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Community Creator Events Changed The Trajectory Of My YouTube Career With Josh Griffin
00:39:19
In this episode of the YouTube Creators Hub podcast, host Dusty Porter discusses the evolving landscape of YouTube and content creation with Josh Griffin from the HVAC Guide for Homeowners. Fresh from attending VidSummit, Josh shares his...
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- [00:02]
Dusty Porter
Welcome to the YouTube Creators Hub podcast where we help you conquer the Internet one video at a time. We cover everything from how to start a YouTube channel to how to make a video go viral. And now here's your host, the one and only Dusty Porter. Hello and welcome to this week's conversation on the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. I'm so glad to be here with you this week. Every single week I look forward to these conversations that I have with these wonderful creators. And with the landscape of YouTube changing so frequently right now with YouTube releasing and announcing all kinds of exciting new features for creators. If you want to hear me talk about some of those on my other podcast, Tubebuddy Express, I do that in depth, so definitely go check that out if you haven't already. Really excited about talking to my friend and YouTube creator Josh today about his journey going to VidSummit and what he learned and what he believed that basically the trajectory of his YouTube career has been changed forever because of what he learned and just the, I guess the overall ability to look at your channel from a different perspective of hearing all these high level people discuss and talk about topics. And we're definitely going to dive deep into that today. Huge thank you to Tubebuddy for continuing to support the show. If you want to know who they are and what they can offer your channel, you can get a 30 day free trial if you use our link in the show notes of this episode. Also, we have other ways you can connect with us. I offer one on one private coaching for YouTube channels and podcasters and creators. If that's something you're interested in, go check that out. We have one of the fastest growing creator communities on the Internet over on our Discord server. You get access to that for five bucks over on our Patreon. Literally five bucks gets you that. Plus our monthly Mastermind calls that I host on Zoom. And we either put someone on a hot seat or we cover a topic in related to YouTube like thumbnails, titles, packaging, monetization, just to name a few that we've done in the past. So definitely check all of those opportunities out for you. And for absolutely free, if you would. Wherever and however you're listening to your podcast, go to that podcast player. Leave us a review. It really does help the show grow as that's letting Apple and Google and Spotify know these people are listening, but they're also engaging as well. That would be greatly appreciated. And it costs you nothing but about five to ten minutes of your time, so I would appreciate that. So with all of that out of the way. I hope you all have a great day. And let's go ahead and jump into this week's conversation. Hello, wonderful people. Welcome to this week's conversation on the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. Dusty here as always with my good friend and fellow creator, Josh Griffin from the H Vac Guide for Homeowners. The channel now has almost 150,000 subscribers, just over a thousand videos. Josh, you have absolutely been taking the H Vac community by storm with just the intuitive and innovative things that you're doing on your YouTube channel. And I'm sure we'll talk about that and the growth you've had. You've been on the show one other time. You are a part of our Mastermind group, and you and I talk quite frequently, I'd say quite frequently. But we talk at least once a month on the calls and sometimes even more than that. And I cannot wait to talk to you today about some experiences you've had that have changed your mindset on YouTube and how you're the trajectory of your channel. So how are you doing today, sir?
- [03:16]
Josh Griffin
I'm good. Thanks for having me. This is a dream come true, sir. So thanks for having me.
- [03:21]
Dusty Porter
You're being nice and I'll pay you later. But I appreciate you saying that we're just going to go ahead and just dive right into it. No fluff, anything like that. I'm just going to just ask you this question and then we'll jump off from here. You just recently came back from Vidsummit and you correct me if I'm wrong, this is the first time you've been to something like that, correct?
- [03:38]
Josh Griffin
First time. I've never been to any YouTube educator conference or meeting of any kind.
- [03:45]
Dusty Porter
Okay. And so you made the decision and it is a commitment. And I think we would be remiss if we didn't talk about that. It's a commitment of not only your time, but your resources and your finances and finding a room and getting together. But as we're going to talk about the community building aspect of it and what you gained from it was well worth the money and the time that you spent. And so we'll certainly talk about that. But I do have to mention that it is a time sink. It is a money sink. And there are some resources that you have to put in place and some planning and mental space, things like that. So all those things out of the way, let's just talk about it. You went, give me the initial experience. You show up, you get there. What's your Initial just response of just you're there for an hour or so and you're just what are you thinking?
- [04:27]
Josh Griffin
So we got there on the first day because it's a multiple day thing and we stood in this line and for me, I can't speak for any other conferences or because I know there's a number of them out there. But immediately, just the conversations that we were already having standing in line to get into the building, I could tell everybody there is there for the same reason I am like, they're, this is not a hobby. Although for some of us it's a hobby too. Let's be honest, it's funner than my old job. But just the folks that were in line immediately I was like, this is different. People were talking about things that I love. Some of the educators out there that will say things like, just hit that record button. But that's step one. I'm way past that. I hit the record button now. Now what? And we were talking about the now what? And it was just immediately, just already I was like, okay, I'm in the right place.
- [05:27]
Dusty Porter
Being surrounded by those people in person, where in your normal day to day walk, you're not all the time talking about, hey, what are your thoughts on like my packaging for my videos or what are you doing to grow your brand or how far should I niche down? These are all topics that I assume are coming up at a conference like this. And let's talk about. We're gonna just do them individually. Let's not just me ask you a question and then you give me all of them and not really break them down. Let's just do them one by one. What are some things that you learned when you were there that has really changed your mindset on not just your YouTube channel, but being a content creator in general?
- [06:06]
Josh Griffin
There's a lady named Hopescope that gave a talk and there were multiple talks that elaborated on it. But the main theme of her talk was knowing your audience. And I think for me, I know what my content's about and I thought I knew who my audience was. They got even deeper and talked a lot about who you're not just your audience, but who your target avatar is. Meaning if you're, if you were to pick the most perfect person. And not so much, it's so much deeper than that because I don't even know if I'm giving it enough, enough justice trying to describe what her talk was about because they not only do you determine who that is and what their gender is and what their age is. But then they go further than that. What are they into? What are their hobbies? What are, what else are they watching online other than hopefully your next YouTube video? And it really puts me in a. Because most of my content, I've always said, is it's for heating and air customers. They're about to buy a heating and air system, and that's my audience. But I've never really given it more thought than that. Like, I've never thought so deep on the level of when they stop watching YouTube for the 8 or 10 minutes that they just watched, what are they going to next and what did they last go to? So it's just her talk in general probably changed my entire trajectory on my next 50 videos because now there's a little more intent behind, okay, what are they doing? And maybe my next video would have been super in depth and very informative, but maybe, just maybe that target avatar ain't going to click it anyway. And it really doesn't even matter how informative that next video was going to be because they, it wasn't going to appeal to them enough to even click it. And so my whole, it just shifted everything for me on that front.
- [08:08]
Dusty Porter
So let's speak on just specifically relating that to your channel. Now that you've gotten back home, how have you implemented this specific thing? What you make for people who don't know his channel is the H vac guide for homeowners. Go check it out. You have your niche, you have the space that you live in on your channel. But what type of perspective shift has this talk in general made for you? And give us the examples with your channel specifically.
- [08:37]
Josh Griffin
So the first thing that I would say that I am doing different and I've done it with you, whether you know it or not, because I signed up for one of your coaching calls one time. And that is I want to see it through a different, a lens of somebody that doesn't necessarily know as much as I do about what I do. I want to see it through. What do they think my next video should be or what is missing from my channel when they go to it. So I've been doing a lot more of that. I, I asked some of the people there at VidSummit once I made that mind shift, what, you know, what do you think? And, and because of that, my latest video is doing better than most of my videos. It's. It's performing a little better. And I think for me, again, I make educational content. And the theme of my channel has always been that When I started my channel, there were a lot of heating and air guys making videos for other heating and air guys, but nobody was making content for mom if she was about to buy her next heating and air system. And that's always been my slogan, if you will. But at the same time, maybe my content's not necessarily for mom, maybe my contents for that millennial first time homebuyer who just happens to be trying to figure out why there's an arrow on their air filter. And I need to just do a quick, broad, bird's eye view of that topic and answer some of those questions. So as you can tell, my avatar has changed since vidsummit. I'm now thinking about things that I never have before.
- [10:07]
Dusty Porter
I'm so excited that to hear you say that, because I. It was part of a little bit of the conversation that you and I had privately when we did the coaching session, but with you defining that millennial who that was me. When I first got my house, I knew nothing about. I was never trained. My dad and I never did sit down and he never did say, okay, this is how you replace an air filter. Here's how important it is to do it frequently. And we talked about changing the oil in my vehicle. That was something he and I were both interested, whatever. But as far as like, the air filter side of things, like, that would be me. So your video would be perfect for me if I just, I think about a couple at my church who just recently, very young couple, just recently got their first house. And I'm sure they know certain things, but others they don't. And so having guides like that on your channel, that is so powerful to hear you talk about how it's redefining of how you think about who these videos are for. And you're still making the same content. It's just how you're packaging it. It's how you're putting it out there. The titles and your most recent video, I think is a great example of that. It's the assume you're talking about the video the Five Reasons H Vac Systems Are so Expensive. Is that the one you're referring to? Yeah. And so it's got a great thumbnail. And for people who don't know much about heating and air, like, why are they. I know what it does for me. So again, you're breaking it down knowing who your audience is. And I just, I love that I would encourage people listening to this to really think about your audience and what they do after they click off one of your videos or what they do before they click on one of your videos. And what people don't realize is that this will help their monetization. Right. Would you not agree with this? This is going to help you make more money, not with the. Not only with the ad program, but with sponsors. And when you can really hone in who you're reaching and who you're getting in the box when they're watching your video, that's a very important and powerful things. Okay, that's one we talked about her call. Now what's the next one? Was there something else after that?
- [11:55]
Josh Griffin
So one of the cool things that VidSummit does is they have multiple rooms. And so you can. You can almost. When I was a kid, there were these books called choose your own adventure. I don't know if you ever saw those. You would. You could choose if I'm going to take the mountain or the valley, and then it would say, okay, flip to that page. And so the entire book could be different for you versus me, because maybe you took a different option than I did. So Vidsummit, there's different rooms, there's different breakout sessions. And so I can't speak to every session, obviously. And so one of the sessions I did was on contracts with a potential sponsor. And that changed everything for me. I learned what the word perpetuity means and that maybe I don't want it in every contract or any contract. And I feel like I'm probably a. I would like to think a little smarter, a little sharper than the average bear. I've always had had lawyers involved just to cover me. But I went back through a contract that a lawyer. I hired a lawyer. I signed to the contract. And now what? Now that I'm learning some of these things, there's probably some verbiage that I didn't even want in there. And I even had a lawyer look at it. That would probably be another one I would throw in. There is. They focus on more than just the videos themselves, but maybe as YouTube as a business and some of the things we need to be making sure we're making good business decisions on. I don't know if that answers your.
- [13:21]
Dusty Porter
Question, but it does. I think about a lot of contracts that I've done over the years that have been like he said, she said. Where. When I first started the podcast and people were approaching me about coming on the podcast and the show as a sponsor, I'm like, oh, yeah, money, that sounds great. And then we. I'd send them an invoice on PayPal and there wouldn't be much to it, but I think that covering all your bases and being smart about how you do your business and so let's talk about YouTube as a business for a minute since we're on this topic. What have you. Where have you shifted as far and I know you have because I've been watching your journey and listening some things you've been talking about. Where has your mindset shifted as far as like your channel and where it plays a role in how you make money? Can you talk about that for a minute?
- [14:00]
Josh Griffin
I don't know that vidsummit alone made a huge shift in that manner. I will say after that class, I have turned down three different sponsors for different reasons. And there's different, as I said, there's different reasons for that. It ain't just because of the wording in their contract, but just knowing what the end goal is. And it may not be to always make a quick buck. Maybe the end goal is for my next video to hopefully for me, maybe not viral in general, but just viral for me is more important to me than making an extra 1,000 bucks on that next deal. If that makes sense.
- [14:36]
Dusty Porter
It does make sense.
- [14:37]
Josh Griffin
But just, just in general as far as business decisions go, this is a business and it can be as big or small as you want it to be. If it's just a hobby. I know a lot of the folks that that are in your group and probably listen to your show, maybe they don't necessarily look at this as a career, but if you do look at it as a career, I think you need to make decisions based on that. Long term decisions. It's a marathon, not a sprint.
- [15:02]
Dusty Porter
Yeah. I think that no truer words have ever been spoken on this show. It certainly is a marathon. How are you dealing with sponsors just as a whole? Can you talk about your fool? It's something you and I listened to our last episode that we did from back when we did that first one way back and we didn't talk about this, didn't cover it because at the time I'm not quite sure you were doing much sponsor stuff. I think this is a new thing. Not new, but it's a newer thing for you, new development. And so what are some kind of tips or maybe some things that you've learned from your failures of dealing with sponsors of advice. And we're straying away from Bid Summit now. So this is more just what's going on with your channel. What are the not really pros and cons, but what are the tips and tricks of dealing with sponsors and how to do it the right way?
- [15:46]
Josh Griffin
I think that, number one, it's okay to say no, right? It's. I would go to, into almost every single negotiation with the thought of I, I could just possibly walk away from this. So, for example, for me personally, I can't speak for all creators, but if there is language in the contract that is uncomfortable, that's already a red flag. If that company has language in their contract that doesn't have my best interests at heart, that automatically does not line up with my values. And, and because of that, I may not even work with you because of that. Now, now, again, that's maybe just me personally. Maybe there is something to be said for negotiations and, and redlining a contract and so on. But that's probably the first thing. The. Some of the other things I would say, it's okay to say no. I would say if you do need to be making money though, just understand that it's a numbers game. So if you need a one sponsor, then you probably need to take meetings from at least 10 or 15 companies. And to get meetings with 10 or 15 companies, you probably need to approach a couple hundred, if not more. So it's a numbers game just like anything else in sales. I don't. Again, I don't know if that answers.
- [17:03]
Dusty Porter
Your question, but it answered my question very well. And it's a numbers game. I think of it like having people as a guest on my podcast. Every Monday and Tuesday, I send out, I have a list of people and I have someone who's helping me. I got another gentleman who might be helping me as well to curate. I have a, I call it my algorithm, but it's really not an algorithm. I have requirements of people that I'd love to have on the podcast and they have a certain growth number and it's not like a subscriber number. It's like, how quickly are they growing? I go to some of these tools and I can see how many views they're getting. And I want people who are growing and not just people who have massive sub numbers, but I also want smaller creators and things like that. And I email out 25 on Monday, 25 on Tuesday, something I've been doing for years now. And now that people are coming to me to be on the show, as the show has grown, it's helped out because I supplement that way. But it's a numbers game. I may email 50 people, but only two or three get back. Now there are some weeks where I email 50 and I get like last week I like 13 responses. So it really just depends. It is a numbers game. Now I do want to ask you this, Josh, as far as like view count requirements, like, people ask me all the time, how big do I have to be to get sponsors? And I think you're a great person to ask about this because being in the education space on in a specific niche like the heating and air area, some of your videos are going to get more views than others because of the nature of the video, right? Like you're doing these secret tips and tricks videos and things that you need to know as a contractor. Those may get really high views. Evergreen content like how to change your air filter may get a ton of views over six or seven years, but your normal everyday average video may only average 5, 10, 12, 15,000, whatever it may be. So how many views are like, is there a metric or should I be looking at demographics? Give me the breakdown of what I should look when I'm approaching a sponsor.
- [18:45]
Josh Griffin
I think it's a really good question because obviously if you don't have a huge following, that plays a role. And I don't feel like I do. I feel like I'm just still getting started. That said, I think that should be part of the conversation. So for me, when I approach a sponsor, my goal is not to land them as a sponsor. My goal is to land them on a discovery call and then on that call get some of their expectations and just get a feel for where they are. I think if their expectations are either unreasonable or you can just already tell that they're going to be tough to work with, is that okay to say? Then that should affect your pricing. That should affect whether you even want to work with them, in my opinion. I from the get go again, from the very first moment, I'm looking for a reason to not work with them. And that's okay. I would much rather say no to that one and still have enough time in my calendar to fill with the next good one than to again make a couple bucks but just not enjoy the experience of working with them.
- [19:56]
Dusty Porter
Over the years, I have turned down a mini a sponsor just off of the initial kind of vibe, I guess would be a good word that I got from the initial phone call of man, yeah, I may make $1500, which is 500 more than I would make early on in my YouTube career or podcasting, whatever, but man, I can already tell it's going to be a thorn in my side. If I ju. You can just get that feeling, right, of what's a good company. And also speak on just like trusting the product and like knowing that your audience is a valuable asset for you and promoting things with sponsorships that you not only approve of, but that you might use yourself for valuing the trust that your audience and yourself have built along the way.
- [20:37]
Josh Griffin
The very first sponsor that ever offered me what I would call, I don't say life changing money, but more than a hobby money, the very first one I ever said no to, I only said no to them, not because I didn't necessarily dislike their product, but I wasn't sure that they were the best at what they do. And so for me, I want to align that. If you see me talk about a sponsor on my channel, they're the best, like they're going to be the best at what they do, usually for the most part. And so I think that your reputation is a part of that. I think one, a good example of that is a few years ago that FTC where that guy was crazy and a bunch of celebrities were paid to work with them, obviously they did not do their homework and to me it hurt their reputation. Most of those types of folks could probably bounce back from it, but if you're seen as a, as a, an expert, a subject matter expert for your niche and then you go ruining your reputation, I'm not sure you're bouncing back from that. So again, I think it's a whole lot easier to say no than ending up in a courtroom a year later. And I'm probably being extreme on that. Maybe a courtroom's not the place you're going to end up, but your channel could stop growing.
- [21:52]
Dusty Porter
It's, it's easy for people to hear us say this and they're like, oh, yeah, they have sponsors and they've made money. Like, I'm trying to always try to think about it from my audience perspective of someone listening to this, like on their walk, and they have a small channel or they started a channel where they may be a large channel and they haven't dabbled in sponsorships yet. But I truly mean this when I say I've turned down way more sponsorship offers than I've accepted. We're talking tenfold, right? Because you really have to value that relationship that you have. I can't tell you how many AI companies are approaching me right now. And there's a couple of sponsors that I have taken AI wise for the podcast, but it's because I believe in them and I've spoken with the founders and these are People who I believe are have the betterment of the creators in mind for my niche. And so I just feel like it's so important to know as a creator where you stand and the trust that you have and to not take advantage of the people, to not take advantage of their time or money. You take advantage of one of those or both and you're really going to ruin something. You're going to rub somebody the wrong way. You want to mess with someone, mess with their time and their money and it's going to mess with some people's. They're not going to have a good taste in their mouth. So completely agree with you there. So there are some changes coming to YouTube. They announced some at Vid Summit that week and they've announced some recently as of the past week in extending short form content to three minute style shorts. What were, what was the feeling that you were getting when you were there? Just the thoughts and the conversations that you were overhearing at VidSummit of kind of the direction of YouTube and where you see it going as a creator and what it's going to mean for us.
- [23:25]
Josh Griffin
So I forget, what's the guy's name? Bill you, I think is his last name Tom Bilyeu, maybe?
- [23:30]
Dusty Porter
Tom Bill you, I believe. Yeah, yeah.
- [23:31]
Josh Griffin
He gave a talk about AI and, and he actually showed some examples and it's not going away obviously for me. Honestly, it's a little scary. I think that one of the things they talked about was how AI in the future will not just be able to help make content and things like that, but it'll also even go so far as to know what your habits are based on the next piece of content and then be able to generate that content immediately right there. Now I think we're a little far from that.
- [24:06]
Dusty Porter
Yeah.
- [24:06]
Josh Griffin
During this conversation. But that's crazy if that is where we end up. If you go on there to do one thing and it automatically is generating content for the next five minutes right there on the spot for you to consume.
- [24:20]
Dusty Porter
So I heard a conversation in a podcast that I was listening to this week and the question was presented that said, 15 years ago, 10, 15 years ago, when all the social media companies were cropping up Facebook and Twitter now X and then Instagram and as of late TikTok or whatever, the question was posed, what should we have done as a society, as people to regulate or what should we have done differently? Because there's a lot of data and science now behind how you can't see me if you're not watching the video version, but basically how our phones are, especially for young people. Our attention spans are abysmal. A lot of it is linked to social media and how we're consuming content. Let's leave YouTube out of it for a minute. So when it comes to AI, I guess I want to pose the same question to you, Josh. What, if any, type of regulation or things that looking back at this whole Facebook generation, like, what could we have done differently and what can we do knowing how powerful AI is going to be? Because I am with you, I'm not sure how excited I am about watching a video and then within those five minutes, having an AI create the thing that I want to. I don't know if that interests me at all. One of the things that I love about YouTube is it's the main thing, the people. YouTube has always been people or creator centric, which is why I started this show. I don't Want to interview AIs on this podcast or robots. Right. I want to interview people who have. It might have been episode 30 or 40 of this show almost a decade ago, but there was a father and his son who came on the show. And I asked the father, I said, hey, I said, what does it mean to you to be able to do this with your son? And they now have over a million subscribers and they've gone on to do really big things and just nothing. Dead air. And I could tell he was tearing up. He was starting to cry.
- [26:11]
Josh Griffin
Oh, my gosh.
- [26:12]
Dusty Porter
The power of people on this platform, I think, is what makes it. And I hope that we don't lose the essence of that. And I do see that there were some things that I wish we would have done as a society with social media. And I see what it's done to young people. I see what it's done to kids who now have iPads and YouTube kids and all these things that they're constantly inundated with notification after notification. We forget just what matters and what should take precedent. So for you, the creator, talk about both sides of those things and what do you think we should do knowing that AI is this big ball rolling down a hill and we're not going to stop it?
- [26:50]
Josh Griffin
Who. That's a lot to unpack, right there. It is what we could have done differently. Honestly, I'll just tiptoe around that because I think part of this is it doesn't really matter what we would have done differently, because here we are, right? Yeah. And so here we are. And I think moving forward, I can't speak for all audiences. I can't speak for everyone that consumes any sort of content, but I can say personally that if I come across a piece of content that I know is AI generated or I know is acting. So, like, I see these prank videos that'll pop up on my feed sometimes, and if I can tell, or at least I think they're acting, then I usually will, number one, skip them. And I've even blocked people because of it, because I just. I'm not. That's not why I'm there. And I think that at the end of the day, why are people on YouTube? They're there for three reasons. They're either there to be entertained, they're there to get value in some way, or they're there to learn something. And as long as you're fulfilling one of those three things, regardless of how that content is generated, then you know you're going to win. And so I'm. I can only speak from personal experience. I think there could get come to a point where we don't. It's going to be hard to discern what's AI generated and what's not.
- [28:14]
Dusty Porter
And that's the scary part, right?
- [28:15]
Josh Griffin
Yeah, that is the scary part.
- [28:18]
Dusty Porter
Someone who has kids and someone who. We're already seeing it with celebrities doing deep fake videos and these things, all of these things make me want to go back to that old blocky interface of YouTube when I first started of just. I can still see the old interface and I know it makes me sound old, but I worry about the younger generations, the type of content that they're going to be. I don't know, it just feels so watered down. And I feel like YouTube as a platform has done a good job thus far. I'm saying thus far you could be listening to this later on and this not be the case, but doing things like providing the AI software or AI ability to have backgrounds for your vertical video that they're going to do. Like, all these things sound really cool and they're supplemental. They're not something that's going to be the replacement. And we were already seeing the crop of like faceless channels and people that, you know. And I have nothing against faceless channels. I know creators making tons of money doing it. And some would consider my channel faceless because I oftentimes never show my face. I'm just doing tutorial videos. It really just depends on how you're looking at it. And I do think that it's going to be an interesting topic to cover as far as AI in The future of kind of what, where do we go? How does it get regulated? And I'm excited to see where it goes, but I'm also a little bit nervous as well. I could not agree more. Talk about in closing now for the next few minutes, Josh, the con experience of going to VidSummit as a whole, not a specific talk. Why would you encourage people listening to this to find a conference to go to? I've gone to a few, not very many in the recent years because of small children. But I have gone to podcasts, small ones in Atlanta and things like that, and attended some virtually, so I know the benefit of them. What would you say to someone? Because I'll be honest with you, when you got on that call last time, right after you got back, you were just basically glowing. You were just like. You were just beaming of motivation. I think of those kind of box cars we had as kids. And that car would get down and you'd have on. If you ever had those little things that had the little motorized things or once they slowed down almost to a crawl and then. And they get right to it, zooms it out. I feel like that was you. You had been just boosted. You've really been motivated of man. My eyes have been opened to a whole new world. I've been doing this thing this same way for a long time. And now I know there's another side of this thing. Speak on just that whole experience.
- [30:49]
Josh Griffin
So again, I can't speak for all conferences. I think there are some cool conferences out there that have celebrities or football players at. Right. So I can only speak for VidSummit. Vid Summit did not pay me to do this, but I can tell you I don't know that I'll ever miss another one. It changed everything for me personally. You talk about some of the new things that are coming. They talk about that there. Right. That can be your source of information and so on. I talked earlier about how there are other people there that are for the same reasons. I don't know if that's the case for all conferences. If somebody's listening to this and this is just a hobby, Fit Summit's probably not for you. It's not cheap to go. It's the people that are there are for the most part there for the same reasons that I am. They're there to figure this thing out, figure out how to grow this thing and get motivated. Right. I wanted to highlight. I made a few notes of some of the things that were there that I did not know would be There. So the break sessions, there were vendors there. So if you do want to know what the latest and greatest products or AI or any of those sorts of things, there were vendors there that were giving out things. That's the other thing. They were constantly giving away stuff, so that was cool. There's networking, there's a. They actually use an app so you can meet up with other creators. So one night I had dinner with some of the folks that are in your group and a few others. We all met up at this restaurant and that was cool. I. And then the app itself, I noted that it's got a number of things in there that you can draw from and you can message with people. There's a little instant messenger inside of there. But yeah, I. Again, they didn't pay me to say this, but I would highly recommend checking it out. It might be one of the more expensive options out there. But I think that there's a. There's reasons for that. They want to make sure that you're there for the right reasons and you're not just there to. To get around, you know, another big YouTuber or something like that. That said, I feel like I got my value out of it. I spent some money, but I got what I needed and I was really motivated. I would just say that if you go there, I would be go there with an open. And this probably goes for any conference, but that one, specifically, because of everything they talk about. It's not that it's different than the things that I've learned or have experienced, but they're thinking about it in a different way that I had never considered. And so a lot of the breakout sessions, a lot of the keynote talks, they're talking about things that are not just a different way of looking at it, but also a higher level of looking at it. So when I'm trying to, I get. If I'm getting a thousand or five thousand views per video and I want to get to 10 or 15, they're like, no, how do we get to a million views per video? And what do we got to do to make that happen? And I'm like, oh, this is different.
- [33:48]
Dusty Porter
It's a high level. It's a high level of conversation and it's different. I love that. And oftentimes when I talk to people who come back from conferences and things that they've experienced, it's the hallway conversations or the restaurant conversations or whatever it may be of these people that are. It's invigorating and motivating. When you talk to People who are doing what you're doing. And it's just so motivational of just having back and forth conversations about YouTube, about content creation. It is really powerful.
- [34:19]
Josh Griffin
Yeah, absolutely. There was a lot of that too. One of the guys I talked to told me that he was out in the hallway more than he was in the rooms and just having some of those conversations. And again, they're there for the same reasons you are. So if you ever do make it to VidSummit, there's a hotel near the venue and that's where like all the, you name it, the who's who. I don't want to drop any names because I'll leave them out. But the big YouTubers, that's where in the lobby area of that hotel. If you want a fan girl, if you're. If you like getting around some of these people, that's where you would do it. Some of the largest YouTubers in the world were in that room. And I'll be honest with you, I was fangirling a little bit. Colin and Samir were there. That's one name out there.
- [35:04]
Dusty Porter
So that was kind of Colin, Colin and Samir. They've got a great show, a good newsletter, and they're great resource for. For creators. Sometimes it's a little bit much for me, some of the stuff that some of those guys talk about, just because a lot of it is blurring the lines between YouTube and Hollywood at times now. And I'm so into the individual content creator of kind of what people can do on YouTube. I love that aspect of what YouTube provides those people that sometimes that line blurs a little bit. And I love what they're doing for that top level of creators. Again, big praise for VidSummit in particular and hopefully we can encourage people to go. And I want to go in the future as well to get to really sit with my community because we've built a community here and to see those people get together, it was emotional for me. And to have that have you send me that picture, it was really neat. But hey, listen, Josh, I appreciate your time today. I want to close with this. YouTube is changing. There's a lot going on and with everything. What would you leave the creators as you leave the show? What's top of mind for you for your YouTube channel going forward the end of 2024 into 2025?
- [36:06]
Josh Griffin
So I'll say this. There were people there at VidSummit that had zero subscribers. A year or two before that were there with millions. And so I think that the opportunity Is there? I think that I hate when people say, oh, there's never been a better time. Because maybe that's cliche and maybe it's disingenuous, but I do still think it's a great time. There are people that now that they figured out the formula, they're starting channels from scratch with what they know now and growing exponentially. And so that alone just shows you it's not too late, the opportunity is there. And I would just encourage anybody that's maybe thinking about it or just getting started, that man, just go for it. And you're going to look back and be like, oh my gosh, thank goodness I did.
- [36:55]
Dusty Porter
Why didn't I do it sooner? I did something speaking of AI and I thought this was a really cool thing and I'm going to end on this. And I think you'll think this is neat too. I took all of my previous podcast episodes and their transcripts using a tool and I put them in this kind of large language model, which is just a version of an AI. And I basically asked it a bunch of questions. And one of the questions that I asked it, I said the prompt was, I often ask my guest, what is something that you wish you would have known sooner or whatever, getting this far in your YouTube journey? And I believe I put in 362 transcripts and audio logs into this large language model, the AI, and it presented to me like a top down graph of some of the responses. And there was over 160 some odd people that said the same thing. Just start. That was the two words. It was either just start or I wish I would start it sooner. Almost 200 out of the 400 almost interviews, that was the thing. And so if you're listening to this, just whatever that thing is, whatever that barrier or roadblock is, I just want to encourage you. Just go out there and do it. Like you have these phones that we carry around. We were talking about being so distracting earlier. They've got wonderful cameras. There's cheap ways to get into things. Now, I'm with you. I've said it so many times, it is cliche to say there's no better time to start than now, or it was yesterday. Whatever, get over all that. Just do it. Just start it. And you can improve on it. And even if you do 50 videos and they suck, you'll get better every time that you do it. So, Josh, thanks again, Josh, from the H Vac Guide for Homeowners. Good friend of mine, wonderful creator. All of his links will be down below. And Josh, we'll talk to you next time.
- [38:36]
Josh Griffin
Thanks, pal.
- [38:38]
Dusty Porter
Hello everyone and thank you for listening to this week's episode of the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. I really do appreciate it. Don't forget you can subscribe to the show for absolutely free and your podcast player of choice. Also, there are ways you can connect with us you can support by supporting our sponsor TubeBuddy, as well as supporting us over on Patreon to get access to our Creator Discord community. And I also offer YouTube coaching and consultation, YouTube channel reviews and just overall business coaching if that's something that you are wanting to look into. So make sure you check us out there and we'll see you next week.