“As a YouTuber, you need to make sure that you’re approaching what you’re doing like a business. You need to remember that when you’re going into content creation, you’re going to reach a point in what you’re doing where you’re going to start asking yourself questions about money and is this worth doing,”
– Desiree Martinez
SPECIAL GUEST:
– Desiree Martinez | The Funded YouTuber Podcast | The Cast Agency
HOST: The VidAction Podcast is hosted by:
– Dane Golden, YouTube Consultant
VidAction.tv | LinkedIn | YouTube
TRANSCRIPT:
Desiree Martinez:
As a YouTuber, you need to make sure that you’re approaching what you’re doing like a business. You need to remember, when you’re going into content creation, you’re going to reach a point in what you’re doing where you’re going to start asking yourself questions about money and is this worth doing, is this something I can like invest in, like what’s my growth look like…
Dane Golden:
It’s the VidAction podcast, and today we have a special guest, Desiree Martinez, and Desiree has started recently, pretty recently, one of my favorite new podcasts. It’s called The Funded YouTube Creator, or the YouTube Funded Creator?
Desiree Martinez:
The Funded YouTuber.
Dane Golden:
The Funded YouTuber, and it’s for GigaStar. And I really like how you’re talking to big creators and it sort of gives people a vision of where they might be going.
Most of the people we’re talking to might have smaller YouTube channels, but I thought you might be able to give us some tips that people have talked about so that when we’re looking to be big, what can we do now put things in place so that when we are big, we can solve problems better. How’s that sound?
Desiree Martinez:
I think that’s great. And I also find it really interesting. So for me, I know we do have some big creators that have been on the podcast. So we also have like normal creators. Like I call them like the middle class creator, like the regular person that has found their path to full time income with YouTube and how they’ve done it.
My, it’s like how everyone has done it. It looks different. How everyone’s income works is different. How everyone’s teamwork is different. So it’s really interesting to like. And take a look behind those curtains. than like just talking about production and growth and things like that.
Dane Golden:
I love that you’re actually saying numbers. You’re saying, here’s how much this person makes. Here’s what happened. Here’s how much they were making. And very few people do that, and it’s very revealing and inspiring and sometimes just a challenge.
Desiree Martinez:
Yeah. Not everyone is super open to talking like the specific numbers. So like some creators will be like, I’m in the seven figure range, I don’t want to talk about the specific dollar amount. Or I have other people that are like, I make a hundred thousand dollars like annually doing this. what we do in the podcast that’s really different, just to like, for those that are uncomfortable talking about the specific dollars amounts, is we break it down by percentages.
So like, this percentage of my income comes from this, then comes from this, then comes from this, so that they can just like, get it. And so it’s still very enlightening, and it’s still very income focused, but it allows also to for creators that are like, I don’t want to talk about my money, or I don’t want to share that, or I have this NDA or whatever in place. It just gives them the freedom to like share without, uncomfortability.
Dane Golden:
so what’s one thing, give some tips here. What’s one thing that people are doing that, that small creators can start doing now or start thinking about based on what you’ve learned from this great wealth of knowledge with these great creators?
Desiree Martinez:
Yeah. there’s so much about like what creators are doing, but there have been like some, like, I think that common threads that people have really, exposed and shared. And I think the, I mean, like a couple to go over, but I think my favorite one is building away from the platforms, which sounds so contradictory to what we’re doing.
Like I said, the here, like the VidAction podcast is about like using YouTube and things like that. So, yeah. YouTube and TikTok and Instagram and all of the socialy places that we’re building audiences. And this is like the most cliche thing that everyone always says, like it’s rented land, right? But like they have their own really specific agenda and their agenda isn’t really geared towards helping you.
They actually have a more of a vested interest in like making a really good user experience, people consuming your content. Followed by a really good advertising experience. They’re not as much worried about the creators, because the creators exist to be thing that the people consume and the advertisers put their money on.
And so they try to say like, Oh yeah, we care about the creators. I’m not saying that they don’t, but they have an obligation to those other things that are first. So when you’re creating away from the platform, it’s really important. Oh, yeah. All of them. All, of them. There’s not a platform out there that’s not like, Oh, I have to have shareholders. I have marketers. I have marketing budgets that like, like people are advertising on my platform and we have to make really good user experiences that have a advertising like underlying component to it.
And so the creator experience is often like, while it is something that they do take into consideration, still not their number one priority. And I think just. Business transparency. When we’re talking about though, like with platforms, like the thing that causes the issue for the creators themselves is that they can change things and it affects us.
We have no say, we don’t have any control over what is being done. And so it makes things more difficult. Like, so for me, for example, I was having really great trajectory and growth for my YouTube channel. And then. And a lot of that was through COVID, which I can understand, like once COVID was over and people were like out of this whole, like, I don’t want to be on the computer anymore era, like I expected there to be a dip, but from like where I was cruising for two years, sitting between like 80,000 and 100,000 views per month, I’m now averaging somewhere between 30-35,000 views per month on my content.
For no other reason than, I don’t know, and even like YouTube can’t answer it, YouTube experts can’t answer it, and we’ve seen that across the board with the, with a lot of creators, especially looking like what I do, which is the education space. We also have things out of control, like once, and what really Pushed my viewership down was the introduction of Shorts. And Shorts is supposed to be this like amazing thing that allows for us to be really great and get lots of traffic, but it’s a totally separate viewing experience and it also took away advertising budgets from the long form creators.
So even though there are creators that have never had more views before in their life, their AdSense is still less than what it used to be. And a part of that. We saw that big drop happen when Shorts monetization kicked into place in February 2023, and it just continued to kind of be stagnant, which is frustrating because Shorts monetization still hasn’t, like, figured out its way either.
So, The reason it’s important to build away from the platform is because if you can’t control what those platforms are going to do, and so by taking that audience, so it’s like you want to use the platforms as the top of your funnel, like as a marketer, like I love the funnel, and Use that as like the top of the funnel to attract them in, prove your expertise, get their attention, and then you want to take them to someplace you can control, like an email list, a membership, a text messaging, something or other, like a place where you can control when you get to talk to your audience and them getting to see your content.
Dane Golden:
So to, step back and talk about what you said, a moment here, for people, you know, for some people they totally know what funnels mean and some are new to the concept, but a funnel just means the idea is that the broadest number of people start at the top, meaning they’re in being introduced to you.
And then the people who are more and more interested continue on. And that funnel, just like a normal funnel that you might pour water or gas in or whatever it is. That becomes a smaller group of people as they get interested and then they finally do become a customer or a member or whatever, and that’s a smaller subset so that when we say top of funnel, we just mean people who have just been introduced to you. And are
Desiree Martinez:
It’s definitely a V, right? We attract a lot of people into the top and then slowly it comes down and it gets a little slower and it trickles in. And you know, trying to do from like, when we think of it from a business perspective, we’re trying to turn those people into buying customers. And.
You know, I think if I would say like my second thing that, you know, it’s important for people to understand, I knew this going into the podcast, and it definitely gets reinforced, and it’s that as a YouTuber, you need to make sure that you’re approaching what you’re doing like a business. You need to remember when you’re going into content creation, you’re going to reach a point in what you’re doing where you’re going to start asking yourself questions about money, and is this worth doing, is this something I can like invest in, like what’s my growth look like, my taxes are getting weird, like there’s all these little things that start to step into place… that, you have to ask yourself to it, ultimately be like, is this going to be something I do long term that can be financially lucrative for me?
And I’m taking it from hobby or project into the next step? Or am I just going to continue this as the hobby? And the vast majority of people, when they go hobby, it’s not sustainable. It’s inconsistent, and it’s nothing they can really rely on.
So what we’re interested in doing is building this up from the beginning as a business. And I’m not talking about things like, like, you know, establishing your business as like an LLC or all of those like, like legally, attorney, accountant, like sorts of things.
I’m talking about, really sitting down and looking at what you’re going to create on YouTube, knowing who you’re talking to, knowing what you’re going to sell to them ultimately, and what your long term like one to three year goals are with your channel that are linked to income versus being linked to like views and subscribers.
Dane Golden:
Right, so tip one was try to build additional platforms that you own like email or text or membership to get people. Off of YouTube, once they’ve become fans, the next thing is understanding that you should be thinking of this as a business, not necessarily setting up all the finances and bookkeeping, but thinking what you want to sell, why you want to sell it, why is this a good niche to sell in, and, also, and also, as you’ve said on your recent podcast episode, is, thinking about getting people on that list, that email list, is part of thinking about this as a business because even if you’re not selling anything today, that interaction, that owned relationship, you can sell to them later.
Desiree Martinez:
hundred percent. Yeah. So you want to make sure that whatever you do, and when you approach this, like when you think about it, like how, like I am, like I’m a business owner. First, I got into YouTube because I needed to get leads to my business when my husband was in the Air Force at the time we got stationed overseas.
Like it’s a whole thing and I talk about it in great deal, on The Funded YouTuber Podcast. But, It’s easier for me to think about this from like, because I am a business and I have business like things in place and yet generally people in the education space, that’s kind of how I operate. Even from the entertainment perspective, it is really important to think that like even if you’re doing something like if you’re like a vlogger of some kind, if you’re in gaming of some kind, if like you’re just in like entertainment and you’re trying to like do like game show or just fun stuff, you still should have a way of to communicate with your audience beyond what you’re posting on these platforms.
It might be a little bit more work to get those people over there because it’s what they’re used to, but it still doesn’t mean it’s not necessary. And so, you know, creating something that’s like a freebie of some kind, or literally just starting like a Patreon, like it doesn’t have to be a paid thing.
You could offer like a one, a free or a $1 Patreon, something like that, to get people to come over and like, have early access or get extra behind the scenes or get like the unedited video or like have a weekly or monthly chat like there’s ways to incentives that you can offer to people but you have to really think no matter what kind of creator you are no matter what you’re talking about you have to have a way to get people to a platform that you control.
And by a platform you control it just like an email, a membership where you can control communication with your audience.
Because all of the algorithms are currently designed to, like it’s kind of forgettable. I think about people like all the followers that people that you follow or all the subscribers that you, places you have subscribed, you don’t see what they’re doing all the time because it’s not based on whether I hit follow, therefore I see everything.
It’s based on what your viewer behavior is and as your viewer behavior change, you can fall off.
Dane Golden:
and just to recap what you just said, the, just because someone’s a subscriber, Even if someone’s a subscriber and gets notified, and even if they watch your videos frequently, that doesn’t mean that they’re going to be served that video again. So, what you’re saying is when you send them an email, or maybe, you know, a lot of these email platforms now, they have text platforms associated with them, so, your viewership may be much more text oriented than email oriented, but the idea that you can, with this owned platform, remind them about all the great stuff you’re doing and engage with them so that maybe they get a link directly from this, or they’re just going to do a search for you when they return to the platform will go directly to your membership. Now, when you say off platform, what, just to summarize what you said in the first tip is that whether it’s TikTok or Instagram or YouTube, that’s not something you own, but something that you do own is email membership text, right?
Desiree Martinez:
Yes.
Dane Golden:
Okay, and so the third awesome tip from Desiree Martinez of The Funded YouTuber is…?
Desiree Martinez:
So one of the things that is so appealing about being a creator is that you get to work for yourself and you get to control your income, but when so many people rely on only one, maybe two streams of income and like commonly things like AdSense and sponsorships, you’re setting yourself up for a lot of scary times and a lot of, it’s, you might as well have like a job.
Like that’s how I look at it. Like if you only have one stream of income, you might as well have a job. And you know that you don’t control your job any more than you can control what happens with your AdSense or if a sponsor goes away or something like that.
Like I just had a sponsor relationship end, for nothing that I was doing. The company was sold to another company in another country and they are literally severing all of their relationships and firing everybody at the company that works in America. Like it’s literally like a four year relationship. Just like, up and spoke for no reason. Like, and while it’s not like a big part of my income, it was still like, you know, 1500 bucks I could count on every single month and I don’t have that anymore.
Right? So you never know when it’s going to go away or what can happen. So when you diversify your income, it allows for you to really look at what you are doing and what you have to offer. And Figure out how you can get different streams of income to add up to like what you’re doing in different parts.
That way if one goes away, it’s not as devastating. So…
Dane Golden:
Run through a list of, like, what someone can do. There’s ad revenue, there’s sponsorships, they could build products, they could have memberships. What else?
Desiree Martinez:
You can also have affiliates, you can have a service, coaching, you can have merchandise, you can develop a physical product, you can syndicate your content, you can do UGC which is user generated content where you’re creating content for other brands. Get like paid to speak and travel.
There’s funding options that are available to you. So like with Gigastar, which is presenting sponsor for the Funding YouTuber podcast, it’s where you’re able to get investment capital into your your YouTube brand to help you take your business to the next level. Yeah. So, I mean, you know, there’s other things that you can do that are kind of like quirky or different.
Like how can I diversify what I’m doing so that I can not have a, not get trapped in what I’m doing with my income so that I can make money while asleep.
So that I always have steady stream coming in and I’m able to really just not have to worry about where my money is coming from in the same way, like if I have a job and I get fired from it.
Dane Golden:
So we had number one. Number one tip from Desiree Martinez of The Funded YouTuber was own. Find a way of owning more of your audience, getting people that you still want to them to be on YouTube. You don’t want to necessarily drive them off every single time, but make sure you’re moving some people from the beginning to being an owned audience on email and text and so forth. Membership. Tip number two, think about it as a business. Tip number three, part of that business is having more than one income stream at any given time. Tip number four is…?
Desiree Martinez:
Have a clear buyer persona. So this is like, you know, what we kind of talk about in the YouTube space is like know who your viewer is. Like who’s watching your content. marketing we call it like building like your avatar. And buyer persona is another, like, way of talking about that. And the reason I’m saying buyer persona rather than viewer is because, again, we’re thinking about our YouTube channel like a business.
We’re diversifying how our income works and we need to know very simply who do we want to buy from us, not just watch us? So, you know, like we’re talking about the funnel, we have people that attract it. We have the people that we attract and we have the people that we convert into buyers. And so who is it that buys from you?
So for with my YouTube channel, who I’m looking to buy from, have buy for me, are going to be business owners are going to be people that are service providers in the tech space, education, like that kind of thing, who are doing all of these things in their business and they haven’t set aside someone to do their marketing very specifically for them.
And so they want their marketing done for them. They want someone that handles like all the communication and they figure out like what buying looks like for them. Like do I do ads? Do I sponsor this local event? Do I need to wrap my vehicle, like, you know, managing, like all that stuff. So those are my perfect customers, for me, those people that I want to buy from me.
The Funded YouTuber, their buyer persona is a YouTuber who is looking to take their YouTube channel to the next level. They probably are somewhere in the 50,000 to 200,000 subscriber range. If not more, they make over 25,000 in annually in YouTube AdSense revenue.
Dane Golden:
That’s so specific. It’s so specific. By getting specific, by making certain parameters, you also throw away certain people. You’re not throwing away. That’s the wrong word. You seg separate out people.
Desiree Martinez:
It unqualifies them.
Like there’s a, website and I would say, a business called Adobaro. Adobaro is a Korean based, Adobaro is a Korean based company that helps you repurpose your existing content stuff you’ve already made onto Chinese social networks. So you’re
Dane Golden:
is that spelled? Adobaro?
Desiree Martinez:
Adobaro. It allows for you to expand, your, digital footprint.
You’re, you have a lot of more sponsorship opportunities, but when you go through Adobaro, you qualify for the creator funds of all of those social networks from video number one, rather than having to go through the qualification because you’ve, because that company has built that relationship with the, with those social networks.
So it allows for you to have a lot more income opportunities. So it’s about Like, being aware of what’s going on and, like, what is happening, like, you know, in this era of, like, TikTok is going away and getting banned and YouTube’s in this weird place with shorts and stuff. Like, Snapchat, like, I know that people are like, what’s Snapchat?
Like, I don’t go away, I promise, like, there’s a whole thing here. Like, Snapchat has a whole thing. And it’s just like the whole like creator program. They are really investing in and really going after and brands are spending a lot of money on Snapchat creators and there’s not enough like they need more, so, cause that’s a really big messaging, communication, and sharing app for younger people. Like, like by younger people, I mean like under 30. And so it’s just one of those things that people just need to, Think through Like they’re, even when I’m doing like my sales calls, like I have like a free consultation or like a sales call that we do, like to see if like they, like, Like, they’re qualified buyers for me, like, are you going to be the one that I need to help me with what I’m doing or no?
And, you know, you know,
Dane Golden:
Let me pose this question. Let me pose this question. Let me pose the opposite question. This will help people learn, I think. I do business with everyone. Anyone who shows up, I’m very happy to do business with them. Somebody gives me money, I do business. They say to do this service, I do this service. Why should we not do that?
Desiree Martinez:
When you’re doing business with everyone, trying to, if you’re trying to make everyone happy, you’re going to make no one happy, especially yourself, especially your bank account.
Dane Golden:
Huh.
Desiree Martinez:
You’re not supposed to be for everyone, right? So let’s take a look at the grocery store.
Dane Golden:
Okay.
Desiree Martinez:
Everyone goes to the grocery store.
Everyone. And there’s something in the grocery store for everyone, but not every aisle and every section is something that you specifically or uniquely pay attention to. So when I’m going to the grocery store, I’m going, and like, I have my list. I know what my menu is going to be. I’m a mom. I have two kids and a husband, like, so I have a strategic plan when I go to the grocery store.
Like, I, and like, that’s what I’m doing there. Like, I have, like, who I’m buying for, how much I need, what’s the menu, do I have coupons I’m paying attention to. There are things I’m tuning out. Like, I’m not probably buying processed food. I’m doing more of the, like, ingredients for cooking things. And sometimes I go in the middle because that’s where all the like cooking stuff is, like flour, sugar, chocolate chips, that kind of stuff.
And then the occasional like supplement for making like things easier, like frozen waffles for the kids, right?
Dane Golden:
Right.
Desiree Martinez:
Like those are for me, but like there’s a whole sections of the grocery store I don’t go down. Like I don’t go down the Pop Aisle. I don’t go down the like, I’m not paying attention to, like, the gluten free stuff.
I am not shopping for a pure vegetarian diet. I am not shopping, using, WIC or food stamps. I am not shopping for, bit, for the office. I’m, but all of those people, though. Come to the grocery store. YouTube is the grocery store. And everybody has different experiences on YouTube of what they’re interested in watching.
So while some people are avid, you know, Mr. Beast watchers, other people are watching smaller educational creators like myself. And there are some people that are in this, like, for the podcast experience, like, and they’re watching here for the Joe Rogans or the Danes the internet, right? So different experiences.
And so you have to kind of think about how, like, who’s coming to your store to shop? What’s this, their grocery list look like?
Dane Golden:
Why will the customer, or the viewer in this case, and I sometimes use the word viewer and customer interchangeably. Why will the,
Desiree Martinez:
They’re so different, though.
Dane Golden:
Why would the viewer be happier if someone is creating a channel just for me instead of a channel for everyone? Why will I be more interested if someone is creating something for a smaller group?
Desiree Martinez:
It’s all about the problem that you’re solving for them, and sometimes people have really niche specific needs, like, so maybe someone is like, I am trying to figure out how AI works, and so I need to go Like, so my feed is just filled with like AI users. I’m trying to figure out how to do podcasting. So my feed is now filled with a whole bunch of podcast stuff.
And while there’s lots of people talking about podcasts and there’s lots of cereal brands in the cereal aisle, we all have the ones that we like the most because it connects with us. It’s a flavor that we like, it’s a price that we like, it’s whatever it is, right? So you, that’s why. You know, people are like, Oh, it’s oversaturated or whatever.
It’s like, no, because you have your own unique experience and perspective that you can offer that can help. And so like when you’re getting really focused and specific about who your buyer is, you’re going to be able to create, to attract your viewer, which is where the funnel comes into place. Again, we can’t, we’re coming back to this, like we are attracting viewers at the top, and then we’re using.
you know, way that we get them off platform as our next level for leads, right? So for me, how I get people from viewer into my system, do I communicate with them is through email marketing. And so I offer a freebie to them. And so it’ll be things like grab my free content planning worksheet. Get my list of 50 videos every business owner can make right now, you know. Everything you need to know for going live effectively. Like I have these specific freebies I’ve created that are part of my funnel. And then the next,
Dane Golden:
…with your specific viewer in mind, your targeted viewer in mind, not just anyone.
Desiree Martinez:
And so they go from viewer to prospect. Like that’s like where that is. So I’m nurturing them, proving my expertise, and maybe I just catch them at the right time where I have the solution to their problem that they will give me money for.
Dane Golden:
And some people, they’ll even name this avatar or this buyer persona.
They’ll say, like, for instance, I saw a session. A couple years ago from Liron Segev of The Techie Guy, I saw him at VidCon. He went through each individual thing about his avatar. He said, my, and this is just his, my guy is the tech person for tech people.
He is between 35 and 55, his name is Jim, or whatever he said it was. It was a specific name, he’s got kids, he’s got a minivan, and he just went down. Now, is everyone going to be exactly that same? No, he has this vision of somebody in mind. And for you, it might be a military spouse who has kids, lives in America or maybe lives overseas, could be as narrow as that.
Even if you don’t end up with this exact person, which is not a real person, you really are really targeting in on who that person is and you think about ways to service them in the ways that they want to be helped.
Desiree Martinez:
Yeah. Like I said, I know for me, like, so for a long time, so I’m in the process, like when we’re recording this, I’m in the process of rebranding my agency. I have had a company called All In One Social Media since 2015. And what I have learned in the past year very specifically is that doing just social media doesn’t work.
Like we’re not in a place where we have really niche specific services from our marketing and service providers as business owners. I totally respect that and I totally get that. And so I’m evolving what we’re doing as a brand. And so. All In One Social Media’s perfect customer was Crystal.
Crystal was in her mid to late 30s.
She ran a small business, and she was so overwhelmed with how much she needed to do that the idea of doing social media just stressed her out. And she always had these intentions. She would sign up for Webinars and she would talk to her coach about stuff and she would take pictures and videos all the time of all these cute dogs that she was walking and taking care of.
But then when she actually had to sit down and do the work, it just was like so far from her mind as something that she had to prioritize to do that it wasn’t going to get done. Because it requires being consistent and showing up all the time. And she was too busy running payroll and booking clients and taking care of people’s pets.
And so that was my favorite customer when I was like rebranding, when I was All In One Social Media. And my rebrand with The Cast Agency, which focuses on creator-first holistic marketing where we like, we have two parts where it’s like organic marketing where we are creating from the top of the funnel with YouTube and like video podcasts and we are repurposing down into social email marketing, blogging, all of those things, like core online pieces that you always have to be doing to stay relevant and topical and then supporting it with CMO services, Chief Marketing Officer. So that like, there’s like, okay, what are the other marketing things that you should be doing? What is advertising like? What does mailers look like?
What does local sponsorships look like? Right? So like that person. So my target customer, his name is Chris and Chris runs a, business, business water restoration business, and he is so busy working in his business, but he has become the face of the business, and he doesn’t want to be the face of the business because he has business partners, and he’s not in the field, and so what he wants to do is use his online marketing as a way to make the name of the business known, not him known. And so what word, what he was looking to do is like, how do I give the brand recognition? How do I grow the brand rather than growing myself as an individual in my company? And so like, he’s my perfect customer, right? And so he’s my perfect customer because we can do the organic marketing.
We can offer CMO services to help them grow their business. Build the brand in other places it goes from there. Right. And so that’s like by knowing who that buyer is. So when I’m building my content to attract my viewer, I need to like, Hey, what are the problems Chris has? What are the things that he needs help with?
What are things that could attract people in a broad scope that I can just say, like, are you doing anything with reputation management? And they’d be like, well, what’s reputation management? Like that. Like, what do you do with that one star review? Like, you know, so it’s like, how can I attract those people to get them down my funnel?
Dane Golden:
this is really great. want to ask this, question, because now you’ve moved from your ideal customer, you’ve created this person named Crystal, and now business is evolving as every single person’s business does. It evolves every single, now you actually have envisioned this mythical new customer who, is named Chris, similar to Crystal actually, but now it’s a man, and he has a totally different kind of business as your services and what your value as you perceive it, is evolving.
Now, I want to ask a related question. What I do when I am on camera and speaking, I’m just here in my office, just talking to the camera, I actually envision a very specific person. And what I do generally. Is sometimes I envision the customer, but sometimes I pick a person I know and I talk to them without saying, ever saying their name. But I think of them.
Desiree Martinez:
Full disclosure, both of my personas are actual people I know. Like,
Dane Golden:
Same name?
Desiree Martinez:
and, Yeah, same name,
Dane Golden:
Oh, I see.
Desiree Martinez:
Crystal and Chris are both my friends and I know them and we’ve done business together and I’ve helped them and I know they are my perfect customer because I have worked with them and found that like, it’s what brings me joy and, that’s why I’m like, we’ll get to the second, my fifth thing is network.
Like that’s how that kind of…
Dane Golden:
Do you envision you’re actually speaking? Now, I actually don’t tell people who I’m talking to. I keep it a secret because I found when I’ve told people, it just sort of is something weird because they don’t actually know I’m talking to them, but that I’m talking directly to them. So don’t actually say their name or even tell the person, but I say, I am talking to blank.
Desiree Martinez:
yeah,
Dane Golden:
Now,
Desiree Martinez:
and you don’t need to tell the, like, you don’t have to start every video saying, hey, Chris, what’s up? Like,
Dane Golden:
I never even tell the person that they’ve become my muse. They call it in writing, they call it a muse. But do you think, do you envision that person as you’re looking at the camera, imagine you’re speaking one to one, or is that just my thing?
Desiree Martinez:
I think that it’s, everyone is different. For me, I’m performing for the stage. And so I think of like, for me, when I’m looking at my camera, it reminds me of like theater where the lights are so bright, you can’t see the audience. so that’s how I am when I record my content. But I also find that I do my best content when I get to interview and talk with people. Like talking with you, I pulled that grocery store analogy out of my, my, my butt. Like it was just, but it was so perfect what we’re talking about. And I, that’s just, my brain works really well through conversation. I think it’s a really great tactic that a lot of people could do. I’ve heard of people putting pictures of the person that they’re talking to right under their camera so they can like remember who they’re talking to. I’ve had people who are like I’m going have someone come into the studio, stand behind the camera, I’m going to look at them while I do this, otherwise it just comes across too stiff.
It really is about whatever works for someone to get what they’re trying to deliver.
Dane Golden:
And Desiree Martinez, The Funded YouTuber and the Cast Agency. Tip number five was what?
Desiree Martinez:
Network. You know, now, I have not had a single business relationship that did not, especially my long term ones, that did not come to fruition because I didn’t, I networked with somebody, you know, we get to hide behind cameras and say fun things like I’m wearing pajama pants right now, and I work in my basement by myself, and I get to control my schedule, and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah.
Like those are all the benefits of it, but I cannot tell you how monumentally powerful and necessary networking is in our industry for everything that we do. I know there’s some people out there that would kind of push back on it, but like when we’re talking about, especially with getting started, like being able to go to conferences, being able to spend time on LinkedIn, talking to people, doing video catch up chats, like that’s why we’re here today.
Like it was like a, let’s chat again. Oh, you need a guest for your podcast? I’d love to come on and give value to your audience. Like that’s my favorite thing to do, right? Being able to network and build relationships is really important when it comes to growing a business, let alone growing a YouTube channel. Like one of tips that a lot of creators will tell you about, like how to grow your channel is to collaborate and like, I’ll make a channel, a video for you.
Let’s you make a video, like for me, let’s go in there. Let’s do this together on our stuff. Let’s do a podcast interview, all of that stuff. It’s all collaboration, networking and talking to people. And I don’t care what industry you’re in. I can’t think of a single thing that couldn’t be more successful and more financially lucrative if then like doing something in person, and talking to somebody face to face, eye to eye, not in person necessarily, but building those relationships.
Dane Golden:
And you and I, we’ve talked on podcasts, we’ve talked in person, we’ve sent referrals over time to each other. Sometimes it works out. Sometimes it doesn’t in the end, but you engage and refer and support and lift up other people in your network. So those are five great tips and people should subscribe to The Funded YouTuber right now.
Now, even…
Desiree Martinez:
Connect with me on LinkedIn so we can network.
Dane Golden:
Aha, that’s right, and have her on your podcast. If she will, if she has the time, because she’s a very busy woman. Now. I want to talk about the Cast Agency even though it’s not properly launched. Let’s just give people a thumbnail sketch of what it’s going to be. And we won’t hold you to it if you adjust it as you’re evolving.
Desiree Martinez:
Yeah, no, the Cast Agency is a lot of like what I talked about earlier. So the Cast Agency focuses on a two part marketing strategy for businesses where we focus on, one, ongoing creative first organic marketing. So creative first is like we’re talking, we’re starting with like YouTube videos or podcasts where we’re telling stories and connecting with our audience around problems that we then repurpose and trickle down into online marketing through blogs, through email marketing, through social posts, all of things that you can do and you should be doing very routinely in your strategy.
Dane Golden:
Anyone, everyone needs to be doing this.
Desiree Martinez:
Everyone needs to do it. I don’t care. Mr. Beast needs to do it. Like, everyone needs to do this, because it’s the stuff that just keeps working for you. It’s the stuff that stays super relevant and necessary for ongoing purposes, especially in like the industries that I’m, I target, which are service based ones.
So there’s that ongoing part. And then we support it with CMO services. CMO stands for Chief Marketing Officer. And a lot of companies will maybe have a marketing person or agency that they worked with or whatever, but they’re not anyone that like can manage what needs to be done for their marketing.
And so as part of like a retainer, it’s like, okay, what are the other things that you can be doing to grow your business? And. Because there’s not just one thing. If there’s anything I’ve learned in my seven years on YouTube is that there’s not one way to be successful. There’s not one way to grow.
There’s not one way to do something. A lot of people love blanket statements. I think it’s bull, but it’s just it doesn’t always work the same for everybody. Like what works for some people does not work for me. And it’s just how it is and that’s okay because I’m a unique butterfly in myself. And so, you know, It’s what are the other marketing things that businesses can be doing to help their business.
And this is stuff where it’s like, you know, local stuff, like what does it make? Does it make sense for a business to sponsor, you know, a local chamber event or, you know, the local high school’s baseball team or something? It’s what does direct mail look like for my business? You know, really want to run ads through our busy season, but we don’t, We just want the phone to ring.
We don’t want to figure out how it’s all working and made and tracking and all this stuff. So like, who can we trust to do that? You know, what does LinkedIn look like for my business? What does Pinterest look like for my business? Like, so there’s all these things to figure out and that’s what your marketing manager or your CMO is supposed to be tracking and managing.
And so that’s what we’re offering to businesses.
Dane Golden:
The Cast Agency, now Desiree Martinez. LinkedIn, that’s D-E-S-I-R-E-E M-A-R-T-I-N-E-Z. But we’re not done yet because here’s my bonus question. What is the question I should have asked, but didn’t?
Desiree Martinez:
Oh, that’s the question you should have asked. That’s a really good question. I’m going to steal this one. I think it’s like, what don’t, I said, what don’t I know? I think that it’s, you know, it’s hard really do that. I, you know, it’s, and I think that, here, how about this? The question you didn’t ask is like, what can I be doing that no other YouTuber is doing?
Dane Golden:
Okay. So what can, so I should ask that for my own purpose? Like how can I do it that no one’s doing? Or what, that’s what everyone should be asking.
Desiree Martinez:
So that’s the question to ask me so that your listeners can consider it. So this is what I’m going to say and it’s going to be YouTube ads. I have not tested this, so please do not hold my feet to the fire on this one, but I just did an interview and it comes out, June, two days from now, whatever that is, I don’t know, June 19th, a gentleman named Craig Campbell and he is like an SEO guy.
I met him in. Birmingham, UK, at a conference I was emceeing called TubeFest, and he had this talk where he was talking about how he’s using YouTube to grow his business and get his multiple streams of income and all of the things. When I say I was shook to my core with like, oh my god, really? This is, this could be the option, about using YouTube ads to help revitalize my channel or get the videos I want specifically watched and found by my target audience never occurred to me.
I’m not talking about YouTube ads in the sense of like the things that go at the beginning of videos that most people skip or the things that pop up in the middle. I’m talking about like, Hey, I have this video and I want to target my buyer. Let’s get that video in front of them and I’m going to put ad money behind it to make sure that it gets seen. And he has done this in some really strange ways because he’s like, well, YouTube wants his watch time and what YouTube wants is for people to click on videos. And so for me, who’s have. It’s had this struggle with my YouTube channel. I’m like, could this be how I revive? Cause I could literally reactivate my existing subscriber count, my previous viewers to what I’m doing and be like, cause I have a whole like launch plan in July for my video content that very strategically and specifically promotes what I’m doing with Cast Agency.
And I’m like, I could reactivate my entire YouTube channel. Like, viewer, watch, previous watch audience by putting ad dollars behind it. And like, as a marketer, I’m like, what is wrong with you? Why didn’t you think about this? But it’s a really great way for you to get your content in front of people. And am I saying YouTube is pay to play?
Absolutely not. If you were to watch a big, if you were to talk to big YouTube experts, they would be like, never in a thousand years, it will kill your channel, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. This guy has Just got over a million subscribers on his YouTube channel and his YouTube channel is all about SEO, search engine optimization.
And he is making a seven figure business through affiliates and sponsorships. And he has like an agency that’s very niche and specific. He’s speaking in conferences all over Europe. You know, he’s doing a lot of things and it’s like, and I love what he said about anyone that says. No, don’t do that or whatever.
Remember, this is literally a tool YouTube has given us in the back end of our studio. We have the Promotions tab in our YouTube studio that anyone can access now. Why would they penalize you long term or even now for paying them money to help you get more views on their platform and build the audience that will help you get more views?
And he says go look at their bank accounts and tell me how successful they are…
Dane Golden:
So,
Desiree Martinez:
… and then come look at mine and tell me if what I’m doing is wrong. And I was like, holy bananas, all of the sense has been made to me.
Dane Golden:
This is, potentially agreed this is a service that we offer and do for customers. It’s very easy to do it wrong is the problem. That’s the real problem. It’s not that it’s hard to do it right. It’s very easy to do it wrong and overpay for the wrong thing. But, Desiree, I’m going to do this for you and I’m not going to charge you for it.
I’m going to show you how to do it and then you can, modify it after I’ve showed you the principles. So, just let me know.
Desiree Martinez:
We’ll do it. We’ll do a follow up. We’ll do a follow up podcast. We’ll have the numbers, where I was, what happened, what we did, what it looks like, how, like, we’ll come back in like six months. We’ll come and we’ll like recap this. Okay.
Dane Golden:
I’ll walk you through exactly how to do this. So you just send me a message when you want to do it, when you’re ready.
Desiree Martinez:
We’re talking about this after we’re done with this interview.
Like, don’t think we’re done. Like, just gave me the keys to a kingdom I want access to. Like I said, we’re, so plan on that. And if this, you’re listening to this in like 2025, 2025. Dane’s going to put the link to the new episode in the show notes. It’s like the update of like what happened. So you can come back and do this and see how it happens.
See if it is worth it.
Dane Golden:
Desiree Martinez. How can people find out more about you?
Desiree Martinez:
LinkedIn. LinkedIn is the best place to connect with me, especially if anything that has to do with Creator Economy stuff. It’s linkedin.com/in/MrsDesireeRose, M R S D E S I R E E R O S E or just search for me, Desiree Martinez on there. So I, that’s the best place to connect with me.
Dane Golden:
And you definitely should also subscribe to The Funded YouTuber Podcast, which I listen to all the time from Desiree and GigaStar. And, until next week, here’s to helping you help your customers and viewers through video.