Why YouTube is HARD and What to Do About It

<p><span style="font-weight: 400;">You would think someone like Shawn Johnson, a well-known olympian, would have had an easy time on YouTube, right? WRONG! Despite having an established following as a professional athlete, Shawn’s decision to start a YouTube channel proved to be a lot more work than she initially thought. Her instagram followers didn’t immediately hop over to YouTube, and at first, her channel was struggling. HOW can that be?</span></p> <p> </p> <ol> <li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">You have to constantly be creating content… a MINIMUM of one video a week, because without that, you cannot grow. Every video you upload has potential to be your next viral video, and each video means more chances of your video being picked up by the algorithm. Naturally, the more content, the better.</span></li> <li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style="font-weight: 400;">The initial growth (and then later… the stalling of growth) is HARD. Shawn only had 50k subscribers after 2 years with her channel. Even a celebrity like Shawn has to put in the same work as everyone else to take their channel to the next level. Once Shawn decided to go ALL IN, Shawn leveraged her celebrity status to do collaborations with other celebrities and YouTubers. She also did A LOT of trending videos. </span></li> <li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style= "font-weight: 400;">Balancing working with brands and satisfying the needs and wants with the brands while still being authentic to your audience.</span></li> <li style="font-weight: 400;"><span style= "font-weight: 400;">Finding the balance as a vlogger to share what your audience wants to see while also protecting your own privacy. Once you throw it out there, people will say whatever they want to say about you. </span></li> </ol> <p> </p> <p><span style="font-weight: 400;">For Shawn Johnson, YouTube is truly a balancing act (see what I did there? Shawn Johnson is an olympic balance beam champion), but it has given her SO much freedom and a new way to serve