A 21-year-old nature YouTuber who posts three videos a year explains why ideas, story and sound beat consistency, and how he tests every cut on strangers before it ships.
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today
Duration
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Interview
educational
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Big Idea
The argument in one line.
If raw reach is the goal, the idea and the story decide everything, so spend most of your time choosing one great idea and testing the cut on strangers instead of posting more often.
Who This Is For
Read if. Skip if.
READ IF YOU ARE…
A creator posting weekly who keeps getting flat views and suspects volume is not the lever.
An education or how-to creator in a 'boring' niche who wants people outside the niche to watch.
Someone with a phone and basic editing app who thinks gear is what's holding the channel back.
A solo creator who wants a repeatable way to judge whether a video is ready before publishing it.
SKIP IF…
You want concrete camera, lighting or macro techniques: the guest declines to share his filming tricks.
Your channel exists mainly to sell a service or product: the guest admits three videos a year builds reach, not trust, and the advice shifts for that goal.
TL;DR
The full version, fast.
Posting consistently is the most overrated YouTube advice if your goal is views, because one great story outperforms a stack of average uploads. The guest picks ideas with a four-part rubric (original, explainable in one sentence, timeless, fun to make), plans the emotion he wants viewers to feel at each moment rather than the plot, sneaks facts in only when they push the story forward, and refuses to publish until strangers at the gym or on FaceTime ask to keep watching past ten seconds. Sound matters more than camera. Consistency still wins if you need trust and sales, so pair weekly maintenance videos with an occasional reach video.
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Montage of the guest's strongest lines plus the host's framing: 21 years old, nearly 6 million subscribers, billions of views from 12 videos.
01:24 – 01:58
02 · Show intro
Think Media Podcast intro and a subscribe ask.
01:58 – 04:18
03 · Consistency is overrated (for views)
The biggest mistake is obsessing over title and thumbnail instead of story. Three videos a year average tens of millions of views; consistency matters only if the goal is trust and sales.
04:18 – 08:10
04 · Sound first, then learn story
Audio beats camera, the muted-voiceover test, studying movies over YouTubers, hand-copying trending video scripts, and learning to hold a 50-person Thanksgiving table.
08:10 – 10:15
05 · The idea rubric
Lock yourself in a room for a week, write a thousand ideas, then filter for original, one-sentence, timeless and fun. Outlier theory produced his worst video.
10:15 – 14:30
06 · The stranger test and contact-list viewings
Handing his phone to strangers at the gym, FaceTiming his contacts A to Z, letting them control pause, and iterating until he runs out of contacts or knows the script by heart.
14:30 – 17:53
07 · Origin: the secret channel under the desk
Story over spectacle, editing under his desk in high school, teachers playing his videos unknowingly, and the 'one more video' bet that hit 110 million views.
17:53 – 19:40
08 · College, passion and the 5 a.m. routine
Not anti-college, pro-passion; finishing schoolwork before 7 a.m. so every evening went to YouTube.
19:40 – 23:51
09 · Production then and now
From iPhone and iMovie to Sony FX3s and Final Cut Pro, homemade foley, licensed songs, guarded camera tricks, and capturing every enhancement idea in Notion.
23:51 – 26:40
10 · Telling stories to people who don't care
Plans to hire and post monthly, his mission to make people love nature, and testing videos on people who don't like animals.
26:40 – 29:17
11 · Plan the emotion, not the plot
Sympathy to awe to stress to excitement in the ant video, and the 'Dr. Plants-worthy' test: the viewer should never see the subject the same way again.
29:17 – 33:25
12 · Ideation beats editing, and tricking viewers into learning
Avoid killed videos by over-investing in ideation; the host argues a great idea can carry weaker execution; the guest hides facts inside the story so viewers never notice they're learning.
33:25 – 37:40
13 · Translating it for normal creators
Maintenance videos weekly plus a monthly reach video, the one-week ideation room with a scored rubric, three years of study as a mental database, and small levers like short titles and bright intros.
37:40 – 40:20
14 · Perfectionism, audio and the long game
Perfectionism is why he only posts three times a year; the single best upgrade is audio; building the biggest nature media company; why it's not too late to start.
40:20 – 41:44
15 · Host wrap and VRA Fast Start pitch
Host's takeaway and a pitch for Think Media's VRA Fast Start program with on-screen QR code.
Atomic Insights
Lines worth screenshotting.
If your only goal is maximum views, you can post one video a year and still win, because consistency builds loyalty, not reach.
Twelve long videos clipped to Facebook and Instagram pulled 600 million views in a month with almost no extra effort, because a good story travels to every platform.
A parasocial relationship is a function of time spent together, so eight minutes across three videos a year will never build trust the way weekly uploads do.
Audio is the first investment: a camcorder video can get 100 million views, but nobody finishes a video that sounds bad.
Run a final pass with the voiceover muted; if the video is not watchable on sound design and music alone, it is not finished.
Hand-copying the script of a trending video while it plays trains your writing in a way that reading an AI transcript never will.
Choosing an idea takes five minutes and executing it takes 500 hours, so the choice deserves far more scrutiny than most creators give it.
A good idea is original, explainable to your grandmother in one sentence, timeless, and fun for you to make.
If a stranger hands your phone back after ten seconds and says 'great video', the video is going to fail.
Never tell a test viewer it's a viewing and never test in groups, because both change how people watch.
When ten people all pause at the same 30-second mark, something specific there is broken; a background color change was enough to fix one.
Viewers fall in love with characters, not spectacle: an ant video beat the guest's big-budget spectacle attempts.
Plan the emotion for each moment of the video (sympathy, awe, stress, excitement) and the story writes itself.
Only include a fact if it pushes the story forward; the moment viewers notice they're being taught, they leave.
AI has made most content exceptionally average, so being 10% better than everyone else acts like a 10x view multiplier.
The guest's first 110-million-view video was shot on his phone and his mom's phone, edited in iMovie, and cost about $300.
Titles under 52 characters and brighter intros are real levers, but they're the difference between 50 and 100 million views, not between zero and one million.
Takeaway
One great story beats a steady stream of average
WHAT TO LEARN
When reach is the goal, the leverage is in choosing the idea, mapping the emotion, getting the sound right, and proving the cut on strangers before it ships.
03Consistency is overrated (for views)
Decide your goal first: consistency builds trust and sales, while a few exceptional videos maximize raw views.
The biggest mistake is polishing title and thumbnail while neglecting the story inside the video.
04Sound first, then learn story
Invest in audio before cameras, and check that the video still works with the voiceover muted.
Study movies and TV, not only YouTubers, and hand-copy scripts of videos that held you to the end.
05The idea rubric
Write hundreds of ideas before choosing one, since the pick takes minutes but execution takes hundreds of hours.
Keep only ideas that are original, explainable in one sentence, timeless, and genuinely fun for you to make.
06The stranger test and contact-list viewings
Show the first ten seconds to a stranger; if they hand it back politely, re-edit until they ask to keep watching.
Test one person at a time without telling them it's a test, and look for pause points many viewers share.
07Origin: the secret channel under the desk
Spectacle doesn't carry videos; characters do, so build the story around a subject viewers can root for.
A phone, a free editor and a few hundred dollars were enough for a 110-million-view video when the story was right.
09Production then and now
Write down every enhancement idea the moment it hits, because you will have forgotten it when it's time to script.
10Telling stories to people who don't care
Test on people outside your niche; if they stay, the story is doing the work rather than the topic.
11Plan the emotion, not the plot
Plan the emotion you want at each moment, such as sympathy, awe, stress and excitement, and let the plot follow.
End each video with a changed view of the subject so viewers never see it the same way again.
12Ideation beats editing, and tricking viewers into learning
Include a fact only when it moves the story forward, so viewers learn without feeling taught.
Weak ideas are best avoided upstream with heavy ideation rather than killed after production.
13Translating it for normal creators
If you need customers, pair weekly maintenance videos with a monthly reach video aimed at a wider audience.
Spend a week writing and scoring ideas against a detailed rubric; one will stand far above the rest.
14Perfectionism, audio and the long game
Perfectionism has a real cost in output, so publish once the video feels great rather than doubting it endlessly.
It is not too late to start: average AI-made content means being 10% better stands out sharply.
Glossary
Terms worth knowing.
Outlier theory
A YouTube research method where you find videos that massively outperform their channel's subscriber count and copy their format or topic for your own channel.
Stranger test
Showing an unreleased video to someone who doesn't know you and watching whether they hand the phone back after a few seconds or ask to keep watching.
Parasocial relationship
The one-sided sense of personal connection a viewer builds with a creator through repeated time spent watching them, which drives trust and buying.
Foley
Sound effects recorded by hand for a video, such as ripping a cabbage in front of a microphone to sound like a plant growing.
Reach video
A higher-effort video designed for a broad audience that funnels new viewers into a channel's regular, narrower maintenance content.
Tacit knowledge
Know-how built through repeated exposure and practice that is hard to put into rules, like sensing which idea will work.
See every word as it's spoken — crank it to 2× and still catch all of it. The same dual-channel trick behind Amazon's Kindle + Audible.
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metaphorstory
My own teachers began using my videos in class, but they didn't know it was me. And the video is now at 110 million views. Edited on my phone and it cost less than my flight here today.
What if one of the biggest differences between average content and breakout content has nothing to do with your camera i believe that youtube is just a storytelling contest the people telling the best stories are the people getting the most views what is the most overrated youtube advice oh my god posting consistently i post three videos a year on random dates today i'm sitting down with jaron brower better known as dr plants at 21 years old he's built an audience of nearly 6 million subscribers and generated billions of views from only 12 Videos YouTube said that 20 million videos are uploaded every single day Do you think it's too late to start YouTube or can you still get in the game?
I think there has never been less competition. I think AI has made everyone's content exceptionally average.
Whether you're a content creator, YouTuber, or business owner, you're going to learn valuable insights for coming up with better ideas, leveling up your production, even if you don't have a big budget, and storytelling secrets for holding viewer retention longer. And if I'm being real, this is genuinely one of the most valuable conversations I've had on content creation this year.
Let's dive into it. Welcome to the Think Media Podcast, your go -to source for unfiltered YouTube tips for building a profitable channel and online business. Hey, if you're new here, we are bringing you interviews like this every single week, as well as tactical tips.
Can you hit the subscribe button and you'll get more content like this? All right, let's dive into the conversation. So you have 6 million subscribers on YouTube.
You clearly know what you're doing. What do you think is the biggest mistake that you see creators that aren't growing? What do you think the biggest mistake they make is?
I think the biggest mistake most people make is they worry so much about creating a title and thumbnail and not enough about creating a story. For me, I believe that YouTube is just a storytelling contest. The people telling the best stories are the people getting the most views.
What is the most overrated? YouTube advice that you hear people sharing? Oh, my God.
Posting consistently. I post three videos a year on random dates, not specific times, not because it's a holiday weekend. I post the video whenever it's done and it's the best of its ability.
I only post three videos a year and they average 67 or whatever million views. And it's not. Consistency might build you a more loyal audience.
You might develop a deeper connection with your fans. You might be able to sell more products. But if you're talking purely about getting as many views as possible, you can post one video a year.
How many total videos are on your channel? 12. Only 12 videos on your channel.
Do you know the view count of everything? Across all socials, it's in the billions. I don't know how many.
From only 12 videos, yeah. 12 videos, and then you've also posted those same videos on other platforms. Yeah, so what I'll do is last month, we did this for the first time.
We took all 12 Longhorn videos and we clipped it on Facebook and Instagram. 600 million views. It was like no effort.
It just shows you by putting all the effort into making a good story, it translates to every platform. That's amazing.
Quality or consistency? Quality. Every day.
And later on in the conversation, we'll unpack that more because you are the quality guy, clearly. 12 videos, billions of views. But do you think it depends on the type of creator?
Or let's say you were giving advice to somebody that does want to sell products or sell houses, real estate, business. Do you think there's a place for consistency or more quantity of videos? I do think so.
It all depends on your goals, right? My goals up to this point has to get as many views as possible. That's been my strict goal, not selling products, not selling brand deals.
And it's worked. We're now the second most viewed YouTube channel in the world on a views per video basis. But now I'm pivoting.
I want to build that deeper brand connection. And a parasocial relationship is purely the amount of time you spend with your viewer, the amount of quality and positive interactions. And across 12 videos, eight minutes each, that's not going to develop that.
So if you are a real estate agent and you want to sell more houses and you want people to trust you, yes, consistency does play an important role. Your videos are incredible. I recommend anyone who's just meeting you to watch them.
And the production value, the storytelling, the sound effects, the music. What is one tool you couldn't make videos without? I mean, I edit all these videos.
I used to edit my videos on my phone. I filmed them on my phone. I think the most important thing to your video is sound.
Sound is way more. You could film your videos on a camcorder and it could still get 100 million views. But if your audio, if that sounds horrible, no one can watch it.
You need the first investment you should make before anything is a good microphone. Yeah, you know, it's interesting too. Would you also agree with somebody needs to watch your videos just like with their eyes closed?
Because you've got the music is ebbing and flowing. Sound effects come in. You're obviously adding sounds back in.
At the end of a video when you're breaking. the terrarium or whatever that is. the glass shattering sound effect, you're adding it in.
Yeah, so what I do is my final pass of the video, I'll remove all voiceover and see if it's watchable with just sound. So in a way, you're storytelling with sound effects. Yeah, exactly.
On top of the music. I think that's absolutely pivotal. Man, so powerful.
What do you think is one skill every creator should learn? Become a better storyteller. I think you should be studying movies and TV shows and not just be studying other YouTubers.
You're going to be crushed by saturation because everyone... Everyone's videos look the same. You're just gonna become another one lost in the crowd.
Study the videos other people aren't studying. Learn the content other people aren't learning. Try to find a way to be unique, be different.
Where did you learn storytelling? What have been the biggest influences for you? When I started, it was YouTube.
I started my channel under my desk in high school. I would watch videos all day. I would watch your channel.
I would watch literally everyone on how to make better videos. And once I ran out of that content, I started just going to the trending page every single day. I would watch all the most trending videos.
And I'd watch them on a loop. I'd be like, wait a second. That video was so good.
I just watched the whole thing. Why did that happen? And I'll watch it again.
But the second time around, I'll actually go get a notepad and write the entire script as the video goes. So that I'm literally programming my brain to talk like them and write like them. So you're telling me you would go to the trending page, watch a trending video.
If you stayed to the end, you're like, wait a minute, I got sucked in and I didn't click away. You'd rewatch it now with the mindset to study and you would take notes, but with a pencil and a notepad. Yes.
Write their script out. I mean, it's funny because you could just. AI transcript.
No, but you won't get any of the value. But the value, are you thinking it's even a tactile experience? I swear.
I mean, you could type it on your computer too. I think it's a personal preference, but actually being the one physically writing it, it's making you think so much more about those words versus just getting the transcript and reading it after. That's not going to help you nearly as much.
Wow. Okay. So keep going.
So that's how you learned storytelling was by studying YouTube. Are you watching TV and movies? You getting any kind of mentorship or reading about it or is it mainly study?
You know, I didn't have any friends. I was just doing this all completely by myself. I didn't have any mentors.
I was like, I was the weird kid in school. Everyone else was playing tag. I was in the dirt looking for worms, right?
So I had to kind of hide this hobby of mine. I have a very big family. So I think something that played a role in becoming a better storyteller was that at a big family gathering like Thanksgiving, it's a meet and greet every time because there's so many new people.
And the only way that you could get in a conversation with all 50 people at that table is you had to be the one that could tell the best story. And it would get everyone to be silent. That's how you know.
Wow. It's interesting. Family dynamics.
Like childhood dynamics, influencing kind of the leader or even business builder or creator that you become. 100%. So what matters more?
The idea, the thumbnail, or the execution? I believe the idea is the highest leverage thing that you can do for your channel. If you're a new creator and you're just figuring it out, I would lock yourself in a room for a week.
Do nothing but write out ideas. By the end of that week, you might have a thousand ideas. And I promise you, if you choose one out of those thousand ideas, And you really like, oh, my God, this would be you will have the best idea you've ever made.
So then how do you know? Because a lot of creators deal with self -doubt. But I like this one, but I like that one.
But will it be worth it? And they're afraid of investing time into making a video, especially the kind of time you put into a video. What if I invest all that time and it doesn't work?
And some people say, well, you need to test a lot of ideas, see which ones and then maybe double down on it. Like, how do you develop the confidence and the commitment? to go all in on the idea or do you just feel it?
Oh, so a big thing is tacit knowledge and it's just a sense of feeling. But it was so important for me early on to figure this out because it may take me five minutes to choose a video idea, but then I'll spend the next 500 hours executing it. Yeah.
Right. So there's so much weight on it. And I use like a framework of a couple of things.
Number one has to be original, never been done before. I really don't like outlier theory. I did one video on outlier theory and it was the worst performing video I've made on my channel.
And it's because it was purely spectacle driven. It wasn't because there was a deeper why behind it. It was just like, this is going to get a lot of views.
Number one. Number two, it should be explainable in a single sentence. You should be able to go to your mom, your sister, your grandma, and every single person would be like, oh, I get it.
Number three, it needs to be timeless, right? I did a video on hatching eggs. It was 100 million views.
And that's because hatching eggs will work the same way 100 years from now as it did 100 years ago. right? It's not like it's a Christmas special where this video can only be watched during Christmas.
And then finally, the most important thing to me is that it's fun, right? I've seen a direct correlation between how much fun I've had making a video and how many views it gets. I don't think enough people put leverage on that because then you're not motivated.
You should be so excited to wake up that morning and be like, yes, I want to do nothing more than make my video. Because if you're not having fun making the video, how can you expect the viewer to have fun watching it? What is something you do that that most people would think is excessive?
So before every video comes out, there's a lot of things, but this is going to be one. Before every video comes out, I usually go to the gym. I know it doesn't look like it, but I'll go to the gym and I'll ask, excuse me, do you mind if I work in with you?
I'll find someone working out. And I call this the stranger test, where after one or two sets, I'll hand them my phone. I'll be like, do you mind watching the first 10 seconds of a video I just made?
There are two ways this can play out. Option one, after 10 seconds, hey, it's a great video, and they'll hand it back to you. Your video is going to fail.
Wow. Option two. After 10 seconds, they're still watching.
20 seconds, 30 seconds. And a minute in, they go, excuse me, do you mind if I watch the whole thing? Imagine a complete stranger, right?
So this has happened. This has actually happened many times. Dozens and dozens of times.
So dozens of times you've gone to the gym. started working out, handed the phone, you actually do this. And they actually go, yeah, that's great.
And they hand it back after 10 seconds. And so you stopped. You go, I got to go back.
And I go back and I re -edit it. And then you go back to the gym and you do it again. Exactly.
And my whole mindset is how can you expect a stranger to watch your whole video online if they won't do it in person? Okay. Right.
Like for someone to watch your video, that has to be more valuable than anything else they're doing in their day. So why shouldn't it apply at the gym, at the supermarket, at your house with your mom? You should be able to do this with anyone.
This is a test anybody can do. When I was studying you, is it true that you also did something else? Like you developed a list of friends or family or contacts that you sent your videos to?
Did you do anything like that? Oh, that's actually a great thing. So it goes into that gym thing.
So I don't always have time to go to the gym anymore. So I'll go from A to Z in my contact list and literally FaceTime every single person that picks up. Just text them or you FaceTime them?
No, I just call them. I will never text them because for number one, I don't want them to know it's a viewing. As soon as the person know it's a viewing, they're going to come in with a different mindset, right?
That's number one. Number two, you don't want to do viewings in groups because they then begin to rely on each other's reactions more than the actual video.
You FaceTime them and do what? I'll FaceTime them and be like, hey, how's it going? I'll catch up with people I haven't talked to in five years.
I'll be like, what's new? What's going on? And they'll say, what's new?
Hey, I've been working on this video. Do you mind watching the first 10 seconds? And I'll always specifically say the first 10 seconds.
And do you show it? Then you hold the phone up to the computer? No, I'll screen share.
Okay, screen share and play it from your phone. It's like an MOV file MP4 on your phone. Exactly, and I'll give them access to pause it.
Like, you know you're able to give them phone access? So usually they'll pause it, and you'll notice a correlation after the first 10 people. All 10 people paused on the 30 -second mark, right?
I changed the background from blue to yellow. The next 10 people didn't pause. The background.
visually in the video? That's it, yeah. Did you reshoot it and change the background or are you in editing?
I just color graded it, yeah. Yeah, color graded it different. You're saying the color stopped people from pausing at 30 seconds and moving forward, the background color.
As little things as that, yeah. And how many rounds of revisions go into a video? Usually until I run out of my contact list.
Yeah. It's usually when I run out of my contact list or I'm very, very confident. I usually spend like three days to a week editing the video.
And then I'll spend probably another week doing these viewings. And then how, I mean, with all of this, you've developed obviously the confidence and you have the results and that momentum is built with the views you've already gotten. How do you know when a video is done?
I know a video is done when I'm on the floor and I physically cannot hear the words anymore. I know the script to every single video of mine almost beginning to end. You could go into my channel right now and point at anyone and I could just rehearse it.
The newest video or the egg one. Here is the world's biggest egg. And I could just go through the whole thing.
I've rehearsed it so many times. And once I get to that point where I'm like, wow. I really feel it every single time.
That's how I know it's done. And there might be parts where you're like, I didn't love that part. So you also, at this point, you feel the whole script.
You've gotten the feedback. Is that part of it? It's not just that you memorized it.
Yeah, it's that like, I'll start ad -libbing the script around my house and my friend will be like, yo, I cannot hear that part of the script one more time. I'm like, oh, gone. Yeah.
Removing it. Nice. That's amazing.
What do you know now? And for people listening, you're 21. What do you know now that you wish you knew at 17?
I wish that I made all my videos about what I was most passionate about. And not just what I thought would get the most views. Because at the time, I thought that greater spectacle correlated to greater views.
And I didn't know yet that greater story is really what correlates to greater views. You don't need a Lamborghini and a Ronaldo in every video to get 100 million views. One of my most viewed videos is about ants.
Yeah. Right? But I learned very quickly that people don't click the video for the ants.
They're watching it for the story of what happened to that ant. You know, people fall in love with characters. They don't fall in love with spectacle.
I want to talk a little bit about... the background a little bit more about the craft idea strategy and then also translating some of this to everyday creators whether you're a business owner whether you're you maybe don't have the bandwidth i'm sure you could probably dispel some myths because you've and then let's go bigger than youtube and talk about the vision does that sound good so when did this actually start and what was the original inspiration to start the channel i heard that You started it as kind of like a secret and maybe even your teacher played one of the videos not even knowing You were behind the video.
Yeah, so I started this channel back in high school under my yes, cuz like What do you mean under your desk? So I would literally be editing these videos and filming them on my phone.
I'd be editing them under my desk. And it was my biggest secret. I was so embarrassed.
I had this channel about animals because nobody else liked them. Everyone was talking about sports. They'd be like, oh, hey, did you see the soccer game last night?
I was like, yeah. Did they score any touchdowns? I literally have no idea how sports are played.
I'd be so into my world. And so I kept this channel a secret. I didn't want anybody to put me down.
And it... the secret became very hard to keep. My own teachers began using my videos in class, but they didn't know it was me because in the videos I put on a voice, you know, I'm like a hundred days ago.
Yeah. So I didn't have my face in the videos at the time either. And I just kept going at it.
And eventually my parents had to figure out cause I got monetized. I don't have a bank account. I'm 17 years old.
So I was like, mom, dad, I'm a YouTuber. And they were like, well, They were really supportive and they loved it.
But obviously, everyone my age was going to college. So it was either, all right, you're going to either go to college or become a YouTuber. So I told them, one more video.
And I locked in. I spent three months on this video. I ran out of storage on my phone, so I had to actually start filming it on my mom's phone.
I was so excited. I spent $300, which was a lot to me at the time. Three months.
This was going to be the make or break if I go to school or not. And the video is now at 110 million views. Jeez.
Edited on my phone and it costs less than my flight here today. Hey, really quick. If you want more tips and strategies for growing your YouTube channel, make sure you're subscribed to the Think Media podcast.
Every week we bring you conversations just like this to help you grow your channel faster and get better results. So make sure to subscribe so you don't miss an episode. All right, let's dive back into the conversation.
Do you think people should... become a creator instead of going to college? No.
I think that you should do whatever you are the most passionate about. If you love school and you love learning, you could still do it outside of school. That's not the place.
But I'm not against college. I'm against, like, I was going to go to school for a mechanical engineer because I was told that's what I should do. It wasn't what I was passionate about.
I believe that if you're passionate about becoming a nurse, you obviously have to go to school to become a nurse. You should do that. But I'm the biggest proponent and advocate of following your dreams.
You will be the most successful because you wake up every single morning thinking about that dream. There's no distractions because that is a distraction. So do you think then maybe too many people are doing what they're pressured to do or what they think they should do?
And if they have a fire to really lock in and the kind of energy you're talking about. that stepping out taking a risk or were you making kind of an educated bet because there was sort of like an if this then that hey if i get one more video and it proves it works yes so it some people say burn the ships you're like you might want to keep a ship why are we burning ships anyways like we get you know so it's like a it's a risk but it was kind of a uh calculated risk yeah it was kind of pressure though because it was i was at So I go to school every morning at, I think it was like 7 a .m.
school starts and it ends at 2. So I would wake up at 5 a .m. every morning to get all my schoolwork done.
And I would be the first one in the parking lot. It was me and the janitor. It's a 2 ,500 -person school.
And me and the janitor would be the first ones in the parking lot. I would do all my schoolwork before school started. So as soon as I get home, I can work on my YouTube videos until the second I go to bed.
Wow. And then loop every single day for years. So I also wanted to ask you, this first video you made was just your phone.
Then your mom's phone for all the storage. $300 that invested in resources and supplies for the video. And it got 110 million views.
What editing software did you use? Oh, I think it was like iMovie. And has your production evolved since then?
Yeah, so now I film on FX3s. And I edit in Final Cut Pro. Everyone makes fun of me for editing in Final Cut Pro.
But I'm such a big advocate. It doesn't matter if you're editing in my movie or Final Cut Pro. You can tell a good story no matter what platform you're using.
No matter what camera you're using, it literally does not matter. As long as you have good audio, of course. Yeah.
And so you proved that with limited gear, it probably was part of your storytelling. Now you've got fancier gear. What's the title of your video about kind of like being in the desert and it's harsh and then you break it at the end?
So that one was simulating Africa for 100 days. Simulating Africa for 100 days. Is that FX3s?
Yeah. You're also using maybe like macro lenses or whatnot to get rid of... Exactly.
So I don't even know how to use a camera. I had to figure it all out. Yeah.
I was just watching a YouTube video. I was like, oh, this is the camera I should buy. And I went to the store and I bought three of them.
I was like, all right, this is it. And I learned on the fly. And then the macro lenses so you could get really close to the insects, the ants and things like that.
And then where does the sound design come from? Where are you pulling the music and the sound effects? So a lot of the sounds I actually make myself.
So let's say you're plant growing. I'll go take a cabbage in front of a mic and rip it. Okay.
And that's actually really cool because it makes it actually sound like the plants are growing. A lot of it's folly. So you make some of them yourself.
Do you also use any kind of resources to get audio sound effects? Did you break the glass yourself or where did you get stuff like that? So the grass sounds, I think I got it off of some stock website.
Yeah. I'm really trying to explore more music options. I'm really interested in getting custom composed music.
Your music at the end of that was like this kind of cool vibe. I felt like it was like a transition scene in Breaking Bad at the end of the Africa video. Like where did that song come from?
Oh, I think the song name was The End of the World. Yeah. And it was a really famous old song.
And I just love that song. Like, you know, it really fits the vibe. You just threw it in there?
I just threw it in there because I liked it. I mean, you still got monetized on the video? Yeah.
So I think I used Licked. Okay. Yeah, because you could use popular songs through licensing agreements.
Exactly, yeah. Because that gave it a whole feel. It's such a premium film story feel to it.
Yeah, I agree. And then, I mean, these are like very niche questions, but when the ants are underneath the dirt, how did you actually get the light and even the ability to see them? Because I figured from the outside, it looked like they weren't really there, but when you zoomed in, you could see.
Like they weren't visible from the outside of the tank and the glass or maybe they were. Did you have to dig? How did you get that perspective?
Yeah, there are all kinds of camera tricks I have to do to really be able to like, you really go to see these animals on the ground. My biggest thing is that I'm not trying to make documentaries. I'm trying to tell stories and I really want people to feel like they're there with the animals.
So sometimes we have to play camera tricks so you can be like, oh my God, I never knew they actually lived like that. Yeah. So how'd you do it?
Or is that too, is that proprietary? I'm just curious. We keep it like a magician never tells their secrets.
You know, a YouTuber, a cinematographer doesn't tell their techniques. Yeah, because there's a lot. All right.
So that's the production workflow. So like how many hours? I mean, there's not just days, but like you lock in on one video and you work on it like.
four, eight, 10 hours a day. You probably have to just let time progress in some cases, but yeah. That's all I do.
Like I wake up every morning, YouTube. I go to, I'm eating lunch, YouTube. I'm dinner, YouTube.
I'm showering. Oh my God, I should do, I should hatch an ostrich egg. Okay.
And then you, so are you also, the story's evolving as you go too. You have some notes, but it's evolving. Yeah.
So my girlfriend says YouTube is the other girl in the relationship because it's all I talk about. Right. So.
I'm scripting my view at all times. I have, I don't know if you use Notion. I love Notion and I'll really build out.
Every time I have an idea, it is so important you write that down. Yeah. Because you are going to forget that in a month from now.
And you're talking, now you're talking niche ideas, not video ideas, ideas about enhancing the video. Yeah, I'm like, oh my God, how cool would it be if I fed the ants sugar water and you watch how all their abdomens change color, right? Yeah.
And I'm like, oh, I should write that down. And then I come back when I go actually write that video. Like, oh, I remember all this and now I can act on it.
Wow. Okay. And so days and hours and edits and three videos a year.
And you work on those three videos all year. But you're pivoting now. What's this next version?
You're going to still try to do that, but you're also, what does it look like next as you're evolving? So my next step is I really want to be able to get out more videos a year. I want to be able to upload monthly.
So my whole thesis is that I believe every human being has an innate capacity to love nature. And those who don't just haven't had the right experiences yet. Right.
And it's my job to make those experiences. Yeah. And in order to make enough of those experiences, I can't do it.
Me. It's not a money issue because the videos, a lot of them cost less than a thousand dollars to make. The real issue is just time.
Right. I'm the one writing. I'm the one scripting.
I'm the one editing. And I'm really just looking for talented people who love nature and who love stories as much as I do to join your team. Yeah.
Got it. So you're thinking about building the team. I one of the biggest epiphanies from studying your work.
Was the fact that you okay you're on a mission to get people to love nature But is it true that you're trying to write stories that would be entertaining even if you don't care about nature? Yeah, so a big thing I do with the viewings is most people I show I show people who don't like animals Okay, because if I can get someone you ask them Yeah, I'll literally, well, you kind of just vibe them out, really.
But I'm like, hey, sometimes you just tell. A lot of people just don't care about ants. I mean, like the ant video, we're simulating an ant colony for 100 days.
I promise you not one person woke up this morning out of the 84 million people who watched it saying, I want to watch a video about ants. Not one of them, right? But they want to watch a good story.
Exactly. So the epiphany for the listeners is you might think, your niche is boring or it's capped because your niche only exists for people that are interested in it.
But your passion for your mission, I think, is similar to a lot of our listeners' passion for their mission. And learning the art of storytelling would be how could I present this in such a way that it will be interesting because of just how humans have worked always. Storytelling, what would be some of the biggest things you've learned about storytelling itself?
People would say beginning, middle, and end. I'm sure there's a lot more to the arc than that. You know what?
It's really a feeling. And it's getting like showing strangers your videos. And you just know when they're getting bored.
They start going on their phone. They'll pause it. And you're like, all right, we should either tighten it up or they'll be like.
You see them questioning, okay, maybe it's time to add clarity here. And it's really just a thing of trial and error. I will never get it right on the first time, and I've been doing this for three years.
Do you have any frameworks like conflict, tension? You've probably heard some of the frameworks of also like, you know, opening loops or raising the stakes. You start, something is introduced later.
Do you think about conflict or plot points? Is any of that? Yeah, I mean, I think about it.
I more just... I think less about the conflicts and the characters and I more think of how do I want to make the viewer feel. Okay.
I worry more about emotion of all else. I want to know, I plan out the emotion and exactly how I want the viewer to feel at each moment of the video. Yeah.
And then the story writes itself. Like maybe, and what are some of the feelings and emotions you want them to feel if you're taking them through an ebb and flow of emotions? Let's say it's a video on ants and you don't care about ants at all.
So the first feeling I want you to feel is sympathy. So you watch how it starts with a single ant by herself. And you're like, oh, my God.
When I see all these ants in my house, I didn't realize it started with one. She has to do all this by herself. That's crazy.
Right? And then I'm like, I want to move from sympathy to awe. And you watch how she builds an empire of thousands.
Right? And you're like, I didn't know they do this. They do this by themselves.
And then stress. They're going to war against another thousand ants. And it's like some Avengers level stuff.
And then. You feel excitement when they win the war. You're like, wow, I had no idea these ants that are just living in my pantry are living their whole little civilization on their own like this.
What are some of the creators, maybe even like slept on creators that you think are some of the best storytellers? You know, I don't watch that much YouTube. Which, surprise, I'm a YouTuber.
I really love watching movies like Christopher Nolan, The Odyssey. I watched it. I was like in my seat shaking.
I was so stressed. Yeah. And that's the emotion I want to convey in my videos.
And you're feeling that and you're thinking, okay, if I could create content that could make people feel something. Yeah. I'm very big on impact.
What makes an idea Dr. Plantsworthy? Kind of that list I gave you before where it's timeless.
It can appeal to anyone in the world, no matter how old or young you are. And it has to paint nature in a positive light where you end this video. not seeing the animal or subject the same way again.
Like, for example, I did a video on testing a hamster's survival skills where this was really happening. I went to a pet store and I saw a hamster. I'm like, where do these things actually live?
Like, what do they do all day? Is this a wild animal? And I do some research and I'm like, wait a second.
This thing's just a wild animal. It's not even like... they're not even really domesticated.
And I come to learn that they hunt, they dig burrows, they store food. And I do a whole video debunking and I change your worldview where you're like, oh my God, I never knew. This is a wild animal.
This hamster that I bought at PetSmart goes hunt cockroaches and worms. Well, we're just feeding it out of little Barbie bowls, some seeds. Have you ever killed ideas after putting significant time or money into them?
Really? Yeah. Like, so I think a lot of people, There's a lot of advice that says just post it anyway, just put it out there.
And again, depends on your objective, but maybe a business owner's posting content that might apply to somebody, a service provider. However, I think it is interesting. You're the quality guy over quantity by far.
You know, you're the billboard of 12 videos have produced billions of views. So do you think more people should actually scrap ideas and not just, you know, You become known for what you uploaded last if they're uploading something that's not good.
And how do you know when to not post it? So I think the biggest thing is to just avoid this entirely and just spend an egregious amount of time in ideation. Just make sure you know how to make the best ideas so that you don't even have to deal with this issue down the road.
That's interesting you say spend an egregious amount of time on ideation because... You know, and one of our ways of saying it is we actually feel like if you're actually good at coming up with the idea, you can be worse at everything else. Really?
Meaning, and you've probably seen this, that somebody, if they have the right title and the right idea and the right topic, they just talk about it in their car and they can get a level of views from it. Why? Because of the idea.
It doesn't mean, and you could be worse at everything else, maybe not terrible, but you deliver the information. Now, if you get better at everything else, but with that. Would you agree with that?
You're saying the idea matters so much. It might be that their way of rating ideas is incorrect. They're not rating the idea the right way.
Are you rating that your idea makes a great story? Is that even in your rubric? Got it.
If your rubric is you don't have a storytelling, then done. Obviously, then it's not a good. And I might be talking about, because in some cases, talking head videos in cars on YouTube go viral all the time.
The point is, though, what's it about? And, and, but I would say it's usually a story and it might be dramatic though. It's, it's usually like dramatic, like how I lost 221 pounds in 30.
That's also an achievement. And then they tell their story, those types of videos. I guess the point being, if we were helping a fitness coach, they might be like how to do bicep curls for women over 40.
That'd be a very SEO boring video and probably impossible to get views on today. If they tell their own story, the ideation, the packaging, and maybe the thumbnail says I felt like quitting and they're a little bit more sad, that's all packaging. And that would be the idea.
And if you're... Good at ideas, you can be not as good at everything else. You should still improve at everything else, but the actual idea you post matters so much.
I'm very big on tricking the viewer into learning. Like those 84 million people that watched my ant video, none of them woke up that morning wanting to learn about ants. They didn't.
I sneak in the facts in the story. And every time it's a fact, I only say that fact if it pushes the story forward. For example, ants make graveyards.
Did you know that? They literally build graveyards where they pile all the ants. I didn't know that.
So I'm like, how can I put this in the story? So after that war, then they took all the dead bodies and they literally built a graveyard. And now the viewer now feels remorse towards the answer.
Like, wow, I did not know this. Yeah, I got it. So and that's interesting.
So we mostly help education creators. And this is a genius conversation with so many nuggets that are transferable, which is where I want to go next. It's interesting that if you tell a good story, the best way to educate could be to hide those facts and trick viewers into learning.
They don't want you. As soon as the viewer knows they're learning, it has to be like the facts need to be the story. Right?
It's like, oh, let's say it's a story about losing weight. I need to learn how to lose weight. Okay.
So in order to lose weight, I had to do this many bicep curls and it pushes the story forward. I had to run on the treadmill this much and now I'm exhausted. Oh my God.
How do I recover? I feel exhausted. And now the viewer is learning how to recover.
But it's also pushing the story forward at the same time. So I want to translate this for what I would call normal creators. But do you think most creators should actually post less?
Especially in today's world. We're here at an event called VidSummit doing this conversation. Do you think most people should really decrease frequency?
and increase quality? I don't think they're necessarily matched. Some people can do really high quality very often.
I mean, Jimmy posts a video every other week right on his main channel. That's amazing. But I...
But that's a whole team and a system behind him. I know. For the individual or typically the small shop.
Once again, it's very goal -oriented. If your goal is to get as many views as possible per video... Post until you know that video is an absolute banger.
You hold off. If your video goal is to make as many customers as possible, maybe do an in -between where you have those maintenance videos you post every week. And maybe once a month, you spend that extra effort on a reach video, a video where it's tailored for a wider audience and funnels them into those maintenance videos.
So if someone's listening to this and they practically, because of their life, can't spend three months on making one video. Or I guess they could, but the downside would be they're not uploading that entire time. But what could they do if you tried to translate the Dr.
Plant's framework? If they had an iPhone or like a DJI Pocket Camera, they have a thousand subscribers. They're early on in this process.
What could they steal from your process that would almost be translatable to all creators just to make their next video better? Come up with more ideas. Lock yourself in a room for a week.
I don't care what is on your schedule. Every ounce of free time you are in that room writing ideas. And at the end of those seven days, you're going to have so many ideas.
So many ideas. And you're going to tailor them down based on a detailed rubric of is it original? Does it make a good story?
And you're going to rate all of these ideas. Can it be explainable in a single sentence? And you build out a really detailed rubric.
And you go through all 500 ideas. And at the end, I promise you're going to have one vastly above the rest. That stands out.
Do you recommend in doing that? Are you off the internet when you do that? I think it really depends on the person.
My best ideas are just in the shower. Okay. Right?
Because that's what outlier theory suggests. You're going to YouTube to look at videos outperforming usually subscriber count or just outperforming in general, going viral, maybe even adjacent. You could steal a framework.
Yeah. I did X in 30 days. Yeah.
Okay. But you're not a big fan of outlier theory. No.
So I think when someone thinks about locking themselves in a room with ideas, they might think, well, I don't got any ideas. I'm asking ChatGPT about it. I'm copying other creators.
I'm looking at outliers. How do I get in the state to do this creative process? Because the listeners that are locking in for this valuable episode are one video away from breaking out at a whole other level.
If they follow what you're doing, it's going to take discipline. So what you're not saying is like everyone's just asking Claude. I think what's unfair is that my brain is kind of a database.
I spent three years researching before I even started my channel. I didn't post a single video. And researching YouTube?
Just tailoring my brain into literally a YouTube LLM. Okay, so you were watching YouTube, watching the trendy videos, writing the scripts. You did three years of pre -work.
Yeah, so I can now have the privilege of being able to lock myself in a room and just have this database to pull from. I am like ChatGPT for YouTube now. You know what's interesting is I do think one of the powerful things...
especially for a very busy business owner, is knowing YouTube itself and knowing formats. You probably have gotten good at, does that make sense, on formats? Yeah.
Maybe even looking at your title structure, there'd be a lot to learn from.
The idea itself, how it's written, how it's presented in as few words as possible. Is that the kind of data points you were picking up? I mean, little data points like your title should be less than 52 characters or brighter intros lead to higher retention.
But these are all like the difference between 50 million and 100 million views. Did you say brighter intros? Yeah.
But these are all like differences between getting 50 million and 100 million views. You learn all these little things. So like the common creator, the highest leverage thing is coming up with better ideas.
Yeah. That's what's going to leverage you from the 1 million view to the 10 million views. What's the difference between craftsmanship and perfectionism?
I'm a perfectionist and it's very dangerous. You should not be like me. It's the reason why I only get three videos out a year.
Yeah. You should just, after your video is like, you see that it's a beautiful thing and you feel great about it, you should just post it. You should not doubt yourself a million times and go again and again and again because that's one of my biggest flaws.
And what's one upgrade that would make the average person's video noticeably better? If it was a small thing. Oh, mic and audio sound effects.
Really? If I were them, I would remove all their voiceover from the video and re -edit the video now with just sound design and music and listen to it. If you cannot watch it without your voice, then you should not upload that video.
Would you extend, this is a podcast interview, would you extend advice like that to content like this or does it depend on the context? You know what? I'm not.
informed enough in the podcast realm that I want to make a statement on that. But when it comes to making actual long form and short form videos on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, 100%. Yeah.
Okay. You said you want Dr. Plants to become something much bigger than a channel.
What are you actually building? I want to build the biggest nature media company in the world. I want this to be a household name.
I want people to hear the word nature and they think Dr. Plants. Because I was that kid.
growing up where I couldn't talk about my pets in school without getting made fun of. I want kids to have someone to look up to and be like, oh, this is actually a cool thing to appreciate animals and love nature. I was never allowed to have a dog or cat growing up, right?
I was only allowed to have animals I could fit in my bedroom. So I had to learn to appreciate the smaller things in life, like fish, like ants. And that's where this passion all started.
And I know there are other kids out there like me who can't keep pets. And I really want to inspire them and let them know it's possible to enjoy this stuff. And other people also like it just as much.
I have one more question for you. But if you want to shout anything out, go for it. Where can people follow you?
One place? Now multiple channels? Check me out on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, at Dr.
Plants. Last question for you. YouTube said that 20 million videos are uploaded every single day.
Do you think... It's too late to start YouTube or can you still get in the game? I think there has never been less competition.
I think AI has made everyone's content exceptionally average. It's the reason why when you go into YouTube, you're like, why does everything look the same, right? Being 10 % better than everyone else is a 10 times view multiplier.
It is not too late. Find what everyone else is doing and find a way just to do it 10 % better. If you're improving a little thing on every single video you do, it would be impossible to lose.
So there was so many powerful insights from that conversation with Dr. Plants. And one of the biggest takeaways and lessons I noticed was that success on YouTube isn't just about being more consistent and posting more videos, but it's about slowing down and posting.
And so I'd love to hear from you what your biggest takeaway from this episode was. And another thing I've learned is that you can't get any success on YouTube. if you never start or hit publish in the first place.
And that's actually why we created vrafaststart .com. If you've been on the fence for a while, if you've been watching podcasts like this, consuming information, maybe you've even posted a few videos, but you haven't got momentum yet. You haven't figured out how to consistently publish videos.
that actually get views, we have a really cool program that we just launched called vrafaststart .com. If you want to learn a little bit more about it, you can scan the code on screen and we'll also post a link to it in the description below. VRA Fast Start is our brand new updated step -by -step program designed to help you plan, film, and publish your next breakout video, even if your last one only got seven views.
So if you're ready to stop overthinking and to start with a clear step -by -step plan, go to vrafaststart .com or scan the code on screen or check out the link in the show notes below. This is the Think Media Podcast. Like, rate, share, review wherever you watch or listen if you got value today.
My name is Sean Cannell, your guide to building a profitable YouTube channel, and I will connect with you in a future episode.
The Hook
The bait, then the rug-pull.
The title does the selling: nearly 6 million subscribers from a channel with only 12 videos. The cold open stacks the guest's best lines (teachers screening his videos without knowing, a phone-edited video at 110 million views, 'posting consistently' as the most overrated advice) before the interview proper starts.
Add Modern Creator as a preferred source and Google shows you more of our breakdowns in Search, Top Stories, and AI Overviews. It only changes what you see, and you can undo it in your Google settings anytime.
Add to Preferred SourcesOpens your Google source preferences with us pre-loaded. Tick the box and you're done.
Sean Cannell sits down with speaker and author Jon Acuff to break down the framework he uses to open, structure, and close every talk, book, and video, plus the camera-confidence and humor rules that go with it.
A single-host teaching episode breaks down a seven-part framework for turning a YouTube channel into a community people belong to, not just content they watch.
Sean Cannell interviews Ben Azadi on how a niche keto channel became the second-biggest health channel on YouTube — and the under-talked-about affiliate structure now generating $700K a month.
Roberto Blake and Sean Cannell on device-first strategy, the clipping industrial complex, and why AI is the working-class creator's only competitive advantage.
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