Big Idea

The argument in one line.

YouTube works for a business when every video attracts the right viewers and moves them from viewer to lead to sale, not when it chases the most views.

Who This Is For

Read if. Skip if.

READ IF YOU ARE…

A coach, consultant or service business owner who wants YouTube to feed leads and sales instead of vanity metrics.
Someone who posts once a week or less and over-polishes every video before it goes live.
A creator whose videos get views but whose lead magnet and offer don't line up with the topics they cover.

SKIP IF…

You want a deep technical guide to the YouTube algorithm or analytics; this is a high-level habit list.
You're a pure entertainment creator with no offer or lead magnet to send viewers to.

TL;DR

The full version, fast.

After earning $700,000 from YouTube, Nolan Molt lists twelve habits for business owners. Chase the right viewers instead of views, post more than feels comfortable, aim at recommendations instead of search, and mix packaging-first with content-first ideas. Make the intro prove why a new viewer should listen, add a verbal call to action, and keep the topic, lead magnet and offer aligned. Add conversion content like a YouTube VSL, use AI for thumbnails, level up production gradually, end each video with a handoff to the next one, and make content only you can make.

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Chapters

Where the time goes.

00:00 – 00:50

01 · Cold open and credibility

$700K claim and the promise of twelve cheat codes.

00:50 – 03:15

02 · 1. Chase viewers, not views

Cole Gordon's narrower niche and the $70K mastermind buyer who found him on YouTube.

03:15 – 05:15

03 · 2. Post more than you want to

30 videos in 30 days kills perfectionism; the 30-day challenge pitch.

05:15 – 06:35

04 · 3. Focus on recommendations

Interest-based recommendations over search; 60K to 400K in four months.

06:35 – 08:25

05 · 4. Balance content-first and packaging-first

Mix title-first videos with content-first ones to keep shipping.

08:25 – 09:35

06 · 5. Optimize the intro for new viewers

Answer why they should listen, using B-roll and proof.

09:35 – 11:30

07 · 6. Call to action in every video

Verbal CTA, description, pinned comment; viewer to lead to sale.

11:30 – 13:10

08 · 7. Create clear alignment

Topic, lead magnet and offer must match; VA lead magnet example.

13:10 – 15:40

09 · 8. Create conversion content

Long trust-building videos and the YouTube VSL funnel.

15:40 – 17:00

10 · 9. Leverage AI

AI-generated thumbnail concepts sent to a designer.

17:00 – 18:34

11 · 10. Level up your videos over time

Start with talking head, add visuals, then bring on an editor.

18:34 – 19:42

12 · 11. End with a transition

Send viewers to a related next video to drive binge-watching.

19:42 – 20:20

13 · 12. Make content only you can make

Use your own experience; pointer to a framework video.

Atomic Insights

Lines worth screenshotting.

A $70,000 mastermind buyer found the host on YouTube a week before buying, which shows a 50,000-view video aimed at the right people can beat a million-view broad one.
Posting more than you want to forces you to stop overthinking, and that speed is the skill that compounds.
YouTube recommendations are driven by the topics a viewer watches, not by who they subscribe to.
One channel went from 60,000 to 400,000 followers in four months with traffic coming almost entirely from recommendations, not search.
Packaging-first means choosing the title and thumbnail before the video; content-first means the reverse. Mix both so you keep shipping.
YouTube pushes your video to people who have never seen you, so the intro must answer why they should listen.
Send viewers to a lead first, not straight to a sales call; a free community or lead magnet converts better.
If the lead magnet and offer don't match the video topic, people arrive at the sales call wanting something else.
A long, trust-building video such as a webinar or YouTube VSL can sell for you, with no sales calls needed.
AI is good for generating thumbnail concepts to hand to a designer, even when it can't make the final version.
Level one is a talking head with no editing; level two adds screen recordings or drawings to lift retention.
Ending a video by pointing to a related next video turns new viewers into returning, trusting ones and helps recommendations.
Content only you can make, drawn from your own experience, is the one thing nobody can copy.

Takeaway

Build YouTube for viewers, leads and sales

WHAT TO LEARN

YouTube pays a business when every video attracts the right viewers and pulls them down a clear path to a lead and then a sale.

Aim at a narrow, valuable audience; 50,000 right-fit views can outperform millions of broad ones because a single buyer can be worth tens of thousands.
Posting more than feels comfortable breaks perfectionism, and the speed you gain is a skill that keeps paying off.
Recommendations follow topics a viewer watches, so make videos around what your target person already watches instead of leaning on search.
Alternate packaging-first and content-first videos so you get the title and thumbnail lift without stalling production.
Use the intro to answer why a stranger should listen, with proof, B-roll and a clear promise.
Put a verbal call to action early, then repeat it in the description and a pinned comment, aimed at a lead magnet before a sale.
Keep the video topic, lead magnet and offer aligned so leads arrive wanting the thing you sell.
One long trust-building video, like a webinar or YouTube VSL, can sell on your behalf without sales calls.
Use AI to produce thumbnail concepts, then have a designer finish the best one.
Improve production in steps, and end each video by handing viewers to a related next video to build binge-watching.

Glossary

Terms worth knowing.

Packaging first: Choosing the title and thumbnail before making the video, then building the content to fit that promise.
Content first: Deciding what you want to talk about, filming it, and working out the title and thumbnail afterward.
YouTube VSL funnel: A funnel where videos send viewers to one long video that works like a webinar, with case studies and a sales pitch at the end.
Lead magnet: A free resource offered in exchange for contact details, aligned to the pain point the video covers.
Conversion content: Longer videos made to build trust and sell, rather than to win new viewers.

Resources

Things they pointed at.

01:00channelCole Gordon

00:15channelThink Media

10:40productFree School community

03:35product30-day YouTube challenge

Quotables

Lines you could clip.

00:50

“Don't chase views, chase viewers.”

short and punchy, no setup needed→ TikTok hook↗ Tweet quote

16:40

“Not all of us are LeBron and go straight out of high school to the NBA.”

memorable sports analogy for leveling up→ IG reel cold open↗ Tweet quote

19:50

“If you can make content that no one else can copy, you're going to win on YouTube.”

clean closing thesis→ newsletter pull-quote↗ Tweet quote

The Script

Word for word.

Read-along

Don't just watch it. Burn it in.

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.

After making $700 ,000 online strictly from my YouTube channel, I'm going to be sharing with you in this video, the 12 YouTube cheat codes that you can use to blow up your business. Now, these are things, it's not generic advice. These are things that have worked for me or have worked for some of my clients like Cole Gordon or Think Media.

I've worked with some of the top educational creators on the platform and businesses. Some businesses you may have never heard of, but are literally making tens of million dollars a year. And I'm going to share with you what I've been doing on their YouTube channels to grow their business.

So let's start with number one. Number one is just simply do not chase views, instead chase viewers. When I wrote this, I was like, that's kind of a bar.

Don't chase views, chase viewers. But the truth is like with Cole Gordon, for example, I'll pull up his YouTube channel. When we first started working together, He wanted to go really, really broad.

And I was like, yeah, I'm down for it. Let's try and get like millions of views, millions of subscribers. But very quickly, we figured out that number one, it wasn't going to.

apply to the person he wanted to sell into this different program. We were trying to figure out where to send the traffic to. And then he got really clear on how he wanted to use his YouTube channel to send traffic to, he has multiple businesses.

So he figured out what offer, what business he wanted to send that to. When doing that, we figured out, Hey, we can actually be a bit more specific. And so now we're really talking to advanced business owners, much smaller niche.

We're not trying to get millions of views, but like if we can get 50 ,000 views, like on this offer video, that's like a huge win for us because there's some whales inside this viewership. And I remember even at the, it's called the eight -figure boardroom, his mastermind.

I remember talking to people. I was like, yeah, there's one guy who joined the mastermind. It's over $70 ,000, I'm pretty sure, to join.

And I remember asking him and I was like, yeah, how'd you find out about Cole? And he was like, YouTube. I was like, awesome.

And he was like, I literally a week before buying my ticket, found him on YouTube. And then he like just watched his YouTube content, bought a ticket to the event. I was like, that is amazing.

So the thing is you don't need to go viral, especially if you know who you're trying to attract and you're very clear on what that looks like. And that's just one thing. I just see a lot of people kind of getting wrong is they're trying to just chase vanity metrics.

Number two. You should post more videos than you want to. Now I just got done posting 12, sorry, not 12, 30 videos in the last 30 days.

And that was way more than I wanted to. Usually most people are like, I want to do once a week. Um, the last time I did this last year, actually I did three videos a week.

I ended up making 30 K that month, uh, doing that 30 day challenge where I just increased my upload volume. The best thing about doing this, if you're a business owner, is if you post daily or you just decide to post three times a week or four times a week or whatever is more than normal for you, it literally forces you to stop overthinking and to let go of that perfectionism that literally has held me back.

It's held so many of my students back is we want things to be perfect. But when you force yourself to just post more, you're like, I got to get a video out. I have a lot of videos to get out.

And so you can't overthink. You just have to act and do and move on. It's really nice when you allow yourself to do it.

And so I would just challenge you like 30 days post more. And that actually brings up perfectly with the challenge that we're running. So Zion and I, you can watch this video.

We're putting on a, I'll leave a link in the description, but over the next 30 days, this literally starts in a few days. you can actually join us. We're going to do another 30 day challenge where we're going to post more frequently.

And whether that's two times a week for you, it's three times, or you decided to do daily, whatever it is, we're basically making a competition for business owners to see who can actually make the most leads, get the most leads, make the most money, get the most sales and grow their YouTube channel the most. And so this is going to be super exciting.

If you have been wanting to post on YouTube and you also want to figure out how to make videos very quickly, you want to figure out what kind of videos to make, all of that, then I highly encourage you to check this out. You can apply and hop on a call with one of us. And over these next 30 days, there's limited spots.

We're going to just speed run growth on YouTube and see how much we can grow our businesses. So if that sounds fun to you, you should definitely check it out. We're going to be doing that very shortly.

And yeah, it's like if you just posting more, you will learn the skill of making videos quickly, which is a great skill to have. Number three, focus on YouTube recommendations. Most people, most business owners are trying to they just think about search.

And I'm surprised people are still talking about this because it's a bit outdated that they're like, what is now? There's some tools in search that are good because you can figure out like what are topics that are proven? What are topics that people?

And I'll share this story in a second. But basically, you've probably heard it's interest media now. So when you go on YouTube, your recommendations are not based on subscribers.

Your recommendations are based on the topics that you watch. Your algorithm is based on what you're interested in. Really, it's based on topics.

And so what we want to do is we want to make videos around the topics that the person you're trying to reach will watch. And in doing that, YouTube will recommend that content. I've been doing this for years now and I've been able to grow multiple channels past 100 ,000 subscribers, multiple channels, plus even a million subscribers focusing on YouTube recommendations.

And more recently we went from 60 ,000 followers to 400 ,000 followers. I made a whole video breaking this down and like sharing the YouTube studio analytics with you. I'll have to link that in the description as well.

But when we looked at the traffic, it was just recommendations. It was not search. And we just exploded that channel in four months from 60K to 400K.

And that's the power of like really tuning into the YouTube algorithm and finding the right topics and all of that. So I'll leave a link to that video in the description as well. But let's get to number four.

Number four is to balance content first and packaging first. So content first is when you think most, this is what most business owners do. They go, what do I want to talk about?

today. And they're going to make a video based on whatever they want to talk about. Packaging first is thinking what would be a good title and good thumbnail.

And then thinking of that first and then reverse engineering, what are you going to talk about based on that title and thumbnail? The opposite, like I said, content first is you go, I want to talk about this. So then later I can figure out the title and the thumbnail.

You will just get more views typically if you focus on packaging first and you go, this is a great title. This is a great thumbnail. Now let me go make the video.

The thing is that takes a lot more time and it's really easy for you just to go, I want to talk about this. And so I'm going to shoot the video. Boom, it's done.

Cool. That you can, especially if you're deciding to post more, you're going to do the 30 day challenge with us. Like that is absolutely, uh, should be part of your game plan is you want to balance both of those.

Some videos just think content first, some videos packaging first. And the crazy thing is sometimes you can actually, once you learn how to actually title YouTube videos, when you think of content first ideas, um, I'll give you a good example like this one. I actually just.

uh, recorded this video three minutes. It got 7 ,000 views. And I just thought of the content first.

I was like, I really want to talk about, because I, on a sales call, this guy was like trying to ask me for the hack on YouTube. And I was like, there's no hack. It's just getting good at psychology, figuring out what topics they want to watch.

And I break it down, you know, um, I came up with a good title later. Unfortunately, there's no hack to going on YouTube. And so sometimes that can resonate with your audience.

So you shouldn't. just always do packaging first. That's going to take a little bit more time, a little bit more research.

You can do content first and sometimes those do really well as well. So do a mixture of both. That way you can really do this in the long run and stick with it.

All right. Number five, optimize your intro for a new audience. You got to remember when you're growing on YouTube and YouTube's pushing out your videos, they're pushing it out to people who do not know you.

They're pushing your video out to literally people who have never seen you ever before. This is what's called a new viewer on YouTube. They never watched your content.

And so in your intro, you need to give them a reason why they should even listen to you. Explain who you are, why viewers should listen to you. And I was just sharing this with a client.

I was like, use B -roll. They have all this footage of them speaking on stage. And I'm like, when you say your little hook, show video footage of you speaking on stage to the room of business owners or whatever it is.

visually add credibility and also tell people why they should listen to you. And that's why I even shared, um, you know, my stand store, like the amount of money I made because people want to know, like, why should I listen to this guy? Tell me how to grow my business with YouTube.

Well, cause I'm doing it too over these past couple of years. Um, and I'm just like, here's why you should listen to these 12 things because of this. So that's a big one.

Make sure your intros clearly answer that question that people have of like their radars are up when they click. Why should I even listen to you?

You want to answer that right away. Number six, have a call to action in every single video. This is a verbal call to action.

You watched me do this earlier with the 30 day YouTube challenge. This one was a bit long, but you know, I like, I shouted it out because we're, uh, we're literally doing this in a few days. Um, but it can be super short and super sweet.

And What you also want to do is you, you absolutely should. I try some videos.

I don't do this. I'm not perfect at it, but every single video do that call to action earlier on in the video, like one third of the way through a quarter of the way through, and then make sure I always do this. It's always in the description and you have a pin comment as well with one link, your pin comments, one link in your description, you can have multiple links, but the top part of your description should be.

whatever, wherever you want to send people. And I'm going to get into this into a second, but we go from viewers to leads to the sale. You want to make sure that you don't try and just jump into like, I tried doing this, going from viewers to like booking a call.

What works so much better is if you just go YouTube viewers to getting leads. And so like now my main lead magnet is just my free school community, which is in every description of mine and if i can just build more leads more leads more leads that'll turn into more sales so focus on getting viewers turning them into leads every single video you should gather leads that brings me to number seven create clear alignment so when you are sending people to a lead magnet from your video they clicked on your video for a topic they're getting your lead magnet for maybe a pain point or a promise or whatever that is And then your actual offer, the thing you sell, there should be clear alignment in all of this.

Because if your offer is different than your lead magnet and your lead magnet is different than the topics that you talk about, you're going to get people all the way down here, maybe on a sales call or a landing page. And they're like, why? Like, I don't want that thing.

We want to start from the very beginning, attracting people who actually want the thing you sell, giving them a good lead magnet. And then we already know they want the thing you sell. Like if you're having on a sales call with me.

I know you want to grow on YouTube because that's why I talk about my YouTube channel. I talk about YouTube. And so make it easy for yourself by just having clear alignment throughout the entire process from your content and what you talk about to your leads, to your sales.

Keep a clear path from viewer to lead to your offer. Got that. Lead magnet example.

So I was just talking to a guy in our free school community. We do a live call once a week and he doesn't have a lead magnet. He was just trying to get people into his free trial.

I was like, you should just. Throw a lead magnet up there. He helps people staff VAs into their business.

And I was like, a great simple lead magnet you can do is that aligns. It has clear alignment is 10 ways a virtual assistant can save you 20 hours a week. You're literally selling them on.

Cool. That's amazing. Now I understand like how I can hand off these things to a virtual assistant.

And then maybe I should book a call and have this guy help me do it. So just clear alignment. Obviously, his video ideas should be talking about virtual assistants as well and saving time in your business and all of that.

And then it all just flows naturally. Number eight. is create conversion content.

Not every video do you need to just hyper -focus on trying to get more viewers or more of the right viewers. Sometimes you can post a video, specifically one video that's longer form. Maybe it's a 60 minute deep dive.

It's a full course type of video. It's like, maybe you just post your webinar. I've done that.

I just posted my webinar and post that on YouTube with the goal of those videos. being to build trust and sell. We know if people are going to hang out with you for longer periods of time, it's going to build more trust.

And so you should have some long form content that builds trust. I had a video and I still do this with some clients. I think it's a great strategy that still works, depends on your offer, but have a YouTube, we call it a YouTube VSL, the YouTube VSL funnel.

And it's where you have videos and it sends to one specific video that is meant to sell people. It's kind of like a webinar. And it sells people and it shares a ton, like all the examples of all the case studies, all the people you've helped.

And then there's a clear like sales pitch at the end of that YouTube video. And it's not designed to go viral. It's meant to be super specific, but you just send traffic there.

And I found that when I sent traffic there, well, I didn't even need sales calls. People would just DM me on Instagram that they wanted to work with me. They'd DM me a specific word and then I'd show them a Notion doc with all the information and they'd be like, I'm in or I'm out.

And that's what I did for the first two years. Probably made $500 ,000 just doing that. No sales calls, just having one key conversion piece of content that sold them for me.

So whether, even if you are taking sales calls, have conversion content, that's going to sell people before they work with you. Number nine is leverage AI. I'm going to show, uh, this is pretty crazy.

So this is pretty cool. I, um, so Essentially, YouTube is getting easier for anyone to hop on because AI is making it easier to create amazing thumbnails, even good ideas and good titles and all that.

You have to know how to do it correctly. But once you learn how to do it and leverage it, it's just YouTube becomes easier because of that. And the Slack story is I sent all these different thumbnail options to my thumbnail designer.

And then what happened is I was like, you know what? Let me just ask my chat. I said, hey, do you see that thread in Slack?

Can you actually just go make those and then send them to me? And they were amazing. Now, some of these I'm going to share with you are like.

So these are the thumbnails that we got back. Let's see if I can zoom in a little bit on this. I have to go full screen.

There we go.

Some of these I had to like. the skin tones got messed up i had to replace them actually in it but like look how good these actually turned out um like this is pretty sweet right uh and again some of these are mainly ai and then i might tweak a few things later but like most of this is just ai and me working together to get this done.

So pretty insane. Like what's, what's possible for you to do with AI and creating thumbnails, creating all that kind of stuff. And you should definitely be leveraging AI, even if it's just not to maybe make your final thumbnail, but to come up with some like thumbnail concepts, then you can send to a designer and be like, you know, you come up with five, six, come up with 10 thumbnail concepts, see which one you like the most.

And then you can send it to a designer to make it. actually look good because maybe it might not look super good the way you did it. But that's a very easy way, even just with thumbnails to start leveraging AI.

Number 10, level up your videos over time. So most people think they need to have like the best videos of all time when they start on YouTube, but just start with level one, like start with just talking head videos, no editing. Layla Hermosi does this sometimes she'll go on a walk and she'll just pull out her phone and she'll talk.

Obviously at Cromozy, we remember the closet days where he was in the closet. You don't need the best production value in the world. You just need something helpful to say.

You need something of value to bring to the table. And so just start there. If you haven't started posting yet, just start with talking head videos, unedited stuff.

Over time, it's going to be better and it's going to hold retention better if you give people something to look at. with a screen recording, a loom video, drawing on your iPad, anything visual. There's plenty of simple ways to add visuals.

This is a Notion dock with a screen recording. This to me is level two. Level one is I could have just been looking at this and talk to the camera, but actually having something visual, sharing some of my screens, showing YouTube channels, that makes retention.

It's going to increase retention on your YouTube videos, which is going to help. youtube go think this is a better video and push it out to more people like we want people watching more of our content and then eventually over time then you can bring on an editor and they can add in their own visuals they can make it way better and we're just leveling up over time you don't have to jump to being a professional athlete right away you can start you know at juco college and then get better and work your way over time not all of us are lebron and go straight out of high school to the nba i don't even know if he actually went straight to the nba I'm pretty sure he did because he doesn't have a college team.

Anyways, someone will let me know in the comments. That's number 10. Two more.

End your videos with a transition. This is number 11. Basically, at the end of your videos, you don't just want to end the video.

You want to transition them to the next video. If you can get viewers to binge watch your content on YouTube, you will make more money. I feel like that's obvious, but it's like the more people can watch more of your content, the more trust is going to happen, the more time spent with you, the more value you can actually give them, the more they can learn about who you've helped, how you help people, what you're really good at, and we want people to binge watch our content.

New viewers is great. We want to get new viewers because... um the the fishing analogy right you have the different ponds we need new fish in the pond so that we can sell to more people but also we need to nurture those fish and that happens through binge watching content that happens through making returning viewers so all you got to do is if you have another video uh put it on the end screen like hey go to this video and watch this one next and preface it like make it related to the actual video that they're watching Um, if you don't have a video net net next, you can just put a best for viewer and be like, Hey, if you'd like this video, you're probably gonna like this one.

Go watch it. And yeah, this is going to help the YouTube recommendations because they value watch time. And if someone's binge watching your channel, that's a really, really good sign.

And number 12 is make content only you can make. So think about like what have only you done before or what are you currently doing and think about your own experiences. And if you can make content that no one else can copy, you're going to win on YouTube.

And I have a whole framework that I do with all of my one -on -one clients. Uh breaking down how to actually pull out those hidden gems from them to make amazing pieces of content that no one else can copy You can click on the screen watch that video and you're going to have a ton of great video ideas That only you can make if you watch that video next so i'll see you guys in the next video

The Hook

The bait, then the rug-pull.

Nolan Molt opens with a revenue dashboard and a $700,000 claim, then promises twelve non-generic habits drawn from his own channel and clients like Cole Gordon and Think Media.

Frameworks