You invest a couple thousand dollars, you don't make that back right away. It's a lot invested right up front. And then liftoff was not overnight. And so such a clear picture of the even years this can take. So I'm curious, when did you go? When did like the finances click? In a little bit. Did you lessen your time at the clinic? Are you still keeping that as like a pillar full time because of passion? And what was kind of the transition between your full time work and what you would call going quote unquote, full time on YouTube, which is defined differently by different people?
- [34:55]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah, so I, when I went into this niche, especially in iCare and YouTube, like it never really existed before. So again, I didn't have a mentor. I didn't have any idea of how much potential it could make financially. So I think the first moment I had when I was like, wow, like financially, even just as a YouTube channel, I didn't have a course, I didn't have any products to sell. It was just Adsense and basically like some affiliates. And within the first year I was getting to a point where I was hitting like 10, 10 grand a month of extra income. Right. And I think for a lot of people that's, that's not small change.
- [35:37]
Sean Cannell
I was that your first year or second year you mentioned? Like, I mean if I count six months of kind of prep, three months of throwing videos against the wall, eventually you get vra. I'm just curious, was there kind of like almost like the prequel and then it starts because you're getting ready or just so we have like a realistic timeline.
- [35:57]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah, thanks for clarifying that. I guess in my head I meant one year after I got monetized.
- [36:02]
Sean Cannell
Okay.
- [36:03]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So the first year, of course I spent six months not posting anything. I, by the end of that first year I did get monetized and I probably made at most, at least got my money back for my equipment at the end of the first year. That doesn't include all the time investment. Right. But for, for at least physical equipment, maybe two and a half thousand dollars by the first year. Because when you first get monetized, unless you have a huge video, you don't get that much off of Adsense. And I maybe had, I was just dabbling in affiliate. They didn't really know how. I had just gotten onto like an Amazon partner at the time. So as the channel continued to build up, probably, we'll say a year and a half into the process from my first video posting, I, I, I got a, a, an AdSense check of like $9,000. And I was like, wow, I had no idea it had that potential. And that's off of adsense, which is I think unreliable at best. I hate to say, but it's, I think that was a big moment in my head. I'm like, whoa. This has a different type of business model that, that could work very well in fueling the mission rather than me just working six days a week in the clinic, which is not uncommon for a lot of doctors.
- [37:29]
Sean Cannell
So did you stop? Do you still do some, what was that pivot point? And how do you define full time?
- [37:35]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah, so in 2021, I eventually started winding down. The YouTube channel, had gotten to about 200,000 subscribers or so. The clinic I was working at actually ended up selling to a private equity company because originally I was going to become partner but lost that opportunity. And I was like, you know what, this might be a blessing in disguise. I have this upper opportunity that I've been working on. It's growing, it's having this success. This is a time for me to pivot and put a little bit more weight into the YouTube channel. And I wanted to see more success there. So I dropped down to two days a week in the clinic, more time on YouTube. And I stayed at two days a week from 2021 until 2024. The beginning of 2024, I switched to one day a week in the clinic. Now I still see patients. I love seeing patients. It also keeps me relevant in my, the core profession and other professionals in my space take me more seriously. The fact that I still see, I still see patients every week. And then so I've really shifted to more I, in my mind I'm more full time YouTube. It's still, it's like a seven day a week job. You know, if you're a business owner, you think about it almost every day, but it's, it's the primary focus of what I want to do and what I want to continue pushing and building.
- [39:00]
Sean Cannell
I really love your story and I love this ethic. You know, to each their own. Listening to this, how their career might evolve. But it's a personal, I mean, maybe call it a pet peeve of mine that there are so many legendary teachers you could learn from. Maybe you meet one at college or university. But also universities in my opinion are unfortunately there's too many, like business professors that have never run a successful business or they ran a successful business 30 years ago. And I Just think it's something so powerful about staying in the trenches. You know, one of our ethic ethic media, we recently had Nathan and Craig on our podcast. And like, whether it's doing church video production, whether it's shooting weddings on the weekend, whether it's, you know, using the cameras in the real world and of course, creating content is the real world as well. But we call it player coaches. This idea of like, we always want to be on the field and if we're going to be teachers, great, but let's keep it. And it might shift to one day a week. But it's also. I want to share this because I think it gives you an edge, it gives you an unfair advantage when this idea of content creation can become so meta, where all you're really doing is like, you're not in it as much. And the closer you are to the pain points, the feelings, the issues, facetime, you know, in the church world. There was a quote that I was a campus pastor once and like a old school pastor that had like the wisdom and the time under his belt. He told Miguel Ogas, who I was working with. He said, I can tell you're a real pastor because you smell like the sheep. Kind of a funny quote. But it was like, because you're actually, you're not just in the green room. You're not just locked away. You're not just, you know, they call it management by walking around Michael Scott the office, you know, but it's like it's. It's like actually being out there, like, you know, using the stuff, like putting the wear and tear on it, whether that's the gear, whether that's whatever you do. Not to overemphasize that point, but I just love seeing that progression and the wisdom of staying in it when certainly you have so much opportunity before you and so many things you could do that could just completely take up all of your time. I really like that. Now, if we go back to, well, actually just paint today, who's on the team? Do people edit the videos? Thumbnail designers Assistant. What does an assistant do?
- [41:31]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah, the team has evolved a little bit. I still have the original assistant. She now takes on a little bit larger role. We're trying to still figure out what do we call her, because she does more than just my assistant. She's almost like a co producer in a way. She helps figure out the content, what plan are, you know, the structure of the content, the planning of kind of time blocking throughout the week. She still schedules what my meetings are but she also, as an educator, she has a really high level understanding of how do we build systems and how do we better teach to teach our viewers and potential customers, clients, that sort of thing. So we're still working on what her role really is, but she's expanding and doing a lot of things. We do have a part time assistant, only works about 10 hours a week, but he does more on the sides of research, helping plan and look up SEO numbers, tracking. Okay, what are, what, what are good topic, possible title options. He also does some research of like, hey, if I'm going to be doing a video on this topic, I want him to go dig into PubMed and pull up every single publication in the last five years on this topic. That saves me time. You know, I don't, you know, my time is worth a little bit heavier because I need to write the videos, I need to produce the videos so he can at least save me the time so I'm not sitting there scrambling, doing all this research. I still read the publications he finds, but again, digging through the algorithm, the, the search bar, I don't have to do that. And now as a business, we're in this hot season. The new season we're in is really reformatting the business, building in systems so that we can find someone to build the thumbnails for us. I've had an editor, we've been paying, this is a private contractor for years. He does great. But we're looking at maybe finding someone that's more full time, that can invest more time into building better animations or graphics for us rather than us having to do that heavy lifting. And so we are, we're in that season of growth and change. Right.
- [43:33]
Sean Cannell
Who does the thumbnails?
- [43:35]
Dr. Joseph Allen
I largely still do the thumbnails.
- [43:38]
Sean Cannell
You're still. Okay, so you're hands on. What do you use software wise?
- [43:41]
Dr. Joseph Allen
I still use Canva. You know, I started using Photoshop but it's, it's a bit complex for me. So I got into Canva and now I'm at like a black belt level of it. Yeah, if you look at some of the thumbnails, you're like that, that, you know, there's like multiple layers of different things on top of each other with different shading and, and kind of creative uses of removing backgrounds. And it's, I'm impressed myself sometimes, but it's, it works great.
- [44:08]
Sean Cannell
So you've had a contract editor, a contractor, you, you've been doing the thumbnails. When it comes down to like getting the title and the Video optimized and description and all of that. Do you also do that, do all your own posting?
- [44:21]
Dr. Joseph Allen
That has historically been me for the last six and a half, seven, seven years. And now again we're in that season where we're trying to shift and see who can do that and take that off my shoulders because I need to be investing my time more wisely.
- [44:35]
Sean Cannell
Got it. And then today what are the revenue streams? You know you mentioned it's Really, I mean 10k a month on ad revenue is really incredible actually because some never make it that far. But they can actually build very profitable YouTube businesses and online businesses. But as you fast forward to today, if we were to draw out like a pie chart, even if we don't have numbers, how do things break down in regards to ads or other income streams?
- [45:00]
Dr. Joseph Allen
So right now we're equal about 1/3 split AdSense, another 1/3 split of product sales like affiliates and then another one thirds is probably more on the line of sponsorships or some sort of brand deals. But again we're in this season of change and we're in the process of building our own digital products. And so the business is going to shift pretty heavy here going into the next year. But I think that will expand our potential income and accelerate massive growth I expect with. Because we're going to be, that's going to give us more funds to grow the business to get us from producing one video, major video a week to two videos a week. We'll hire more people. It's, it's, it's going to be great. I think it's going to be a great asset for us.
- [45:50]
Sean Cannell
And has that been your commitment over the past six years? One video a week?
- [45:54]
Dr. Joseph Allen
I've been basically doing one video a week. We also have done live streams like once a month and we kind of put that in place of one video because we've actually found great success with live streams over the last few years. The amount of time like this watch time has been incredible. And some people prefer that long form content. They, they, we find that we, they. A lot of people listen to live streams that are 30, 40 minutes long as if they're listening to a podcast. And we go a little bit deeper on subjects than just what we stay kind of surface level with just the like a 8 to 10 minute YouTube video.
- [46:29]
Sean Cannell
I mean for education channels. That is absolutely true. I know a lot of people in the Think Media podcast watch replays of our live streams because it is basically a podcast with rich information. Even the Coffee with Cannell show Replays cover all kinds of different stuff. And I do the same. I don't know if you do. You know, I'll go to. When I find a channel I like, I. I will look at not just the videos, but the live streams and maybe find a topic. It's 45 minutes. It's an hour and 15 minutes. Turn it on when I'm driving, doing, you know, chores around the house or something. So you're saying one video a week, but maybe if you did three and you don't have another one going, you would replace one with a live stream. But the ethic, the simple strategy is one video a week for six years.
- [47:15]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Basically. Yeah. And right now, if you, if people who are. If you were to go to my channel right now, you'd see I haven't posted anything for three weeks. What's going on? Well, I am strategically making that business decision of, hey, I need to pull back, I need to restool the business I have. And funny enough, we actually have seen more growth in the last three weeks not posting anything because we have put in the work of videos that rank videos that have great content. And so it has bought us this time off to retool the business and build our product, which is ultimately going to leverage us in the future. So it's.
- [47:53]
Sean Cannell
I'm about to jump out of my chair and click my heels like a leprechaun. Because if compound interest is the seventh wonder of the world, ranked videos are the eighth. Because when you have a library of ranked videos, videos like you've posted that are as old as six years old and still getting views, it not only helps you build the empire you've built, but it buys you freedom. Freedom to take time off, work on the next thing, rest, recover a little bit, and still have your channel growing. And that's really cool to hear. Speak a little bit more to just the mindset, though, of the compound effect and consistency. And a lot of people are looking for, like a magic number of like two videos a week, three videos a week, one video a week. And then sometimes maybe like around a certain holiday season, I'm gonna do vlogmas or something, and they want to do 30 videos in a. In a month. The simplicity of your approach, but the consistency, because I think there's something about it multiplied by six years. There's something about just, you know, whether you're feeling up or down, whether you're going through challenges or not. Like, how have you had that resilience to just make the plan and stick with the plan?
- [49:04]
Dr. Joseph Allen
You Know, it's, I think early on, again, I learned a lot from you, Sean. But I, I, I saw like, hey, if this is something I can just stick with, I'm going to show up all the time. It, it basically reflects good on my brand. Right. If a doctor owns a clinic or if they work at a clinic, do you expect to get paid if you never show up for work? You know, so no business is going to work unless your staff shows up. It's never going to grow. No. You go to that clinic and it's closed. You're like, why is the door closed? There's no sign. I don't know. So I had this mentality like, I need to show up. Even if the video is not going to be a million view views video, that's okay. As long as I show up, I deliver consistent, it's quality content. It grew, it has grown. My brand not just as like a great resource for education, for the consumers, but even in my profession, doctors, both nationally, here in the US but internationally, when I go to conferences in eye care, there's doctors around the globe who know the brand of the YouTube channel, Dr. Eye Health because it is consistent and it's quality and they, they have faith in that. And so it's, it's, it pushes me that I owe it to my viewers and to my profession to show up.
- [50:29]
Sean Cannell
Man, that's super strong. I just was telling our team because I'm going to be, you know, we're always updating vra. I was talking about taking some time off. Not to take time off, but to focus on the next version coming soon. And it was, we weren't going to slow down the podcast or stop the podcast. One, we're actually going to probably repurpose some episodes. But two, I was talking about might have a guest host. So think media podcast, get ready. It'll be an incredible month or two. And it might only be. We'd post twice a week. But regardless what the aha moment to me was, I was like, yo, we're a church. Not that we're a church, but I was like, church is open every Sunday. And whether the pastor's on sabbatical or not, whether it's a guest speaker, whether it's the youth pastor preaching. And it's also like, who's going to get that shot? How do you actually raise up leaders? And, or, and so there is something interesting about the mindset of showing up consistently. And if you were to go to a church and you're like, oh, this would be awesome to check out and the doors were locked on Sunday when it was should be advertised. Then you kind of miss out on that opportunity. I think having that mindset is tough, but I want to encourage listeners because early on you're like, well, no one's taking me serious yet. I don't have a brand yet. I don't have the money yet. I think that's, that's a losing mindset. You have to be thinking big in small places. Don't let your small YouTube channel make you small minded. You're, you're acting as if you are a professional organization that is a media company that is showing up and being true to your promises in your word, even though it's so hard because you're in that tough early season and massive respect to how it's grown your brand because you've showed up over the years and you've bought, built yourself the momentum to now also have a library of videos. So you're still showing up thousands of times a day on your old content to all kinds of viewers. I am curious specifically, there's some listeners that are professionals, maybe in finance, business, any arena, maybe medical content. I'm curious how you've dealt with mindsets of maybe what if I damage my reputation through content creation? What if I get sued? What if I get judgment from other professionals? How'd you work through those mindsets? Or what lessons did you learn about those that are hesitating to get on camera because of those fears, which might be false evidence appearing real, but nevertheless that fear feels very real.
- [53:02]
Dr. Joseph Allen
When I first started, I was worried that other professionals in the eye care space were not going to approve of my content. They weren't going to approve of the information I was getting out. And I think, I don't know, a lot of it was probably the imposter syndrome, just kind of fears of judgment. Funny enough, as I put out this information, as long as you're giving out good information, good quality content, I have more support for my industry than I ever thought was going to happen. And it's so I think it has paid off. But I think the key to it is you just have to have quality content. But there was a lot of mindset of just, hey, this takes courage. If it was easy, someone else would have done it already, even for that. If there's somebody else in the niche you want, if somebody's new and they're like, hey, I want to build this and there's already a hundred creators in this niche, that's okay, you are a different person. You Speak differently. I always coach to other, other doctors. Even in the eye care space. I'm like, look, someone may want to learn eye care from a female doctor who has, like, an Indian accent there. They might have somebody that connects better with that. So it takes courage, though, without a doubt. But you kind of have to figure out which part of is this your ego talking to yourself that you're worried about, or is it like, does it truly matter to your mission? And so I think in many ways, I learned to kind of mute my ego and focus on who I'm really making content for, for. And that has always kind of led me in the right direction.
- [54:45]
Sean Cannell
My final question for you is, what would you tell creators if they were feeling like maybe it's too late to start YouTube? And if you were to start from scratch today, in light of the market today, what would be some of your first tips? But before you answer that, if people want to check out your content, follow you, study your channel, learn from what you've been doing, we'll make sure it's in the show notes, but give a shout out to your stuff.
- [55:09]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Yeah. So thank you, doctor. Ihealth is the channel. We're also on Instagram. We're on TikTok. We're on all those different channels. So you can spell out D O C T O R I health or you can put in doctor. Eventually you'll find it. So thank you.
- [55:26]
Sean Cannell
Amazing. We'll make sure to link that up in the show notes. And I also just want to acknowledge you, grateful for you being a part of our community, being at some of our events, the chance we've gotten to shake hands and connect, and just really being. You're an inspiring story in the video VRA community. From the action you've taken, the way you've implemented, and I know you've shared at a couple different things, VRA show and things like that. So always thank you for taking the time and adding massive value. We are truly grateful for you. As we go into a new year or listeners are listening to this in a new year, if creators feel like it's too late, what would you say to that? But also, what would you say in light of a colleague comes to you right now and they're like, man, I want to start, but world's noisy. Plus people are watching Hulu and Netflix anyway. There's so much to do. Like what? What should I do? How should I get started right now? What would you say?
- [56:17]
Dr. Joseph Allen
Well, one, I just would. I want people to start. I think it's just it's, you know what? Even if it's, if it's okay, if you're. You're on, you are feel shaky about investing. You're afraid to put yourself out there. You know what? Everybody's gonna. Everybody has that fear. That's how everybody starts. That's how I started. I'm sure when you first started making your first video, you're like, I have no idea what I'm doing. You know, it's. It's not, it's not inherently easy, and it takes courage to put yourself out there. But if you have clarity about who you're talking to and why and the key topics you want to cover and really get your voice out there, showing up and showing up consistently, your skill set will constantly rise. And I, I've. I've looked back and thought, you know what? During 2020, one of my best friends, he wanted to start a video game channel. And I encouraged him and I tried to help him a little bit. He eventually lost passion and gave up on it. But I look back, I'm like, I know other channels that never existed before and started in 2020. They're now almost five years in, and they have hundreds of thousands of subscribers. They're generating income. They're. They're growing their brand, and that's because they started and they stuck with it. So it's scary at times, but really just getting going, showing up, waking up in the next day and saying, okay, let's. Let's see if we can do it again. Let's see if we can do it a little bit better. That's really the mindset to success. I think, when it comes to YouTube, you got to show up.
- [57:49]
Sean Cannell
Strong advice and tips, and I want to thank you again for being on the podcast. And if you want more help showing up and learning how to get views, subscribers, all the YouTube best practices. We've got some incredible guests and solo rounds coming up on the Think Media podcast. But if you got value out of today's episode, like rate, share, review wherever you watch or listen. My name is Sean Cannell, your guide to building a profitable YouTube channel, and I will catch you in the next episode.