459: How She Got a Billion Views With Niche Videos (Full Masterclass)

Summary

Podcast Summary: Think Media Podcast Ep. 459

"How She Got a Billion Views With Niche Videos (Full Masterclass)"

Host: Nathan, Think Media
Guest: Anastasia, Nail Art YouTuber / Educator (Nail CO)
Date: October 30, 2025

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Overview

In this episode, Nathan welcomes Anastasia, a YouTube nail artist and educator who has built a multi-channel empire in three languages, amassed hundreds of millions of views, and converted her content into a thriving business. The discussion is a deep-dive masterclass on YouTube growth strategies, covering content ideation, analytics, thumbnails, titles, storytelling, retention, monetization, and continuous learning. Anastasia offers practical, tested tactics for both new and advanced creators.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

1. Anastasia’s YouTube Journey & Multi-Language Channels

• Started with a Russian channel; expanded to English and then Spanish.
  • Quote: “My first channel was Russian because that's the language I speak. But since nail art is so visual, people were commenting in English. So after two years, I realized I need another one.” (03:20–03:39)
• Monetization through Ads, Sponsorships, Affiliate Links, and Online Classes.
• Diversity of revenue: pivoting when Russian ad revenue was lost to global events.

2. Finding and Prioritizing Video Ideas

• Process:
  • Maintains spreadsheets with hundreds of ideas.
  • Leverages YouTube Studio's 'Trends' and 'What Your Audience Watches.'
  • Checks trends across Pinterest, TikTok, and uses AI (like ChatGPT) to analyze comments for topic trends.
  • Quote: “My problem is typically how do I find time to create all the ideas I have? … Some come from my head, but later I realized research is better.” (05:02–05:32)

3. Starting with Analytics—For Beginners

• Focus on what's already working: Look at best-performing videos, analyze views and retention.
• “Views don’t lie… take the best performing videos and analyze their retention graph, and then go from there.” (07:13–07:59)

4. Benchmarking Competitors and Adjacent Niches

• Analyzed every single competitor at the start; now leverages AI to quickly spot comment trends.
• Draws inspiration from similar visual niches, e.g., fitness, to innovate presentation.

5. Ideation to Packaging: Thumbnail and Title First

• Recent shift: Thinks about thumbnail and title before recording the video.
• “If I cannot come up with a really good idea for the thumbnail, maybe it’s not the video I should record right now.” (11:44–13:33)
• Uses AI tools to sketch thumbnail drafts and A/B tests titles.

6. Thumbnails: Big, Bold, and Before Over After

• Key tactic: Zoom in on details (nails) for clarity—even more important on mobile.
• “When thumbnails are really small, you can't see anything if it's not zoomed in. Especially in my niche, nails are already small.” (16:03–16:53)
• Transformation format works best if ONLY the “before” is shown in thumbnail:
  • “For some reason, they perform much better if I only show the before. The viewers are curious about what happens. They want the story.” (17:14–18:02)

7. Titles: Simplicity Beats Technical Jargon

• Mistake: Using overly professional terminology deterred clicks.
• “Once I started implementing simple titles, they were doing so much better. Something as simple as possible that even a child will understand.” (20:22–21:24)

8. Retention: The ‘Hover Appeal’ and Re-hooking

• First Seconds: Must be visually compelling—viewers decide while hovering, not clicking.
  • “I try to show something really catchy at the beginning. Not me talking, but the nail, the transformation. Briefly describe what I'm going to do, then jump right to it.” (23:41–24:31)
• Retaining Attention:
  • Preview upcoming steps (“We have nine more to go!”)
  • Tease future sections within the video.
  • Storytelling and breaking content into segments or time jumps.

9. Storytelling in Educational Content

• Incorporates real client stories and anecdotal evidence—improves relatability.
• “It's still nice when there is a story involved… people relate and comment, ‘My nails are just like that!’” (32:49–33:33)
• Uses analogies and sometimes props to make technical content more memorable.

10. Calls to Action: Placement and Strategy

• Optimal placement: In the middle, not end, before the most interesting reveal.
• “I put it like right in the middle… if they already watched to the center, they're probably engaged already.” (39:49–41:44)

11. Continuous Learning and Improvement

• Mantra: “Never stop learning.”
• Regularly reviews analytics, tracks not just views but “subscriber density” (subs-per-1k-views).
  • “Some videos, even with low views, may bring 10 subscribers. Those are usually the most valuable, educational ones.” (47:11–49:09)
• Imports YouTube data to spreadsheets for deeper analysis—watches for spikes/dips in retention graphs.
• Encourages taking notes and applying insights right away: “If you just listen and forget, that knowledge really means nothing.” (43:27–45:11)

12. Ensuring a Balanced Content Strategy

• Makes content for wider audiences (not just hard-core fans) to convert new viewers to returning/subscribers.
• Mixes broad and niche videos for a healthy channel ecosystem.

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• Thumbnails Before Content:
  “The time you spend on doing a video, you need to spend at least the same amount or half of it to packaging the video.”
  — Anastasia (00:51, 54:43–55:59)

• On Simplicity in Titles:
  “I always was trying to name my videos very smart and professionally… but whenever I named my videos something like ‘How to use Thai gel to hide hyponychium,’ people didn’t click. Simple titles did much better.”
  — Anastasia (20:22–21:24)

• On Thumbnail Strategy:
  “For some reason, [videos] perform much better if I only show the before. The viewers are curious about what happens. They want the story.”
  — Anastasia (17:14–18:02)

• On Retention / “Hover Appeal”:
  “I try to show something really catchy and something to the point right at the beginning of the video… not me talking, but the nail… show today and then jump right to the video.”
  — Anastasia (23:41–24:31)

• On Analytics Obsession:
  “I just can’t stop from looking at analytics all the time… I can look at these graphs forever.”
  — Anastasia (47:11–49:09)

• On Learning and Applying:
  “I was always writing it down so I will not forget, and try to use this knowledge in my next videos.”
  — Anastasia (45:11)

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Important Segment Timestamps

• [02:52] — Multi-channel introduction & revenue streams
• [05:02] — Ideation: Where video ideas come from
• [07:13] — Using analytics to double down on what's working
• [11:44] — Thumbnail and title first, before recording
• [16:03] — Thumbnails: Zoomed visuals
• [17:14] — "Before" photos outperform “before-and-after"
• [20:22] — Simplicity in titling
• [23:41] — Hook strategy: “Hover appeal"
• [25:55] — How to re-hook and retain
• [32:49] — Storytelling in educational content
• [39:49] — Mid-video calls to action
• [43:27] — Growth, learning, and active application
• [47:11] — Analytics deep-dive: Subscriber density
• [52:49] — Producing content for different audience segments
• [54:43] — Advice to beginners; packaging is as important as content

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Where to Find Anastasia

• Main (English) Channel: Nail Co – Nail CO U (53:56)

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Closing Advice

• For Beginners:
  “My best advice is to learn the strategy… The time you spend on making a video, you need to spend at least the same amount or half packaging the video… I had some great videos, but not that many people watched because thumbnails and titles were so off.” (54:43–55:59)

• On Consistency vs. Analytics:
  “At the very beginning, count uploads—be consistent. That’s your scoreboard. Later, analytics help you level up.” (55:59)

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This episode delivers a tactical and inspirational roadmap for any creator—especially those in niche or visual categories—to grow and monetize their channels by thinking like an audience-first strategist.

Transcript

[Nathan]

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[Anastasia]

The time you spend on doing a video, you need to spend at least the same amount or half of it to packaging the video.

[Nathan]

Over 700,000 subscribers, more than 340 million views, channel wide. But that's just one YouTube channel.

[Anastasia]

I have channels about nail art in English, Russian and Spanish. I will just try to understand, like, was it the topic? Was it the thumbnail, Was it the video itself? So I always think, how can I visually show it and make the thumbnail?

[Nathan]

How do you go about titles then?

[Anastasia]

Sure. I have one insight that also took me years to discover.

[Nathan]

Anastasia is a nail artist, an educator who's clearly cracked the code on how to make niche videos that get massive reach across each of her channels. We have multiple languages going on and she's actually built a real business in the process. And so today I'm so excited she's letting us inside her YouTube empire and we'll break down what's going on. We're going to talk about how she finds topics, how she packages them, how she makes changes to ensure that every upload is better than the last one. Man, we got a lot to go through. So welcome to the Think Media podcast, the number one show bringing you unfiltered YouTube tips for building a profitable channel. I'm Nathan, one of the YouTube coaches here at Think Media. Anastasia, what's going on? How are you doing today?

[Anastasia]

Hello, Nathan. Thank you so much. I'm super excited to be here because Think Media was the blog I used to to learn YouTube. I used to watch a lot.

[Nathan]

Oh, let's go. Well, hey, this will be so much fun because, man, if you got to learn some stuff from Think Media before, I'm excited for what you're going to be able to with our audience now of what you've learned, because you've quite a journey. If you don't mind, I'd actually like to just jump right into where you're at right now. I mentioned in the intro that you've got, you had a lot of subscribers, a lot of views, a lot of videos that outlier, which are just videos that have overperformed. And so I'd love to, if you could give us a snapshot right now of what your channel looks like, like, how are you making money right now across your multiple channels?

[Anastasia]

Yeah, so I have channels about nail art in English, Russian and Spanish. And I make money from ad revenue, sponsorships, a little bit from affiliate links, and also I have my online classes about nails. Like I teach people how to do nail art. So that's another stream of income.

[Nathan]

Wow. Okay. And I, you know, the obvious answer is you didn't start with all of this, but which channel was your first channel that you started?

[Anastasia]

Well, my first channel was Russian because that's the language I speak. So. So I just decided to try it out. And since something I do is very visual, like people can understand nails even if they don't know the language, I noticed some comments in English. So that's why I think about after two years, I realized I need another one.

[Nathan]

Wow. Okay. And so after two years then you jumped to your English channel.

[Anastasia]

Correct.

[Nathan]

Okay. And then when did the Spanish channel come into play?

[Anastasia]

When I moved to Mexico, I thought, well, I live in a Spanish speaking country, so I should do something in Spanish here too. So this is how well it was before the YouTube had this feature of multi cross languages yet. So that's why I started it too.

[Nathan]

That's right. This is before the auto dubbing and everything that's recently come out. Yes. So what's impressive is that you were able to recreate the success of your first channel on each of these other channels. And so I'd love to just jump right into talking about videos if you're cool with that. Because none of the stats that I just shared in the beginning would even be possible without videos that do well. That's something that a lot of us are trying to do. No matter what we want to use YouTube to do, be it getting monetized on YouTube or using YouTube to help us monetize in other ways, like a course or a product or a service, it all starts with making good videos that actually get the views. So I'd love to talk about your video process and maybe if you think through some of your most popular videos that you've done or recent videos that you've done here, I'd love it if you'd walk us through your process for creating a video and feel free to take your time. Like from the very beginning, how do you come up with a good idea for a video?

[Anastasia]

Sure. Well, I heard that some people are struggling with finding ideas. My problem is typically how do I find time to create all the ideas that I have? Because I have just crazy amount. So I have this spreadsheets with like hundreds of ideas, but some of them just come from my head. But later I realized that that's not the best approach. So I usually doing some research first. So I use there's a trends folder in this YouTube studio now and there's another analytics what your audience watched. So I do this and then I use another analytics tool from Pinterest, TikTok. They also have this like trends sections when you can see what's going on. And then I simply combine them and see, okay, so this looks like trending. And I also wanted to create something like that. And depending on that, I decide which idea is going to be next. And of course I use a lot of AI like ChatGPT to analyze comments sections so it will show up the trends among my audience. Like what were they asking mostly of? Sometimes I don't need it. I can just manually see like, oh, they were asking for this new product, they came out. So usually it's a combination of all the analytics, what my audience is demanding, and of course something that I would like to do too.

[Nathan]

Wow, this is huge. So the big takeaway is you're clearly revealing your veteran status, Anastasia, because you're like, yeah, I've got spreadsheets, I've got analytics, I've got tools, you know what I mean? Like, you're just so in it. And I wonder if we could break down a couple of these that'd be most helpful for maybe someone who's at the beginning of their journey right now. Let's say someone has posted, they've done their first 10 videos, maybe they got their first 15 or 20 videos. So relatively new to the YouTube platform, but at that point you've usually got enough videos on your channel to actually get use out of analytics. Right. So let's say if there was one tool for someone to start with, how, where would you encourage someone to look? Just inside the YouTube studio, not even using any other tools yet. But like what metrics or analytics do you or your Team find most helpful right now?

[Anastasia]

Well, yeah, of course, 10 videos is actually a good start to see analytics already. I would definitely take a look on which video got most views because usually views don't lie. There is a reason why this video got more popular and once you see it then I will just try to understand like was it the topic? Was it the thumbnail, was it the video itself? And I also like to always look at the retention graph, of course, because I do have some videos, you know, with good views but the retention not so good. Which means the topic and probably thumbnail was catchy and you know, sparked the interest, but the video was not so good. So I would do that first, like take the best performing videos and analyze their retention graph and then go from there.

[Nathan]

Oh, that's such a big insight. That is something that man, hardcore tactic you could go do. Right after you finish this podcast episode, crack open your analytics, look at the video that's performing the best so far and look at exactly what Anastasia encouraged you to do. This is something that as a coach, Anastasia, I mean would do the same thing. Like it's, I find it kind of funny when people analyze the low performing videos, when it's like you can, I'm sure you can learn things from that. But unless you're comparing it to something, how do you know that what you're looking at is good or bad? Right. So you want to make sure you start with, hey, what have I done well? Or even as much as you can from an outside perspective, looking at other people's videos in your same niche that maybe have done well too. How do you incorporate. Yeah, looking at competition or looking at other people in your niche, how in the beginning. Let's go back to the beginning. How did you, did you get ideas or inspiration from other channels? How did you kind of find your own way to make content in the beginning?

[Anastasia]

Oh yeah, a lot. I was just spying on every single competitor. Like back then 11 years ago it was possible in my niche niche because there were not that many. I almost knew everyone. So yeah, I was definitely analyzing their videos too. I was checking, okay, this one has most views. Why I was trying to do the same thing but analyzing their videos, analyzing their comments. And right now you can do analyze it so easily with AI, but back then I was doing it manually. And also I always like to take ideas from someone not from my niche or something maybe a little similar like fitness, which is also a little visual. So I was thinking, okay, maybe how can I implement it to my niche?

[Nathan]

That's huge. What is your process for analyzing comments using AI? Would you mind walking us through that? What steps? How would someone do that?

[Anastasia]

Sure. So you simply go into comment section and copy everything and then put it in ChatGPT and ask like, hey, can you do me like a shortcut to show the most, you know, like, what are the most demanding topics and questions the audience want to know? Or give me ideas for my new videos based on this feedback? You can ask directly about that.

[Nathan]

That is absolutely fire. I love that. Because the cool thing about comments, especially if someone could be listening, right. And say, I don't have any comments on my videos, in my videos yet. Right. Maybe you're just starting. Well, you could go find, to your point, other people in your niche that actually that are getting comments on their videos on the topics you want to make or even. I love how you were talking about adjacent niches, right? Like niches that aren't, you know, exactly the one you're in, but that have some similarities. Like you mentioned fitness being a visual. Right. Sort of content format. So if you can get into other people's comment sections, copy and paste things using a tool like AI to help you quickly figure out, like, what are the pain points? What are the main. What are the main concerns here? One of my favorites is what does it seem like this video didn't cover? Like, you know what I mean? Like, where did this video that all these comments are on, where did it miss the mark? What is something that they left out that the creator did? Right. And so you can take that as, you know, some insights for your next video. When you go create a topic like that, you can make sure that you address all of that beforehand. Right. Oh, man. So, so cool. Okay, so we've talked about some tools, we talked about analyzing and how you're getting video ideas. I'd love to learn more about. Yeah. Like when it comes to other tools that you're using. So you've got like analytics and you've got AI tools that are helping you process ideas and come up with things. What happens next? You know, so let's say you've got an idea that you are going to create, you've said yes to it. What do you do next? Where do you start?

[Anastasia]

Once I have the idea, now I'm thinking about the thumbnail first. I haven't done. I used not to do it and now I realize it was a big mistake. So I always think, how can I visually show it and make the thumbnail? And sometimes if I cannot come up with a really good idea. I'm even thinking maybe I should, you know, it's not the video I should record right now. So I do not necessarily create it right away. Sometimes I postpone it a little bit. Sometimes I do create them, like even before recording. But I just at least think. And there are also many different tools now where you can, like with AI, create a sketch at least. So I have this idea of how I'm going to show this thumbnail. Think a little bit about the title. Now it's much easier with this AB testing available, so I can think of different options. And from that I try to create and record video, like around that idea.

[Nathan]

One of our Secret weapons for YouTube success here at Think Media is Vid IQ. They make it super easy to come up with video ideas that get views, optimize your videos. And the new suite of AI iTools has been a total game changer. And if you haven't tried Vidiq's AI Coach or Video Idea Generator yet, you've got to check it out. The truth is, creators that have better tools have an unfair advantage. So if you want to accelerate your channel's growth for just $1, hit the link in the description down below and start using Vidiq today. Now, let's jump back into the video.

Before you press Record Research Reverse Engineer. If you can get that thumbnail and title concept doesn't mean it's set in stone, but you've got at least an idea of what it would look like. And so I correct me if I'm wrong. I heard you say sometimes you won't make the video if you can't crack the thumbnail or the title or. How did you say that?

[Anastasia]

Yes, I had it couple times. Like, the idea was great, but I just couldn't come up with any nice thumbnail on how to visually show it. And this is when I thought it's not going to get that attention that it deserves. So, yeah, I just maybe think about it later.

[Nathan]

Oh, that's huge. I think that's a big insight that's worth just saying again. And, you know, I think we forget, as a coach, I see it a lot that creators have really good ideas. Actually, most of the time, I think a lot of us are like you like. I think a lot of us have ideas for the videos that we want to make, but we Forget that on YouTube, on the platform of YouTube, there are, there are decisions that viewers are making. Right. So someone has to decide to get into your video. And the first decision isn't, let me watch the video. The first decision a viewer makes is let me click on the title and thumbnail. Right. It isn't let me watch, it's let me click. And so to your point, that's a veteran move. Hey, there's some, like, fire game right there. If you can't crack the code on the title and the thumbnail, even if it's a good idea, it's not worth. It's worth putting out later. It's worth putting out. You can win both decisions. For someone to choose to click through the title and thumbnail and then choose to watch through your great content. Right. Wow, that's huge. When I look at your thumbnails across all your channels, first question, are you still making these yourself, or do you have a team that helps you now?

[Anastasia]

Well, I have a team, but no thumbnails. I do them still myself because I always find it just too complicated to explain what I want. I rather do it myself.

[Nathan]

Yeah, let's go. Okay, well, then this is even more fun. You've still been making your thumbnails all this time. What are some best practices when it comes to thumbnails? I wanted to call out at least one that I noticed right away as a coach that I think you're doing really well, which is scaling. Scaling. And I mean, the size of all of the elements in your thumbnail are big. You know, like if you're showing a nail or you're showing something that's wrong, you are zoomed way in on the finger on the nail. And I'm assuming that's intentional. Right. So that people can really see the transformation, what the nails could look like. Right. Or the kind of. The horror story. Right. Of chipped nails and stuff. That's stuff that doesn't look good. And you're zooming way in on that imagery. Is that something that you've always done or. Yeah. When did you pick up on that? Like zooming way in on what's on your thumbnail?

[Anastasia]

No, it took me years of experimenting. I mean, if you will look at my old thumbnails, there were nothing like that. So, yes, I was just simply doing different kinds. And eventually some started to perform better. So this is how I figured it out. But, yeah, that's also. At some point, it just came to me that when you look at the phone, when the thumbnails are really small, you cannot really see anything if it's not zoomed out. Especially in my niche, like nails, they are small already, so they. You. You want to zoom them out so they will be seen better. And now with this, a B testing of thumbnails. Once this appeared, I like I had so many insights. And this is also when I realized what is working better compared to, you know, what, what I tried before. Just blindly trying different pictures and seeing how it goes.

[Nathan]

Oh man, so good. What, what are some other insights you've gained from? I mean you've posted thousands of videos. I can only imagine how many A B tests you've run. So what are some insights that you have learned now when it comes to the thumbnails that do well on your channel versus the thumbnails that don't really seem to get the watch time for your videos.

[Anastasia]

One of my most popular formats is like transformation before and after. And for some reason I always thought it's nice to show the final look or I used to show like before and after but for some reason much better. They perform much better if I only show the before because they're probably curious of knowing oh how it's going to look at the end. And some followers even shared in the comments like, like I actually like when you do not show the final result at the beginning because we kind of want to see all the story, all the process and then what kind of design you are doing at the end. So I decided that okay, I'm going to keep it as a secret. And so I'm mostly showing the before picture so they will figure out how I'm going to change it and transform.

[Nathan]

I think that was a mic drop moment. Like if you're listening, you should re. Listen to what you just said. I think that could apply to just about every niche is thinking, thinking about the before and obviously in a niche like yours, Anastasia, where the visuals are already naturally pretty great because you can show a thumbnail or you can show, I was going to say thumbnail but like actually a nail in your thumbnail that does not look good, that looks bad. Right? And so you think about it opens a loop for the viewer to think about, oh, if it's that bad right now, like where does it go? You know, and it's, it's on. It's sad, but it is kind of human nature I think to favor, you know, the negative or to be. To get our interest piqued by the negative than the positive. And so if you can capture someone's attention with the negative, with the way things are right now, with the frustration of the current moment for whatever your niche is for whoever you're trying to reach and then let the video show the transformation because someone clicked in and they meet you, you're helping them see how to go from that bad spot to the good spot. That's like absolutely ninja. So, yeah, showing the before even you said performed better for your channel than before and after in the same image, man. Okay, that is absolutely awesome. Do you mind if we talk about titles really quick? Because I would love to know, first off, are you starting to use. Do you have access to the title testing? Are you starting to use that?

[Anastasia]

Yeah, I recently got that. So I think it's been already in two videos. Yeah, I got a chance to try it out.

[Nathan]

Very cool. Just at the level your channels are at, I think that's a great thing, right, to be doing. You're gonna get a lot of cool information. So I'm curious to check back with you on what you've learned through testing a whole bunch of titles. But what if you've. You've already tested a whole bunch of titles through uploading a lot of videos. So even though, you know, let's put a B testing to the side, you've just created thousands of videos. So I'd love to know when it comes to titles, if we got thumbnails that are zoomed in that scale. Well, that show the before opens a loop, gives, you know, gives the viewer a reason to click in to get the transformation. How do you go about titles then? What have you noticed about titles that help get the click that help complement the thumbnail?

[Anastasia]

Sure. I have one insight that also took me years to discover. So I always was trying to name my videos, like, very smart and professionally, since I also do online classes. So I always want to show this knowledge and expertise. But whenever I name my videos something like how to use Thai gel to hide hyponychium, people didn't click very well. So I figured, okay, I need to use simple words. And the fact that English is not my first language was probably the advantage. I was like, okay, how am I going to say it? Like, to explain it to someone. So I realized I need to use something very simple, like what to do if you have wide nails. Like how to make them look more elegant. Like something very simple that even a child will understand. So once I started implementing that, they were doing so much better. Like something as simple as possible that will be possible to understand even for a person who is not a nail geek like me.

[Nathan]

Oh, my goodness. Again, another killer insight. I see this a lot too, where the titles. And again, it's because ourselves as creators, when we're on the platform, we start making videos if we're trying to help somebody. And especially the how to educational space on YouTube, there's something you're trying to help a viewer do. Right? But the way that we make videos when we're new to YouTube is we just, we just start from our own experience and what we know now, having been on the other side of the transformation. Right? So to your point, you're the expert. You can use all of the expert definitions and terms. Right? But the people you're trying to help don't even know what that means yet. Right? It's kind of like that's the point. They haven't gone through the transformation yet. They are not the expert. You're the expert. And so I'm getting more and more confident that a responsibility of you as a creator, especially if you're in the educational space, is to let your expertise be known in the video. Right? Like when someone clicks in, you show like, yes, you're helping us do the thing. But to just get people's attention. Sean says all the time you need to meet the viewer where they're at, you know, and you need to see them through their eyes, right? Not through your expertise eyes. And what you know now after the years of whatever, you've got to think about where that person is because they're at the beginning of their journey. So I love that tip of keep it simple, keep it everyday talk, save the expertise language for when you're in the video or for a more advanced video that's on purpose, but to reach more. The biggest audience for any niche. Right. Is going to be beginners. It's going to be people that are just getting interested in something. And so the way that you meet them is going to be to talk to them. Right? So that's huge. I would love it if we could kind of shift gears now. Thank you so much too, for your time. Anastasia. You're just dropping bombs here along the whole content creation process. So let's jump into the video now. We've talked about ideas, we've talked about titles and thumbnails. What are some things you've learned or some things that you try to do to keep retention, to keep people watching once they've decided to click? How do you handle the hook or the opening? What do you've learned? What have you learned to do in those first 30 seconds that YouTube measures?

[Anastasia]

So one of the most powerful tools I use recently is this. What's it called when you hover the. The mouse pad when you're scrolling the videos? Yeah, the first. So I try to show Something really catchy and something to the point right at the beginning of the video. Not to keep it till like the later, so people can see right away. Not me talking on the background, but the nail. Like, what kind of nail? I'm about to transform. And very briefly, like 3, 4 seconds also describe what I'm going to do and show today and then jump right to the video. Because I used to do very long intros like introducing myself and, well, people were clicking away. So then I decided to do it later or sometimes not do it at all. Just go right to the point.

[Nathan]

Wow, you've. You've inspired me here today. So we will credit you with this term. But I'm calling what you just said the hover appeal. So when your mouse hovers over, right. I think this is what you're talking about. Especially on desktop, when you hover over a video, even though you haven't clicked, it'll start playing, right? And it's, you know, it's usually playing from the beginning. So I'm thinking about, oh, that's the hover appeal. And, you know, I don't think a lot of us have even thought about that. What are you doing in those first 30 seconds? Really? Just the first few seconds to convince somebody to continue watching. So I love that. The hover appeal. How do you pass that test? Well, you're realizing in your niche, well, it's better to show than tell, probably. Right. Like to be able to visually show, like you said, you're close up on the nails, just like you were in the thumbnail, perhaps. Right. And showing what you're doing and getting started on your work. So I love that idea. So I'm going to accredit you with that. Anastasia. It's the hover appeal. A new Think Media strategy. Great. Okay, so with a hook, you're getting people's attention. How do you sustain it? So here we go. We've just had the click. We've talked about those first few seconds. Now, let's say, okay, someone's chosen to watch. Someone's made it through the first 30 seconds. Do you continue? Yeah. I would imagine you, you're still thinking about how do I keep people with me? So what have you learned to sustain the retention from the first 30 seconds into the rest of the video?

[Anastasia]

So, yes, once I got their attention, I need to keep them watching. So I have different formats. Like there is one when I try different kinds of products, usually about eight different products. So usually I just try one or two, like about 40 seconds to 90 seconds. Something like that. And then I reassure, tell them like, hey, this was the first product or first two products and we have nine more to go. And also do this like 12 seconds, preview something like you said, like hover appeal, but later, like remind them of what's going to be next. If it's a transformation, then I also mention like, okay, now I do the prep, but later I will show you a trick that will save you some time.

[Nathan]

Huge. Okay. So I hear a lot of people call that different things seeding or teasing you're giving or rehooking, right? It's almost like you have a somewhat of a hook later in your content to keep people watching for later, you know, so saying like coming up or the transformation or if you've got a. The number system works really where works really well. If you are reviewing X number of things, five things, you know, it's like you can say, make sure you know, if you're on number one or two, well then there's naturally three more to go, right? Or you can say, man, number four is crazy. Or number five really changed my mind or you know what I'm saying, Like there's a lot of things you can play with to keep people going. So a lot of teasing or seeding. Anything else that you try to do as a content creator when you're, you know, in the middle of your content and you know that you've got something important coming up that you want people to be able to hear and see, anything else that you, you try to do?

[Anastasia]

Well, mostly this. It's also sometimes when I, when the tutorial or transformation is really long. So I will not fall too much into technical terms. I tell some stories like some that happened to me when I was working in the salon or some story of this client. Sometimes if they share it, it and I'm like, oh, okay, so I will like share the rest of the story later. Now let me show you this like unpacking, so also like breaking it into segments. Like I noticed now this is very popular within shows like on Netflix. They also, they do not just do the linear story. They just jump from different time frames like this. This was their childhood and this is what it is now. So I think it also is keeping people hooked. Like to continue watching.

[Nathan]

This is huge. Maybe we'll, we'll hang here for a second. So storytelling is something I was going to bring up here in just a little bit anyway because I noticed that the story for you isn't just in your videos. Just like what you just said, telling A story about, you know, the. One of these videos you posted, like a week ago, at least on the English Channel. The title is Reshaping the Widest Nails I've ever worked on. You know, and the thumbnail is just great. It shows the before. Right. It shows your face, your reaction there. And so the story seems to start from the title and thumbnail in a lot of your videos. And so I wanted to talk about that. It's. You know, because storytelling, maybe that's something that. Yeah, it could be a little more common in the YouTube strategy space, like make sure you're storytelling and your content to keep people's attention. But what I'm noticing is you're. You're storytelling from the very beginning, like from the click. And so I want to ask, is that intentional? I'm assuming it is. And if so, how did you come up with that idea?

[Anastasia]

Interesting that you bring it up. I never thought about it this way, actually.

[Nathan]

Oh, fun. Okay.

[Anastasia]

Because. Yeah. Well, I just thought, okay. Of course the title should reflect what's in the video. And now I try always to begin with it because sometimes I use title of something that happens, let's say, only in the middle of the video. Like, let's say, client came, her nails look pretty. But then I started to remove and found some infection inside. So I still include it to the beginning. So they will know that this is part of the story. So. No, actually, I never thought about it this way. I guess it just came out naturally from all the testing.

[Nathan]

It's just natural. Yeah. Again, another strategy. There you go. That you just. You made. But that's. I really noticed that actually, in a lot of your videos. And then when I would get into the content as I was preparing to hang out today is I was like, wow, it's the. You open the loop right in the title and thumbnail. But that sets the stage for the story. And I thought that video from just last week was a really good example of that, of reshaping the widest nails I've ever worked on. And to your point, it's a great example, I think, of everything we've talked about so far. The language in the title every day. It's everyday simple language. I'm sure you could give us the technical terms for the wide nails and what was going on and. But you said reshaping the widest nails. Right. I've ever worked on. It's already a story. And so I'm clicking in as the viewer even subconsciously to hear you talk about this. You know what happened here. And so when you're in the content and you're doing the storytelling, I mean, how much work do you put into that? Put into that, Anastasia, is it something where you're kind of like in your outline for your content, you jot down things, you want to make sure you stay as you're recounting a story or are you intentionally thinking about, I heard you just mention, you know, there was irritation or there was an infection and that could be a sort of rehook or seeding of oh, there's something went wrong, like as you're telling a story. Right. So anyway, I guess with the overall question is, yeah, how do you go about planning your story? Do you put a lot of work.

[Anastasia]

Into that before shooting the video? Like, usually I shoot the first part like on the model, like on someone's hands. So yes, I think about what I'm going to do. So sometimes the focus is going to be on transformation. Like, like with wide nails. We have wide nails. We're going to turn them into something different. So the focus will be just on the, like this transformation. Sometimes the focus is the product. Like, hey, I'm trying this new gel that like nobody seen before. It's like working faster and curing faster. So the focus is more on the product. That's why I always try to. Since I already recorded thousands of videos, I always try to find now models with something new, unusual, like super short beaten nails or you know, just different nail shapes. Because I also noticed that people can really relate to that once they see on the thumbnail certain kind of nails. I get so many comments like, oh, my nails are just like that. And I never thought there is a way to make them look so pretty.

[Nathan]

Wow.

Okay, so this kind of gives me to my next question here about story and then I'd love to keep moving on and taking a tour through your empire here, but. But what have you learned makes a good story? I mean, this style of content you've done for quite a bit now and I think one of them is definitely what you just said, relatability. Right. That people can find themselves in the thing that they're watching and hearing in the story that you're telling. Any other. Any other things you've noticed either from comments or just yourself after making so many videos that yeah, what makes a good story?

[Anastasia]

Yeah, well, even though I think my content is mostly educational, I think it's still nice when there is a story involved. Whether, let's say if I'm transforming. Once I had this video with short Bitten nails and I transformed them into like slightly longer ones. I also explained like this client came to me and she was hiding her hands like this, like she was holding them in a certain way. But once we did the nails, she was doing it in absolutely different ways. So how it impacts the everyday life of people. And yes, like you mentioned, of course, relatability, because usually I get a lot of comments like, oh, I have a nails like this or my daughter have the same nails like this was very insightful.

[Nathan]

Wow. Okay. This is a really helpful discussion, Anastasia, because something that, you know, we'll hear a lot is just working with people is storytelling is one of those tactics that's thrown out there. It's one of those strategies for making good videos. You tell good stories, but a common pain point is how do I tell a story when I'm teaching? Right. Like it makes sense to tell a story if it's more of an entertainment based channel for some people, a vlog or what have you. But when you think about educational content where you're teaching and there's a point A or you know, point B and you're walking somebody through how to really do something like tactically. Yeah. I would just wonder how do you tell a story when you do that? And so what I'm hearing you say is, is you're really telling stories about people you've actually worked with, people that you've helped. People are experienced that experiences that you've had. Will you also draw on stories of people that you've worked with? Maybe you haven't actually worked on someone specifically, but you've heard a story from someone else or how do you come up with those stories in your content for educational content specifically?

[Anastasia]

Well, since I was doing a lot of classes before I started online school, like live classes, so I also got some experience. Even though I was always teaching adults, not kids, I mean they supposed to have a better attention span. I still noticed when it's getting too repetitive or worrying, they do not pay as much attention. So let's say when I was explaining how on nail anatomy, so I ordered this giant nail, the cushion nail that we have and I just was putting different stickers like bacterias and stuff and I was using this large broom to clean them. It maybe sounds a bit silly like for the education of adults and they were like laughing a little bit but they remembered it. So I thought what if sometimes I can make it a little more fun or use funnier terms. Let's say when I'm explaining also this bacteria on the nail I said, well, if you have this product lifting, then it works as their home. So once you break their home, they will be gone. So like I said, I always thought it's more for kids, but it's actually working with adults. I'm obviously trying not to overdo it, but just use a very simple terms and analogies. You know, something like you need to hold the file and do these motions. Like when you're driving with a steering wheel, right. You cannot do this. You always, you know, do the circular motions instead of straight.

[Nathan]

Oh my goodness. It's so great. I love the. So my, my YouTube channel was educational. It was helping people make music, write songs. And I would do the same thing. I would use visual aids, you know, I would like, you know, use props sometimes to help, you know, explain something. And so I love that. I actually really like that advice because it, while it might seem, yeah, like kiddish or childlike to you as the creator, I think that goes back to you being the expert in your field. You already did all the study and all the classroom. You know what I mean? Like, you know what? You know now. So it might seem juvenile to you, but to the viewer who's at the beginning, I'm like, what a, what a help that actually is right? To, to use a visual to tell a story, to use an analogy and break out those classroom props, so to speak. Like, that's actually a really good note if you're listening. What could you do in your next video to better explain something than just talking about it? But what could you show about it? You know, like, what's an analogy that you could use? What's a story that you could tell from your own past or someone else you've worked with? And I think that that's a really good call to action there, Anastasia, that more of us as creators should be a little bolder and put, put a little more effort into how we're teaching or how we're explaining or how we're showing something. Because YouTube is a visual platform, right? I mean, it is video based. So you might as well take advantage of that and try to have other things in your shot than just you. Very, very cool. Okay, well, I'd love to start moving towards, you know, a little bit more about your revenue streams and the business model that you've been able to build because of the videos you're posting on YouTube. So I would just love to know, like, how did you make. Make this transition right from creating these videos into a business and having multiple channels and like thousands of Videos, like that's a lot. That's just a lot to handle, you know what I mean? Like that's like it just didn't happen overnight, obviously. But I'd love to hear about how did you start to make that switch from yeah, building something on YouTube to turning it into something that's sustainable and become your job?

[Anastasia]

Well, actually when I started my YouTube channel, I immediately thought that this is going to be great, a source to do advertising of my own services. Because back then I have a physical school in Russia, so I thought I can promote my classes, so that will be nice. It just, I didn't expect that I will enjoy doing videos so much and it can be a stream itself too. And then yes, I did an English channel, but later, by the way, another reason I started the Spanish one was not only because I moved to my Mexico, but also when the war started, the views from Russia got demonetized. So my Russian channel, who's at 1.6 subscribers now, was not bringing any revenue anymore. And back then it was like a huge part of it. So I was like, oh man. But at least I got my English channel and maybe I should start another one. So this was another reason I did that. And I was like, wow, I'm so grateful that I do have have another one. I'm still continuing with the Russian one even though it's not bringing revenue, like I said, because I still enjoy it. But later when I started doing online classes, I realized that this is a perfect way to promote them because I don't really, I'm not even thinking much on how to do it because I'm just explaining a certain stuff. And then I mentioned, hey, if you would like to do it professionally, just like me, I have this online class here. So I direct them into like page where they can sign up for a class.

[Nathan]

That's huge. And you would do that just in your video, you would have a call to action to sign up for a class?

[Anastasia]

Yeah, usually I put it like right in the middle of the video because usually if they already watched right to the center, they're probably engaged already. Yes. Not at the beginning, like somewhere in the middle.

[Nathan]

Wow, that's really good feedback. A lot of people will put calls to action at the end of the video. And actually this was just a conversation I was just having with several creators and trying to encourage them. I made the same mistake. I would put call to actions, you know, to off platform things like an online class or product or something at the very end of the video. And the thing about that is, you know, all. All of our retention curves drop, you know, over the video. All of our retention curves, you know, usually there's less people watching than, you know, than there were at the start. And so that means if I'm giving a call to action, to the thing that I want people to do, get into a course, get into a workshop, get into my email list, whatever I'm trying to do, if you're doing it at the end, you're asking people, you're asking the least amount of people, because there's not as many people still with you at the end. Right. And so that's a really good tip of a good question that we get a lot is where do I do the call to action? Like, where do I ask people to click the link in the description for something like this? And it's a really good rule of thumb. I say. I always say, like, by halfway, like, buy halfway, you've done this. And I think that's really strategic, not just because of the retention. So you've got more people watching, ideally. But to your point, if you've done it after you've already given some value, after you've already taught, after you've already shown and tell right when you get to that point to your, like you said, I think people are more qualified to use that word because they've been watching with you through the whole time. And if they've already gotten help from you by that point, you offer them an opportunity to go somewhere else. Click a link and you can expand on this video or work with me or go deeper. It's a pretty good spot to do it. Do you still do it that way? Do you still try to go about halfway for your call to actions now?

[Anastasia]

Yeah, definitely. Because, like, all of my videos are built, like, you always try to make them want to watch until the end. Like, with the transformation, you definitely want to see the outcome. So, yes, I'm trying to put it in the center and to the place that is, like, right before the most interesting part of the reveal. So they will definitely watch.

[Nathan]

That's ninja. So yet again, seeding and teasing. That's a pretty ninja move. I've heard Sean do this as well. Yeah, we're like, right before you do your call to action, you tease where you're going next and if it can be a pretty interesting place to go, you know. So we're about to get into how to. Whatever, you know. But first, I just wanted to let you know if you've been getting value out of this video, actually Put together something ready. And so you're teasing that kind of like an anchor for people to hang with you. Through to call to action. Through to call to action. Wow. Okay. So we have just been. This is such a fun episode. This is such a fun episode. Thank you for just opening up. Clearly, you know, you know what's going on when it comes to YouTube because of how much we've talked about in the trenches with analytics, ideation, titles, thumbnails. Right. Retention, and my goodness, it's a masterclass. How. How have you poured into yourself to learn? Like, I would love to ask someone like you, who's got multiple channels, millions, hundreds of millions of views, thousands of videos, how do you keep getting better? And like, how do you keep learning? And how do. What do you, like, what books are you reading, courses you taking, podcasts you listen to? Even back, you know, several years ago when you started, you've clearly just continued to level up, you know, and I'd love it if you could maybe pour into us a little bit. What does that personal, you know, YouTube, personal growth plan look like for you right now?

[Anastasia]

Sure. Yeah. So when I was studying in college, I was the programming it part. Some of the subjects were so boring that I could barely keep my eyes open. Like, I wanted to fall asleep so bad. And this is the moment when I realized, oh, my God, is education that boring? Like, is it like that? And I was already starting doing, like, nails, like, starting my business a little bit. And at some point when I started teaching, I thought, okay, so I'm going to find a way to make it fun in some way and educational. But people will not fall asleep like I did back in college. Like, it should be something that will keep you excited and awake. And as for myself, yeah, I, by the way, the motto of my company, like, with the classes, nails Pro Academy is never stop learning. So that's my motto too. Like, I just always, yeah, read books. Like, Think Media was my biggest source. I joined the video ranking Academy, I think when it was like, first presented that with many years ago on another platform back then. And I was, I was even taking notes of some videos. I don't have this notebook with me now, but I. I was always writing down some insights that I get from different videos from Sean. And then whenever I'm reviewing my strategy every week, I'm thinking, okay, I'm going to try this and this and this. Like, I was always try to implement it to my videos right away. Because if you just read or learn and then, you know, just listen to it like a podcast and forget that knowledge really means nothing. So I was always writing it down so I will not forget and try to use this knowled in like in my next videos.

[Nathan]

That's huge right there. That is why I have a job. That is why we have coaches here at Think Media. Right? Is because the gap between learning stuff and then doing stuff can be really vast for a lot of people. And that is the hardest part and is actually doing the things you're learning. And then it's almost like making sure you're doing the things that you're learning in the right way so that you're, you're actually practicing well and you're not practicing bad and creating, you know, bad habits. And so that, that's a lot. There's a big gap there. And so I, I love how you said you would. It sounds like you would take it almost like a module at a time or like take in some sort of information or teaching, taking notes, like thinking through how to apply this to your own content, but then actually go apply it to your content and then kind of work in this sort of back and forth between learning something and doing something that's really powerful. And just in case you're listening and you're curious about, like, hey, what is, what is this stuff that Anastasia's talking about? Anything that Think Media, if you go to vrapodcast.com you just check it out, you can go to that website, you can learn more about the exact same coaching that Anastasia is talking about and has used. And if you feel like, yeah, you're in that gap between knowing and doing, or maybe you don't even know, maybe You've been at YouTube for a little bit and you're like, like, what I am doing is not working or the approach I'm taking is not working. So if you need help, you can go to vra podcast.com and we'd love to help you out there and see if it'd be a good fit. But I'm also curious, Anastasia, how do you review videos? I'm so curious about this question from you because, I mean, you know, being around Think Media, like one of our sayings, right, is 1% better with every upload. So what's your process or your team's process for when you post a video and whether it does good or it does bad, what do you do? Anything there, how do you, what do you look at? How do you try to improve going forward?

[Anastasia]

Of course. So once the video is out, I'm checking analytics. So, well, Just views and comments first. Because retention graph usually comes after two to three days. And then of course he has their retention graph. And am I always looking at the disk dips as well as at the spikes and thinking like, oh, okay, probably that was. I was explaining this part too long. I should go a little faster next time. So yes, I'm actually, I just can't stop from looking analytics all the time. You know, like some people are always scrolling the feeds or something. I'm just, you know, whenever I have a minute, I'm just go to the YouTube Studio app and I, I don't know, I. I just can look at these graphs forever. And there's another metric that is not on YouTube studio. So I had to do it in a spreadsheet. So the videos that are doing well and have many views, usually those are the one that bring the most subscribers, which is logical. And if you sort it like that in the studio, you can also see that. Okay, I have this one short with millions of views. Of course it brought the most subscribers, but is it actually like helpful? So if we take another video that was not doing that great and it brought a certain amount of subscribers. So if you divide the number of subscribers for views, which means every thousand views, how many subscribers does it bring? I hope this explanation makes sense. So sometimes it can be like one subscriber. Some. Some videos, even with low views may bring 10 of them. And I always look at these videos too. Usually for me those are. Are the ones that bring value, like educational ones. Not the comedy, not the funny content, not just something that's too shocking, like something more like simple but educational. And that's another thing I also try to analyze. So how much new. How many new subscribers does this kind of videos bring me?

[Nathan]

That's. Man, here we go. Right at the end. Still dropping bombs, Anastasia. Thank you. This is. I almost think about like subscriber density. It sounds like like per. For a video, right? What you're measuring. And maybe you can walk us through that math one more time just to help people out. But what you're doing is you're dividing subscribers by views, right? And it sounds like you're starting by sorting by most views or when you start this process, are you sorting by most subscribed in your analytics?

[Anastasia]

Well, yeah, you can just import this as CSV document. And yeah, you can sort them either way. It's just when you. Yes, I think I can show you this document later. So yeah, once you divide. So the metric we're looking for is how many subscribers per every thousand views. And the videos that went on top were the ones that surprised me. They were not the ones that are more popular. Actually, usually those are the opposites.

[Nathan]

Gotcha. So that's what subscriber density, that's what you're measuring for, is actually per 1000 views or per the views that I got in this video. Which video actually brought so much of a connection or so much help that someone went out of their way to hit the subscribe button. That's awesome. Because to hear, you know, to kind of just rephrase what you're saying, that's proof that those videos, even if it's not one of the videos that had the highest view counts, you're showing that, oh, these are the videos that might be connecting the most or that might have been most powerful. Only because I'm a Fellow, you know, YouTube nerd too, is I would love to know, do you then go into, I'm sure you do. You go into the retention graph for those videos and like, have you, have you studied those before? I'm just curious if, you know, like, oh, okay, A video that has a higher subscriber density based off the views it got and the people that subscribed. When I look at the retention graph, is it usually strong too? Does it represent that?

[Anastasia]

Yes, of course. So, and yes is the reason is before I used to pay more attention to just the best performing videos, but then I realized, especially with shorts, usually, you know, just something with a very strong visual or something that was hyping at certain time or period of time, maybe sometimes they get millions of views. But what brings actually, yeah, like you said, engaged audience. Something that got real impact from my videos. Yeah, this is from this kind of videos that might be usually there in the middle, not the most popular.

[Nathan]

Wow, okay. And then, you know, pure curiosity. How do you, what do you, what do you or your team do with that information? So say you've done this, you've ran this report, you've identified videos that have a higher subscriber density. Retention graphs are showing that. What do you do next? Do you make more videos like that or do you try to get into the retention graph and learn, like, what are the common patterns that we're doing here? How do you, what do you do with that information?

[Anastasia]

Sure. So I always first think about the goals I have for my channel, like for like year and month and week. So if depending on the goal, if it's just to grow subscriber base or maybe sell more of my courses, but, well, currently my Goal is to make more content that will be relatable and understandable to wider audiences, not just to nail nerds. And. And you need to create different kinds of content like some to bring new viewers. And now there's the new tab in YouTube analytics also where you can see new casual. And what's the third? Like another type of returning, I think.

[Nathan]

Yeah, yeah, New casual returning.

[Anastasia]

Right. So I figured that these videos, they're actually the one that helped me to turn new viewer into returning. So I should do more of these videos, but not just them. I definitely need to do a little bit just for the new and a little bit for core audience as well. So yes, I just think that I need to do more of these videos. At least one or two if we are talking about long form videos in a month. So I can keep that kind of engagement.

[Nathan]

Wow. Oh my goodness. We might just need to do a part two of this conversation because I think that as much as we have covered, we just might have been scratching the surface is my hunch. And so thank you so much for your generosity, Anastasia. Just like opening the gates and filling us in and answering these questions before we land the plane here. I would love it. If you wouldn't mind. You can go ahead and shout out where could people find you? Maybe they're interested in your niche. But even if they wanted to take a look at your channel and just kind of see some of the things we talked about, like your thumbnails and everything. What, what channels would you point them to? Where could they find you?

[Anastasia]

My main English channel is Nail Co Nail C O U. So that's how you can find me and check out my channel.

[Nathan]

Awesome. Thank you so much. Okay, final question here before we in this conversation. You know, you, you know a lot now, clearly because you've studied a lot and you've done a lot. We were just talking about that. Right, right. But back at the beginning, maybe if you were to talk to, you know a classic question. If you were to talk to young Anastasia, knowing what you know now, say that she's posted 10 to 15 videos and is getting discouraged, feels like YouTube is against her, feels like the algorithm doesn't understand her, what encouragement would you have?

[Anastasia]

Honestly, back then I was not doing that much of analytics and research. I was just posting videos and hoping will get some views. So I didn't really have any strategy. So my best advice is to learn the strategy. Especially now when you have so much opportunities. There is like a YouTube channel. Think media that you can watch for free. You can Watch the podcast. You can join this V Academy. And there was also advice from Sean that really hit me deep. Long time ago. He said that the time you spend on doing a video, like one, two hours. Well, for me, sometimes it's eight hours. You need to spend at least the same amount or half of it to packaging the video. And at that time, that was my. My aha moment. Because honestly, I will just, you know, really, like, record the video, do a lot of editing, all that stuff, and then I will. Before uploading, like five minutes, I quickly do the thumbnail, the title, and just post. So now it's the opposite. Yeah, I do all this research work on the thumbnails and titles and all the packaging first because. Because what I realized that I actually had some great videos. Well, maybe not super great, but good videos, but not that many people watch them because the thumbnails and titles were so off. Just they didn't make the people click.

[Nathan]

That's. I would totally affirm that. Even now here today, I think that it's even. It's more important than ever to care about what YouTube cares about. And the first point of entry is the click. We talked about this earlier, so I really appreciate that encouragement to people. And I would say the exact same thing. And on the other side of better titles and thumbnails, right, that's where more views start to actually become a reality. Because if people don't click, they don't watch. If they don't watch, there's no views. Right. So I really appreciate that encouragement there. And along the lines of what you said as well, I just wanted to point out how you said at the beginning, because, goodness, we've gone through so much today. I mean, this has been like a masterclass on YouTube and even analytics and data decisions and all this stuff. But it's so encouraging to hear you say, I really wasn't doing a lot of this at the beginning. And that is so in line with how we try to coach people at the very beginning, which is instead of counting views, instead of counting all the stuff you possibly can in your analytics, Sean will say, count uploads. You know, those are your. That's your scoreboard in the beginning is how many videos have you posted? Have you been consistent with it? How many courses or modules or books or podcasts have you listened to and then taken action on? It's like a different dashboard that you need when you're starting a different set of measurements to enable you to make enough content to be consistent enough so that there are actually one day analytics for you to look at and make more of these intense decisions right like that we've talked through. So I appreciate that so much man. Hey, if you are listening watching, would you like Rate Share Review Leave a comment thank Anastasia. My goodness she just broke down so much. If you want a part two, let us know because I would sure love to continue nerding out with her. And hey, this is the Think Media podcast. I'm Nathan S Wine and I can't wait to connect with you in a future episode.