Ivan: If views don’t equate to a creator’s success, there’s much more, way more that goes into it than just looking at peer views. 

Spencer: There’s a fine line between growing your channel and doing videos that you wanna do. 

Ivan: So if you’re making videos, you need to make sure you give up a good first impression. Good audio, good video, good background. 

Spencer: Hello and welcome back to another episode of Creators Uncut. I’m Spencer, I’m the host, and today I’m excited for another episode to kinda talk about the behind the scenes of YouTube, personal side, and get to know Ivan Mana. So Ivan, thanks for being on the show. 

Ivan: Hey Spencer, thank you for inviting me. Pleasure to be here. 

Spencer: Yeah, so your channel is actually called Ivan Mana, right? 

Ivan: Yeah. 

Spencer: Nice. Why don’t you go ahead and tell us a little bit about yourself and about your channel and kinda what it’s about. 

Ivan: Sure, yeah. So I started online in affiliate marketing about eight years ago. So I’ve been selling affiliate products online, using paid ads, and I really loved, well, I loved computers my whole life and just all the technical aspects of it and coming in there. I think in another life, I was a programmer, developer or something like that. 

Oh yeah. And I love teaching too. I’ve been teaching this whole life as well, ever since elementary school, where I would teach math and languages and was a teaching assistant in university, so on and so forth. And so you combine the two together and you have a YouTube channel. So as I started learning about online marketing, January 1st, 2017 is when I first typed in what is affiliate marketing into Google to learn about it. And then 22 days later, January 22nd, is when I opened my YouTube channel and started posting videos about everything that I learned right there and then. So yeah, since then, I’ve just regularly been posting content. Usually it’s stuff that I found complicated and that I took me a while to figure out that I now post to try to make it as easy as possible for people, go through the same thought processes that I went through to make it easier for people to do themselves. 

Spencer: Gotcha, that makes sense. I love watching tutorial videos. It’s so nice when you have something you need to do and you can just search it up in the videos right there that kind of walks you through it. So are your tutorials all about affiliate marketing or do you do other types of tutorials as well? 

Ivan: I think at the start, I did have a few review videos, some for different products. I had some motivation videos, like how to stay focused, how to motivate yourself, things like that. But then, yeah, that didn’t last long and I just went back to the computer technical stuff, something that I really like. So it’s mostly, yeah, it’s mostly online marketing related, anything to do with online marketing, but there’s a wide, very wide spectrum of that. 

So you could still have book reviews on that that are related to that. There are website building apps that you can show people how to build a website, email marketing, paid ads, there’s a whole world of this. So yes, it’s mainly just online marketing right now. 

Spencer: Gotcha, cool, that makes sense. So you kind of got started, you created your channel in, sorry, say it again, was it 2019? 2017, yeah. 2017, okay. So you kind of learned about affiliate marketing. Was there someone who influenced you to start a channel or was it kind of like, have you, did you see other people doing YouTube channels about affiliate marketing? 

Ivan: That’s a good question. Actually, there were two people that motivated me. The first one just to start and the second one to actually keep going. So the first person who motivated me was my brother because he already had a channel in gaming. Oh, nice. I was looking at what he was doing and then I said, well, I’m gonna try it too. And it was a good way for me to share my thoughts, share my knowledge, all that stuff. So he motivated me, I was my brother. 

And then what who motivated me to keep going was a YouTuber named Miles Beckler. He talked about 120 day YouTube challenge where he said, or was it 90 day? Yeah, it was a 90 day YouTube challenge where he said make a video every single day for 90 days. And I extended that to 120 days. So I was making one video every single day for 120 days. You can see that if you go to my channel history, like just 120 videos in 120 days, some of the earlier videos 

Spencer: from all the knowledge that I’ve accumulated. So as I was learning, I was basically documenting my knowledge via YouTube. That’s cool. I haven’t heard of Miles Beckler before, but that sounds like a great challenge. Kind of create that habit. So you did it for 120 days. Did you do it longer than that? Or did you kind of like spread out the videos after that? Yeah. 

Ivan: Yeah, so I did it longer, but then I just spread it out after. So I still kept making videos, but just one video every two days to take a break. And then it went to one video every week or so. 

And now it’s just one video every two weeks, but it’s been like that for the past few years. But it allows me to stay consistent and to, yeah, keep going. 

Spencer: Yeah, I know that makes sense. I think consistency is one of the best things for YouTube and to grow your channel. So did you kind of do everything yourself, like the planning, the shooting, the editing for those 120 days, I guess? 

Ivan: Yes, everything on my own for the next few years, probably after I started for the next few years. Yeah, even planning, it was really just me learning something cool, something complicated and technical that I just said, wow, this is complicated. 

Let me help other people doing it. And luckily enough, this was in a niche that was actually profitable, that people would actually watch. It wasn’t just some random topic that nobody cares about, luckily, because I just stumbled upon this topic that I liked and I ended up making videos about it, which ended up being something that other people find value in as well. So yeah, so at the beginning there wasn’t much planning. It was just I learned something new, boom, make a video on it. But thumbnails, recording, all that stuff, yes. I did that all that at the start. 

Spencer: Wow, that probably took so much time. So did you, at this time, did you have another job or was the affiliate marketing kind of supporting you as you did this? 

Ivan: Yeah, so at that time, for about six months, I was finishing school and I had a bank job. So I was working at a bank, being a financial representative. And yeah, so yeah, it was just that. I was just doing that as much as I could after school, before school. 

Spencer: Dang, that’s dedication right there. So one more thing I wanna mention about the consistency. I don’t know if you also consume a lot of YouTube like I do, but I love watching YouTube videos and I watch a variety of people, but I used to watch a guy named Casey Neistat. I guess I do still watch him. I don’t know if you’ve heard of him, but he did like vlog style content in New York City and he posted a video every single day for like two years. So when you mentioned that challenge, it kind of reminded me of that, but I think his channel is probably still growing. 

He doesn’t post that much anymore, but his channel I think it’s still growing from that like two year daily vlog because it captured a lot of people’s attention. So, and then I kind of wanted to move on. So you were working as a bank financial person and doing YouTube on the side. When did you decide to kind of like go all in and make YouTube like your career? 

Ivan: Actually, this is more related to my affiliate marketing career in general. So when I started making consistent income via affiliate marketing, nothing to do with YouTube. YouTube, I didn’t even monetize via the YouTube monetization system until about three or four years when it was given to me as a recommendation. 

Actually, it was just something else we could talk as well. Now that brings back memories, how did I not monetize it for so long? But the goal of YouTube wasn’t to monetize or to make money. 

That was just my outlet to share honestly. So when I decided to go full time into YouTube and affiliate marketing is when I started making my first income with affiliate marketing. I made my first sale about four to six months into affiliate marketing. I mean, my first sale shortly after another one. And then after a year or so, I made some consistent income. It wasn’t much, but it was enough to say, I can do this now full time. 

You know, it was a thousand to $2,000 a month. So just purely online via my own affiliate commission. So that just allowed me to stay alive while I pursued it more and more. Yeah. And so yeah, that’s when I said, that’s when I had more time. So that’s when I started doing more affiliate marketing, more online marketing, and then YouTube as well. Gotcha. 

Spencer: I actually want to jump back quickly, really quick. Can you kind of explain, I know what affiliate marketing is, but can you quickly, briefly explain it in case some of our listeners don’t know what affiliate marketing is? Of course. 

Ivan: Yeah, it’s basically a referral based business. So it’s basically promoting other people’s products or services for a commission. That’s all it is. So most products, most programs have an affiliate program, let’s say Amazon, they have an affiliate program. You can go through, find any products you want there, books, videos, anything you want. And if it’s relevant to whatever it is you’re doing, your niche, your audience, you can promote it and Amazon will pay you a percentage. From two to 5%, from two to 10% Amazon pays. It’s very low comparatively speaking, but that’s because they don’t need affiliates, right? They’re huge, they’re good on their own. Other products have much higher commission rates, but that’s what it is. This is basically a referral based system. 

Spencer: Yeah, so from my experience, most of that, the ones that I’ve seen in terms of affiliate marketing is people like YouTubers or people who make videos, they’re using a product and they’re like, hey, if you want this product, the link is in the description, by the way, it’s an affiliate link, blah, blah, blah, blah. So is that kind of how you did it? Did you make videos showcasing the product or did you do it a different way? 

Ivan: Yeah, I did that too. It wasn’t necessarily showcasing like some of the Amazon videos, like unboxing, things like that. It was more so how to make money online. And then as part of the process, I would show how to use certain tools or how to build a website. And as part of the process, naturally you need some tools to build a website. So that’s how I would showcase in the digital marketing way, how to do that using the products. 

Spencer: Gotcha, cool. That’s awesome. I could talk about affiliate marketing a lot because I also find it interesting. I’ve never done it myself, but I’ve thought about doing it. So I should probably go and watch a lot of your videos. So I guess kind of moving on, something I’m curious about since your brother also does YouTube, do you guys like communicate and like give feedback for each other on each other’s channels or are you kind of like separate? 

Ivan: We’re close to me and my brother. So yes, we always share ideas. We always talk back and forth about anything, including YouTube, absolutely. Yeah, so lots of good ideas when you have somebody who does it, who you can talk to back and forth about for improvement, just for even just seeing things in a different way that you’ve never seen before. So absolutely, yeah. 

Spencer: I talked to a lot of creators, but it’d be nice to have someone to, personally to bounce ideas off of. So that’s cool. So you do a lot of tutorial videos about affiliate marketing and how to build a business and stuff like that. How do you decide, I guess you kind of mentioned this earlier, but how do you decide what tutorials to make? Are they ever influenced by sponsorships or is it solely like comments that give you ideas or is it like things like you mentioned earlier, you wanted to learn about it and so you made a video on it? How do you kind of decide what videos to make? 

Ivan: Yeah, that’s another great question, which brings out a whole other conversation we can have. It’s the whole debate, right? Or not debate, but topic you could have about passion versus framework, versus actually doing the research and just making a video regardless of whether you want to do a video on it or not. 

So right now it’s a balance of both. I started for the first few years before I monetized the channel, three, four, five years, just purely based on passion. So just whatever I felt like I struggled with and I wanted to help people with, those are the types of videos I made content on. Or something exciting that I found, like when I started ClickFunnels was big, it just came out, it was huge, it was really popular. So I would make videos on that because I used the tool. 

So I have like 50 to 70 videos about it from various topics because I was just really interested. It was really cool for me, building out this whole funnel, which is like for somebody who doesn’t know what a funnel is, basically a system for you to generate leads and then make sales. Basically that’s a funnel in short. 

So you were able to do that with ClickFunnels. And so I’d make a lot of videos because I was just excited, I was just really passionate about it. I loved it. 

I loved going in there and building out these funnels. And so I would make videos. And then you get on the side, you get some complicated small topics, like how do you add a favicon to your site after you do it? And it’s like this small little thing that I did my research on, because it wasn’t very, there weren’t many videos on stuff like that at the time. And so I found these small, tiny little topics and I made videos on them. 

So that’s what I did for the first few years. Even now I still do it sometimes, like just a few months ago, I had a problem with Camtasia. Camtasia is my recording software and editing software, both I had a problem where whenever I would try to export the video, it would freeze the screen. Oh, that’s not good. 

Freeze Camtasia. So I had to restart, I tried to export it again. I had to restart, it didn’t work. And I finally solved it after digging around. 

I finally figured it out. And so I made a video about it, how to solve this Camtasia freezing issue. Now looking online, if you do your research, it’s not a video that’s gonna get you a lot of money, not a video that’s gonna get you a lot of views, but I didn’t care. This was a few months ago. I still posted it because I struggled with it. And right now after, I don’t remember when I posted it, but several months ago, two a year ago, sometime in that range, it’s got just 5,000 views. That’s all it’s got. But I helped 5,000 people. 

That’s all I care about, right? That’s 5,000 people who had the same issue that I was really frustrated. You can imagine, you finish a video, you finish editing, you spend so much time, you try to export it, nope, can’t export. It’s this, basically YouTube is my way to express my emotions if we put it that way. So yeah, so even now I do it, like some videos out of passion, but after doing some more research and being a little more experienced in this, it also helps if you get a steady stream of views so that your channel can live on, so that more people can see your channel. So now I also have a system, a little system that I use with tools like vidIQ or TubeBuddy. You can use those tools to help you understand whether a video has good potential or not. And so I use a tool called vidIQ, and I’m able to see, there’s a whole framework we can discuss if you want, but in general, you’ll look at some of the top performing videos on the topic that you’re interested in, and you see how many views per hour are they getting right now. 

Using this tool, you can see that, this information that you would normally see only inside the Creator’s dashboard. And so you’re able to see how many views per hour they’re getting. And so if it’s low, then you know that this video probably isn’t gonna do well. If it’s got a lot of views per hour, then you know that it has potential. People are still searching for it. So that’s your basically Google Keyword Planner for YouTube. 

Spencer: I love vidIQ. We use it occasionally for our stuff. And even, I’ve never used the paid version, but even the free version is helpful as well. It can give you ideas for titles and topics. I think the paid version, is it the paid version that kind of shows you the views per hour? Cause I don’t think I’ve seen that before, but that sounds like it’d be super helpful to kind of see what videos would pop off. Absolutely. 

Ivan: Yeah, the free version does that as well. If you go to any video on the right hand side, you will see the views per hour in the chart, even with the free version. Gotcha. 

Spencer: Okay, cool. Yeah, I need to look at that again. But you brought up something very, we’ve actually talked about it before on the podcast with another guest, but there’s a fine line between, you know, growing your channel and doing videos that you wanna do. He specifically does like power tool reviews, but sometimes he wants a tool so he can do something for his house, but the video won’t necessarily do as well. But then he gets other tools that will get a lot of views and help grow his channel. 

So kind of a fine line that you have to balance. So do you get sponsorship videos, like people reaching out to you like, hey, we want you to do a tutorial on our software or anything like that? 

Ivan: Yeah, I get lots of legitimate ones and lots of crappy ones every day. 

Spencer: Yeah, but I’ve done a lot of sponsorships. Yeah, lots of them for all the, a lot of, I won’t accept a sponsorship if it’s not in line with my audience. So I get tons of, when I mean bad, it’s when I say bad sponsorships, sometimes they message you, they don’t include your first name, they just say, hi, you know, we need you to do this video for some table. And it’s like, but I’m not a table channel. 

Ivan: You know, like, where am I gonna put this? But the ones that I do work with, the ones that I do accept are the ones that are in line with what I do. So usually landing page builders, website builders, tracking software. Yeah, even ones that I’ve already made videos for in the past, they reach out and they say, you know, you’re one of the top ranking affiliates, what can we do to help you? Do you want to do some sort of sponsorship deal? 

And so some of those came through as well with some of the software products that I worked with where it’s videos that I’ve already made a lot of, but they want to strengthen the partnership, the relationship. So yeah. That’s awesome. 

Spencer: Have you ever had any crazy, good or bad stories working with any sponsors? And if you have, you don’t have to say their name. 

Ivan: But yeah, yeah, absolutely. No, it’s a good question. Makes me think there is a story This is as bad as it gets. It’s not bad. It’s not horrible or anything like that I’m just trying to remember now the exact details. I remember the idea Trying to remember the exact details. 

Basically. Yeah, it was a company that was very in line with what I am doing what with what I was doing and We agreed and they had a contract No, so okay, normally now I’m just as I’m remembering things. I’m it’s coming back to you. Yeah Yeah, yeah, yeah most of my sponsorships are honestly based on trust so Somebody messages me saying hey We see that will be a good fit Can you make a video for this much and then I come back and I say yes or no? I want higher. I want lower I never say lower, but We Negotiate and then I just make a video I send it to them as a draft and then that’s it They send me the money and then I upload that’s what happens with 95% of my sponsorships I don’t know if that’s normally how it’s done to be honest, but that’s how it’s been done with me It’s it’s always I usually just talk to the owner and I don’t really sign a contract. I just make the video publish it That’s it pretty straightforward a few times I do get companies that reach out with a contract and so in this case This was my fault because I didn’t ask to see the contract first So I thought that you know, we had a good deal for a good amount And I made the video it was a One hour long video. I think it was a big to tour on a big topic and and then I sent that as a draft Everything was good and then they sent me the contract and in the contract There were some terms that I didn’t agree with like they have total exclusive rights to anything and they can change and Change anything in the video themselves But it doesn’t say anything about for example, it not being in a bad way Right like we can change things but not in a bad like not to make you look bad So some small things like that there were a few clauses like that that made me question That I asked the person the contact to look at that and they didn’t end up changing it They made the impression that they did but the terms still stayed just as bad So the terms were not acceptable. So this was my fault if you What you should do if you’re getting a sponsorship deal is ask Will there be a contract and if so, could I please see it right now? 

If there’s no contract fine I’ve never been ripped off knock on wood with not having a contract I just send them the draft they give me the money and I publish the video. That’s it never had any problems knock on wood but In this case what I had to do Because the video Named it was very specific with the name of this company and actually everything I showed most of what I showed was the company’s tools and Resources so I had to redo the video. I didn’t want to redo the whole one hour long video so I Readed some parts and then I did some crazy fancy editing To basically hide all those names and replace it with something else. 

So it was a tedious process I think the editing took more than the actual recording Mm-hmm in this case So yeah, this is the craziest case that came to mind or the most uncomfortable for me because I just had to do so much work in reediting it to the software that did match What I what I normally promote the one that I normally promote Right. So right. 

Spencer: Yeah That that is that is interesting. I’m actually surprised you don’t do contracts usually I’m Knock on wood like you said that that seems a little on the risky side But I’m guessing you probably you know vet the companies beforehand to make sure they’re legitimate. 

Ivan: Oh, yeah Yeah, I mean these companies they’re legit and I’m usually talking to the owners So it’s usually the owners or the Representative the affiliate representative that I talked to and a lot of them I work with consistently There is a company that I’ve made videos for the past four years now consistently I have like oh, wow seven or eight videos sponsored all by them and we never had a contract They just literally messaged me. I send them a draft They give me the money and then I publish the video if you think about it. There’s not much to lose right? 

I mean, I could spend all the time making a draft and sending it to them But yeah, they don’t really have much to gain either way if it’s not published if it’s not uploaded 

Spencer: That’s true So most of these people that you work with they don’t take the video and publish it on their own platforms No, it’s you publishing on your channel. Yeah. Yeah. 

Ivan: Yeah, that makes sense always like that. 

Spencer: Yeah, well, that’s that’s interesting I guess kind of going along with you know, I guess crazy stories. Have you ever had any? experiences with YouTube in general that like any crazy comments or crazy Videos or anything like that from your experience 

Ivan: Nothing too crazy in terms of comments, but there is one thing that drives me absolutely crazy as a creator on YouTube This drives me nuts. I don’t know if you’ve experienced it But let’s talk about the YouTube creator studio support Okay, you have experience with those guys. 

Spencer: I have not had experience with those guys 

Ivan: Okay, it’s a very funny topic that you brought out if you’re curious if you have a few moments check out some videos on YouTube about this There’s some hilarious videos by some big creators Including mine. I’m not a big creator compared to them, but I have some videos about creator support as well Where it’s just it’s hilarious The interactions that you have with them Like I’d rather not have support to be honest than have what they have to offer It’s just it’s just so frustrating that if you’re not ready to provide support just don’t Basically, 

Spencer: so is it like if you have a problem you go to this Support and they’re supposed to help you. 

Ivan: Yeah, they’re supposed to help you but Again, I invite you and your audience to look at some of the videos on YouTube Just type in YouTube creator support and see because it’s funny. 

Some of them are actually hilariously done by creators It’s really funny But to give you an idea is it’s basically bots who don’t read your question They they’re just not reading your question who can close the chat at any time and then not allow you to get back in There’s no way to rate them. There’s no way to talk to a manager Nothing, they don’t read your question. They don’t understand what you’re asking like I’ve probably contacted them about 50 times in total For various needs throughout the five years that they’ve been existing I don’t remember how long they’ve existed not when I first started they weren’t there yet But every time I contact them It’s like I have to repeat my question five times and explain myself five times for them to provide something so Super super frustrating. Yeah, if you if you ask me about my YouTube experience, that’s probably the most frustrating part of Being a youtuber is their support. 

Spencer: Yeah That that sounds rough. So is it like an AI? 

Ivan: Computer basically that’s what we think look at the videos and tell me I’d be curious what you think I think it’s a I because they just don’t read like or they don’t speak English. I don’t know. Yeah, I don’t know But they don’t read they don’t answer your question. You have to ask five times and Think yeah, they just give you totally irrelevant answers that have nothing to do with your question So my guess is their bots. Yeah, I don’t know. Yeah. 

Spencer: Yeah, I’ll have to go check out those videos. 

Ivan: That’s how it’s funny So I kind of actually Want to jump way back You mentioned you kind of held off monetizing your channel For three to four years. Do you want to kind of talk about that and like why you kind of waited so long? 

Ivan: Yeah That’s also a good question that I’m asking myself It’s I never thought about it because my goal with YouTube was never to monetize it It was never to sell that was never the goal and so The first few years when somebody did even bring up the idea, I just thought I don’t want to be annoying I don’t want to annoy people with ads. That was my answer And then when I monetized it, I realized how much money I was missing I was keeping it on the table and the biggest problem was that YouTube still showed ads So even though if you don’t mind it when you monetize your videos YouTube shows ads on your videos Even if you don’t they still do So after I realized that and I realized that well people watching YouTube They’re used to ads regardless and most people have ad blocker or they have YouTube Prime or premium whatever it’s called premium. 

Yeah, it really doesn’t matter. I’m not hurting anybody basically plus they see ads anyway, even if I don’t monetize it, so I went ahead and did it and Yeah, I never look back. It was it was good It’s just extra free money that you’re just keeping there on the table. 

Spencer: Yeah, so I’m curious You don’t have to give me specific numbers But is your revenue from your YouTube videos anywhere comparable to your affiliate marketing or is your affiliate still a lot better than your revenue? 

Ivan: No, I’m still making most of the money from affiliate sales. Okay, especially YouTube reduced the RPM so revenue per meal per thousand impressions that somebody has seen so some of my earlier videos Look good going back a few years. I’d make 35 to 40 dollars per thousand views. Oh, wow. Yeah, so if I have just Sorry, 

Spencer: sorry, I think that’s a pretty high RPM. 

Ivan: Yes Yes, yes, yes, so it was like that a few years ago and especially in the online marketing niche Which is actually one of the you can say myths of YouTube is that when when people look at my videos and they see thousands or tens of thousands views and some of my videos They think oh wow this guy’s not making anything But actually it’s the RPM that matters and the RPM the revenue per meal differs for every niche for entertainment Like gaming or things like that. It’s actually way lower. It’s like three to five. I think dollars per meal From from what I remember would have to look into it But I know for a fact it’s way lower because it’s not in one of the three niches that is super relevant for people Which is health wealth and relationships people need these three things right they need health they need wealth They need a partner they need a relationship as opposed to games and entertainment which isn’t as important for them compared to those things So yeah, so the the RPM was very high. It’s still Relatively high compared to other niches, but it’s not as high anymore. 

I don’t know what happened I don’t know if they just reduced it or not made some changes. I don’t know It’s not as high but even even back then most of my income still came from the affiliate sales and affiliate marketing Regardless, gotcha that makes sense. 

Spencer: Yeah, I was just curious and I’m glad you you brought up the the different RPMs for different niches That’s a big thing and for our listeners if you’re creating a channel, you know, that’s something to keep in mind It’s like what niche are you going into because that can kind of affect, you know down the road what kind of revenue you’re making And I know like like you mentioned health wealth and Relationships relationship. Yeah, those ones are really high and I know that like Ones that are niches that are I don’t know what to call them, but like more risky Those tended not have higher PMs because Advertisers are less likely to want to advertise on your videos So like for example, like, you know people who do like gun videos I’ve heard that those are are lower just because like or like political, you know content may have less Advertisers because it’s riskier content. Yep So more volatile, I guess I should 

Ivan: say yeah, that makes sense And in fact when you because I’ve been on both sides of the equation I’ve been on the receiving end having ads show up on my videos and also the giving end where I would pay for ads via YouTube ads So I’m familiar with the whole journey So when you create YouTube ads, they actually have an option where you can select what types of channels you want to promote on Like PG channels or more risky channels as you said more mature channels things like that So you’re actually given that option and yes That’s why the RPM is lower for those channels. Yeah. 

Spencer: Yeah So cool I’ve got a couple more questions for you before we wrap up and these are kind of like your experience with YouTube And any advice that you may have but the first one is throughout your your journey actually, when did you start YouTube? Was it 2017? Yeah. Yeah, so what is that eight years? 

Yeah, so from your eight years of experience has there been any mistakes that you think you learn from that would be Beneficial to our listeners to know just off of the top of your head 

Ivan: Yeah, I mean the biggest thing that I’m still struggling with at this point is that Looks matter Impressions matter, right? I’m a very down-to-earth chill guy. I’m a minimalist. I don’t need fancy cars and big airplanes I just need what I need to be happy That’s all I need. 

I don’t need to buy fancy watches to feel good. That’s me That’s my personal life choice. I’m happy with people around me just having a good time having a good laugh So I’m a minimalist Unfortunately, that’s not the case For most people especially as it comes to YouTube So if you’re making videos you need to make sure you give off a good first impression good audio good video good background I don’t really have a good one right now, but that’s the thing that I’m kind of struggling with is that’s not me I’m not gonna go and rent out a fancy $10,000 a month Airbnb as I’m traveling right now Because I don’t need it. I’m comfortable here, you know in my two bedroom one bathroom. It’s perfect for me Perfect great view got everything next to it. 

Perfect. And so It’s this kind of trade-off right you need to have something that’s appealing That’s that looks nice because that It plays an effect on people so If you’re asking for tips and advice for people is that you really try to put in the best quality that you can I’m still struggling with it in terms of video stuff in terms of background because that’s not me But I’m still working on it trying to find maybe a good angle some good place where I can maybe have a nice Presentation, but if you’re making videos always make sure you look presentable Make sure you have a nice background make sure your audio is good make sure the content is good and high quality You’re not just flat out repeating what somebody else says One thing I’ve noticed which is kind of tied into this Is like in my issue there are tons of tutorials on Google ads for example How to create a Google ads campaign tons of tutorials on that? So I love doing a video on that how to create a Google ads tutorial But if I make a video on that I need to make sure to add something that nobody else has done Add something a little bit extra maybe put in another small topic in there a small introduction A small one to two minutes of value that no other video has right so Long story short quality really matters and first impressions really matter especially as it pertains to YouTube. 

Spencer: Yes I completely agree. I think you’re actually the first creator to kind of bring that up in our podcast About first impressions Yeah, I agree every video should be the best that you can make it So when someone clicks on it, they’re like, oh, this is you know what I can expect from this creator really like that advice and The last question may go along with that maybe maybe maybe not But it’s about YouTube myth-busting so we ask all We ask all of our our guests this but are there any myths about YouTube that you think Should be busted any misconceptions that are Common from your experience doing YouTube Good question. 

Ivan: I have to think on that for a bit Any myths well one of the ones I guess we did talk about is that when people look at views They count how many views you get and they determine how successful you are in life There is much more to it that goes beyond just how many views you get right you have the affiliate marketing in the description all those links You have different rpms Some of my videos some of my top I have some videos that rank at the very very top spot on YouTube for some topics for some hot topics like landing page builders and things like that and I don’t have that many views there But I have a lot of people who signed up via those links right, so I guess if you were to phrase it in a sentence is that if views don’t equate to a creator’s success There’s much more way more that goes into it than just looking at pure views 

Spencer: Yeah, and to add on to that also subscribers isn’t necessarily You know how big the creator is I think I’d be interested to see I don’t think there’s any way to see this but I Feel like most Maybe I shouldn’t say it most but a lot of creators a lot of their views come from people who are not subscribed They’re like from the recommendation page And so subscribers aren’t necessarily like how successful you are so that’s that’s what I’d add on to that, but yeah, yeah, I agree 

Ivan: Yeah, that’s fair another maybe misconception now that I’m just thinking of it is People think if you’re making YouTube videos that every YouTube video you’re trying to get views And that’s also not the case as seen in my example. I have over 700 videos More than half of them. I just put out there because I just felt like it literally I don’t care about views so that’s why you see some of my videos have tens or hundreds of thousands of views and Some of them have hundreds of views. I don’t care about that. I just want to post the content out, right? So yeah, these are misconceptions about specifically creators not as much YouTube. 

Spencer: Yeah, awesome. Well, thanks for sharing that Ivan and thanks for being a guest on the show really appreciate it. 

Ivan: Thank you for having me on Spencer. 

Spencer: It was a pleasure Yeah, so your channel is Ivan mana. Yeah, are you on any of the other social media platforms? 

Ivan: I am YouTube is my biggest one and my website Ivan mana.com People can go there. I usually have some freebies either free starter access to my training course or just Bunch of different potential freebies you can see at some point. So check that out as well. 

Spencer: Awesome. Thanks for our viewers and watchers for checking out this episode. Make sure to check out Ivan Mana and his website. Thanks for checking out this episode and if you ever need help with creating videos make sure to check us out at creatorluxe.com and we’ll see you in the next one!