Things I've learned from Ali Abdaal
Lessons from a ~$4.5M/year YouTuber.
Ali Abdaal has nearly 4M YouTube subscribers and makes ~$4.5M/year, with a profit of around $2.5M per year.
Not too bad for a mid-twenties content creator.
In April, I'm joining Ali’s final cohort of his Part-Time YouTuber Academy course.
Now I’ve never done videos or YouTube at all—but I want to. I think video is the best medium for educating and connecting with an audience.
So given that, in preparation for the cohort, I've gone through Ali's "YouTube for Beginner's" course.
Here are my top takeways I've learned about content creation (in general):
1. Be an Archaeologist, not an Architect
There are two ways to approach creating content:
Be an architect. Have everything perfectly planned before breaking ground. For example, knowing your topic, audience, offer, and format before ever posting.
Be an archaeologist. Just start digging holes and when you find lost treasure, put all of your focus there. For example, just starting making things that interest you and when you find something that resonates, double down.
Most successful creators got there by just getting started and fumbling about. It took Ali 1 year and 50 videos to hit 1,000 subscribers. It took MrBeast years. They started and figured it out along the way. Now MrBeast has over a decade of experience.
As Ali says: "The first 50 videos are for you. The next 50 are for your audience."
2. Don't create for algorithms, create for people
Sure, my company, Demand Curve, famously writes about growth tactics every week. Tactics legitimately do help speed up and unlock growth.
But what really makes a product or content outpace others is by being exceptional. You can’t polish a turd—at least not for long.
So to grow your YouTube channel (or Instagram, or Twitter, or blog):
Create an enticing thumbnail and title so people watch it.
Make the video interesting and engaging throughout.
Leave people satisfied so they click on your next video.
It's simple in theory, but incredibly hard to actually do. It takes a ton of practice, so...
3. The reps are more important than anything
When you're getting started with a new skill, the quantity and frequency of practice is more important than the quality of each session. Whether that's creating videos, crafting Twitter threads, writing newsletters, or building product—it's better to do it often and consistently.
Focus on developing the habit first. You'll naturally get better by doing it frequently. Then once you have developed the habit, you can double down on getting good.
As Ali puts it: "Get going -> Get good -> Get smart."
Start by lowering the bar. Prove that you can do 1 video a week consistently.
Once you’re consistent, worry about making good videos.
Once they’re good, figure out how to be more efficient with the process.
4. F*ck the gear
We all see people like Ali Abdaal with their $10,000 camera and lighting setup, and their perfectly manicured studio and background:
We think: “I can’t compete with that. In order to start I need to get gear like that.”
Then we obsess for weeks about the right gear to buy. We delay and delay—waiting for gear to arrive—or are too afraid to pull the trigger.
When really, the gear doesn’t matter.
It’s not what separates you from them. Instead, it’s their years and years of experience making videos every week. They know how to script, pace, edit, and shoot a video. They know who they’re making videos for, they know what will resonate with them, and know how to hook them and keep them interested.
Their $10,000 camera setup is not what does that. It’s everything else.
Hell, MrBeast famously only uses very basic cameras so they feel more normal.
So get started using an iPhone camera and a $40 microphone. That will more than serve you for months to come.
5. Talking to a camera is never easy
In the course, Ali does an entire unedited take of him filming a YouTube video. It’s by far the best lesson in the entire course.
He’s made literally hundreds of YouTube videos. He’s spent probably hundreds to thousands of hours speaking to a camera. He runs a podcast with 100,000s of subscribers. And he does lots of public speaking.
But he could barely go 5 seconds without messing something up and needing to reset and say it again.
If you’ve ever spoken to a camera, you’ll know suddenly your mouth stops working. You fumble over basic words.
This is normal. Simply pause for a second, snap your fingers or clap your hands to mentally reset, and then say it again.
You can edit it all after. And the claps make it easy to identify where to edit out.
6. Leverage your “Unfair Advantage”
Instead of trying to create content about something you generally like, focus on something that you have an unfair advantage over most other people.
For example:
Ali started on YouTube when he was a medical student at Cambridge. Which very few people can say. Therefore, he started a channel that taught people how to get into medical school.
Lenny Rachitsky was a product manager at Airbnb, one of the hottest startups over our generation. His unfair advantage was to write about product management for people who work at medium to large tech companies.
Or hell, my girlfriend has two kids and went through a shitty divorce. Her unfair advantage could be to create content on navigating co-parenting, divorce with young kids, and things of that nature.
You don’t need to have an advantage over 99% of people. You just need to have an advantage over the majority.
What unique set of circumstances in your life give you an advantage over most people? What jobs have you done? What experiences have you had?
Document them all out. Or think, what stories or topics do people get really interested in when you bring them up.
–––
Thanks for reading!
How I can help you grow:
Book a 1-hour consultation call with me. I’ve helped grow 1000s of companies. And I run two 7-figure bootstrapped businesses.
Check out Demand Curve’s free resources.
Work with my agency, Bell Curve, and we'll grow your startup for you.
😍
– Neal