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The decision to start a YouTube channel is not as easy as it may sound! You may have an idea or niche in mind already, or coming up with your million dollar idea may be your first big hurdle. In my case, I had wanted to start a beauty channel for years, but I had no idea where to begin! Where do I video? What do I use to video? How do I edit my videos? How do I promote my videos? What if no one likes my videos? It can all feel so daunting!
Equipment
Where did I begin? After finally deciding I was going to take the plunge and film my first video, I had to get some equipment. For a beauty channel, the first thing you need is good lighting. People aren't going to want to watch you do your makeup if they can't see the makeup itself! I started out with a ring light from Amazon (link below) that could hold my phone for videoing. This made it easy to get good quality videos with great lighting and well-lit photos for thumbnails and social media.
Editing
My next hurdle to overcome was the fact that I knew literally nothing about video editing. The full extent of my experience was editing school projects on iMovie in high school. Unless you count my "digital blue" kids' camcorder from when I was about six years old. Then I'm a total pro. But for the sake of this post, I'm going to assume you aren't filming your YouTube videos on a children's camcorder from the early 2000s. I started out by googling free video editors for Windows computers, and the vast majority of them did not work well for me. Many of the "free" editors I found wanted to charge me for most of their features, making editing without paying very difficult. Eventually I found VSDC Free Video Editor. VSDC does have premium features that they charge for, but I haven't needed any of them yet. This editor did take a lot of trial and error before I would consider myself good at editing videos. The good news is that there are lots of tutorials for this software out there!
Promotion
Promoting your videos is a full-time job if you want them to get noticed. Luckily, there are tons of social media platforms that are great for sharing your videos! I already had an Instagram account for my makeup, so I was able to just focus on being more active, increasing the quality of my posts, and growing my following. Before I started making videos, I didn't have a separate Twitter account for my makeup. I made a Twitter account and made sure to use as many relevant hashtags as possible. With both Twitter and Instagram, I regularly search hashtags to find profiles that post content similar to mine and follow them in order to gain a following of people with similar interests. In the beginning, I posted my videos only on my personal Facebook page. This has been great for getting support from friends and family, but it isn't great for reaching a larger audience. Recently, I created a business Facebook page that I can exclusively share my beauty-related content and reach more people. The important thing to remember with social media is that it's a very slow process to grow your following. Your goal may be to get 10k followers, but maybe you should start with the first 100.
Aside from sharing on social media, your most important marketing tool is YouTube itself! When you post a video you have the opportunity to get your video noticed using the title, description, keywords, and thumbnail! One great strategy is to plan a video idea around a set of keywords or a phrase. For example, beauty pages often make reviews of a highly searched product. People can then search for reviews of that product and watch your video before they buy. YouTube and Google use the words and phrases from your title, description and keywords to recommend your videos to others. In order to get your videos seen by the maximum amount of people you should make sure these elements are relevant to your video, highly searched, and not overly saturated with competition. Remember that if you post a video called "Natural Eyeshadow Tutorial" there will likely be tons of videos with the same name, and channels with more views and subscribers will get recommended far more than a video from a new channel. However, if you post a video called "Natural Eyeshadow Looks Using the Naked 2 Palette" you reduce the volume of videos by being more specific but still use something trendy enough that people are likely to search it. Lastly, you want to make eye-catching and relevant thumbnails. You want your thumbnail to catch someones eye, give them an idea of what your video is about, and make them want to watch your video. A better thumbnails means more clicks which leads to more likes and subscribers!
Building up the Courage to Post
Let's be real. There are lots of people on the internet just waiting to tear you down, post negative comments, and make you feel like you aren't good enough. Fortunately, there are also lots of people that want to lift you up! Before I was able to post videos I had to get to a point where I was confident enough in my work that a few negative comments wouldn't crush my spirit. It's important to remember that everything is subjective. Half the people that watch one of my videos may love my style and the way I do things while the other half has a totally different style and doesn't like it, and that's okay! The sooner you can come to terms with the reality that not everyone is going to like what you post, the better off you'll be. Every YouTube channel has to develop its own unique audience, and with enough hard work and consistency, you'll soon find an audience of people who love your work!
As cliche as it sounds, the best advice I can give is to not give up! One day you'll want to delete your channel and quit, and the next day you'll gain 20 new subscribers. Just hang in there!
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