How to Be Successful Online

I’m a YouTuber.

It’s not something I expected to be. It’s not as if when I was growing up, I told people I wanted to grow up to be a video star. YouTube didn’t exist until I was 21 years old.

The funny thing is, even saying I’m a YouTuber now seems so effin’ odd. I don’t feel like a YouTuber. I don’t consider myself a successful YouTuber by any means. I have 65,000 subscribers. It’s a lot for me, but it’s no Mr. Beast. I’m extraordinarily lucky and happy with what success I have had, and even if I never get another subscriber, I always will be.

I have learned a few things along the way about being “somewhat” successful online. Today, I really want to focus on just one of those lessons.

Solve Somebody’s Problem

People don’t usually seek out a YouTube video or a blog post if they don’t have a problem they need to solve. Okay, sometimes people are just there to be entertained, but a lot of the time, your first exposure to someone online comes about because you were searching for a solution to something in your life.

If you, as a content creator, can solve someone’s problem, they may find your content likable enough to stick around.

This is a lesson that has been hard for me to learn because I love to rant. And rants really don’t solve anyone’s problem. They almost universally fall into the “pure entertainment” category of YouTube.

Some of my most successful videos, however, are those that solve problems that people have. Whether that’s finding a new display manager like LY or showing how to use a window manager.

This is a way of doing things that can be exhausting if I’m being honest. The hardest videos to do are videos that solve problems or showcase applications. It’s a lot easier to sit down and rant on the state of things for 10 minutes. And at heart, I’m the laziest of lazy people. I have the awards and everything.

And I think the lesson I need to learn from all this is that I can’t be everything to everyone all the time. Nobody can be. But if you want to be successful as a YouTuber, blogger, or really a content creator of any kind, solve problems that people face, and that can help support the more entertainment-style stories you would like to tell.

Like with all things in life, balance is key.

There are plenty of problems out there to solve

One of the reasons the online marketplace of content has worked out so well for so many people is that there are many problems out there to solve, and plenty of people out there to solve them. Need to know how to build a deck? You can find that on YouTube or on a blog somewhere. Sure, you may end up with a crooked deck because seeing someone else do something doesn’t equate to being able to do it yourself, but you tried. You don’t have to go to college to learn how to do it. And, it was free.

I’ve chosen Linux as my area of expertise. It’s a small niche, to be sure, but it’s also one of the best decisions I’ve ever made. When you choose what you want to talk about, make sure you choose something you really enjoy. If you don’t, burn out will happen immediately. You can’t spread your passion for something if you have no passion to spread.

The question I have to ask myself is how can I do this better? I constantly aim to improve, but I’ve felt like I’ve been stuck in a rut for a while. And I come back to the idea that there are countless problems to solve. Beyond just choosing what your next Linux distro will be, I mean.

If I can solve those issues for others, I can get myself out of the rut I think I’m in. I can still rant, but broader horizons for myself and my content can only be a good thing.

I hope my rambles helped you think about how you can craft your content to become more successful online.