← YouTube Creators Hub
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- [00:00]
A
I didn't want to stress about it because at one point I was also considering do I start a new channel and go in this new direction. But I didn't really want to do that either because I didn't want to maintain two YouTube channels as it is now. Dealing with burnout is a real thing. I do YouTube part time at this point and I have other things that I have focus on hello and welcome.
- [00:30]
B
To this week's episode of the YouTube Creator sub podcast. If you're a creator looking to start, grow or monetize your YouTube channel or beyond, this is the show for you. Each and every Friday I interview a wonderful content creator and we talk about the ins and outs of what it takes to succeed on YouTube and as a creator and much, much more. Go ahead and subscribe wherever you listen or watch over on YouTube to your podcast and we'd love to have you each and every Friday so you don't miss an episode. We do have any ad breaks or sponsors in the show. We're just brought to you by all of the things that we offer you. The creator number one. I have one on one coaching where I sit down with you. We do a 30 or 60 minute call and we can do this on a regular basis or just a one off if you would like. And if you want to go a little bit below that price range, then we do offer YouTube channel reviews and audits. 50 bucks gets you a six to eight minute video screencast for me reviewing your channel, talking about things that you could do better and things that you're already doing well. Next we have the Mastermind group. Five bucks gets you in. You get access to a Discord forum where you can talk YouTube Shop with creators all throughout the week as well as our monthly Mastermind calls. And then I also release weekly podcast episodes exclusively for that group with intentional topics around the creator economy and things that you can do to better yourself as a creator. Lastly, we do have an email newsletter called the Entrepreneurs Minute. Just a behind the scenes look at what I do here in my business, things I'm up to, things that I'm interested in. All of that is free. And then we have the Entrepreneurs Toolbox, which is just a running list of all the things mentioned here by all of the creators that we interview on the show. And with that said, let's go ahead and jump into this week's conversation. Hello everyone and welcome to this week's conversation on the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. As always, I'm joined today by a wonderful creator. Today am joined by Dana FindWell over on YouTube. And let me tell you a little bit about Dana. Dana. Her YouTube journey started after she was laid off in 2020. She launched a thrifting business and a channel focused on her business. But for two years, she struggled to gain traction. Everything changed when she shared a very personal video about what it was really like starting over at 59. And we're going to dive into all of that today. Dana, how are you doing today?
- [02:45]
A
I'm great, thank you, Dusty. Thanks for having me on.
- [02:47]
B
So tell me the story. You got laid off in 2020. You decided to start a YouTube channel. Take us back. How did that all happen?
- [02:57]
A
Yeah, yeah, 2020. So that's what, five years ago, I was in graphic design and art direction. So I was laid off from an ad agency. I had been in that field for over 30 years, and I was a single mom. My mom, she got really sick and she actually passed away on the day that we went into lockdown. So 2020 was a really difficult year for me. I wondered, what am I going to do about making money and all that? And I felt like I didn't really want to go back into advertising and design. I had been doing it for many years and I felt like I wanted to change. So while during that period I went ahead and did some freelance art direction, and I also explored other, I don't know, ideas of, like, different jobs that I might be able to do. I even looked into becoming a library assistant and thinking that, okay, I think at the time I was 55 or 56. I'm like, how am I going to restart a whole new career when even thinking of advertising, like, I'm older and how many years do I have in advertising? Which I really felt like it was a very young, youthful industry. So I was going through all those thoughts and the same time trying to just take care of my kid. And I'm grieving my mom. And that's when I discovered reselling. And I love to thrift. So it seems like a good segue for me to go into. And so I went heavy into it and I started watching a lot of YouTube, you know, videos and things. And that's when I really dove into it and committed myself to it. And at that point, a little after that's when I decided to, hey, maybe I should also start a YouTube channel, not as an expert, but in reselling and thrifting. But as here's my journey, document my journey, and perhaps some people would be interested in a newbie starting. So that's what I did. That's how I started. It really was part of my starting over after being laid off journey. And what had happened was I really didn't have much traction with that channel. So that's how I led into where I am today.
- [05:48]
B
So here we are now in October, the end of October 2025, almost six years. It seems so crazy that 2020 is six years behind us. It's man, what is time. But with that being said, you now have a channel with the name dana find on YouTube. You have over 30,000 subscribers, a very active community where you talk about declar cluttering, you talk about your business, you talk about the different things that you've done after certain ages. And so can you talk about you've got some videos with tens, hundreds of thousands of views and you've got. You found so much success in just over a hundred videos. And so I'm going to ask you about that, but first I want to ask you had no prior experience with production or video creation or did you. Where did. Did you just learn on the fly?
- [06:40]
A
I pretty much learned on the fly since I worked in advertising. We did do some videography and things like that, but I came more from the art direction side of it, not in really creating the overarching idea and also not actually implementing how to edit a video or anything like that. So that's something that I had to learn on the fly. But yeah, and then also you hinted at something as well. I only have a hundred videos. However, that kind of goes with the big pivot that I did back, I guess it was a year ago and I was doing reselling content like sold to ships and showing my hauls. And that wasn't getting very much traction. And then one day I said, I want to try something different. And that's when I said I'm going to just share a very. My personal journey of how I got to that point. And that was my Starting Over. I think it was starting over after 56 video. And so that was the big change. And that video went viral and I think it's under a little under 800,000 views at this point.
- [07:59]
B
Yeah, yeah, you did that. You did that a year ago. The video is titled Not Too Late to Start over finding purpose after 40, 50, 60 or at any Age, which is a great title by the way. It's a picture of you, very authentic picture. And the thumbnail says starting over at 59. It's just sitting at 770,000 views and looking at Vidiq. It's still growing and still producing tons of views every single month. So you made a pivot from talking about the business and the reselling, which you still do, by the way, but you are now more of a. I don't even know what you would call the type of, what do you call the content that you create? Because you talk about decluttering, you talk about what's the best way to declutter if you're over 50. Is it primarily just decluttering and cleanliness and kind of more personal, authentic videos? Because that's, you're getting tens of thousands, hundreds of thousands of views on these videos. And so what did you learn from that pivot as far as like niching down and finding who your audience really is?
- [09:04]
A
Yeah, that's a great question. I learned that pivoting to something that you feel very comfortable talking about is huge. And for me, when I was doing the thrifting or the reselling content, I had this self imposed imposter syndrome about it. I felt that I wasn't an expert at this field and whether or not it probably showed in my videos. And I developed a really, really nice group of viewers, which I, a lot of them came over still. But when I pivoted, what I talked about was essentially me and my experience. And Since I am 61 now, I've had a lot of experience in, in life. And so that became easy for me to switch over. And Dana Finewell is the name of my channel, but I started it off as Find was the name of my online stores because I'm finding thrifted items and I'm finding it. Well, let's say. But then my channel became Dana Fine. And then I thought of this tagline or overarching idea or concept of finding wellness after 50. And I always go back to that concept as my overarching niche, let's say. So that's more like finding wellness. And what happened was with the decluttering, I was trying all different things, like, oh, I'm going to try budgeting and frugal living and I'm going to talk about reinvention about myself and my thrifting business and how to start your own business. I tried all different things. And finally I said, okay, I'm going to, I'm going to do a decluttering video. Because a lot of times people at my age are decluttering, they're downsizing, they're retiring, they're maybe they're moving to a smaller home. And so they're faced with that. And I was faced with that as well. Because I moved from my own house. And then my oldest daughter, she bought a house back in 2020, so that was another big change. She bought a house that was two floors. So I live in the granny flat. And so that was a big change for me as well because I was downsizing. So I did talked about how I had to declutter my own big house to half of a house and that video took off. And so for me, I just had to say, okay, this seems like it really resonates with my viewers. And I experimented and I kept trying different things. I do some vlogs, I do some, I don't know, talking about just things that are going on in my day to day life and they didn't quite hit as well as when I talked about decluttering. I made a conscious decision to really focus on decluttering after 50 or. And it's much more focused to folks who are more midlife because I believe that people in midlife are faced with dealing with a lot more sentimental items and keepsakes and heirlooms as opposed to maybe somebody who's in their 20s, 30s, or even 40s. I feel like this is a really good sub niche for me. I don't know, does that kind of answer the question? It does.
- [12:50]
B
It makes a lot of sense and it's a great answer because you found what worked and what your audience was looking for. And now that you have decluttering as one of the buckets of content you can create, you can start finding other stuff that fall under that wellness umbrella and you can find other ones that work very well. That's one of the things that creators do very poorly, is they get married to an idea or they get married to a topic and a specific way to approach a topic. And I talk to a lot of clients of mine that, that are stuck on certain ways to do things and I'm like, but you're still going to get the same message out there if you do it this way. It's just, I don't know why you're so tied to doing it that one way. And so it's interesting to hear someone like you, who's been successful say, hey, I threw everything at the wall under this umbrella and found some things that really stuck. And the decluttering was one of them. Can you talk about maybe the technical side of YouTube as far as what you found work for you? Can you talk about producing the videos, the thumbnails, the titles? What is your process as a creator? Give us a kind of behind the scenes look of kind of what you do to find success.
- [13:54]
A
Oh, sure. So I create all my videos on my iPhone 16. And I also have this little Hollyland microphone I use for editing. I use DaVinci Resolve I used to use. I started learning on what Premiere, Premiere Pro I think it's called because I, as a. As an art director and designer, I was very familiar with Adobe products. So I had the Creative Suite and use Photoshop and Illustrator InDesign all the time. But I had never learned Premiere Pro. So I think for me to pick that up was a little bit easier because I was a little familiar to the UI of Photoshop and things. And I really enjoyed. I really enjoy editing, actually. I'm not super great at it. I'm not really super advanced or anything. And this is my studio, basically, which is my. My desk, my office desk. And I often just sit here and talk and go through things, but then I'll try to shoot different areas of my home. So that's my setup. Does that or is it does. Have you.
- [15:15]
B
What changes have you made as far as, like, when you've seen the success and the views started to come in. Did you make some tweaks to your thumbnails? Did you make some tweaks of how you curated your titles? What are the things that you've done that. That maybe the inside baseball? Oh, yeah. I did make some changes here. And once I did this, I did see a little more success.
- [15:36]
A
I think what it hearkens back to when I was doing my reselling videos. I was doing reselling videos. I belong to a mentor group. It's called Reseller Greatness. And it also has a zoom call for social media. There's Quite a few YouTubers on this call, but they're all. It's mainly focused on reselling, so it's. It's more of a smaller niche. But they were. They would go and critique my thumbnails and my videos and things, and they critiqued my video, my thumbnails, because I basically would do the same thumbnail every time. And I would say, sold to ship 101, sold to ship 102. And it was not good titles. So that's when I started to explore, okay, maybe I need to come up with this more interesting titles to really say, I want to check out this video. So that was one shift. I also, because I'm a graphic designer, I knew that as far as my thumbnails, I would try to keep them pretty consistent as far as color palette and think fonts and things like that.
- [16:41]
B
That's a big one.
- [16:41]
A
So I, yeah, so I just knew I'm going to stick with this kind of look. And then I forgot I failed to mention that. So when I had the big viral video, the big pivot was, okay, what do I do with all my reselling? Do I talk, go back and forth and talk about reselling? Do I do. And I just was so confused. But finally I made the decision to stop doing reselling because I felt like the algorithm was still shooting me out to reselling, you know, people. And so I made the huge decision to take, I think I had 200 videos of reselling content. And I hid it all. I unlisted it all. I don't know if that's something that everyone should do. That's just what I chose to do. And I started off with I don't. 10 videos. You know what I mean? So that, that was a big shift.
- [17:36]
B
I'm interrupting the conversation just for 30 to 45 seconds to tell you about our YouTube channel review and audit service. We have now done over 150 reviews in past three months and it is a great way for you to inexpensively get someone to take a look at your channel. Another set of eyes and I'll record a six to eight minute screencast video telling you things where I think you should be spending your time to make the most of basically that value time that you have to spend on your channel. And then lastly, the best, basically, I think bang for your buck in the creator space is our Mastermind group. It's the creator's corner. Five to ten bucks get you in. You get the forum to talk to all the YouTube creators and past guests that are in there. You get the Mastermind calls every month on Zoom, hosted by me. You get the exclusive podcast episodes released every Friday called the Creator's Corner and so much more. So go check those out if you haven't already. Now back to the show. I was on a call with a client this week where we were having this conversation about should he remove the history of his channel. And I don't. I'm not going to say that you did the incorrect thing. I believe that it's to each their own and it is a case by case basis for whether you should or shouldn't remove the old stuff. If you're making a pivot in a niche change, I don't think YouTube punishes you. I think that you still have that history to go back on and look at. Some creators choose to remove them like you did, and others choose to leave them but it's interesting. Did you find any negative impact once you removed those videos? Did you see the data or analytics skew a certain way or anything that was interesting to look at once you did remove those videos?
- [19:15]
A
I'm not a huge like numbers person, so I don't follow the data very carefully, but I did feel like my views went up and I also stopped stressing about it because I felt like the new viewers that were going to come on were going to be new viewers for my new content. If. I don't know if that makes sense.
- [19:37]
B
It makes a lot of sense.
- [19:39]
A
Yeah. Yeah. So I stepped. I didn't want to stress about it because at one point I was also considering, do I start a new channel and go in this new direction? But I didn't really want to do that either because I didn't want to maintain two YouTube channels as it is now. Dealing with burnout is a real thing. And especially If I do YouTube part time at this point. And I have other things that I have focus on when I'm a new grandma and Malia is going to turn one neck tomorrow and I babysit her two days a week. So to me that's a huge commitment, especially if I have my thrifting business. I have my YouTube channel. So there was no. At that time I didn't. Melina wasn't born. But I was like, oh, there's just no. I want to focus just on this one thing. So that's why I decided to hide all those reselling videos.
- [20:39]
B
And YouTube gives you that freedom, right? YouTube gives you the freedom to understand that, hey, listen, I am a new grandma. I want to spend time with my, my, my first ever grandchild and I want to really be there for them. And YouTube allows us to do that. Let's talk about that. The monetization side of things, you obviously do thrifting. But as far as YouTube, how are you making money? And then to end this question, on average, how much could you make in an average month? Can you talk about just the monetization opportunities and what it has brought you?
- [21:09]
A
Yes. So I probably make about averaging about $500 a month. I don't make a lot of money on AdSense. And after the viral video, I made a lot of money for me, like almost $4,000 at that point. So I saw, okay, there's definitely potential here. But I just did AdSense and I did all my other things that I had to do. Thrifting business, babysitting. But just a little while ago I had been asked if I wanted to be on in this event, it was called Get Organized HQ event and they asked over a hundred creators to submit videos and then it was going to be like a week long event where people could watch your video. Of course I felt really happy that they asked me and I submitted my video, we did the whole thing and I just felt so honored to be asked to do this event with top creators in the niche of organization and decluttering. So to me I just felt validated in a way as a creator. And from there I decided I need to branch out and I need to get more involved with other avenues if whether it's creating a membership or doing some kind of mentorship, I could create products. I could also do some lead magnet sort of free downloadables and things especially if I focus in on decluttering and organizing. And I couldn't really see myself doing that before because I didn't feel like an expert at anything other than just me starting over my life at age 56 or whatever. But then once I moved into that niche or sub niche, that's when I decided I'm going to go ahead. And so right now I'm in the process of opening up other income streams for myself and I just had a couple of zoom meetings with subs. I sent out some emails I'm working with, I think it's called Kit. Yep, that was a. Yeah, that was the first thing I did was worked with Kit in order to create a landing page and somewhere where I can gather email, email addresses and things like that. And at that point I really wanted to, I really wanted to talk to some of my subscribers. I don't know why, I just wanted to see, I don't know when I could bring what kind of value I could bring to them. And just talking to a couple of my subscribers or my viewers just felt so like validating. And yes, I think I'm on the right path. I want to do something like this. I also want to create some products. I'm going to create an ebook, a more in depth ebook on decluttering an organization. I'm also going, I would like to, and I'm not sure if I'm going to do this yet but create some guided journals as well. And one since what I think my, I don't know if you call it a superpower but my thing that I'm maybe strongest on is what to do with keepsakes and that kind mementos and things like that. I was thinking of a guided journal maybe called a keepsake journal or maybe Even a grandmother's journal, journal kind of thing. I'm going to think about that. And especially with my graphic design background, I used to produce a lot of different books and things like that. Yeah. So I was like, maybe I should tie into something that I used to do.
- [25:25]
B
I think it's so important that you branch out and have other opportunities. And you've already started making money through the ad program. You've had proof of concept with that video that did so well. And there's thousands, tens of thousands of dollars to be made monthly and getting a physical product, opening up an exclusive group of people who are interested in the really sub niche that you're in. There's so many really doors that you're just now starting to open and YouTube's going to give you those opportunities. I want to ask you this, Dana. If you could go back, what is one thing that you wish you would have known sooner about content creation going back to 2020, if you could have told yourself then this thing, what would that be?
- [26:04]
A
Wow, that's a great question. I. Because I had to do my journey no matter what, but I probably would have said, go ahead and tell my story right away and don't be shy about it and don't be afraid to be a little bit vulnerable. And I think my vulnerability has built up over these last few years where, you know, I, I was. I'm a very shy, introverted person. I'm not super outgoing. I'm happy and I'm happy, I'm a happy person. But I would be a little bit standoffish and I would be more about, oh, Dusty, tell me about you. Oh, I want to talk about you. And then all of a sudden to be in front of a camera talking about me was really hard. But it actually opens me up and makes me more of a confident person. And also it makes. Actually makes me a better conversationalist in real life because I'm not so shy to talk about myself, you know, so there's a little bit more back and forth, I think, in, in real life. So I don't know.
- [27:31]
B
You mentioned the imposter syndrome. How did you get over it? Like, how are you able to get on here on YouTube in front of hundreds of thousands, eventually millions of people, and just talk about things that are near and dear to your heart, things that are very personal. How did you get over the fact of looking at everyone else and what they're doing on YouTube and you now say, hey, I have a voice. I want my voice to be heard. And so I Have this channel and I'm going to use this platform. How did you get beyond that?
- [28:01]
A
A big one was switching niches because I didn't feel confident being a reseller guru, for example. And when I switched over to what was more age appropriate for me, not age appropriate, but who I'm. I'm 61 years old, I had to accept that. I think I was playing imposter for many years before, even before YouTube, being in, working in an ad agency as an art director with a whole bunch of young people, I felt like I had to hide my age. And whether or not that was just self imposed, like feeling like I need to do that, I don't know. But that feeling of being, I don't know, not an imposter, I'm not really truly who I am. Once I switched over and I talked about myself and I saw that people were actually interested in that, that gave me so much confidence. That gave me the feeling like, why am I hiding myself? And, and I am an authority to my past, what my life is, you know, so I am an authority in my own life and that's what my channel is about.
- [29:24]
B
Do you believe that in 2025 and beyond, it's possible for anyone, any age, any gender, any political preference? Do you believe that anyone and everyone, if they put their mind to it, stay consistent, can start and not just start, but grow a successful channel on YouTube and get their voice heard on this platform?
- [29:44]
A
Yes, I, I do, I do. I. All right. I love YouTube. I think it's. I think it's the best. I really do. I love being a consumer of YouTube as well as a creator. And I love the fact that there's so many different niches and there's so many different possibilities for anyone to come on and be able to talk about their stories, to find their tribe or their community. It's. I don't know. I feel like the possibilities are endless. You know what I mean?
- [30:20]
B
I do. Do you think the hardest part is starting? Do you think that people listening to this, even if they have a channel, maybe they've been super inconsistent or they're not seeing the growth they want, you know, what would you tell that person?
- [30:35]
A
I would tell the person who hasn't started yet to just go ahead and start. I would just say go ahead and start talking to your iPhone. Go ahead and just start talking and feeling comfortable with it and then go ahead and post it and you're just going to get into the flow. I think that's really important because a lot of us are oh, I'm going to start my YouTube channel after I get everything, all my ducks in a row. And I'm going to do. But I need to do this first, and I need to do this first, and that's great. But if it's taking you two years to get all your ducks in a row, then why don't you just start? And then during that time, you're just going to get better and better at what you do. So that's for the person who's just starting and then the person who is discouraged, maybe with not getting a whole lot of views. What I've. I'm sorry, I hit my mic. What I thought about was I was discouraged and that's when I pivoted. Right. I didn't know what was going to happen, but I just took a chance and created this weird video that was totally not about my niche at the time. And it sparked me to try another avenue. But if you're in your niche and you love what you're doing, the other thing that can happen is you can build a community that's very. It may be small, but it may be very loyal to you. And that's something that can give you confidence as well and can boost you. And comments going back and forth with your. Your community is helpful. You get a lot from that as well. And then you can maybe think about, oh, maybe I want to start a membership and to even build the community even more. Just the fact that you don't have maybe that many subs at this point, maybe that's okay.
- [32:48]
B
Yeah, I'll have to say this, Dana. It's creators like you that make doing this show fun for me. I'll be completely transparent and give everyone a kind of a peek behind the curtain. When I started this show, 14 going on 15 years ago, my YouTube channel was sub 50,000 subscribers. At the time, no one knew my name. I didn't know any YouTube educators. And thankfully there were some creators willing to come on the podcast that helped me grow the channel. And now my main YouTube channel channel is approaching 400,000 subscribers and I get hundreds of thousands of views, millions of views, sometimes every week. And I'm so thankful for the opportunity to be able to chat with people like you and get a different perspective on. On a YouTube journey. And I hope people listening to this can hear that it doesn't matter what your topic is or what you're trying to say. You can. It really is a game of persistence. And if you are willing to sit through and learn from the mistakes and failures that you're going to make and being willing to pivot, just like Dana has done to find success and being willing to try new things and understand that you're not always right, the things that you think. And being able to be honest and humble and have humility and be authentic with your audience is so important. So, Dana, you've been an amazing guest for us today. I'm going to link in the show notes for this episode to Dana's YouTube channel, where you can go check out where she does all of her content right now and then other links that she may want me to share will be there as well. But thank you again so much, Dana, for joining me today.
- [34:24]
A
Oh, thank you, Dusty. I really had a lot of fun. Thank you.
- [34:27]
B
And that is a wrap on this week's episode of the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. Man, what a great conversation it was today. Hopefully you got something out of it. If you did, don't forget to subscribe to the show. It's absolutely free. And check out one of our offerings, Whether it be one on one coaching YouTube channel reviews, our mastermind group, the Entrepreneurs Minute Newsletter, or the Toolbox where you can go and see all the links mentioned throughout the show's history. With that being said, you guys have a great day or week whenever you're listening to this and we'll talk to you next time.