How Riverside Built a 100K YouTube Audience (Full Transcript)

[00:00:00] Speaker 1: Riverside recently passed 100,000 subscribers on YouTube. And I wish I could tell you that there was one strategy that made it all happen, but there wasn't. Because there are thousands of videos promising the strategy, hack, or secret that will grow your channel. But the truth is, reaching 100,000 subscribers had much less to do with any one tactic, and much more to do with something most creators overlook. So what actually gets a YouTube channel to 100,000 subscribers? Let's talk about it. The first thing you need to understand is that consistency alone isn't enough. I know that's hard to hear, but publishing more videos gives you more opportunities to reach people, learn what works, and improve. But if those videos keep reaching the wrong people, or don't give viewers a reason to return, you can build a large subscriber count without building a consistently engaged audience. You don't wanna simply upload more. You wanna make every upload more intentional than the last. And that starts with understanding exactly who you're making videos for. What problems does your audience have? What questions are they asking? And can you show them something like a skill that will genuinely make things easier? Some of Oversight's strongest videos answered one specific question, or walked viewers through a real creative workflow. The value was immediately clear because we built the video around something that we knew our viewers wanted to accomplish. And I know that sounds obvious, but it's something that you can lose sight of really quick, especially in cases where you chase a popular trend because it worked for another channel, even though it doesn't really fit your audience. Or you might come up with an idea that sounds interesting to you without stopping to ask why someone else would click on it. Now, there's an interesting balance there because you do wanna make content that you're passionate about. Otherwise, the true message won't come across. What helped us was studying our strongest videos, testing different topics, and looking for patterns in what people responded to. That wasn't so we could remake the same video over and over again, but so we could better understand what our audience came to Riverside to learn. But choosing the right topic is the tip of the iceberg. You also need to package that idea in a way that makes somebody want to watch it. Your title and thumbnail probably shouldn't be something you figure out after the video is already finished. They should help shape the idea from the beginning. What's the clearest and most interesting promise this video can make? A good title and thumbnail create curiosity, but they still need to honestly represent the video. We're not here to clickbait. If your packaging promises something the video never delivers, you might earn a click, but you probably won't earn the viewer's trust. You'll probably get a lot of hate comments and thumbs down and stuff like that. That's no good. Sustainable growth doesn't come from convincing someone to watch once. It comes from making videos that they want to return for. This is also where authenticity made a major difference for our channel. But before we started making some long-form content, Steven played a huge part in the growth of this channel. The videos he created worked because he was sharing a creative process he genuinely enjoyed and loved. Our audience, you guys, weren't just being shown a product every video. You guys were learning through his real experience, creating videos and podcasts and live streams with Riverside fitting naturally into that process. That made the content useful, but it also made it personal and somebody that you could come back and trust. People can usually tell when you're forcing a topic because you think it will perform, but they can also tell when you're genuinely excited to share something that you've learned. You still need a strategy, but that strategy should help you find the overlap between what your audience needs and what you're genuinely qualified or genuinely excited to share. So if you're working toward your first 1,000 subscribers, 10,000, or eventually 100,000, don't let the size of that number distract you from what's directly in front of you. Focus on making the next video valuable to the right person. Then pay attention to what happens. Did people click? Did they stay? What questions did they ask? Did the video reach the audience you intended? And what could you improve next time? If there's anything I've learned from making YouTube and social media content for the last 10 years is that every upload gives you information, but only if you're willing to learn from it. You're not gonna reach 100,000 subscribers with one perfect strategy. It doesn't exist. You reach it by learning how to make one valuable video for the right viewer, and then getting better at doing it again and again and again and again. Reaching 100,000 subscribers is an incredible milestone, but it isn't the result of one viral video or a secret algorithm trick. Trust me, I have made a ton of videos for this channel. There is a lot more to it than that. It's the result of learning, experimenting, and continuing to make better videos for the people you want to reach. If you are building your own channel, let us know in the comments what milestone you're working towards right now. And for more videos to help you plan, record, edit, and publish better content, subscribe to the Riverside channel right here. And again, thank you so much for 100,000 subscribers, and thank you so much for watching. We can't wait to see what you create.