Why I Started One Thousand and Beyond
We’re all in this together
Starting a YouTube channel was something I’d wanted to do for a very long time. But I was never far from an excuse as to why I shouldn’t bother.
Work was too busy. I valued my personal time too much. No one would watch my videos. It’d be embarrassing if my family and friends found out. The stuff I want to talk about had been talked about a million times already.
Then, 2020 happened. And, like many people, I found myself with a little more time and, crucially, perspective.
So, I ignored the excuses, rolled up my sleeves and created the Mark Ellis Reviews channel.
As it turns out, it was one of the best decisions of my life.
My early success
I’m genuinely not one to brag about my achievements. In fact, I’ve never really been that keen on having the spotlight swung my way either in professional or personal scenarios. But I can’t help but be proud of what I’ve achieved so far on YouTube.
If I choose ‘Lifetime’ in YouTube Studio’s channel analytics, these are some of the numbers that jump out:
- 1.8 million views
- 165.5K watch hours
- 23.2K subscribers
- £5,410.17 in AdSense revenue
- 27.4 million impressions
Outside of YouTube, I now have an email subscriber list of over 500 people, a website which attracts, on average, 1,500 unique visits every single day, over three-thousand followers on Medium, and a bustling Discord server.
My channel has only just celebrated its first birthday.
I genuinely can’t believe that I’ve achieved these numbers and such colossal reach in such a short space of time. I’ve never had a million of anything attached to my name.
I should point out at this juncture that I’m British, which means I fully expect this to all come crashing down, immediately, tomorrow. Indeed, that’s how I’ve always felt as an independent worker; today will be the day when I open my email inbox and discover that every client has decided to cancel my service.
Only, so far, that hasn’t happened. In fact, the growth I’m experiencing on YouTube alone in terms of subscribers, watch time and reach, is increasing exponentially.
That must mean I’m getting something right.
Why I want to help you
I am not a YouTube expert. I’ve been doing this for a year. But I’ve never worked on anything that has taught me so much in such a relatively short space of time.
Being a YouTuber/creator/influencer/
- you get to make a genuine difference to people’s lives; and
- there’s no such thing as competition.
Don’t get me wrong, competition is a good thing in business. But it can also be all-encompassing, a massive distraction and capable of turning nice people into absolute arseholes.
It also invariably results in far too many spreadsheets and KPIs.
That stuff bores me rigid.
The YouTube creator community (and, indeed, the writing community on Medium) is a wonderful place in which to work. It’s all about collaboration and helping one another, which is exactly why I started One Thousand and Beyond.
Reaching for one thousand subs
YouTube sets a target of one thousand subscribers and four thousand hours of watch time if you want to enrol in their partner program.
When you reach that stage, you can start earning money from the adverts that appear during your videos. As you can see from my channel’s first year revenue, it won’t make you a millionaire overnight, and in no way pays you back for the countless hours you’ll need to plough into the channel each week.
But it is something to aim for, and the 1,000/4,000 mark is undoubtedly the first meaningful goal for any YouTuber.
I gained 1,000 subscribers and attracted over 5,000 watch hours in just six months. Like most of life’s success sorties, some of this was down to good fortune, but it was mainly down to damn hard work, copious research and a pretty solid strategy.
I’ve also got a whole bunch of things completely wrong. Failure has played a massive role in the channel’s growth so far, and I’m under no illusion that it’ll continue to do so.
I’ll be sharing everything I’ve learned — warts and all — on One Thousand and Beyond. So, if you’re looking to start your own channel, or if you’re experiencing slow growth with an existing channel, please hit the follow button!
You can help, too!
I don’t want to be the only person publishing on One Thousand and Beyond. I’ve created this publication with the goal of it becoming a community for YouTubers across the world, no matter their level of experience.
If you’ve been running your own channel and fancy sharing your success story and what you’ve learned from your own failures, please check out the publishing guide for One Thousand and Beyond and send me your stuff!
Ask me anything you like!
I’ve talked a lot. So, if you’ve got any questions about my YouTube channel, its growth or One Thousand and Beyond, get involved in the comments and I’ll happily respond!