There’s No Such Thing As A Small Niche On YouTube - Jason Todd Interview

Summary

Podcast Summary: YouTube Creators Hub

Episode: “There’s No Such Thing As A Small Niche On YouTube” – Jason Todd Interview

Host: Dusty Porter
Guest: Jason Todd (Smart Hobbies channel)
Release Date: August 29, 2025

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Episode Overview

In this episode, Dusty Porter speaks with Jason Todd—the creator of the Smart Hobbies YouTube channel, focused mainly on Sudoku. Jason shares his journey from puzzling for fun to building a thriving niche community, offering practical advice on content strategy, audience discovery, monetization, and the unique opportunities (and challenges) of running a faceless, niche YouTube channel. The discussion is highly relevant to aspiring and established creators alike, highlighting that even the most specific interests can flourish on YouTube with clarity, consistency, and attention to the audience’s needs.

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Key Discussion Points & Insights

Jason Todd’s Origin Story and Channel Niche

• Transition to YouTube ([03:29]):
  • Pre-COVID, Jason’s main hobby was competitive Scrabble until the pandemic forced him to seek solitary activities. He rekindled his passion for Sudoku, realizing he could teach strategies not covered elsewhere.
  • “When I started, the YouTube channel was less than a week. A lot of people said they wish it would start earlier. I could not have started any earlier.” – Jason Todd [03:29]
• Channel Focus ([05:15]):
  • Jason creates daily Sudoku-solving videos and in-depth tutorials for specific advanced strategies ("X Wings," "Swordfish,” etc.), setting his channel apart within the Sudoku niche.
  • Leveraging YouTube’s ecosystem, he cross-links tutorials and solve videos for viewer learning pathways.

Building Community and Understanding Your Audience

• Early Mistakes and Pivots ([08:14]):
  • Initially uploaded content on multiple hobbies (chess, Disney, eBay), then realized the power of “niching down” after a subscriber query.
  • “If I'm confusing people who are watching this channel, I'm confusing the algorithm and everyone else. So then I decided to niche down.” – Jason Todd [08:14]
• Identifying the Audience Avatar ([08:14]–[11:32]):
  • At VidSummit, Jason adopted the “audience avatar” exercise, uncovering his core viewers: “50 to 80 year old men, semi-retired, worried about keeping a sharp mind as they age.” He named his avatar “Jim.”
  • Content shifted to directly address “Jim’s” needs—clarity, pacing, brain health—resulting in more engaged, appreciative viewers.

Community Engagement Practices

• Comment Strategy ([11:32]):
  • Responds to every comment to understand audience pain points, aiming to keep explanation slow and thorough for older viewers.
    • “I respond to every single comment because I do want to understand what people are struggling with.” – Jason Todd [11:32]
  • Greater engagement built a sense of community: people began to help each other in comments, join email lists, and upgrade to memberships.

Content Diversification and Format Strategy

• Content Types ([13:12]):

  • Produces long-form solves, detailed tutorials, interactive Shorts, and monthly live streams.

• Shorts: Hook & Iteration ([13:58]–[17:33]):

  • Experimented with Shorts, initially doubting their potential for Sudoku. Success came when experimenting with strong hooks and concise problems.
    • “If I have a good enough hook in that first couple seconds ... I might be more successful.” – Jason Todd [13:58]
  • Created batches of similar Shorts using color variations and identical scripts to maximize output and test what resonates.

• Live Streaming as Community-Building ([17:33]):

  • Live streams (monthly) deepen engagement without visible on-camera presence, offering shoutouts to supporters and real-time interaction.

Faceless Channel Insights

• Production Efficiency & Tradeoffs ([22:54]):
  • Advantages: No need for on-camera work, streamlined editing, lower production costs.
  • Disadvantages: Less brand recognition, harder to secure sponsorships, takes longer to foster viewer connection.
  • Uses an AI-generated character (“AI Timberlake”) in thumbnails to improve click-through rate while remaining faceless.

Channel Packaging: Thumbnails, Titles & Branding

• Thumbnail Philosophy ([20:25]):
  • Simplicity and recognizability over flashiness. Repeated formats and branded elements (blue backgrounds, highlighted puzzle cells, AI character).
    • “Branding is more important and recognition is more important than the actual colors you use and the brightness you use to get someone's eyes.” – Jason Todd [21:40]
  • Thumbnails and titles are intentionally curiosity-driven (e.g., “Check for Triples,” “Start with box one”), with the puzzle grid as the central visual.

Monetization & Business Growth

• Revenue Streams ([24:45]):
  • YouTube ad revenue
  • Buy Me a Coffee support & memberships: Monthly puzzle packs with special themes (e.g., Pirates of the Caribbean puzzles).
  • Course sales: Moving to Kajabi for automated emails, course delivery, and community migration.
    • Upcoming masterclass on Sudoku solving; plans for a larger comprehensive course.
    • “As you connect with the audience and you make better content, you're just going to reach the right amount of people.” – Jason Todd [29:27]
• Financial Growth Trajectory ([29:02]):
  • It took 21 months to monetize, but the last month saw 10x growth—$2,700 per month.
    • “My last month I had about, I went 10x so about $2700. And it's continuing to grow.” – Jason Todd [29:02]
• Philosophy of Niche Monetization ([29:27]):
  • “There's no such thing as a small niche. You might think Sudoku is a small niche. There's just creators who think small.”

Top Creator Advice

• Signature Advice ([30:19]):
  • “Be so good they can’t ignore you.” (Steve Martin; echoed by MrBeast)
  • Rather than chase metrics directly, focus on improving content quality with each video.
    • “You're asking the wrong questions if you're asking how to get the right more subs, more likes, more views ... the question is, how do you make better content?” – Jason Todd [30:19]

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Notable Quotes & Memorable Moments

• On Getting Started:
  “I wanted to do this and I figured out how do I do a YouTube channel. And just like that, Smart Hobbies was born in February of 2021.” – Jason Todd [03:29]
• On Niching Down:
  “If I'm confusing people who are watching this channel, I'm confusing the algorithm and everyone else.” – Jason Todd [08:14]
• On Serving the Audience:
  “If you want to be serious about YouTube ... it's not about you, it’s about the viewer.” – Jason Todd [08:14]
• On Community:
  “The only way to make that happen is to find out who wants to be a part of that and then reach out to those folks.” – Jason Todd [11:59]
• On Shorts Strategy:
  “If I have a good enough hook in that first couple seconds ... I might be more successful.” – Jason Todd [13:58]
• On Monetization Philosophy:
  “There's no such thing as a small niche. ... There’s just creators who think small.” – Jason Todd [29:27]
• On Top Creator Advice:
  “Be so good they can’t ignore you.” – Jason Todd [30:19]

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Timestamps for Key Segments

• Jason’s YouTube Origin Story [03:29]
• Content Structure & Tutorials [05:15]
• Niching Down: Lessons Learned [08:14]
• Audience Avatar & Channel Growth [10:10]
• Comment Engagement & Community Building [11:32]
• Shorts & Content Diversification [13:58–17:33]
• Live Streaming Experimentation [17:33]
• Faceless Channel Pros and Cons [22:54]
• Thumbnails & Packaging Evolution [20:25–22:48]
• Revenue Streams & Growth [24:45, 29:02]
• Philosophy on Small Niches [29:27]
• #1 Piece of Creator Advice [30:19]

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Final Takeaways

Jason Todd’s story is an inspiring case study in what’s possible within a highly specific niche, especially when relentlessly focused on audience needs, strategic packaging, and incremental content improvement. His insight that there’s “no such thing as a small niche” invites creators to pursue their passions without fear—and to let quality, clarity, and community lead the way.

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For more, visit Jason’s Smart Hobbies channel, or check out his upcoming Sudoku Masterclass (links provided in the show notes by Dusty).

Transcript

[Jason Todd]

Initially noticed is comments started to make a lot more sense to me. I not like everyone else but I do respond to every single comment and I will until I can't anymore. I think the guy had last week talked about 80,000 subs he had to quit. I respond to every single comment because I do want to understand what people are struggling with.

[Dusty]

Hello everyone. Welcome to this week's episode of the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. Dusty here. As always, we have a wonderful guest for you today. I want to encourage you to do a few different things. Number one, subscribe to the show. If you're not, whether it be on our YouTube channel, your podcast player of choice doesn't really matter to me. Number two, leave us a review if we've helped you out along the way. Reviews really help podcasts grow. And number three, go check out any of our services. We have our YouTube channel review service where I audit your YouTube channel for about seven or 10 minutes in a recorded video. I offer one on one YouTube coaching which I really have been enjoying. The coaching calls I've been having recently. And then number three, five to $10 get you in our Mastermind group. That group is now over 150 people strong and we have monthly Mastermind calls. We have our Discord server which we treat like a forum. And you have the ability to listen to exclusive podcast episodes that I record every week that I release there on that feed for those people who support the show. So with all of that said, let's jump into this week's conversation. Hello everyone and welcome to this week's conversation on the YouTube Creators Hub podcast. I'm super excited to not only have just a normal guest on the podcast, but a friend of mine appear in the industry and a super, super impressive creator. Today we are joined by Mr. Jason Todd. Now let me tell you a little bit about Jason before we get started. Jason has turned Sudoku, which we all know what it is, the numbers and the boxes that are empty. I'm not a big Sudoku person, my grandmother was. But he has taken this Hobby, created over 700 videos, now has 26,000 subscrib million plus views on his Smart Hobbies YouTube channel. He's also known as Timberlake in the Discord if you're part of our creator community over there. So he's proving that keeping your brain sharp can be both fun and addictive. And he's building an amazing community over on his YouTube channel. Jason, how are you today, my friend?

[Jason Todd]

I am doing awesome, Dusty. I can tell you from the moment I Wanted to start a YouTube channel. I looked up podcasts and I found the YouTube Creators Hub. And I've listened to you ever since. So you've been with me since day one. Thank you so much.

[Dusty]

That means a lot. I appreciate you saying that. You didn't have to, but I really do. It really means a lot to me that creators have listened to this show. And when I have creators like you that are succeeding at such great heights now, it's really impressive. I feel like the small person on the totem pole because you guys are well exceeding what I've ever done, which if you're a parent, that's what you want for your kids kind of analogy. You want your kids to do better and grow up to be way more successful. And I think that a lot of the creators that I've worked with or have listened to this show have really gone on to do amazing things, and you're certainly on that list. Now. Let's talk about the YouTube channel. Smart hobbies. You cover Sudoku. So let's just break it down for a minute. Explain to the audience the origin story of the channel. How did you start this channel? Were you just really interested in the puzzles and Sudoku and decided to do it that way? You just give us the full story?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah. Great question. Pre Covid, everybody else, I had plenty of activities to do and I like my name. Smart hobbies. I don't just pick up hobbies. I obsess and I work at them so hard that I become very good at them to a point where it's just a casual interest into a driven type of hobby that you get really good at. And at the time, I was actually very much into, believe it or not, competitive Scrabble. So like Scrabble, the word game that everyone has at home, you can study word lists, you can enter tournaments. And I was doing these face to face tournaments in the area. Really enjoyed it. But then Covid shut everything down and so I had to turn to something that was more of a solitary pursuit. And I started watching a lot more YouTube and I started watching the people do Sudoku. And I'd done sudoku puzzles for 20 years. And these guys were teaching me these new strategies, new ways of solving puzzles that were harder than I ever thought possible. And so I got really into it, learned so much. And then at one point I looked at, I was like, I could do this. I could, I like to teach. I could teach people how to solve these puzzles because there were some things they weren't teaching. There were some techniques I was picking up that I didn't see anywhere else. And really from that thought I could teach this myself to. When I started, the YouTube channel was less than a week. A lot of people said they wish it would start earlier. I could not have started any earlier. I said, I want to do this. And I figured out how do I do a YouTube channel. And just like that, Smart Hobbies was born in February of 2021.

[Dusty]

So explain smart Hobbies in general. The Sudoku part of it, explain like what types of videos you're putting out. Because people may think, oh, I know what sudoku is. I've seen it before, seen someone in my family do the puzzles. But how are you creating content around it?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, one of the beauties of this particular niche, Sudoku, if you've ever looked it up. There are more possible Sudoku puzzles than there are sand, grains of sand in all the beaches in the world, all the stars in Milky Way galaxy, the number is so large. So I could do a new puzzle every day. Never run out of content. The basic strategy I do is pick a puzzle, solve that puzzle, figure out what is interesting about it. What could I teach someone who might get stuck on this puzzle to that they could use to get past it and then put that into a video? But beyond that, what distinguished me from the other people in the niche, and there's some really great other channels out there, great community is I also make tutorials. And so in the tutorials I can focus on a very specific strategy. They all have these interesting names. Most of them are like naked or hidden pairs and triples. But then you have things like X wings and swordfish and remote pairs and stuff that you would never heard of. But they have a particular logical realm to it. So I put those tutorials up along with the content of the puzzle solving content. And so what's nice is I think I've heard Nick Nimmin talk about the ecosystem as I'm solving a puzzle and it contains one of those strategies I featured in a tutorial. I can pop up a link to that tutorial so they can get more information about how to solve puzzles, more puzzles like that in the future. And so that's the basic gist of the content that I make.

[Dusty]

So when you're doing the puzzles and you're solving them in the video, are the viewers, what they're getting out of it is just watching you or alongside you. Like, how is the community built? What are your kind of formats that way?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, great question. And so there is online tools where I can load puzzles. The main one, I use the tools called Sudoku Maker, where you can go in and you can create your own puzzle, but I can just take a diagram and input the numbers into it. And then I. Then there's a playing app that works on your mobile or your desktop. It's called Sudoku Pad by Sven Neumann. And so what I do is I take any puzzle I'm going to solve, I put it into a solving link. And so when the. In the description, anyone who's watching the video can click on that puzzle and try to solve it themselves or follow along with me as I do it. I'll say most of my subscribers will try to click on and solve the puzzle themselves. And if they get stuck, then they'll refer to the video and see how I got past that particular point and do the rest of the solve. Other people will sit there and just watch me solve puzzles over and over again. They leave it on their tv and I guess two or three hours of Timberlake is what they want to watch that night, and that's what they get.

[Dusty]

I absolutely love that. That's the beauty of YouTube is that niches like this can just flourish. And there's channels, like you said, there's a big community around this. It's not just your channel. So talk about the beginning phase when you started this channel. What were some things that you look back now and you say to yourself, man, I wish I would have done this differently.

[Jason Todd]

Yeah. Yeah. So this comment and listening to your podcast always wanted to feature these comments for someone who's not quite monetized. So someone in the 300 to 800 subscriber range, if you're listening out there, this is for you. But anyone else can benefit as well, because in that range, you've probably done enough videos where it's past the fun or this is new and exciting. It's the point of this is work now, but you're not getting paid or you're not really seeing an actual benefit for doing it. So it's like, do I continue in that realm if I'm not monetized? And it's not so much fun as is work to keep going. What I've learned I started at base zero knowledge of YouTube. I didn't know when I started, I didn't know the difference between recording software like Obs Studio versus editing software like vsdc. I thought you did it all in one thing. I had never recorded or edited the movie on imovie or anything before I started. I had to figure out, how to load stuff, how to come up with templates, how to come up with the puzzles. So starting with absolutely nothing. But the thing that I wish I would have known sooner. Starting out, there's two things. One is I was called smart hobbies because I actually did other different hobbies along the way. I had videos about chess because I really like chess. And the Queen's Gambit show was out at that time. I had videos about going to, going to Disney World and how to vacation because I've taken my family to Disney World for 20 years, how to sell stuff on ebay, all these other hobbies I had. And I stopped that six months in because I had one viewer reach out and said, hey, I thought this was a Sudoku channel, lol. And from that point on I realized, hey, if I'm confusing people who are watching this channel, I'm confusing the algorithm and everyone else. So then I decided to niche down. But the bigger thing I think would have accelerated it, when I should have known was who is my audience? I didn't really understand who I was making the content for. When you start out, Most people think YouTube is just about making stuff for themselves. What do I care about? What do I want? What I want to show? And I want people to listen instead. If you want to be serious about YouTube, YouTube is, it's not about you, it's about the viewer, the person on the other end and where. It helped me figure out who my audience was. Not just the comment section, but I went to VidSummit, sat through a lot of really great presentations and one in particular was by John Malecki, he's a pro NFL, retired NFL football player. And he talked about identifying your audience and he had this audience avatar sheet. And so I went, I filled that out and I understood that the people who watch my channel, what do they care about? And I found out that it's really 50 to 80 year old men predominantly who are semi retired and they're worried about keeping a sharp mind as they age. They want to prevent dementia. And so now I started focusing my content towards that particular niche, that person, my avatar, I call him Jim. And sure enough, the channel started growing quite a bit after that.

[Dusty]

What did you do tactically as far as to identify? You talked about, you filled out the worksheet, you identified in your mind who Jim was. When you were doing more of a broad spectrum of content, what were the differences that you started seeing? Was it instantaneous? Did it take some time? And what did you notice as a creator once you did Start to hone in on who your person was that you were trying to reach.

[Jason Todd]

Yeah. What I initially noticed is comments started to make a lot more sense to me. I not everyone else, but I do respond to every single comment and I will until I can't anymore. I think the guy had last week talked about 80,000 subs. He had to quit. I respond to every single comment because I do want to understand what people are struggling with and with it. And originally I'd hear a comment like, you're talking too fast, you're slurring. And I thought, okay, you can slow the speed down. What do you mean I'm talking too fast? But when you think it's someone who's 70 years old, who knows Sudoku, but never tried to solve a hard puzzle, and I'm teaching a concept that this gym hasn't learned before, maybe I need to slow down those explanation points, the harder points that he can get it. This is the person who really wants to watch what I'm giving. And if I gloss over that and I don't serve that person, he's going to move on to somewhere else or he's just going to be frustrated and give up. And I don't want that to happen. So I noticed that piece. The other thing I noticed too was the comments got a lot more encouraging and then people were more like minded and so they'd comment to each other. And I started seeing a lot more audience interaction and then I started bringing them into my community. These people are like, oh, you're giving me value. Because I feel like you're talking to me. I understand what you're saying. So now I want to get your, your free guide and get on your email list and then move on to, hey, now I want to be a member and get puzzle packs and also get more value from you to the point where now these people are giving me comments that I can use to put on my website to sell courses. And so now it's just like I'm building this community. I say I want the Internet's best Sudoku community. And the only way to make that happen is to find out who wants to be a part of that and then reach out to those folks.

[Dusty]

So you are really doing a great job of diversifying the format of video that you put out there. I was looking at your channel before we went on this call, and not only are you doing the puzzles and you're consistent, like you have your schedule on your channel description. When you say you're going to upload, you Upload, but you're also doing these really unique YouTube shorts where you say solve the purple cells or solve the green cells, and it's a perfect little bite sized chunk for the community that you're targeting. Can you talk about how you have diversified the types of content? And by types I mean like vertical video, longs, live streaming, because you're doing all of them together. Can you talk about how you're handling your programming?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, yeah. You've actually encouraged me in some of that too. I'd be happy to do that. So let's talk about shorts. I started putting out YouTube shorts back a couple years ago. And the reason I did that is, you know what, I can just solve one cell in a puzzle, an interesting cell, and just put that in a short. I can clip it, I can put it out there. It didn't take very long. I could do three of those in 15 minutes and put them out. And I saw that people got a lot of views, a lot of subs that way. And I reached out to someone who was very successful in shorts, and this person is named Solver Tom. He had made some sudoku puzzles, but he also did shorts where he'd do like word games similar to World and those types of games, and he would solve them for people. And he got very successful. And so I asked him, I said, hey, Tom, I'm putting these shorts out. Not a lot of people are watching. Can, what do I need to do? And you know what he told me? He said, you need to stop making shorts. The type of content you're making, it doesn't flow with the audience. If you're trying to get somebody who's scrolling through the shorts feed to solve this very hard puzzle that they're not expecting to solve, they're just going to pass on it. It's not good content. You got to come up with something different. And so then when I found out, I was like, okay, if I have a good enough hook in that first couple seconds where they can look and go, wait a minute, maybe I can try to solve this, or what is this guy talking about? I might be more successful. So I actually stopped doing the shorts for a while, thinking it was dead in the water. And then six months later, a few of them started popping off. I started getting a lot of views. A lot, a lot of views. What's going on here? And sure enough, it was. There's certain types of shorts I did where the hook was encouraging enough that someone wanted to stay and watch what I was doing. And I was getting well over 100% watch. So people were reviewing that. And so I realized I can do that to lead into those tutorials that will fully explain the particular strategy. So it's an introduction in the short and this is something even Mr. Beast and other people talk about. You do a little introduction, a little snippet, you solve one little problem for somebody. And then now I put a link to the larger tutorial if they want to find out more information. And so it's like a grabbing tool of people to do the shorts.

[Dusty]

I want to interrupt the interview just briefly to tell you about our YouTube channel review service. If you're looking for someone to take a look at your channel, I record 7 to 8 minute videos screencast on your channel, watching your videos and hopefully giving you some advice that can help you move the needle on your YouTube channel. Also I'll have a link below to our email newsletter where you can keep up with me throughout the week. And I release those every Friday as well as our new creator Master Spreadsheet where everything that's been listed or talked about on this podcast from any of my guests, I'm curating those into a spreadsheet. And so you just click on the Google Sheets link there and you'll get to see and have access to all of the links. And you're like, oh, what was he talking about? That will be there in that spreadsheet. All right, now back to the show. I was just going to say is something that I've started doing with my tutorials where let's just say for instance, like this week I was working on some stuff with an Apple Notes and doing some stuff because Apple Notes is changing with the new iOS update. And so what I would do is I had this full 30 minute tutorial on how to be a master at Apple Notes. But what I was doing is I'd put out these YouTube shorts that were about 45 seconds to a minute and 15 seconds like you're saying of one specific topic or one specific answer of a question within Apple Notes. And then most of the time I would link it all the time I'm linking it back to that full video and people would see that bite sized content and they're like oh, I want to be better with Apple Notes. And they'd go to the long and so I can see in my analytics their coming from those shorts and so I love that. So what else did you discover from doing this?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, and then the other thing on the shorts really quick is I have, I'll put three at A time. The script is almost exactly the same. It's just three different puzzle diagrams which show in the same strategy. So then in one day, again, 15 minutes, three different types. I kind of experiment with the color. So it might be a purple background, a green background and a blue background. Send them all out. And maybe one color is more important than the other or one way. I did the strategy, but the scripting is almost exactly the same. So it's an easy way to get a lot done with the short amount. But the other thing I did, and this was from your tell people. I did get a coaching call with you and you encouraged me to reach out and do live streaming if I wanted to grow more of a community. And I thought that was insane. We haven't discussed it, but I use this Timberlake as my pseudonym. It's my nickname. I've gotten through other means because my. Basically because my initials are JT like Justin Timberlake and I have a faceless channel. If you go on there, you're not gonna see my face. It's just a screen grab of me solving. And the reason I did that, it was more of a privacy thing. My wife's. Hey, you don't need to get your name out there and get it all popular. Just. But really it's more about. I'm. The channel's more about the viewer anyway. Like, I want the viewer to focus on it, not on me so much. But what. So I thought it would be impossible to live stream because you're not gonna see my face with I'm solving. And you said, no, try it. And so I did try it. I just did a live stream, a screen grab. I came up with a couple puzzles that I could solve in a format where it wouldn't make a lot of sense to do it in a normal solving video. I could go to a different pace where I can interact with the crowd, with the viewers and feed off their comments and also do shout outs because I like to give shout outs to people who buy me coffees and tips and super thanks and people who are members and people who solve the puzzle packs. So like building the community that way. Which people thought would interrupt a normal solving video, but it doesn't interrupt the live stream, which is for the community. Anyway, so I started doing that. I didn't think it'd go very well, but now I'm. I look forward to the live streams. Do them every once a month and I have so much fun doing them.

[Dusty]

That is really great to hear. I would encourage anyone listening. I always tell People, the live streaming is something that it improves so many of your skill sets as a creator. Being able to talk when no one's there, being able to look in the camera, being able to know and set up all the technical stuff. There's so many kind of creative muscles that you're flexing when you do that. And so it's really encouraging to hear you talk about a positive experience with streaming, even doing it just once a month. So let's talk about your faceless channel. Obviously, you're faceless, but it's not like you're using AI voices or AI videos. You're actually doing the videos. It's your voice. So you're in the kind of the middle. You're in a good middle ground. How do you handle your packaging? So let's talk about your thumbnail titles. Go through the whole nine. How has it evolved and what are you settling in on now?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, great, great question. I'll tell you. I go for efficiency, so I'm always looking for not the fastest way, but I don't want to waste time when I'm coming up with content. I used to do three videos a week. Now I do two videos a week. And so if I can find a very similar format for each one, I'll go through that. So you. One of the biggest helps I had in figuring out thumbnails, so I don't spend too much time on that, is when I read the YouTube formula by Derral Eves. If you haven't spent the 20 bucks to buy that book and you're serious about YouTube, buy the book, read the book. And don't just read it, do the exercises at the end. He also has online content you can access, but you have to do the exercises or you won't get the value out of it. And there's a whole piece about YouTube thumbnails and his point. And you can see this if you look at a Mr. Beast thumbnail or Ryan Trahan, that's another really good. Just watch how his thumbnails are made. It's real simple. It's usually a person with some kind of expression interacting with some kind of an object. And so in my case, my object's going to be the puzzle. And it might be a highlighted cell in it or might be a box that I, you know, put a red mark around. And then I have a person, since it's not me. I did find that click through rate went up if there's a person on the thumbnail. So now I have these. It is AI generated But I got someone to make different poses of a guy that AI Timberlake. And he points to different parts of the puzzle grid on the screen. And so then there's something going on there that has the curiosity factor. And then the text is just supposed to complement what the thumbnail is saying. So it might say, check for triples, or start with box one. And so now someone's like, why? Why do I need to start with box one? What does this mean? What's this guy pointing to? Enough to get that click. And so that's the packaging. And I find too that with thumbnails, if you're in a niche that. And you're gonna do similar content, it's. I think the branding is more important and recognition is more important than the actual colors you use and the brightness you use to get someone's eyes. If I've provided good content, someone's gonna see that blue background I put on in the sudoku grid that I put on and go, oh, wait, that's the Timberlake puzzle. I wanna check it out. That's a new video. I haven't seen that. And they'll click on it because they know I give good content and that's what I strive for. And so if people aren't clicking on my thumbnail, I don't worry so much about changing the thumbnail. I worry like, how do I make better content? How do I make something better so that when they click on something, they're going to get a great experience and they're going to want to click on more.

[Dusty]

What would you say are the advantages and disadvantages of having a faceless channel?

[Jason Todd]

Yeah, great question. So the advantages of having a faceless channel is I don't have to worry about lighting, I don't have to worry about setting things up in the background. I don't have to do weird on location shoots for things. When I edit, it's pretty streamlined. If I mess up and I click on the wrong cell, I just stop. And then I count. I start where I need to go again. Three, two, one, go. And then in the editing process, it's clipped off. And no one knows that I stopped talking. But if it was my face and I tried to do that clip, they would note that I cut through and people are like, wait a minute, you're cheating. And it's not that I'm cheating. I'm just trying to have a seamless experience. All that is really good. And like I said, the just cuts down on cost. It makes it very quicker. Downside, I would tell you is the idea of branding. I can't really brand myself so much because I don't have a face that's recognizable. The smart hobbies is a brand, but it's not so much me. Sponsored deals a little bit harder to come by, but I find I don't really want to deal so much with sponsors. I'd rather get revenue in other methods in other ways. And it took me a little bit longer to get the channel going. I think if I was the personality and I started doing channel, I think I would have gotten more subscribers and more views. Being faceless, it's like it takes a little bit longer to connect with the community. Now they have to believe you just on your voice alone, which is a little harder than if I could use facial expressions and body language.

[Dusty]

So let's talk about revenue on September 1st as we're recording this. Here it is, August 28th. So here in a few days you're launching your masterclass and you can talk about that in a second. Can you just talk about how you're making money from the channel? As of recording, you now have 26,000 subs, almost 750 videos and a great community built around the channel. So can you talk about the different buckets that you're able to make money and then the buckets that you're getting into as well as what you might average on a given month from the channel?

[Jason Todd]

Definitely. So I, I'll say part of the faceless channel and part of the lack of experience I had. It took me a good 21 months to get monetized. So it, when I, it's like November 2022 and it was so nice to get that first little check of ad revenue. It was really nice. So yeah, I got, right now I have two main buckets. The first one would be the ad revenue that I, that YouTube gives. And everyone loves ad revenue because it's pretty passive. As long as you keep making content, you're going to get a check each month. I'm not going out and seeking revenue in that way then in 2023. So two years after I started a channel, I decided I wanted to launch Buy Me a Coffee page. So similar to Patreon, it's the page is there to support the creators, right. And so I create content and in order for me to create and great content, you're supporting me, you're investing in my channel. And the way I gave back to the community at that point is you could buy me coffees and I would have a goal of something I was working towards like being able to go to VidSummit was a goal I had so that I could make even better content and connect with me more people in the community. And then I also said I'll give you, I'll start a membership. And so if you subscribe to membership, I will give you a puzzle pack every month. And so the puzzle pack will help you learn a particular strategy. It's got a theme related to it. So like this next month coming out. The puzzles are based on Pirates of the Caribbean. So like the first movie, Curse of Black Pearl, it's five puzzles and it's got five, five parts plot parts of the movie and then each puzzle contains an X wing because like X marks a spot in the treasure map. So you're going to do these X wings and and then there's a kind of a meta puzzle on top of it. You go through, you solve each puzzle, you're going to get a digit from each puzzle. You put it into the final clue. In this case it's a latitude, longitude, coordinates for like where the treasure is found. And look, you've solved that. Give it to me. And then you get a shout out and so encourages people to finish those packs because then they get a shout out for that. So I get monthly membership revenue there and then some people just buy me coffees, they just give me tips. Super thanks. They'll give me tips just for the free content. The lead magnet. I set out my free solving guide which is really nice. So right now though, Those are my two main buckets and it's probably 7030 rev ad revenue versus the buy me a coffee or the membership pace. But I decided in order to grow the channel, reach more viewers, help more people solve sudoka, help more people keep a sharp mind and prevent dementia. Which is like the really the big reason why I'm doing this. I needed to a stronger, a more robust platform than buy me coffee. So I moved over to Kajabi. I just started that like last month. I'm launching the website where Kajabi is going to help me upload everything and I'm starting the Sudoku masterclass like you said. So now this is a intermediate from someone who's got my free guide but still needs to apply the top strategies I put in the guide. It's a slower paced masterclass where I add now scanning and solving techniques along with the strategies that I defined in the guide to help someone really get that foundation down. And in case you're wondering, I am following Graham Cochran. I'm following, yes, his idea, I took his income accelerator course and I love the appeal of have a full time business working less than 20 hours a week and I still have a full time job. I'm doing this on the side. If I can create a business out of this and I'm going to do that. And then what they suggest is you go from free to the masterclass or some kind of it's going to be 25 deal to add even more value. And then eventually I want to do a full Sudoku course. Very comprehensive. It's going to cover like strategies. We're talking 15, 20 modules. I know from a Sudoku conference, I went, I know a guy who's a three time world champion in sudoku and also puzzle champion. I'm going to ask him to do a bonus video for that. I got other people doing bonus videos. My wife's actually a nutrition therapy practitioner. I'm going to have her do some stuff on how to keep your brain sharp and reduce brain fog as you go older. And she's my number one supporter by the way. I love her very much and my kids, they're great. So that's where I'm growing from there masterclass thing. And then I'm going to move my whole community over to Kajabi. The reason why I need the more robust platform was to do automated email sequences. I can't do that. And buy me a coffee.

[Dusty]

Yeah, I'm running into that. And Kajabi is probably the tool that I've landed on too. Kajabi, you can just do so many different things. What's been your best month so far monetarily up to this point? Do you remember?

[Jason Todd]

I would say, I think it would been last month. And for contrast, when I started on YouTube Discord a year ago, I was making maybe two or three hundred a month. I went to VidSummit, same thing. And so when people were saying stuff like you should get on Kajabi, I'm like, I don't have the money, I can't afford it now. My last month I had about, I went 10x so about $2700, what I made last month on this channel. And it's continuing to grow.

[Dusty]

Yeah.

[Jason Todd]

And the reason is as you connect with the audience and you make better content, you're just going to reach the right amount of people. And then now I can sell to them and connect with them on a larger thing. Because the thing dusty is, I think I told you there's no such thing as a small niche. You might think Sudoku is a small niche. There's just creators who think small. So I'm connecting Sudoku to helping people keep a sharp mind as they age. And everybody wants to have a sharp mind when they get older. And so if you could just do this for five minutes a day doing Sudoku puzzles, why wouldn't you take that chance? If you can make it even better, why not take that chance? And so that's where I see the focus of the channel going and really getting people to connect to that larger purpose. It's not just about the puzzles. It's about keeping your mind sharp.

[Dusty]

All right, so as we end this conversation, I'm going to ask you, you have the floor. What would be the one piece of advice that you would give creators across the board?

[Jason Todd]

Okay, this is why I get creators across the board. And I'm giving this from something Steve Martin said. And even Mr. B's. And people always ask, how do I get more subs? How do I get more likes? How do I get more views? And with Steve Martin, they would ask, how do you book the big deals in comedy? How do you get the right agents? How do you make more money? And he would come back to the same thing. It's an answer people don't want to hear. But if you really want that, this is the answer. And the answer is, be so good, they can't ignore you. The idea is, and what Mr. B says is, you're asking the wrong questions if you're asking how to get the right more subs, more likes, more views. He says, the question is, how do you make better content? So it's the same thing. Be so good they can't ignore you if you keep focusing on making better and better videos. And I have 750 ways how not to make a YouTube video. I'm getting better with the next one. And I keep a list of things that I'm going to work on my next video, and I do that analysis. Your content will keep getting better to the point where you can't be ignored. The sponsors are going to come for you. The viewers are going to come for you, and they're going to latch on because they see the value you're giving them. So be so good, they can't ignore you.

[Dusty]

Be so good, they can't ignore you. I love that. And, Jason, thank you so much for coming on the podcast today, sharing all of your knowledge. I'll link down below to Jason's YouTube channel, as well as when he launches the master class, so you can see what that looks like on September 1st. I'll link that in the show notes as well. But Jason, we really appreciate it and we'll talk to you later.

[Jason Todd]

Thank you very much Dusty.

[Dusty]

That's a wrap on this week's episode. Don't forget to subscribe. That way every Friday we go live. You'll know that we're release the new episode. You can listen on Spotify, Apple podcasts, all the normal places and you can watch us on video if you want to see my face. Don't know why that would be the case but if you do you can watch us on our YouTube channel. You just search for my name on YouTube and you'll find all the episodes recorded there as well. Don't forget all the offerings. We have the creator Mastermind group, our YouTube channel audits one on one coaching and our creator master spreadsheet with all of the links to everything that's mentioned here on the podcast. With that said, talk to you guys next week.