Being a YouTube influencer isn’t something that everyone is trying to do. In fact, most people don’t even know it is a valuable career choice. Imagine this; you get to sit down, think of a video idea, execute it, hit upload and the next thing you know it’s being shown to thousands or even millions of people around the world. How intriguing…

Imagine having a fan page that you can inspire with your content, doing something every single day that you are truly passionate about. That is the job of a YouTuber, and you get paid to do this.

Vlogging, on the other hand, opens up the world of opportunity for anybody with camera and internet connection. When you make Vlogs, your persona or your camera persona is essentially your personality but on crack. The camera takes away 100 pounds of personality. You need to be you but just more you.

This article is about creating a brand around you on YouTube. You will learn how to turn what’s in your head into something that people want to watch every single day. You will also learn how to create content that can be shared by thousands of people around the world.

Additionally, you will get to know what to do and what not to do to make your content go viral, which will be presented in a step-by-step fashion. Simply put, all the insights here guide on how to become a successful YouTuber.

Why do people like watching YouTube Videos and Vlogs?

People like watching YouTube videos and Vlogs for the following reasons;

• Learn new things
• Entertainment
• Feel Understood
• Advice
• Inspiration

Roadmap to a Profitable YouTube/Vlogging Career

This is the start of your journey as a YouTube influencer. YouTube is the perfect platform, and if you can create good content, you can get your stuff to millions of people for free. With 5-6 hours per week, you’ll be able to make a sustainable living off of YouTube.

However, remember it won’t happen overnight. You will need to go through a “pain period” where things won’t click, but ones they click the views will start rolling in. And, when it starts rolling in, you’ll be able to monetize your channel.

Failing Your Way To Success

The most important mindset that you need to internalize is that “There is no such thing as an overnight success.” It’s far too easy to hit a roadblock and give up. That’s what happens to most people who embark on this journey. They hit the roadblock, throw their hands in the air and just say, “you know what, i don’t think I was cut out for this.”

The reality is “Every successful people has to go through a pain period of failure.” Every successful person with success in YouTube hit that initial pain period. The big question remains, what are you going to do when you hit that pain period?

Probably, you spent 48 hours writing the perfect script, stayed until 3am filming and editing your masterpiece. You watched it 5 times in a row to make sure that there wasn’t a single mistake before scheduling it for the next morning. You poured over your list of blogs the least you spent two full days putting together and email your glorious video to the hand-selected list of the 30 best fits.

Few days go by, but no responses. Out of approximately 30 blogs, none of them like your video? Is that normal? And, probably you will just think “I’m not cut out for this.” As mentioned before, “There’s no such thing as an overnight success just overnight awareness.” And, yet every success you hear about seems like an overnight one.

Overnight successes are not an honest depiction of success rather success usually comes after a ton of failure.

Check out one of your favorite YouTube channels, the one with more subscribers. Start scrolling back, skipping those videos with million views, or get back to the first video they made and watch the video. You might be thinking, “This video sucks.” Here’s the thing, they kept going.

Therefore, if you want to see better results , you need to keep trying, focusing every fiber of your being on giving a 100 percent effort. You have to keep on your maximum effort. There’s only one way to succeed, “Commit 100 percent to make it happen. There’s no such thing as an overnight success so stop comparing to other people who seem like one.”

Do Not Procrastinate

When it comes to being a successful influencer, the mindset is so important. People drown in negative self-talk rarely succeed. Things like, “I don’t think i can talk in front of the camera.”, “I don’t think anyone would want to watch me.” These kinds of thoughts become a self-fulfilling prophecy, and they prevent you from taking any action.

Always keep in mind that doing what it feels good is very different from doing what’s actually good. Taking action consistently every step of the way is the only way to succeed. If you’re not accomplishing your goals, probably it’s due to procrastination.

You procrastinate because you’ve trained your brain to form a bad habit. A habit is a behavior that you engage in without even realizing. It is something you do automatically. When you don’t realize just how often habits are guiding your actions, studies show that 45% of your daily behaviors are the result of a habit.

Every habit has 3 components:

• CUE – Trigger for the behavior.
• ROUTINE – Behavior itself
• REWARD – Why your brain includes these chunk of behavior as an automatic routine.

Example: You’re hungry, you decide to order pizza, you eat it, and now you feel good.

• Cue – you’re hungry
• Routine – you order pizza
• Reward – you get the pizza

You keep repeating this behavior repeatedly. Your brain starts shortening the process for you. So when you get even slightly hungry, you automatically dial your favorite pizza store because your brain learned that it makes you happy. This happens subconsciously. Bad habits often trigger other bad habits and may just trigger just more bad habits. And this is how procrastination ruins your life.

Four Easy Steps to Stop Procrastinating

• STEP 1 – Stop lying to yourself. Stop making excuses.
• STEP 2 – Replace the bad habit with a good one. You can just cut your bad habits overnight. Start a new behavior in its place to form a new habit.
• STEP 3 – Plant a Seed. Create realistic habit that will help you reach your goal. Something that you can accomplish even on your worst days.
• STEP 4 – Don’t Break the Chain – Track your progress and give yourself an additional motivation to stick with the new seed behavior. Keep the chain going.

Imagine Your Life As A Content Creator

You can do whatever you want with the internet. You can be a content creator with millions of fans around the world, and you can start right now. All you need is a camera, computer, and the Internet connection.

You create things that are watched by hundreds, thousands, millions of people and these people love you for it. Over half of the world’s population uses the internet, yet the average person doesn’t believe that it’s a viable way to make a living, but a few people know better, and they reap the rewards.

The internet has opened up professions that didn’t exist 10 years ago. You could be a musician without a record deal, you could be a makeup guru without going to cosmetology school, and you can be a filmmaker without a film degree. If you’re a content creator, you could be whatever you want to be.

Phase 1 – Launching Your Channel

This is the first step that qualifies you as a YouTuber. There are endless channel ideas you can choose from. Make your choice based on the various frameworks to find an award-winning channel idea. Before selecting one of the ideas, consider your anticipated content area and audience.

If you don’t know where to start, just generally think of your daily life:

• Opinions – What are you super opinionated on?
• Hot topics – What are the hot topics right now?
• Hates – Do you hate something?
• Likes – Do you like something?
• Pet Peeve – Does somebody say something that pissed you off?
• Cool things – Is there cool things that you want to share?
• Self-help advice – Is there a list of things that people should do to correct their lives?

Just to mention, you can work on the following YouTube four main profitable genres. They include;

• Comedy or Vlogging – this mainly focuses on laugh and audience engagement. Most comedy videos involve real-life skits, animations, parodies or pranks.

• Gaming – this genre is diverse and different people enjoy differently. Most people who want to know how to become a successful YouTuber can try this genre. People interestingly like to watch other people play video games.

• Fashion and technology – nerds and fashionistas belong in this group. Videos in this genre basically involve a review of the latest products, greatest beauty and tech products and much more. Most YouTubers enjoy free review samples from manufacturing companies.

• Educational – if you are a fan of learning, an educational genre is the best for you. Here, many people consider discussing matters to do with deep science, culture, philosophy and much more.

To accomplish this, begin by brainstorming the different YouTube and Vlog topics available. Here, you will need to write down what makes you unique. These are topics that you want to Vlog about.

Some of the random thoughts include; What do you care more than others? What pissed you off? Do you have cool skills that you could teach other people? What do you like doing? Are you passionate about any current events that are going on right now? So make a list of anything and everything you want to talk about.

Phase 2 – Finding Your Channel Direction

Many people still don’t believe that they can build a successful business using YouTube. Procrastinating ideas such as lack of the right equipment, lack of a unique idea, limited online presence to launch something among other reasons are a hindrance. What many people fail to understand that they can do this when starting with absolutely nothing.

Many people became successful by using a crappy webcam, who started out with a horrible idea and even plenty of people who built their careers with no fair amount of knowledge or special connections. Whatever it is that holding your back, it’s just an excuse.

Coming Up with a Killer Channel Direction

Follow the steps below to help you come up with a killer channel direction.

STEP 1: Get out a piece of paper

When you look at this piece of paper, it might be intimidating. You’re looking down at a blank page, and you’re thinking to yourself, I have no ideas for content, and I don’t know where to start.

From there your mind starts to wander off, and you find yourself staring at the wall, you might get ready to find inspiration, you check Facebook, you check your email, you text that one friend you forgot to reply to last night. You are now inventing some task to do because filling out that blank piece of paper seems impossible.

Writers call this “blank page syndrome,” and it sucks since you’re sitting there ready to change the direction of your life completely and all you see there at the back of you is a blank page of doom.

STEP 2: Make a list

As the saying goes, “Do something you love, and you will never work a day in your life.” This is indeed true. Design a YouTube channel where the topic is so interesting and compelling to you on a personal level that creating content for this channel won’t feel like work.

Fill the list with things that you love. Whatever you find something interesting or enjoyable put it on the list. Make at least 25 and do not rush the step.

Here, research and list some of the trending topics relevant to you. Once you’re done brainstorming your list of topics that you like, you should consider incorporating this to the hot topics that are trending right now.

Go check out what’s trending on Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, Google news and literally everything. What are people talking about school? What are they posting on Facebook?

You can use topics that are already trending to get more eyeballs on your video. Writing your script comes next. You should write and read through your script 2-3x until you’re happy with it.

Plan out your script because it will help you save a lot of time. Write a loose script, make bullet points and practice it. Practice enunciating it clearly and practice your delivery. Do not move on to the next step until you feel confident in your script and performance.

STEP 3: Circle Your Favorites

This is the time to go through and circle your favorite ones from the list. Many people tend to over complicate things here. Don’t worry about what’s the best thing on the list, what seems the most marketable or what’s the most filmable. Just circle the things that stand out to you as the most exciting, the ones you really love.

STEP 4: Look for Patterns.

After you’ve circled all the things that excite you, it’s time to start looking at how these things fit together. Look for things that are pretty related or similar. If you can’t find a pattern, proceed to the next step.

STEP 5: Research

You need to immerse yourself in each of the topics you circled. Read news, stories, find YouTube channels, forums, sub-edits about the topic, Facebook groups, and Google. Identify the general direction and the basic niche that your channel is going to be aimed at.

There are 2 reasons why you need to do research. They include;

• Becoming an influencer – one or more of these topics circled can help you to be an expert. The more knowledge you have about the topics, the more interesting your commentary on them is going to be.
• Finding an idea that speaks to you – As you engage on these topics on a deeper mental level, it’s inevitable that one of these ideas is going to speak to you more than the others. The idea that speaks to you the most is going to be your channel theme.

Your channel direction doesn’t need to be super specific at this point. This is a personal process. The point here is to pick a direction you are excited about and start.

Step 6: Coming Up with a Magical Idea

Many new content creators often struggle with this step. What you need here is a magical idea. An idea that is going to get people so interested, excited and fascinated about you and your channel that they’ll be sharing and subscribing in thousands and even millions.

Coming up with a magical idea won’t be hard as it sounds if you have the right approach.

Coming up with something that is 100% original is not the only way to get into your magical idea. You don’t need to reinvent the wheel.

The difference between a channel with 6 subscribers and 6 million subscribers isn’t that the second channel is run by some modern-day Shakespeare who comes up with magical, incredible or original content all day.

The difference is that a successful content creator simply knows where to look for inspiration, ideas, and insight. Starting from scratch isn’t really the best way to come up with the great idea. Instead, start by getting inspiration from contents that already exists, the stuff you already know and love.

That’s the key to creating a magical idea quickly; taking inspiration from other artists, seeing what they do and changing it to fit your own vision. That’s what is called innovation.

Some people got nervous about this process because they are worried that they’ll be seeing as unoriginal.

But, there’s a huge difference between being inspired by somebody else’s contents and straight up ripping off someone’s ideas. Pablo Picasso, one of the greatest artists of this generation once said: “Great Artists Steal.”

It’s okay to use some of the big ideas from the original as long as you do something that makes your content clearly new and different. However, always remember that while it’s okay to innovate, it’s not okay to directly copy someone’s idea.

Whenever you look at a successful piece of content, ask yourself. “How can i make it mine? Use that original work of art, the thing that inspired you as a jumping off points to do something similar but different. This is something unique to you, something that innovates on the original and that’s the difference between plagiarism and remixing.

Equipment

Your equipment doesn’t matter, but your content does. Most people who already have their own channel direction and video ideas get stuck on the start as they think that they can’t start until they have a fancy camera, and lighting and audio equipment. These things are what make a great video. But, remember there are viral videos all over the internet that have technical imperfections.

People will watch you because of your ideas, your story, your personality not whether you bought a 100 dollar lens. Fancy equipment is not going to give you more subscribers than low budget solutions.

Therefore, pick a budget and stick to it. Just think how much you can afford, how much you are willing to spend on this stuff and then stick to that budget.

Solid and Inexpensive Sound Setup

Give more attention to the sound. It is more important than video quality. If your video quality is amazing, but your sound is bad, audiences are more likely to react negatively.

Lavalier Microphones are perfect for picking up sound from an individual person. Just plug a Lav Microphone into your phone. The sound gets picked up from the microphone that’s cliffed on your shirt, and you record the audio from voice recorder app on your phone. This is a solid step up from your onboard camera audio. It only costs approximately $20.

TIP: For those of you who are using a LAV Microphone for the first time, here’s what you need to do about the setup. Your audio and video files will be separate, so you need to combine them when you edit. To make it easier when you start recording on both devices, call out the slate and then clap. That way, when you start editing, you can easily line up the sound waves, and everything is perfectly in sync.

If money isn’t an issue for you, you can use Sennheiser EW 112p Wireless Lavalier System which costs around $600.

Video Quality

Video quality isn’t as important as sounds, specifically on YouTube. If you can afford to upgrade your camera, cool. If not, don’t worry about it.

Consider the following 3 Options:

• No Budget – If you have zero dollars to spend, just use the camera on your phone.
• Low Budget – If you got some cash you want to spend, there are some smaller equipment to get some mid-range options. For instance, the Canon Powershot 190 is a point and shoot camera good for flagging, filming workout videos or filming cooking videos.
• High Budget – If video quality is really important to you, or you and an inspiring filmmaker want to make music videos for big artists then consider getting a DSLR. DSLR’s provide the best-looking images without getting into studio great cameras.

Editing Software

Editing is a good option to eliminate the unwanted parts in your YouTube video. If you have no budget, just use free editing software like iMovie or windows movie maker. Free programs like these are very useful.

If you need high end features for whatever reason and have some cash to spend, use ADOBE PREMIERE PRO since it’s the industry’s current standard. If you are on a MAC, Final Cut Pro X is a great option.

You Don’t Need a High-Quality Camera

In order to Vlog, you just need a camera, a computer and any software and the internet. The type of camera to use doesn’t really matter. If you want a professional camera and lighting, that’s fine. But if you think that people are going watch your Vlogs because you have a bomb ass camera, then you’re really wrong .

Your equipment is not a huge factor at all. If you’re on a budget go on Craigslist , go to the used camera shop, used natural lighting and seriously don’t need to spend a lot of money to create great content.

Don’t Talk Off the Cuff

A lot of people think that the majority of Vloggers are doing it “off the cuff.” Most likely they’re not. There are just too many points to hit. Prepare a loose script or bullet point script. This will help you out when it comes to thinking out of content on the spot or improve your content. It will also help you save time in editing because you get to generalize what you are going to talk about.

Your lose Script of Bullet Point Script should include;

• An Intro – how you are going to introduce your topic
• Body – Have at least 3 points to talk about
• Conclusion – Wrap up your thoughts and let people know what they came for when they saw the topic that you put out that day.

Depending on the topic that you’re going to do, make sure to do your research. You definitely need to practice. If you don’t practice before you hit that record button, you going to waste a lot of time.

How to Film Yourself

Because YouTube videos and Vlogs are based on your thoughts, opinions and your personality, you want your room to be a reflection of that. You can have a plain background, which a lot of Vloggers do, or you can be a little bit centric and decorate the background with some bunch of newspapers or pictures. Have your Vlog in a specific set location, so it will set up your viewers to understand the content that will be put out. Always find your unique style.

Set up your Vlog space, so it reflects your personality. Treat your Vlog like a TV show. Everything should add to your personality. If you want a plain wall, you can go ahead and use a plain wall to make yourself a center of attention. You could use posters or no posters. Play around with everything until you feel like everything on your screen is contributing to your persona. Once you’re ready to film, just keep the camera right where it is.

There are two rules in editing Vlogs. They are;

1. Editing to Impact – You want your Vlog to be impactful.
2. Editing to Enhance – Edit to enhance your points. You don’t need to do anything fancy. You don’t need fancy animations. Popping up a photo is perfectly okay, popping a text is okay too.

Uploaded a Few Videos/Vlogs…Now What

Let’s just say you just uploaded 5 Vlogs to YouTube and you are still getting like 20 views per video. Ask yourself what you are doing to try to gain views. Are you just posting it on YouTube and that’s it?

You can’t just upload it to 1 social media because they are not going to last. You have to post it on various platforms. Ask your friends to check it out. Submit it to the blogs. If it’s actually good, people will share. If nobody is sharing it, then you have to rethink your content.

Is your topic even interesting? Is it shareable?

At the end of the day, you have to figure out why you are doing this. You shouldn’t become a YouTuber if you just want to get a lot of views. If you do, you will always be disappointed that you’re not going viral and it is not going to be enough. But, if want to educate people and share your opinions that’s going to be it.

If you find your love for this, test new things, keep improving your content and make it shareable, the views will follow. It’s not an overnight success but there things that you can do to speed up the process. This includes making content that’s shareable, make content that’s relatable, keep improving your content and be willing to adjust.

After doing this, look at your results. If you’re putting a bunch of time and effort into your videos, but nobody is sharing it, you need to ask yourself the following:

• Is my personality 150 percent there?
• Is my content relatable?
• Does my script need some work? Do I need to practice my delivery more?
• Am I ineffective or picking a side and committing to it?
• Am I editing to improve it?

Good Vlog VS Bad Vlog

What makes a bad Vlog? Some blogs are boring and not compelling for the following reasons:

• Weak Personality – Your personality isn’t just coming through. If that person is not coming through the screen, the people aren’t going to feel what you’re saying. So, you really have to amp up that character. People have to feel you and everything that you are going to say.
• Your topic is not relatable – When you think about topics, and when you want to connect to your fan base, you really have to think about the strong foundation. Relatability is going to be a huge key in that. If you think about something that’s important to you, most likely it’s going to be important to somebody else too. Think about a way that people can relate to your content
• No Strong Opinions – A lot of times when you talk about a topic, you have to figure out what your standpoint is. Whether people, agree or disagree with it, that’s up for them, and you can’t worry about that. You have to make sure that you stick to a point and you do the best that you can relate to your audience.
• Topic Not Thought-Out – Your opinion has to be thoroughly thought out. There’s a lot of bullshit around, and you don’t sound like you’re not sure about yourself when you’re talking.
• Not Edited Down – there’s so much dead space that creates a lot of disinterest.

Good Vlog

A good Vlog is compelling for these 5 reasons:

• Great Personality – Your personality is 150 percent there. Never forget your online camera persona. That persona is going to be crucial. You have to stick to that consistently throughout your videos.
• Relatable Topic – People can relate to what you’re saying, so they share it with their friends.
• Well, thought out Script – Your script is thought out and methodical.
• Pick A Side – Pick a side and stick to it . Be strong with your content. Remember, you as a Vlogger, your opinions matter.
• Edited for Impact & Enhancement – Your video is edited for impact and enhances your personality. You did everything right, you said your points right, your personality on points but sometimes words can get lost. This is where your editing skills are going to come into play.

Growth Hack for Your Views

One of the best ways to get a lot of views is to hit topics that are trending. If you’re doing topics that are already hot, eyes are already on it. You just have to add your own flare and flavor to it. Go on Facebook, Twitter and other social media including Google trends, find those topics, get at least 5 of them, pick those topics down and write something out for them

Every year, there are certain things that always happened. For example, holidays. Everybody does a Christmas video because Christmas must come up every year. Therefore, it’s going to be the hot thing at the moment.

The topic itself might not be that interesting, but it’s your position as Vlogger and opinionated Vlogger at that to add your own taste to it.

Conclusion

Everybody is unique and has something to share. There will never be another you. Everybody is different. You are you. You have your own personal story, and you have something to offer. You just have to share it. When you develop content, you can use it as a base for the conversation with your friend or even strangers.

If you have been wondering how to become a successful YouTuber, your doubts should be over by the end of this article. Of most importance is identifying your channel idea, taking into consideration your audience and producing quality content. All the best!