HOW I GOT 55K SUBS: Elle Meadows GREAT BRITISH YOUTUBERS PODCAST 2020 with NEIL MOSSEY 006

NEXT PART 2 EPISODE HERE: https://youtu.be/RWXW0-X371s
How do you niche your YouTube channel?
@ElleMeadows has been uploading for 6 years with 55k subscribers.

My name's Neil Mossey and I help high-achieving creators and performers to make more people happy. The GREAT BRITISH YOUTUBERS PODCAST is to help you keep your YouTube channel going.

HOW I GOT 55K SUBS: Elle Meadows GREAT BRITISH YOUTUBERS PODCAST 2020 with NEIL MOSSEY 006



TRANSCRIPT: (CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE)

Hang on I wasn't recording I just remembered.
This is the Great British Youtubers Podcast with me Neil Mossey - it's great to have you here.
Today we're going to meet Elle Meadows.
Elle has been youtubing for six years and has 55000 subscribers.
Elle Meadows!
Hello! It is I!

THIS IS THE TRANSCRIPT - CLICK PLAY ON THE VIDEO ABOVE!

This, this is slightly awkward because I feel like I'm going into our interviewer mode but we've actually worked together before haven't we?
We have indeed!
On the, the BBC Earth Kids Youtube channel.
Yep.

You were brilliant because you, you brought your dog - Frank.
You were so good that this pilot actually went out.
The, the BBC actually put the pilot out.
Which is crazy because that never happens!
You have 55000 subscribers.
I do.
Uh 3.3 million views.
Indeed.
You are so far ahead on this journey that I can only gaze from the distance!
What is your biggest tip for someone starting Youtube?
Find your niche.
A hundred percent.

Like there was a time and a place for like people chatting at a camera, and youtube was very oriented around personalities, and if you were personable and people liked you then you could get away with just doing pretty much whatever and they tune in for you.
So that was kind of what the world was like when I started my channel and whereas these days Youtube is a lot more about like niches and specialities and you can't appeal to everyone anymore.

Like you can't say, like oh I want to appeal to girls between 15 and 30 like... you have to be like i'm targeting 11 and 12 year olds who are specifically interested in this specific toy and like, you do really have to be specific these days.
And then obviously once you've kind of gained a bit of a following you can diversify and branch out but yeah knowing your niche which is like the biggest thing I'm struggling with at the moment is definitely the way to get started.
What is the struggle?

I made scripted comedy for teens and - teen and tween girls and at the time because I was like 18, 19 when it kind of like picked up pace I didn't really realize that I had fallen into that specific market in that specific niche but that was what helped me gain momentum because I was actually without realizing it appealing to a very small group of people of which there are many.
Even though that's a very small niche there's a lot of people who fall within it.

But these days I don't want to produce content for teen and tween girls.

I want to be like growing up, aging up, making comedy that I would want to watch but unfortunately there isn't so much of a market for that because I fall into a huge demographic which is just 18 to 45 or something...
or 18 to 50 is generally like I'm kind of just in adulthood now and yeah...
being funny and appealing to those people's not specific enough to really gain any traction um unless you somehow manage to create like a viral video.

I, I want to ask you so much about your journey on Youtube but can I just ask you just out the back just so we get to know you what is your favourite video on your channel?
I did a video about lgbt labels - so talking all about how like labels are just language and language can fail you when it comes to labeling yourself and talking about spectrums like versus categorization and that's probably my favourite just because it's the most meaningful and helpful and like genuinely there's a reason for it to be made that isn't just like escapism or entertainment.
But aside from that... I mean my most recent video is one i'm really proud of which is me playing loads of different characters on like zoom.
Should we spread some more love?
Yeah
Are there three youtubers, three random youtubers that you've watched this week can we go through them for like a minute?
Yes I have been binge watching Jenna Marbles and I said...
I like started saying that sentence with a really happy face and then I have just remembered why exactly I started watching loads of Jenna Marbles um because obviously she's sort of stepped away from her main channel.
Have you, I assume you've heard about this?
I've heard and I've, I've not watched.

It's basically just for anyone who missed it uh Jenna Marbles is like the something like the second biggest female youtuber on youtube, and she was like just og Youtuber gang and she stepped away from her channel because in the past she's made some uh what can be considered like offensive content, um that she is not like proud of and doesn't want to associate herself with so she stepped away and
I have to say like there's been a lot of like you know over the years there have been plenty of youtuber apologies, but she's one of the few youtubers where I've watched the video and been like "fair play!"
Like this is real, you can tell that they're actually what she really thinks and being honest and truthful and taking responsibility...
And that's, that's the minute fantastic!

Is there another youtuber that you've watched this week at random?

So I can't pronounce it because it's German I think but "In A Nutshell" or like a science channel that they do all these like animated videos explaining lots of things about science and some other things um
And I babysit some kids and I was trying to explain to them about like they were doing threats to humanity in RE, and I was showing them videos about like Chernobyl or Chernobyl and like solar flares and all these kinds of technology... artificial intelligence videos...

And I love it because it's really informative but also it's nice to be able to show the kids something that's like actually interesting - learning like interesting education...

And finally let's spread the the love for for one more youtuber?
I like Buzzfeed Unsolved maybe watched a few of those this week...
Did you say bustly when soft?
No!
Buzzfeed unsolved!

My favorite episode of buzzfeed unsolved is the goatman bridge episode so basically you've got these two chaps going to haunted places and trying to communicate with ghosts and demons and stuff and they go to this bridge in - I want to say Texas but i'm not sure.
Yeah they go to this bridge and try and communicate with the devil and it's very entertaining.
Those those are wonderful thank you.

I feel like we've got a little uh portal into your youtube brain there.
When did you know that your channel was a thing?

I started making like videos and short films when I was really young so I was about eight that's when I started learning to like edit.
So for a long time and still currently editing it's my strongest skill, um and so I was making all these videos and I was like I don't know what to do with them, what's the point?
Discovered youtube.

Grace Helbig who at the time was dailygrace was like my absolute like inspiration for my channel and so I just started posting them on my channel around 2013 and then maybe even earlier than that, 2012 - and then I made another channel which is my current channel.
And it was then when I became friends with Alexis G. Zall - who is like a big American youtuber now and at the time she had like something like 20, 20000 followers and I just like reached out to her and made her some like graphics and stuff and she gave me a shout out in exchange and then we became quite good friends and yeah.
That was kind of the point, that was how I got my first thousand subscribers, was just off her because between me sort of meeting her and her giving me a shout out in a video she'd become really close to Shane Dawson so she'd gone from 20000 subscribers to like 200000 subscribers or something crazy.

Yeah, I got my first thousand subscribers just from that one shout out and that was kind of like the push I needed to like really commit.

You just shared a really great tip there the, the life lesson which is that reaching out to someone and offering to help them brought back something disproportionate

Yeah for sure like again I feel I wonder how relevant this is these days because it's just youtube is a different ball game, and again like back then everything was personality oriented and I would, I would have encouraged like collaboration over doing what I did because I had a skill that I could essentially give away in return for exposure which is something that we don't support these days, but back when I was like 17... like it was fine so yeah, like your best bet is to collaborate with people who have a similar audience to you and are about the same size because you never know who's going to randomly blow up.

If only also to I guess improve your own skills and, and not go nuts while you're making these things by yourself?

Yes. The thing that really got to me with youtube was how time-consuming and like just genuinely grueling it is to make it's really hard and you're doing it all by yourself and I basically didn't have weekends for sort of all of my like ages 17, 18, 19 like I would go to school come back work on a video.
I wouldn't stop over the weekend I wouldn't see friends because I was just like working all the time and so if especially if you're just starting out and you have a full-time job as well it's just really hard work and you like won't see anyone.
You have to really commit if you want to do kind of the one weekly, two weekly videos, it's tough.
What kept you going through, through that time?

I was quite lucky that every time I posted a video there would be a reward so you know because I had these first thousand subscribers it kind of like set me off on like a burst and then I went to like, got to know a lot of other youtubers and just so happened that I was getting able to like go and go to conventions or then I'd like meet someone and they'd give me a shout out or I'd be in that video, and then I get a load of subscribers and like that was just kind of in a very lucky like string of events just lots of little wins and like successes that kept me like striving for the next one.
So it didn't matter that I was working seven days a week and then like full-- you know full-time education and working every spare second I had because you know every month or so I was doing something that I was like yes!
And like then I started interviewing celebrities and that was another thing that made me go like yes!

And then yeah they go to and then eventually you end up going to conventions and having friends there is just so much like reward in it but yeah if I hadn't had that like now for example when I have less engagement posting content is just kind of hard work without much reward and it's a lot harder because you have to just be able to, the reward is congratulating yourself for making something that you're proud of.

And please hit the subscribe button if you want to see more Great British YouTubers.
There's a playlist and a podcast. All the links are in the description below.
I'm Neil Mossey and I'll see you on the very next episode of Great British YouTubers.


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