Should I start asking viewers to subscribe, since I don't currently have a direct CTA for subscriptions?
I don't really ask people to subscribe. Why not try it today? If you're watching this video and you're not subscribed to my channel, would you mind subscribing? Then we'll see how many of these viewers are recurring and how many are willing to take a few seconds to help me reach my goals. I find repeated subscriber pitches annoying, so I usually avoid them. Over the long run, people will keep seeing my face—I'm not planning to go away—so eventually they'll subscribe. But I also get that it's not optimal; I just don't like seeming like I'm begging for subs. There could be a tactical way, like the Diary of a CEO host who does a minute pitch early in the video and asks, 'Would you please subscribe?' That works for him—he has 15 million subscribers. I've tried it, but I didn't see a big difference; I already have a high viewer‑to‑subscriber ratio. On my Cloud Code course I got about 3% of viewers to subscribe (60k subs), while most creators max out around 0.5%. So I think it's really about making great quality content, which has earned me most of my subscribers. If you spend four hours with me and I make three subscription asks—roughly one per hour—that probably makes sense.
That's an interesting point, but what else would I aim for — a percentage split of new vs. casual viewers? I could hit some arbitrary target for that today. I feel like I need something to actually progress toward. I do understand the danger of a plateau where the percentage of new viewers relative to your subscriber base goes down over time — I felt that at 100K subs, and it forced me to adopt new strategies to keep growing. But as long as the absolute number of viewers keeps going up, I'm fine with it — I don't care that much about the relative performance metrics, because what I actually care about is getting big enough to meaningfully influence adoption of these AI models at scale among small-to-mid-size business owners and average people. I don't see anything better than subscriber count as a goal right now, but I'm open to being told I'm wrong about that.
No, I wouldn’t start a daily updates channel just for the sake of it. I do it now because my own work—running a scrappy AI automation business—is inherently interesting to watch; it’s like seeing a vlog of someone operating at a high profit level that few people achieve. For most people, watching them wouldn’t be interesting unless they’re already skilled at what they do. Running the channel takes extra time (20‑30 minutes daily) that could be spent elsewhere, but I keep it because the distribution and personal accountability it creates are valuable, and there’s a large potential payoff later as people see my consistent effort over months or years. That said, I appreciate when others start their own channels—like the one set up for me posting daily short Q&A clips—or when they share feedback, clipping content, or experimenting with formats (vertical videos, podcast clips). I’ve seen others, such as Marlon, launch similar channels and grow to around 100 subscribers. I’m open to tips, but I think the current approach is solid. I’m currently bottlenecked for taking calls, so I don’t see near‑term upside in spending time on them. Instead, I’d prefer an affiliate arrangement: if you join Maker School and create clips on channels like this, you can earn money when those clips drive sign‑ups, plus a flat CPM payment for views. This aligns incentives and creates a win‑win. I’ve already answered similar questions about the channel before, so I’ll keep it brief.
I agree that focusing on boring, consistent execution is the real advice for success — hitting the daily Grand means even the worst your campaign will ever perform is still fine. Chase is right that shorts viewers convert differently than long‑form viewers and the monetization potential of shorts is much lower; for someone whose launches are long‑form, pushing shorts audiences to a long‑form channel doesn’t make sense. Instead, it’s better to keep the two audiences separate. My plan is to not send shorts viewers to YouTube but to funnel them to my Instagram, which is slightly longer than pure shorts and where I share AI news. From Instagram I’ll move those viewers to a bite‑sized newsletter, and the newsletter will feed my paid products. I’ll take all of my rainbow‑channel content — five channels across a couple of platforms — and funnel them to Instagram, then to the newsletter, and finally to my paid offerings, with cross‑promotions between Instagram and YouTube but the primary call‑to‑action pointing to the newsletter. My YouTube channel and other content will also feed the newsletter, and the rainbow funnel should convert viewers into paid customers. Point okay one more from from sarcasm.
My personal brand now drives the vast majority of new conversations, opportunities, and clients for my agency; I couldn't run the agency at its current level without it. Initially, I did everything outbound—door-to-door—then moved to less intense but scalable outreach like cold calling, cold emailing, and cold DMs. Three to four months into my YouTube channel, I was making $40k–$50k a month from cold outbound with my agency. I started the YouTube channel to scale my agency, and shortly after, I landed a $20k deal without a single sales call, realizing I could use my subscriber base as a main lever for client acquisition. Many people try to skip the outreach step, thinking they can just start a YouTube channel and get clients from it. However, building a successful YouTube funnel is very difficult and risky; it often takes years of consistent content with no return. Moreover, if you lack outreach, sales, and marketing skills, you can't reliably turn strangers into paying customers. If your YouTube channel disappears or platform changes, you're left without a fallback. Therefore, I recommend not skipping the outreach step: first build a business using traditional outreach, marketing, and sales skills. Content is important, but the internet is full of people who only talk without doing. In my own agency, I no longer manage most projects myself; I have a consultant/account manager (Cody) and a backend/team manager (Geo) handling projects, while I act in an advisory capacity, especially for large enterprise deals like Mr. Beast that require many meetings. In short, you should spend your time and energy building skills that turn total strangers into paying customers. Once you've validated that ability—maybe earning $10k–$30k a month with your agency—you can then invest in more scalable outreach methods like your brand, Twitter, or YouTube channel.