5 things I learned from YouTuber Ali Abdaal

on the Creative Elements podcast

A new session of Audience by Design begins on May 31. If you’d like to learn more about how it could help you to build a bigger and better audience for your work, now is the best time to apply.

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Basically you just need 3 things to change your life.

1. Create useful content

2. Post it once a week

3. Do that for two years.

If you do that, I can 100% guarantee that your life will change in ways you can't imagine.

— Ali Abdaal

YouTuber Ali Abdaal (1.75M subscribers) shared a number of really useful tips on the Creative Elements podcast with Jay Clouse which I think are worth sharing with anyone looking to build an audience and share their creative work.

1. You need to get your reps in.
   Abdaal began his YouTube channel with the mindset that it would take him the first 100 videos to learn what he was doing, and acquire a basic level of mastery. So he set about making those 100 videos as quickly as he could manage (he was still studying medicine at Cambridge University at this time). He would produce 1 - 3 videos a week, learning and making improvements to his workflow, presentation and content.
   
   

2. Don't expect to be an overnight success for the first two years.
   If you are starting from scratch at a skill that you intend to get good at, you should expect that to take about two years from when you start. Beginning with the two-year timeframe in mind allows you to give yourself "permission to suck" at first, knowing that you'll get better over time. It means you shouldn't expect (or want) too many eyeballs/earballs on your work at the beginning. The best time to get a spike in traffic, someone (more) famous to promote you to their audience, or to ‘go viral’ is when you've got a decent body of good work for the hordes to discover when they descend upon your site/channel etc.
   
   

3. Start your newsletter from day one.
   Ali admitted that if he had his time over again, he would take his blog and newsletter more seriously from day one. The same creative energy he dedicated to his videos could also produce written content that he could share via these other platforms.
   
   

4. Documenting, not creating.
   Ali references Gary Vee who preaches documenting what you do, rather than putting pressure on yourself to be the expert.
   
   Ali will often title his videos "How I..." rather than "How to..."
   
   In Audience by Design, a common question is "Why would anyone care about what I have to say?" When you position yourself as someone who is on a journey and document your process/progress, you become relatable. We're all on a journey from where we are now to where we want to be.
   
   This is also a great lesson from Austin Kleon's book Show Your Work. He says "Think Process, not Product" and "Become a Documentarian of What You Do."
   

   "Audiences not only want to stumble across great work, but they, too, long to be creative and part of the creative process. By letting go of our egos and sharing our process, we allow for the possibility of people having an ongoing connection with us and our work, which helps us move more of our product." — Austin Kleon

5. You and your audience will both evolve over time.
   Ali began his YouTube channel vlogging his experiences as a medical student. As he progressed he found other topics he wanted to share with his audience, and he learned what they liked to watch. He didn't (and couldn't) have known when he began his channel in 2017 how it would look in 2021, but he and his audience have grown together. You and your audience can do the same.

Jay Clouse, the host of Creative Elements was a guest on my podcast Studio Time last year. His episode, "Commitment, Creatives and Community" is worth a listen.