YouTube Milestone #1
A viral video, surge in watch hours and disbelief mixed with excitement
YouTube. It’s been a while since I have been obsessed with this platform. This passion. It’s morphing into what I believe is going to be something great, wholesome even. And not just for me, but everyone around me and all of those who become part of my community.
Some numbers and current events need to be shared for two reasons:
Someday someone might wanna look back on this and gain sense of yet another roadmap,
And more importantly, for me to encapsulate this experience into words while I’m going through it.
Let me expand on number 2. I’m big on journaling, and I do it semi-consistently. And I was about to since this is beyond surreal at this point, but I thought why not put it out there. Or here? Whatever.
For context, all these numbers are starting from February 26th, 2024, which is when I uploaded the first video.
A week ago (May 18th) I was standing at the following:
4.9k channel views
143.1 watch hours
35 subscribers added (I had a few before, like my mom, etc.)
A respectable amount of progress given it had been under 3 months.
But May 19 - May 24, I gained the following:
20.0k channel views
158.6 watch hours
34 subscribers added
Basically almost replicating previous 3 months worth of channel growth in 6 days.
This happened because I saw someone’s video and replicated the format (not the video itself). The video is 33 seconds long, and no it is not a short. That video is most viewed video on my channel, and became the highest overall contributor to channel watch hours yesterday.
Some other numbers for you:
Before May 20th, the highest watch hours I ever got in a day was 5.4.
May 20th I got 12.7
May 23rd I got 34.1
May 24th I got 88.8
And today, May 25th, I’ve already accumulated 74.8 watch hours and it’s 7:20 pm still.
I sat down and calculated that if I get an average of 50 watch hours every day for the next 10 days (today included), I will have caught up with the 11 watch hours daily average needed in a year till that date. And after that if I get more, that’s just going to be the cherry on top.
I also calculated, given the retention data for the 33 seconds video, I need about 575k views on that to accumulate 4000 watch hours from that alone. Might not happen, but a man can dream.
I currently have 27,065 views on it, 191 watch hours, 1.6k likes, 172 comments on the ‘Pad’ video.
But most of that doesn’t makes up the milestone. Not really. I mean it’s great and is for sure going to be memorable. Only a subset does:
The real milestone was that yesterday the video passed 100 comments, and 1000 likes. That is CRAZY engagement.
I don’t know where this channel is heading yet. At least not in the short term, and the long term goals might just change. Regardless, the engagement is what is so exciting. People are joking around, having a great time and overall making me feel — say it with me — wholesome.
Insecurities About The Video
I had insecurities about how the video will be received, especially if it got picked up by the algorithm. Would people say I copied someone’s ideas, would they call me out for making content that doesn’t add value, or that I have no business making videos.
One of my friends also added to the anxiety (temporarily and not deliberately). When I told him about it, he said “Don’t be one of those creators, bro.” He probably meant that don’t lose sight of what my intent was with this venture, and to not just follow the views.
Regardless, I still believe it is okay to do what feels right. Do whatever, have fun and take things just seriously enough that you don’t stray off the long term goal.
Long Term Goal
So what is my long term goal? I have done a lot of journaling, ideating, and reflecting to hone in on what I wanna achieve through YouTube. It’s mapped out, sort of.
I just don’t want to put it out there for one primary reason, a phenomenon I came across, which is part of my core beliefs: the Illusory Goal, where talking about goals can create a false sense of accomplishment. I will write about what that means to me more in a separate post perhaps, but I will write one word to encapsulate my long term plans: ‘Jack’.
In the near future though, I want to get the channel monetized. Ideally, within the year. I want every single watch hour counted towards the monetization threshold or the revenue that would be generated after.
My Next Milestone
That is going to be a total of 100 subscribers. I just checked, and I’m already at 93 (went up to 95 while I was proofreading), so not that far. Either ways, that will warrant a follow up, perhaps later today.