After spending a week studying the top 1% of YouTubers, I noticed they all have something in common. Not in their skill set or even in their strategy, but in what they do between videos. These tiny actions that compound in the background until their success simply becomes [music] inevitable.
So, in this video, we're breaking down these seven top habits of 1% creators [music] and how you can use them to transform your own channel. And it all starts with habit number one, the 10-minute rule. Now, this is a strategy that comes from top YouTuber Ryan Trahan and it's his secret to coming up with some of the most novel and interesting video ideas on the platform.
Just listen to what he did in the middle of a conversation with fellow YouTubers Colin and Samir. And we were talking and we were just like talking about whatever, catching up on life and like an alarm went off on his phone and he was like, "Oh, hold on 1 sec. I'll see you guys in 10 minutes.
" Just put on his headphones and just took to his phone. 10 minutes later, he took out his headphones. He was like, "Yeah, so what were we talking about?
" I was like, "What was that? " And he was like, "Oh, every single day I brainstorm 10 new ideas. " Ryan doesn't just wait and hope for a good video idea to come to him every time he sits down to make [music] a video.
Instead, he's highly disciplined in coming up with and collecting new video ideas every single day. [music] And the beauty of this practice is that not every idea needs to be a good idea in order for it to work. Think of it this [music] way.
If you do this daily for a year, that's 3,650 ideas. And even if 99% of these ideas are garbage, that's [music] still 36 ideas with banger potential. Ideas that you wouldn't have come up with otherwise.
So, to ideate like the top 1%, start a new note on your phone's note app, set a daily recurring alarm for 10 minutes of ideation, and jot down 10 new video ideas per day. Because in a world where all it takes is just one banger video to blow up a channel, good ideas are as good as gold. Habit number two is the mirror method.
Now, I first heard about this habit from Stokes Twins, but when I mentioned it to a couple friends who work with Mr Beast and the Sidemen, it turns out they've already been doing this for years. So, it looks like this is one of those things that no one ever talks about, but that every top creator does in some way. Take a look.
I have an account on YouTube where I'm just obviously I have like six different accounts. One is like where I watch sports, another account where I just watch games, um and obviously one account where I just only keep up with like watch YouTube videos, keep up with like other creators. So, from there I'm kind of my homepage, I'm really able to see like what YouTube is recommending me, right?
Where YouTube is kind of serving me up, hey, this is what I think you'll watch, where I'm one of my own viewers. This is how you can turn YouTube into your own dedicated research tool. Because if you just browse YouTube normally, you're only seeing what you like, which in my case is typically some combination of lo-fi, gaming, and Among Us videos.
But by creating a separate account that's trained on what your ideal viewer would watch, you can at [music] any point have a live snapshot of what's trending in your niche. This practice is how the Stokes Twins became some of the best in the world at identifying trends early and capitalizing upon them. And all you need to do to do the same is to create a second YouTube account, watch a few videos from creators you think your ideal viewer would also watch.
When in doubt, check the what your audience watches cards in YouTube Studio. And then just spend 30 minutes a week browsing through that channel, paying attention to what YouTube recommends both in the homepage and the suggested panel. To take it one step further, you could also create separate mirror accounts for tangential or related niches.
And then see if you can notice any patterns popping up across niches as well. Over time, those 30 minutes a week will start to add up. And it's one of the best habits you can adopt to develop your creative intuition and stay tapped into what popular videos are most relevant to you.
Habit number three is the green light checklist. And this habit doesn't come from any one particular YouTuber because it's something that nearly every top 1% creator has in common, a specific process for moving forward with or green-lighting every idea they decide to make. We think a lot before we green-light a video.
We have kind of a long vetting process for green-lighting. The actual checklist that I think about before green-lighting a story involves three things. The best creators in the world know that what you decide to make is just as important as how you end up making it, which is why each of them have their own set of boxes to check every time they evaluate a video idea.
[clears throat] For Cleo Abram, these boxes are, is it genuinely visual? Is it a genuinely good explanation? And is it a genuinely optimistic story?
Mark Rober asks whether or not he can explain the idea with only one to three sentences. Zach King looks for ideas that will still make sense in 10 to 20 years from now. Airrack filters every idea through his one-word brand filter of mischief.
And nearly every top 1% YouTuber considers whether or not the idea can be communicated in a clear visual image and a simple title. But out of all the potential green-light criteria, there's one in particular that is the most effective in filtering out video ideas that were doomed to fail from the very start. I'll leave it to Nick DiGiovanni to explain.
But it comes down to a deep dive on you know, has this been done before and how did it do? I think that's always important to look at. Not to say that you can't take a concept that has been done before and not make it better, but if people aren't interested in something, there's sometimes where it's just like this may not be worth our time.
Before investing days, weeks, or even months into a video, many of the top YouTubers first validate that similar concepts have performed well in the past. Now, you can run the search manually, searching for related topics, clicking into every channel, locating the video on the channel page, and comparing the views of that video to the views of the surrounding videos to check whether or not they're higher than average. But to save time, many of the top YouTubers prefer using a tool specifically designed to find over-performing videos for you, which brings us to the sponsor of today's video, One of Ten.
With One of Ten, finding related top-performing videos is as easy as simply searching for it. Just set the outlier index to two and the views to a minimum of 100K, and One of Ten will instantly surface any relevant videos that have over-performed on YouTube. I mostly use One of Ten for validation, checking which ones have a proven track record before I commit to making them.
But one of my favorite features is the title generator. You can type in what your video is about and get dozens of title ideas that are each validated by videos that have already done well. I was able to get you guys a discount code if you want to try it out, so I'll put a link to that in the video description below.
Thank you so, so much to One of Ten for sponsoring this video. So, to build your own green-light checklist, start by thinking about your creative identity. Airrack has mischievous.
Cleo has optimistic. If you had to describe your channel ethos or lens in just one word, what would that word be? Next, take a look at your best-performing videos.
Why did they work? What traits or characteristics did they share? And finally, consider what other top 1% criteria you want to adopt into your own process.
What filters make the most sense for the type of videos you want to make? Try to aim for around three to five total criteria on your list. With your final personalized green-light checklist set, just spend 5 minutes running a new idea through your list before committing to it and you'll be ideating like the pros in no time.
Habit number four is the learning hour. This next habit is the one that's by far the most important and yet also the most overlooked. I'll leave it to Mr Beast to introduce it.
You just have to have a never-ending thirst for learning. Like, that's very imperative, especially if you want like if you want to get on top and then stay on top. The only way to do it is just to constantly be learning.
Or someone who is learning is just going to yeah, I'll have a leg up on you in the knowledge game. The best YouTubers in the world simply never stop learning. A bit obvious, I know, but it's one of those things that's deceptively tricky to actually put into practice.
Because the busier we get, the easier it is to spend all of our time on the act of actually making videos. [music] And if we ever fall behind, any extra time spent learning is usually one of the [music] very first things to go. But what separates the top 1% of YouTubers from the rest of us is that they prioritize learning even when they get busy.
>> [music] >> And this learning can come in all different shapes and sizes. Michelle Khare studies documentaries, Cody Sanchez analyzes email copy, Preston Goes reads books on screenwriting, Mr Beast even used to go on a walk every day just to call someone up and ask them to teach him something new. And while you don't have to start demanding lectures from everyone that you know, it's worth being intentional in protecting just one hour a week for dedicated learning.
Maybe that comes from studying traditional media. Maybe comes from watching YouTube videos just like you're doing right now. But to evaluate whether or not you're actually pushing yourself hard enough, follow this simple test.
Every 6 months you should look back and hate your videos or at least see things you can improve and be like, "Oh, I could have done this better, that better. " If not, then you're not learning quick enough. Habit number five is the 1% rule.
You see, learning, while incredibly important, is only one half of the equation. Because all the YouTube knowledge in the world doesn't matter if you don't actually apply that knowledge, which is why the best creators in the world are masters at implementation. Just take it from top 1% YouTuber Matt Pat.
Each video is an opportunity to experiment and to achieve something new with your channel and it's an opportunity to learn. And that over the course of 13 years, we have done that over and over and over again, week over week over week over week, 44 videos a week or whatever for the month. The top 1% of creators treat every upload like an experiment, testing something new each and every time.
But while it may be tempting to try to reinvent your entire channel with every video, especially if you're learning a lot all at once, these incremental improvements are actually most effective if they're done gradually, one change at a time. Mr Beast lays down one potential model here. The second one, just I don't know, put more effort into the script.
The third one, try to learn a new editing trick. The fourth one, try to figure out a way that you can have better inflections in your voice. The fifth one, try to you know, study a new thumbnail tip and implement it.
The sixth one, try to figure out a new title. There's infinite ways. That's the beauty of content creation online.
There's literally infinite ways. From the coloring to the frame rate to the editing to the filming to the production to the jokes to the pacing to every little thing can be improved and they can never not be improved. There's no There's literally no such thing as a perfect video.
Each individual change may be small, but when they're done consistently over time, week after week, and video after video, those 1% improvements compound. So, before every video you make, take just 5 minutes to write down the single scalar element you want to focus on improving. It's a simple thing, but it forces intention, and that intention is what turns just learning in the background into [music] actual growth.
Habit number six is the post-video reflection. For most of us, pressing publish feels like the finish line. But, the best YouTubers in the world are just as intentional coming out of their videos as they are going into them.
Top YouTuber Mr Who's the Boss describes his own post-upload ritual here. So, 2 days after it's gone live, I'll kind of I'll spend a good half an hour just going through it being like, "What countries did this hit? How long did those people stay on for?
When did the majority drop off? Was there a significant spike or a significant dip? Did certain parts make people go back?
" Um things like that. This is the final piece of the creative feedback loop. You learn something new, you apply it to your next video through an experiment or 1% improvement, and then you evaluate what the impact of that experiment or improvement was, before repeating the cycle all over again with the next video.
Without this evaluation, you don't know the changes you're making are actually helping. More reps and iterations only matter if you're collecting signal from each one. Now, each 1% YouTuber has their own set of questions they ask when conducting their post-video reflection.
I'll put some common ones up on screen for you to reference. But, to create a custom post-video reflection of your own, choose three to five questions that best represent how you want to evaluate the success of [music] a video, and build them into a template. Then, 2 days after each video goes live, spend 30 minutes filling it out, and use those answers to inform the focus of your next learning hour or 1% improvement.
And finally, the last shared habit of the top 1% of YouTubers is the weekly DM. And if there's one habit that you're probably not doing right now, that has the greatest chance of completely changing the trajectory of your channel, it's this one. When you look behind the scenes of the biggest creators in the world, none of them are doing it alone.
Ryan Trahan, Michelle Khare, and Airrack all have think tanks where a group of YouTube friends spitball ideas and talk about YouTube as a whole. Nick DiGiovanni frequently reaches out to others for collaboration opportunities. And every time Mr Beast is asked in interviews what contributed most to his success, he always mentions his creator friend group.
And I wouldn't be where I am today if it wasn't for them. Um and just all along the way, the friends that I hung out with had such a dramatic impact on on where I am. Like, I I'd probably have 80 million less subscribers, you know, if it was if I wasn't so strategic about hanging out with people that I add value to and they also add value to me.
If you're the only person you know who does YouTube, you're not alone, but the only way to change that is through taking action. And that action doesn't have to be hours and hours of time. Just spend 10 minutes sending one DM a week to a creator peer, someone around the same stage as you in their journey whose work you genuinely respect.
[music] And it doesn't need to be anything formal or forced. You could compliment something specific in their latest video, send a few words of encouragement, or even suggest a small idea to collaborate on. Not everyone will respond, and that's okay.
[music] That's why this is a weekly habit. One DM a week means you have 52 chances a year to make a new friend, [music] and all it takes is one meaningful connection to completely change the trajectory of your channel. So, send the DM.
And while you're at it, spend the 10 minutes a day brainstorming new ideas, 30 minutes a week browsing your mirror account, 5 minutes a week running your ideas through a greenlight checklist, 1 hour a week learning, 5 minutes a week setting 1% improvement goals, and 30 minutes a week evaluating your videos. All together, that's just 3 and 1/2 hours a week. Just 30 minutes a day.
That's it. And if that still feels overwhelming, just start with one habit, just 10 minutes a week, and then add one new habit each week as you continue to build momentum. To help you out, I even made you a free habit tracker you can use to help stay on track and measure your progress.
I'll put a link to grab it for free in the video description below. Let me know in the comments below which of these habits you're most excited to try. But, otherwise, thank you so much for watching.
Like and subscribe if you can. This is your sign to keep creating, and I will see you in the next video. This month's featured creator is The Geek Effect.
He's doing some very cool things with action figures. The production value of his videos is so high quality and incredibly easy to watch. [music] If you have a second, go check out one of his videos and leave a nice comment.
Let's create a community that helps lift each other up. Here are the rules to be chosen for next month's featured creator. Each featured creator is participating in the 90-day YouTube challenge.
And if you want to join in, just watch this video to learn about the challenge, and then post your video using #aprilin'schallenge.
