Reflecting on One Year of Creating on YouTube
On August 11th, 2021, I released my first video on YouTube. It was an overview of an upcoming Homebrew Campaign Series. From then on, I released all sorts of videos in many categories. I talked about books, movies, shows, games, tabletop roleplaying, life, and a million other things. I didn’t have a niche, and that was very deliberate. I was experimenting and just trying to have fun while I figured out what I wanted to do.
It’s a year since I started, and a lot has changed. It’s time to reflect on all of that and discuss what I’m planning for the future. I’m pretty excited to get into it, so let’s go ahead and get started right away!
Results of Niching Down
In April of 2022, a little after my six-month mark, I created a video talking about the channel's future. This was when I said I would reduce my output to one weekly video and finally write down my YouTube channel. That’s a significant decision and one that had a noticeable impact on my channel.
If you’re not down with the YouTube lingo, niching down is a common term for selecting a specific topic you are discussing on your channel. The further you niche down, the narrower your topic becomes. When I niched down, I stopped making personal videos about my history, sobriety, religion, and other similar topics. I also stopped making Dungeons and Dragons content. Instead, I exclusively focused on consuming stories: shows, games, movies, books, what-have-you.
This… helped. It helped significantly! In my first eight months, I reached 40 subscribers. When I niched down, I reached 170 subscribers in half that time; that represents over 300% growth if I know how to do the math. It’s crazy, but it’s also something I have been told would happen: when you niche down, the algorithm becomes more likely to pick up a video.
So niching down was smart and has been extremely beneficial for my channel. I’m looking forward to what the future heals as I further explore my niche!
Meeting Cool Folks
Over the last year, I’ve had the privilege to engage with some cool people, but the kindness and support I have received from these people have been outstanding. I want to specifically call out Cam at Wolfe the Story Nomad and Bryce at Shelf Centered for this. Both of them are kind souls and remarkable content creators who deserve your support far more than I do.
Beyond other content creators, though, I’m incredibly thankful for the people I’ve gotten to talk with here on my own channel! I’ve received many comments from people offering up insights or bits of humor since my channel’s inception. My Lightbringer Predictions and Don’t Read Discworld videos especially have been ripe for engagement with people. I read every single comment and do my best to respond to each of them! It’s been an absolute joy, and I look forward to continuing this with all of you.
Looking Forward
I have thought hard about this and have decided that I’m going to stick to just one video per week for now. It was a difficult decision. I know that three videos per week would be better for growth and I could get a lot more ideas out there far more quickly, but it just isn’t sustainable with everything else going on in my life. Truth be told, I’m actually struggling to keep up the weekly videos and will probably be taking more breaks in the near future like I did in July. YouTube doesn’t pay me anything, it’s just a hobby—the only way I could possibly make money through this is via the affiliate links in the descriptions of my videos. That means I have to be responsible with how I’m spending my time, so one video a week is my maximum for now.
That being said, I am hoping to create some additional content beyond the one-video-per-week by way of shorts. I’ve always enjoyed comedy and I actually used to do improv and skits with my friends back in high school I’d love to do some comedic shorts on this channel in the future. It probably won’t happen until I have a house again due to spacing and prop requirements, but it’s something I’m thinking about adding to my repertoire.
Additionally, I’m going to be creating some more focused and targeted videos. Specifically, I’ll be creating a lot more Discworld content. Three of the most popular videos on my channel are my Discworld videos, which I think is awesome because Terry Pratchett is my favorite author. The fact that so many people are interested in the weird content I’ve churned out about him is fantastic. While I do cringe at those old Discworld videos, I’m pretty excited to create new Discworld content soon. Keep an eye out for that because something big is in the works.
Non-YouTube Stuff
Don't leave yet; I’m going to make this quick because I know this is the part that most folks don’t especially care about. However, I think it’s important to note. I’ve been doing a lot of stuff outside of YouTube. There’s been traveling, working, and even officiating a wedding for two very dear friends (I’m also officiating another one in October). It’s been a wild time in my personal life. If you are curious about my personal life outside of YouTube and books, I post all the personal goodness on my personal Instagram account: TLBainter.Personal. Go check that out to see content about my writing, motorcycle riding, photography, city, and a million other things.
Goals
Let’s chat goals. What are my goals moving forward as I proceed into my second year of YouTube. I don’t have any goals pertaining to analytics, because I’m not really doing this to build a big following or get famous, rich, or anything akin to that. It still is and always has been about building a sustainable community and meeting awesome people. So instead of a subscriber goal or anything along those lines, my goal for the next year is this: improvement.
I am not putting my best foot forward for every one of my videos. Creating videos is challenging and time-consuming. Filming them is probably the most exhausting part for me, even though editing takes longer. I would love to have the energy and time to really pour my heart into every video. There are all sorts of things I would love to do for each of my videos that I just don’t do. Moments that I think would be hilarious and attention-grabbing are often cut due to constraints.
So, once I have my house and I’m not living where I am right now, my goal is to really unleash my creativity and improve the quality of my content. I want location changes, I want skits, I want creative editing, I want engaging performances, I want it all. I know I can do it—I know how and I’ve actually done some of these things in previous videos. I just want to do it always. I want each of my videos to be the best it can be. I know this isn’t feasible for me right now, but it will be, and that’s my goal for this next year on YouTube.
Thank You
Thank you so much for being part of this first leg in my journey. Whether you came before or after I niched down and started really putting forth effort on the channel, I greatly appreciate you for being part of all this. I can’t wait for what happens next and I’m excited to further engage with each of you on future videos. Thank you for being here and thank you for staying.