How to establish consistency on YouTube

It isn't complicated

I’m so proud of how our YouTube channel is performing at the moment. Views have, on average, been consistently above 20,000 for months now, with many videos heading well beyond that and into the stratosphere.

The last 28 days have pulled in over 1.7 million views, more than 95,000 watch hours, and nearly 6,500 new subscribers.

None of this is a fluke, obviously. I’ve got a team now, and we meet each week to discuss video performance and plan upcoming videos. We’re acting on data and experience, and by taking a brutally honest look at what is and isn’t working. The result is a very consistently performing channel, which isn’t only great for morale - it’s a rather lovely thing for attracting brand partners, too.

Today, I wanted to reveal how we’re doing this.

Success on YouTube is all about finding what works and sticking with it. This is, arguably, the hardest part, because the temptation to veer off course and do different things is often too hard to resist. I’ve done this countless times, but it nearly always results in poorly performing videos and a channel which suddenly acts as though the brakes have been slammed on. When I return to what works, everything improves.

You’ll know what works, because the views will increase, and the same people will comment on your videos. They’ll be joined by new regulars, regularly, and those people will start to hit the subscribe button. You’ll become known as the <insert specific element of your niche here> creator, and YouTube will (despite what some may say) place you into a bucket for that particular type of video. Make more videos featuring that thing, and they’ll probably perform. Simple.

However, for this to work, you’ve got to treat your content creation process like a Stock Aitken Waterman production factory where you’re able to churn videos out in military fashion. That might sound far too regimented, boring, and capable of sapping every ounce of creativity from your body, but it doesn’t have to be that way. This is exactly how we treat content behind the scenes at Mark Ellis Media, and I’ve never felt more creatively satisfied.

It starts with reducing production overheads and costs. Only turn your camera on when you need to. Don’t faff around with lights if natural light is streaming through the window. Cancel that order for the slider, dolly, and jib gear you’ve been researching for months. Buy a decent mic, but spend more time configuring a template signal chain for it that you’ll never have to change. Film in one location for a-roll and have set spaces for b-roll shots that you know like the back of your hand. Find a fast editing style, and stick with it. Don’t be tempted to fill your timeline with visual effects, masking, and rows upon rows of visual storytelling elements. No one came to your channel for any of that stuff.

The more YouTube videos you publish, the more you realise that no one cares about the small details. I lie, actually - some people do, but they’re the irritating ones who appear in the comments occasionally and tell you to adjust your mic EQ. Ignore them. Hide them from the channel. Pare down everything while being careful not to remove the fun from the process.

Doing all of those things will speed up the production process of each video immeasurably. That means you’ll be able to turn on a sixpence if a new idea needs realising quickly, and will enable you to establish a steady stream of new content which builds the audience advocacy I mentioned earlier.

You’ll need great processes for this. I am so boring about processes. Our engine behind the scenes for this stuff is contained within Notion, and it is constantly being tuned for maximum productivity and fast production. We only change elements within those processes if we absolutely need to.

That’s it. That’s all you need to do if you want to be successful on YouTube. It won’t happen overnight, and it’s a bloody hard slog getting to a point where you’re running something which could conceivably become a full-time endeavour - and even then, the hard work simply increases.

As for veering from your lane, I’m not suggesting you can’t do that. We still do, but it’s usually for experimentation or, more often, paid purposes. Just keep that stuff to an absolute minimum and focus on what works. Your bread and butter is where the magic lies.