Even though I shifted from blogging to video content creation, I still strongly believed in the power of a mastermind group. So on October 20th, 2023, my hunt for other beginner YouTube creators began…
Hypothesis
Going into this, my thought was that IF it takes 10 years to succeed on YouTube, then would it possible to condense that timeframe radically through a mastermind group? My hypothesis was that if two people perform the same exact task simultaneously, (in this case, creating YouTube videos), then by collaborating and consolidating knowledge together, they would rack up twice the amount of experiences as opposed to working solo. Any desired results that would take one month to achieve would instead take 15 days. Similarly, anything that would take a year, would take only 6 months. So on and so forth…
For two creators (or audience member) continuously exchanging their best feedback about their latest videos, instead of getting 1% better on your own, you both get 2% better. Who knows, with 10 other people mutually collaborating, progress increments might range between 2% to 10% depending on the quality of everyone’s input. Let this compound over a year and the real magic will happen. Of course, the catch is that all members must persist long enough until they each attain a satisfactory level of success according to every individual.
Being entirely self-taught has its limitations and ESPECIALLY in any creative endeavor be it singing, filmmaking, dancing, painting, etc. (and I would argue in everything in life). My belief is that it is impossible to ever become financially free nor accomplish our most ambitious life dreams without a group of like-minded people willing to help one another. I witnessed it firsthand, because I came across literally dozens of 5,10 and even 15 year-old YouTube channels that never got monetized from all across the world (which I will not link to for obvious reasons). All of these channels have even done everything right by the book such as having high-quality audio and footage, great scriptwriting, amazing music (paid for), pretty thumbnails, paid advertising services, etc. Doing everything right while being self-taught through the Internet just doesn’t cut it for the vast majority of people. It might even be very difficult and awkward to convince strangers to work together, but that pain PALES in comparison to the scenario of 15 years of self-taught hard work that never pays off.
The Internet is a GOLDMINE of knowledge and success case studies to draw inspiration from. Anyone with an access to it can potentially become a millionaire (in USD$ 😅) these days provided that they KNOW what to look for and how to apply it to their lives. It is that same observation that led to the explosion of online seemingly lucrative side-hustles. However, this is also what most beginners aspiring to become wealthy (including me at first 😁) get wrong about learning from the Internet. Essentially, because everything is so widely available, it is very tempting to remain self-taught on everything. Sure, we could learn how to fix our faucet, how to solve algebraic equations, how to do magic tricks, how to earn 20k USD$/month, etc. , but in that case, how come we’re not all millionaires? That is the paradox of learning solely through the Internet.
Assembling The Team
Because you can’t message directly someone on YouTube, by default, you have to reach out to them via social media (or their public email). I had somewhat of an aggressive prospecting method. I never waited for people to come to me, but instead , I made sure to find them. I never constrained myself by desiring only a certain profile of YouTube creator whether successful or not. I was not trying to recruit for a governmental or a company executive position 🤣.
I made a point to be extremely proactive by always reaching out first and following-up relentlessly with anyone until they gave me their explicit word of wanting to participate. I always reminded people to show them how honest and committed I was. Whenever I would cold message someone, I would write them something like this:
Asking if they wanted to get on a call with me revealed a lot about them whether they were actually serious or not. Firstly, it breaks the ice between us by proving that this is for real and that I am ready to sprint as fast as possible. Secondly, a video call would allow them to see and hear me for who I am instead of just typing through a screen. Practically speaking, I did the exact same thing I did when looking for other bloggers which was to go on Facebook groups, but specifically for YouTube creators. I guess it helped that I failed at blogging so that it taught me how to find people 😅. When I first went on public and private Facebook groups, I quickly realized that most people on them were selfish. They just spammed their links, asked for likes, shares, subscribers, etc. Even on my posts, I had to hide a lot of them, because they would just take advantage of genuine conversations with traffic to post links or whatever. Honestly, I am not a big fan of consulting these groups regularly for valuable YouTube tips. I would go as far as suggesting you to AVOID THEM LIKE THE PLAGUE. Their ONE and ONLY advantage is that you are more likely to find creators quickly, because Facebook has one of the most powerful network effect ever known to the Internet. I tried searching on Quora, Reddit, Instagram and LinkedIn for many hours daily, but exactly none of them helped me achieve that goal. I also attended online Meetup events for YouTubers even though none of them worked. On the flipside, just one hour after I published my very first post on a large Facebook group, I immediately received 2 random messages whereas on the other social media platforms, nobody (even to this day) ever replied to any of my public posts. I literally found every single member of my mastermind group on Facebook and nowhere else. (Update: I tried using Discord in January 2024 and it worked even better than Facebook!)
I was very adamant on not paying for coaching services. Most of the YouTube creators that I admire never paid for any coaching (mainly because they did not have the money for it) so that tells me that I don’t need to pay anyone. A major advantage of the beginner effect is that any newcomer wants to succeed very badly. Thus, our success would depend on each other and we can’t make it unless everyone remains equally as hard-working. I made a total of 10 posts across 10 different public and private Facebook groups. That was a large enough pool of people to at least land on the right ones. Luckily, only one group declined my post which looked like this:
If you want to send out public messages like the one above, make sure to have a very strong opinion, because otherwise, people will sense doubt and won’t take you seriously. Mention that you started your channel (shows self-determination), mention a few stuff about what you intend to DO with the group (shows them what to expect) and then include a call to action at the end to get them to take initiative. Make it short, sweet and easy to understand for anyone scrolling quickly. Looking back, the very first sentence of that post now sounds doubtful and too vague to me, but in the end, it still worked 😁. If you are curious to know what happened exactly, all of my messages are still out there on Facebook. Just by typing my profile name, you will stumble on all of them (if they weren’t deleted) so by all means, read the comments for yourself.
With the previous post alone, I was able to find 8 people. However, I did not want to stop there, because from my past experiences, I knew some might not stick around for very long and so I published this other one several days later:
Like I said, watch out for advertising services or anything that promise you artificial growth! You don’t get better at making content, you just see your numbers go up right after you paid them (just to then see them drop back from where you started). Some will pressure you but ignore them…
104 USD$ for fake numbers and no long-term strategy? No thanks, I could use that 104 USD$ to buy better filming gear.
Some people took more time to reply and some were very responsive which are both normal behaviors depending on who wants it more badly. Either way, I replied to every single person that messaged me or commented on my public posts, because I was desperate to have a support group. I cold messaged exactly 127 random people during the first week and then 15 more the week after so a total of exactly 142 folks 🥴. I encountered several trolls along the way who were really good at having fake conversations just to sell me their services. Watch out for them! Like I said, after the first week, about 8 people were actually serious and went forward with it. For the record, 8 out of 127 is a phenomenal ratio to hit 🙃. When I tried assembling a mastermind group of bloggers, only one guy replied back to me so yeah 😅. I never waited longer than a day (or even a few hours) before writing new posts on new groups, replying to people or cold-messaging potential members. I had no choice since I quit my job and I had no income stream to rely on. The clock until I become broke started ticking as soon as I made that decision so there was no room for waiting. A few days went by with several more people seeing my posts and then joining. By mid-November of 2023, we peaked at 27 members.
If you want to do this, my tip is to reach out to as many people as you can while disqualifying the wrong ones as quickly as possible. From my experience, if they do not reply after three days, they are not suited for this. If you have to remind them constantly about the group despite sending out countless messages, then it’s not a good sign. If they don’t make an effort to message you privately, then it s also a bad sign. Meet with them once and then devise your system quickly. Don’t worry about perfecting it, because you will work on it with your team.
Devising a process
I video called those who accepted to listen to their needs, goals and preferences before anything. I first thought of having group video calls, but I quickly found out (just like before when blogging) that they wouldn’t be consistently doable, because we all came from different time zones.
So I asked myself:
“What is the most efficient way of managing 10 people from 10 different timezones and who have radically different lifestyles? “
After some thought, I then came up with the strategy of collaborating through one shared Google Drive folder and one group chat on Messenger. Every week, we each uploaded a new video, sent it to our partner and received written feedback from each other. In case we didn’t upload anything new, we simply reviewed an older video.
Of course, I did not expect everyone to stick to that specific process forever, because it is very likely we will figure out a better way to run our mastermind sessions in the future. We simply needed a good enough starting point and tweak it along the way.
Our Early Group
I only had 7 subscribers when we got together having launched my channel only three months prior. My channel’s growth was purely organic and I never promoted anything. All of us started with no formal filmmaking experience whatsoever and completely self-taught through the Internet before getting together. We all just filmed with what we had while learning everything on the job. Still, we all shared the following common vision:
Earn high passive income through creating videos that we love and become financially free
If you participated in our first meeting, which took place on November 1st,2023, you would never in a million years believe in us. We were all random strangers just excited at the dream of earning passive income. You would feel like you didn’t belong with these weird creeps and that you are so above everyone else. You would never believe that we were all on a trajectory to become something big, but I saw it in everyone from that day. Here’s what we all looked like during that first meeting 🤣:
And here were all of our channels back then:
Even though, everyone was drastically different, we NEEDED that diversity of experiences, backgrounds and skillsets. Having diversity in all of these areas was expected, but not a diversity in our common vision.
How our first few weeks turned out…
We started our very first feedback cycle during the week of Oct. 30th, 2023. I did not expect it to run flawlessly nor our first 3 or 4 ones, because it was all our first time doing this. Spearheading the whole group was a challenge. I had to make sure everyone participated every week and was held accountable. I had to be guns blazingly 🤣 responsive by replying to any private messages from anyone within 24 hours to keep our group alive. Every week, I messaged directly each individual to ask them about their experience and to make sure they got value from it. Members had to utilize the platforms and keep tabs on our group chat while creating their videos. That turned out to be hard even with just 10 people and I kinda realized that if I had to remind anyone to stick to this system, then they probably were not a good fit for it.
Momentum was HARD to generate for the group. People had to agree to this and they had to count on each other to come through. Some of us had to learn how to convey implicit information. Being a good creative video performer is everything, but being a good teacher on top of that makes you unstoppable. Everyone was not only encouraged to make better videos, but also to become better teachers. Luckily for me, one of my greatest traits is my love for teaching. I love turning the implicit into explicit.
Although none of us were experts, we were ALL hard-workers. We started from the exact same level of incompetence 🤪 and we agreed to give each other our best feedback. When we started doing this, we had to adjust to everyone’s work style and pace. Like I mentioned, it was our common vision that held us together. Even though, we had no idea how to create great content around a topic we knew nothing about, we all made efforts to give WHATEVER kind of helpful feedback we could to the other person even if it was just our first impressions.
The most popular pitfall
A common pitfall that people get trapped into for side-hustles like these is that since they can learn everything online with so many available free tools, they forget how much more valuable it is to collaborate in close proximity with someone else. YouTube content creation is a VERY TEDIOUS DAILY GRIND, unless your channel somehow takes off rapidly. Most people just want to create and upload videos anonymously however they want, apply all the secret growth hacks (it felt funny writing this 🤪) and then falsely believe that they will earn passive income for the rest of their lives. That’s the fundamental delusion that most beginner creators tend to suffer from. Whenever I would encounter someone with that kind of flawed assumption, in the back of my mind, I am always like: “You’re already done, but you just don’t know it.”
Remember, it is not how your group looks at first, but how fast you all learn and grow from your mastermind sessions. Humans are bad intuitively at understanding exponential growth. We look horrendous at the beginning, with no future, no skills, no nothing. However, over time, together, we grow so unnoticeably small and unbeknownst to anyone until there comes a point when our growth rate rises so much faster that to the eyes of any beholders, it seems like we came out of nowhere.
How to remain motivated
Not seeing results for months (sometimes even years) on end will take a toll on you and you will hit a plateau (plateauing happens in anything in life !). No matter at what stage you are, I highly recommend that you work continuously with other creators (or get continuous feedback from your audience). Some people will suggest that your randomness and personality alone will inevitably attract a large audience. Although it can happen, you will end up pondering frustratingly why if that’s not your case. You can always experiment alone for a few months though, but for the majority of us, mere mortals, it won’t work. People tend to become unnecessarily perfectionist by trying to meet THEIR standards. Having high standards in life is the way to go, but you must never forget that OTHER people must watch and enjoy your content. The opinion of anyone no matter how ordinary and even if they don’t create videos matters a lot more than you imagine. It can happen that one of your videos perform unexpectedly well, but then your latest ones following that all fail despite replicating what worked. Having an outsiders’ perspective gives you a reason to grow and most importantly, helps to retain your faith. We often hear how negative and toxic people can be, but the opposite is also true. The right ones can be energizing, uplifting and helpful! That’s what happened here for all of us. Gathering everyone and benefiting from spontaneous collaboration is a positive feeling that can’t be described into words. You need those kinds of peers in life to never give up. Don’t fall into the trap of thinking that your videos are better than they are and that you don’t need outside help. Just because you enjoyed them (and you should don’t get me wrong on that), that doesn’t mean they will do well. Without ever asking anyone, you will never truly understand what’s going on. The whole experience is akin to asking customers what they think of a business product or service.
Why is success so counter-intuitive?
You will not succeed by copying whoever the hottest and most successful YouTube creator of the minute is. They carved their path while leaving footprints behind and nothing more than that… NOBODY (not even expert creators) can predict exactly what will work or not. This is very hard to be convinced of, because of our strong appeal to authority. We judge success cases so highly simply because they are widely praised by the public. However, that does not mean that they are perfect nor replicable at face value. Once you get to an elite level, then you can play by your rules and break some conventional wisdom. Of course, listen to everyone, but make up your own mind!
People have a natural instinct of seeking expert advice. Everyone does that in real life whether it is going to the doctor, to the teacher, or to senior co-workers. However, when it comes to content creation, expert creators don’t know us contextually nor don’t always have the time to. The actual truth is that, they just have no reasons to, because they already succeeded (unless you pay to consult with them). On the flipside, a group of beginners all starting from the same level and all with a hunger for success have a reason to stick together. The popular saying, united we stand, but divided we fall could never been more accurate that on that occasion. In our case, none of us had all the answers beforehand and by looking at everyone’s channels, you will understand that there are a lot of different roads to success on YouTube.
Conclusion
If I could adapt the Avengers initiative 😅, the main takeaway is to bring together a group of remarkable people to see if they could become something greater. To see if they could work together whenever they need each other and acquire knowledge and skills that they never could on their own. It takes a willingness to be vulnerable and to be shameless about asking for help publicly or privately. I felt so anxious whenever I would allocate time to finding people instead of just getting better at making my own videos. On top of that, I felt so awful and ,weirdly enough, disgusted at myself for TWO ENTIRE weeks just waiting for my notification bell to show new messages. So many left abruptly right after telling me they were going to be whole-heartedly committed with seemingly burning enthusiasm. On two consecutive weeks, I didn’t get any feedback, because these same people left. Even though I felt like an utter loser during those moments, I kept going, because I did not want to work alone not one bit. To this day, I still can’t believe I cold messaged 142 strangers, video called dozens of them and then devised a strategy for everyone all within two weeks haha 🤔😝! I will forever be grateful to everyone who participated in my mastermind group. They took time out of their busy lives just to meet other similar crazy strangers. What an odd bunch we all were 😅😆🤪…