YouTube Gurus Are LYING To Small Creators (How To Actually Blow Up)

I wasn't going to make this video, but then my brother called me panicking. He turned on a setting that a YouTube guru told him to use, and his AdSense revenue started dropping almost immediately. And that's when I realized that I have to make this video, because the advice going around right now for small creators is not just wrong sometimes, but some of it is actively hurting your channel. So today, I'm going to break down this advice and tell you what to do instead. And if you appreciate me calling this stuff out, gently tap that like button, and let's jump into it right now. All right, so the first thing that I hear a lot of YouTube gurus saying is that you need expensive gear. And of course, they're saying this because it makes them so much money, right? They'll show you their $3,000 camera, their $500 microphone, their $500 light, and then they'll casually link everything in the description with affiliate links. Funny how that works. The problem is that beginners hear this and they go spend a thousand or two thousand dollars before making a single video. Then they pick the wrong topics, get no views, and now they're out $2,000 and most of them just quit. And it's kind of like buying the most expensive set of golf clubs before you've even swung one. Those clubs aren't going to help you. You need to learn how to swing first. And you can learn that with a $20 used club from a thrift store. And there was actually a guy who posted on Reddit about this exact problem. He spent over $20,000 on music gear before making a single song. And he said that he bought four synthesizers before he bought a car. And he was living with his grandmother, had student loans, and all of it was bought with hourly wages. And the worst part is he never made any music. And he said he was too busy calculating how many hours he had to work to buy the next piece of equipment. And he got so obsessed with the gear that it actually locked him out of being creative. Now, when I first started, I was filming in front of a gray bedsheet. I was living with six roommates in one house, and I was a pharmacist with $300,000 in student loan debt. And I didn't have money for fancy equipment. And my first viral video got over 4 million views. And it was filmed in front of a gray bedsheet with a potato for a camera. So, here's what to do instead. Start with your phone. If you want better audio, get a $30 lavalier mic from Amazon. That's it. Nobody has ever not clicked on a video because the camera wasn't good enough. They click because the title and the thumbnail made them curious. So spend your money on learning to find the right topics, not on making bad videos look slightly prettier. All right, the second thing that I hear all the time is edit for retention with flashy effects or something like that. So gurus telling you that you need flashy editing to keep people watching, like sound effects every 3 seconds, text flying onto the screen, zoom cuts, and whoosh transitions, and they call it editing for retention. And the problem is it takes forever, and when you're spending two to four weeks editing a single video, you just simply stop posting. And a dead channel is worse than a channel with simple videos every single time. And there was a famous study where they split a pottery class into two groups. Group A was graded on making one perfect pot, and group B was graded on the total weight of pots that they made. Guess which group ended up making the better pots? Group B, the quantity group, because they learned through doing it over and over again. And there was a creator on the YT Talk forum who posted their production timeline. Setup took 3 days, recording took two to four hours, editing took 40 to 50 hours, and uploading and tagging took another 10 hours. So the total production from start to finish was about 10 days for a single video. And that means that this person could only post around three videos a month at best. And if life gets in the way, which it almost always does, maybe one or two. And that pace kills channels. Now, look at this video you're watching right now. I'm not doing crazy edits, I'm just talking to you, and if the content is good and I'm showing up with energy, you're going to keep watching. It's that simple. So here's what to do instead. Keep your editing simple. Focus on your hook, your energy, and the content structure. Those three things will do much more for retention than any editing trick. And a simple video that gets posted is always better than a flashy video that never gets finished. And your goal is to get the reps in. The more videos you make, the better you get, the more you learn, and the faster YouTube's algorithm understands and trusts your channel. All right, quick break right now. Sitting here with my brother Zach. He had never made a single YouTube video before in his life, and he made $214 in a single day on YouTube. And I just wanted to let you know that this week we are hosting a free one-time live workshop. So one thing that people struggle with the most is finding their niche, and that is why we actually created an AI called the niche validator that's going to help you find your niche, or help you dial in your niche if you already have one. And we're going to be giving away this niche validator this week at a live workshop. called the YouTube content advantage for making money in 2026. If you're struggling to find your niche, or you don't want to commit months or even years to a niche that ends up not being profitable, then this is for you. So click the link in the description and the pin comment below. And once you register, hit add to calendar so it shows up on your Google, Apple, or Outlook calendar. And if for whatever reason you're watching this in the future, still check the link in the description and the pin comment below, cuz we may be doing another live workshop in the future, and it'll tell you when. Now, you'll also be able to ask me questions live, so I look forward to meeting you. And you'll also get an update on how this guy is doing on YouTube as well. So see you this week, and back to your regularly scheduled programming. All right, number three is turn on player for education. And this next one is the one that made me want to make this video. You see, my brother Zach messaged me panicking. He turned on this setting called player for education because a guru said it was a good idea on YouTube. And right after he turned it on, his AdSense revenue started dropping. And player for education is a setting that lets your videos be embedded in educational tools used by schools. Sounds great on paper. More places your videos show up, more money, right? Wrong. Player for education plays your video without ads. So when a student watches your video in a classroom tool, there are zero ads running, and you get a tiny share of a licensing fee that YouTube charges the school. But it's way less than what you'd make from regular AdSense. So, if your channel isn't specifically designed for a classroom setting, this dilutes your revenue. And this is exactly what happened to my brother. Now, hopefully YouTube changes this in the future, but that's what's happening right now. So you're basically trading high-paying ad views for low-paying classroom views. And for a small channel where every dollar matters, that's a real problem. So here's what to do instead. Leave player for education off. Unless you're teaching calculus, or biology, or something that belongs in a classroom, just leave it off. If you're making videos about business, side hustles, making money, trades, tech, anything that could be watched in a classroom, but isn't necessarily belonging there and only there, that's not school curriculum, so leave it off. And Zach turned it off, and his revenue went right back to normal. All right, let's keep going. So, number four is to AB test your thumbnails. Now, so many gurus are telling beginners to AB test their thumbnails. And this might be the worst advice I've ever seen for a new YouTuber. AB testing requires a ton of impressions before the test means anything. And if you're a new channel getting 50 impressions a day, it could take months or even years to get enough data. So you're sitting there waiting for results that are never going to come. And it's kind of like rearranging the furniture in a house that nobody's visiting. And it doesn't matter how nice the living room looks if no one's walking through the front door. The problem isn't the furniture, the problem is nobody knows the house exists. And that's an idea problem, not a thumbnail problem. Now, here's the only thumbnail rule that actually matters when you're starting out. If your thumbnail has words on it, someone should be able to look at the thumbnail alone and know what the video is about without reading the title. That's it. If your thumbnail can do that, you're good. Stop overthinking it. There are plenty of simple thumbnails that follow this rule that absolutely crush it on YouTube. Now, if you really want to test out your thumbnails, here's what to do instead. If it's available to your channel, use the community tab. Post two options as an image poll, you'll get results in hours, not months. Or you could use other platforms and post them on there. But honestly, just spend that time finding better video ideas, because that is where the real leverage is. All right, next number five is stuff your videos with hashtags. All right, so this one is everywhere. Gurus telling you to stuff your videos with hashtags and tags. Put 15 to 30 tags on every video. Use a tag generator tool. Spend 30 minutes tagging every video perfectly. YouTube literally tells you that this doesn't matter. Right in their own documentation, it says that tags play a minimal role in helping viewers find your video. And it says that your title, thumbnail, and description are more important. And then it says adding excessive tags is actually against their spam policies. So don't do it. And you spending 30 minutes on hashtags is like writing a detailed note to the mailman explaining that the letter in the envelope is a letter. He already knows. YouTube's algorithm reads your title, your description, your audio, and your visuals. It doesn't need 30 hashtags to figure out what your video is about. And the YouTube algorithm is very smart. And you want to know why gurus push this so hard? Because so many of them get 30 to 50% recurring affiliate commissions from tag and SEO tools. Or they want you to believe that there's one tiny little trick that you're not doing that if you were doing, it would change everything for your channel, and you should definitely watch all their videos. So every time they tell you to use this tool or that tool specifically for tagging, chances are they might be making money from it. But I'm not saying those tools are useless. Some of them are great for keyword research. But the way the gurus push the tagging features is driven by affiliate revenue, not by what actually helps your channel. So, here's what to do instead. Put your main keyword in your title. Write a brief SEO-friendly description, and fill up the tags, but don't spend more than 1 minute doing it. Literally, do not spend more than a minute. You can use SEO tools, or you can use ChatGPT and just ask it what tags should go on that video. And then, spend that extra 30 minutes that you saved finding your next video idea instead, and executing on it. All right, the next thing that all the gurus say is that you should post everywhere. And this one might be the most dangerous because it sounds so logical. Post everywhere, right? Take your YouTube video, chop it into clips, post it on TikTok, Instagram Reels, Twitter, LinkedIn, Facebook, you know, and make content for each platform, right? Maximize your reach. And there's a saying, if you try to chase two rabbits at once, you will catch none. And when gurus tell you to chase six platforms at once, you're going to catch absolutely nothing. And here's what actually happens. You record the video, then you edit it, then you upload it to YouTube, then you start making content for all the other platforms. Maybe you chop some of your videos into clips, then you write titles and descriptions for each platform because they're all different, then you have to learn each of the platforms because for some platforms maybe tags do matter for instance. So you have to learn the nuances of all the different platforms, and then you upload each one individually. And then you engage with comments on each platform, and then you're exhausted, and you stop posting entirely, and your channel dies. Oh wait, it doesn't die because it was never alive in the first place. The number one reason small channels fail isn't that they don't post on enough platforms, it's because they stop posting altogether. And this repurpose everywhere strategy is one of the biggest reasons why. So here's what to do instead. Focus on YouTube, master it, get good at posting frequently with the right ideas and the right titles. That's your full-time job right now. Once you've got that dialed in and revenue coming in, hire someone to handle the other platforms. Don't do it yourself. Your job is to create and that's it. Now look, I know 99% of you are going to take this free advice and run with it, and that's totally fine. This week I'm doing a free live training. I'm going to go deep on how to find the right video ideas, make titles that get clicks, and build a channel that makes real money. And you can ask me questions live, check that out in the description and the pin comment below. So I give a ton of value with my free content and a ton of value on my free live trainings as well. But if you're in that top 1% who wants actual one-on-one help, go ahead and book a call with us by clicking the link in the description and the pin comment below or in the about section on the channel. We're only accepting about three to five new people right now, but if you think you're one of those people, then go ahead and apply. And on that call we'll talk about where your channel is right now, where you want to be, and whether we're a good fit to work together or not. With that being said, these are the types of people we typically work with. Business owners who want to grow and make money on YouTube, YouTubers who are crushing it and they want to crush it even harder, YouTubers that are getting a lot of views but they're struggling with monetization and they want help with that, or people that want to treat YouTube like a professional. They want to treat YouTube like a business. Those are the types of people we work with and we only want to work with people who are very serious and they want to start right now. So that's you, go ahead and apply. There's three to five spots that we just opened up and they won't be open for long. We only accept about 18% of the people who apply, so make sure you answer the questions carefully and respond to any email we send you. With that being said, check out this video right here where we go over somebody who we helped blow up on YouTube and make a ton of money.