When I started this YouTube channel, I assumed years of experience building online businesses, working with SEO, digital marketing, websites and audience growth would give me a head start.
After all, understanding how people discover content online should be useful on YouTube too.
At least that is what I thought.
The reality has been far more interesting.
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Why I Started Questioning YouTube Advice
If you spend any amount of time researching YouTube growth, you will quickly encounter the same recommendations:
- Improve your thumbnails
- Increase watch time
- Improve audience retention
- Pick a niche
- Upload consistently
- Follow proven systems
None of this advice is necessarily wrong.
The problem is that much of it is presented with a level of certainty that does not seem to match reality.
The more videos I publish, the more I notice that predicting success beforehand is incredibly difficult.
Some videos I invest significant effort into barely attract attention.
Others that I nearly do not publish perform far better than expected.
That disconnect has made me increasingly sceptical of anyone claiming to have completely solved YouTube.
The Difference Between Explanation And Prediction
One thing I have noticed is that many people can explain why a successful video succeeded after it has already succeeded.
That is very different from accurately predicting success beforehand.
Looking backwards and connecting dots is easy.
Predicting which videos will resonate before they are published is considerably harder.
This is not unique to YouTube.
It is something I have observed throughout online business, SEO, marketing and entrepreneurship.
Humans are exceptionally good at creating explanations after outcomes are already known.
The Hidden Side Of Becoming A Creator
This is where my thinking has started to shift.
The most interesting part of content creation is not necessarily algorithms, monetisation or subscriber growth.
It is the hidden process nobody sees.
- The failed recordings
- The abandoned ideas
- The self-doubt
- The experiments
- The uncertainty
- The countless moments that never make it into the final upload
I have started referring to this as the dark matter of content creation.
The invisible experiences that shape creators but rarely appear in the finished content.
My Channel Is Changing
When I launched this channel, I expected it to focus heavily on remote business, SEO and entrepreneurship.
While those subjects remain important parts of my background, I am becoming increasingly interested in something else.
Transformation.
The process of becoming something new before you fully understand what that thing is.
That is what this channel is increasingly documenting.
Not just business.
Not just YouTube.
But the journey of transitioning from remote business operator into the creator world and discovering what happens along the way.
So Is Most YouTube Advice Wrong?
Not entirely.
I think much of it contains useful observations.
What I think is wrong is the illusion of certainty.
Nobody fully understands why every video succeeds or fails.
Nobody has a complete map.
We are all experimenting.
We are all learning.
Some people are simply further ahead on the journey than others.
And honestly, that is what makes the process interesting.
Final Thoughts
The biggest lesson YouTube has taught me so far is not how to get more views.
It is how comfortable you need to become with uncertainty.
Because when you start creating, you rarely know exactly where the journey leads.
Sometimes the most valuable discoveries are the ones you were not looking for.
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Tools & Resources
These are tools, platforms and resources connected to my remote business and creator journey.
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