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The Level Up Creators podcast is for digital creators ready to take their business to the next level. You'll learn valuable strategies and hear engaging stories from industry pros and digital creators who have walked the path of scaling up.
Whether you're tired of tap dancing for the algorithm or seeking to build real wealth - without the burnout - this podcast offers proven methods and practical advice to help you elevate your business, on your terms. Join us!
Amanda (00:00)
Hello, you're listening to the Level Up Creators podcast, Amanda Northcutt here, founder and CEO. We help creators and digital thought leaders like you turn your knowledge and experience into rock solid recurring revenue. And we are so glad you're here. Welcome. Today, my amazing guest is the short form video king himself, Mr. Yassin
You probably know Yassin from Instagram, TikTok or LinkedIn, where he sports a formidable audience of almost a million followers. Yassin is a consultant to a handful of globally recognizable brands, has a wildly popular digital course, a thriving membership community and a small group coaching program, all to the end of helping other creators grow their accounts exponentially through the implementation of his short form video methodology. And Yassin has a pretty formidable backstory as well as an all around amazing human.
an insane musician, look him up on YouTube and singer. And I hear he's got a pretty sick basketball game as well. And Yassin is joining me today from London, England. Welcome, Yassin.
Yasin (00:56)
It's a pleasure to be here.
Amanda (00:59)
I am so excited to have this conversation with you. I've been looking forward to it. We've been trying to get it on the calendar for a couple of months. And I'm so pumped for you to share the wealth of knowledge, experience you have and kindness, honestly. So I can't wait to unpack everything we have in store for our listeners today. Let's get into it. So I want to preface my first question with a little observation. So a single commonality between the successful creators I know best and it's this.
their creator business and lifestyle were actually born out of some of the most difficult circumstances of their lives, like a family tragedy, a professional setback, a public failure, an illness, which brought them to like a fork in the road, right? Where they had to make a decision. Do I stay on the straight and narrow path? The one that everyone expects me to be on? The one I've always been told I should go down or do I take a left turn here into the unknown because I cannot, I simply cannot go back to the way that things were.
So with that in mind, could we start with you sharing a little bit more about yourself, your background, and your winding road journey to becoming a very successful content creator and entrepreneur?
Yasin (02:07)
Sure. This is a hard question to answer because my journey is extremely meandering. But yeah, I used to be a musician and for a short while was a semi -professional runner and the music stopped because I got nodules, so vocal damage. The running stopped because I got hit by a car while I was cycling and my knee got bust.
And so my twenties were a slow decline down towards rock bottom as I like grappled with reality and just kept trying to do the things I wanted to do and just wasn't able to do. And eventually became homeless in my like mid to mid late twenties.
And I suppose that that was a learning moment for me because up until then I was all creative. Like I was very much like, it's all about the art, very Rick Rubin -esque, like make it and they will come and that kind of thing. And then I think what that taught me was like...
No, actually, there's like realities in the world that exists that outside of our like romantic view of what it should be like. I would say that was a massive driving force for trying to understand the underlying things beneath creativity, storytelling, content creation, marketing in general, to just create more of a sense of control over
the art that I wanted to produce and that's basically what I'm trying to do is like create educational content that is artful, that is soulful, but that also gets results and I think that underpinning stems from that time of my life where like I've seen the other side, know, where people that side where people say just like do what you want and like it should come from the soul and you know pull from the muse and all of this stuff.
I see that and where it can or at least where it led me was like not to a good place. So I now try and bring the two together, marry the art and the science and it's worked well for me and it's worked well for many of my students as well when they're able to like, yeah, dance between those two poles.
Amanda (04:53)
That's such an incredible story and one that not too many people who have achieved your level of success now had. We're going to dig into your story a little bit more and your learnings from that that you're applying like you were just talking about a little bit later in the interview. But I know you to be a very humble and genuinely kind, caring person. But I'm also wondering, did
Any of these major professional milestones and achievements that you've hit more recently seem inevitable to you at some point or are you still kind of pinching yourself?
Yasin (05:28)
I'm extremely competitive, so I would say some aspect of me thought it was inevitable.
I also think humans are very complicated and you can have one human house two separately conflicting beliefs. And so I would say that's the case here in that like some aspect of me is like, hey, if anyone can do it, I can do it. And then another aspect that's ever present every day I hear it is the like, hey, maybe you don't have what it takes. Like maybe you should give up. Even now, like, I still think that on a daily or weekly basis, like, maybe I'm not
enough. Maybe I won't get to where I want to go, that kind of, or maybe I'll lose it all. So yeah, I would say there's a bit of both, but if I'm humble, it's because I've been humbled, like, and in some ways that's a good thing,
I admire people that are humble and I especially admire people that have skill and are still humble. That don't, I think it's quite egotistical to think that you like decided to be skilled, you know. I think a lot of this is like luck based, like what were you, what are your genetics? Like your IQ, your ability to work hard. This is all like preordained given to you by your parents.
where did you grow up and what was your social circle like as a child these things influence you in massive ways and then even things like what happens to you as you age like my homelessness has definitely driven me in a way that I wouldn't have been driven if it didn't happen so yeah I
I feel like that experience humbled me, but I also like being in servitude of others is like a, it's a very powerful thought to me. It like really drives me. Like if there's a romance to me, it's in that like, how can I be of service to others? And to do that, you have to humble yourself. You have to be wrong more than you're right. Cause like, you know, it's about what the customer wants, not what you think. So yeah.
Amanda (07:54)
Yeah, a lot of good takeaways to be had there for sure. So did you set out sharing content online thinking that this is the direction that things go or did you start sharing and then have more of a light bulb moment that was like, hey, I can make a business out of this online community of followers I've built.
Yasin (08:12)
Yeah, it was definitely tentative at first. I actually started a different account. It was like a philosophy account. And I got that to about 30K. And then I was like, I don't know how I'm going to monetize this. I definitely, I'd been in and around social media for a long time. I'd grown social accounts for startups and big brands along the way in different, different shapes and forms.
And it felt like a moment in time that was high leverage. So Naval Revakan talks about how there's like four forms of leverage. Code, money or capital, think he calls it. Human resources and then media. And I studied computer science, but I hate coding. So it couldn't be that for me. And I didn't have capital.
and or human resources other than myself. So media was like the obvious one and it makes a lot of sense to me right like especially now where you have short form video where even LinkedIn and Twitter are now prioritizing short form video content. So you can post or you create one piece of short form content and then post it across.
six, seven platforms. That's like extremely high leverage. This is not even factoring in Reddit and other places that you might be able to post a short form piece of content. So it just seemed like the most obvious way for me to grow and to grow a business was with social media. So that's why I chose that.
Amanda (10:02)
I love that. And I love that you're so intentional about identifying the form of leverage that was most available readily available to you. obviously, yeah, media is and that is what has changed the economy and the landscape of what it means to be famous and to be able to get in front of big companies and get people's attention. mean, social media has just completely turned our entire society on its head in many ways. And that's certainly one of them. So I think that's cool that you did set out with some degree of intention knowing that was
one of four points of leverage that you could use. So that's cool. I did not know that. And do you remember what were the first steps you took toward monetizing your audience? Was it brand deals?
Yasin (10:44)
No, it was one -to -one calls. So when I first started it, it wasn't social growth. was like copywriting, marketing, advertising, branding stuff. It was an agency. So I hadn't planned on, I had planned on monetizing at some point, but I grew much faster than I thought I would. And I was actually on holiday in France.
And I think I was 26 days into my first, like, was my first 26 days on TikTok with the marketing account and I'd hit 20 something thousand followers. And by the end of the month I'd hit 30 ,000, but I was like, then scrambling to like, take the attention I'd already captured and turn it into revenue whilst I was on holiday. So my partner was not super happy.
because we've come from a super intense work period and I'd promised that I wouldn't be working. But yeah, so I did some one -to -one calls and some consultancy copywriting stuff, ransom branding stuff, like a bit of a mix.
Amanda (11:59)
Cool, so explain the transition then from more marking to short form video.
Yasin (12:07)
Yeah, so I started the business like all in full time in January 2022 and I didn't make any money January 2022. I actually that 30 day challenge that I'd set myself at the start had burned me out and I didn't post after that for like three, four months. And so I didn't make any money. And then I was actually worried that I wouldn't be able to pay rent in February.
and then I started posting and then I got some, deals through the door and I was juggled. started then February was actually a very good month. So was March and I kept building and it grew it quite quickly, but it was just me. I have ADHD and was instead of, I'd come from having one boss with the startup as working with.
to having like 10, 12 bosses with ADHD. So it was like my nightmare. And so I was waking up like in cold sweat and my heart was just like pounding the whole day. I didn't enjoy a single moment through the day. It was just like so hyper stressful for me. But I carried on until May.
And I carried on till May because I was in this painful spot where I was so scared of having another January where I made no money that I was taking on too many clients, which meant I didn't have the time to hire. Anyway, so was this kind of vicious cycle. I spoke to a few mentors, eight -figure, nine -figure business owners, so I respected their opinion. And I was like, hey, look, I've started...
Amanda (13:51)
Yeah.
Yasin (14:01)
learning a lot about social growth in order to get clients for my marketing agency. And I've started these masterminds with different creators. And since I started them, I've started growing way faster and I'm having a lot of fun with it. And so I'm thinking I could just like chuck the agency in the bin and do social growth stuff instead and like have a community.
It's way more like aligned with my strengths because there's no deadlines. I do have to interact with all these different creators, but
the exact times and days, it doesn't matter so much. And I had a lot more fun doing it and it was done with you rather than for you. So there was all these like differences in the structure of the business that seemed really appealing to me. And they all said, all three of them within the space of like three days were like, this is a dumb idea. You have a business, I think the business would have done about maybe like a hundred K in the first year.
They were like, it's working. Most businesses don't hit 100K in the first year. Do not chuck this. So I remember going to a friend's birthday. My girlfriend actually dragged me because I was like, I can't go. I'm like, I'm depressed. And she dragged me and then that friend was like, hey, how are you doing? And I just, I couldn't help but go, this horrible thing's happened. All my mentors have told me not to start a dream business.
Yeah, and then a few days later I was like, you know, screw it, I'm just gonna do it anyway. And so I ended stuff with all the clients that closed things out and started the community and started transitioning my content from talking about marketing and copywriting to talking about social growth. So it was a slow transition and for a while there was an overlap. So I would try and find the Venn diagram.
between those two subjects, which it's not that hard. They're both marketing. So there is a lot of overlap, but just trying to be conscious of, okay, I have 80 ,000 followers. How do I transition in a way that it's not disruptive to them? So I did that. then, yeah, May, I made maybe $35 or something. And then June was not that much better. And then it started building quite quickly after that. Yeah.
Amanda (16:33)
What a roller coaster. I mean, talking about January of 2022, that was just 18 months ago. This is July of 24. And so that was, oh, no, sorry, the beginning of 2022, not the end. Right. Okay. So it's been two and a half years, right? Okay. That's still quite quick to start an agency, sunset it, pivot successfully, transition an audience.
Yasin (16:53)
I think it's been 18 months. Hasn't it? 18 months.
Amanda (16:59)
You said, sorry, you said the beginning or the end of 2022?
Yasin (17:04)
Sorry, start of 2023, my bad. It's been 20 something months since I started the account and then 18 since I've been full in the business.
Amanda (17:07)
Okay, so yes, you're.
Okay, that's friggin' fast to go through all of those transitions to be taking advice from mentors who are wildly successful. You said eight and nine figure business owners, but I'm willing to bet that social media did not necessarily play a role in their business success and is that fair? Yeah, so you're bringing something to them that's completely foreign, not part of their playbook at all, so I can totally understand their hesitation and wanting you to bet on the sure thing.
Yasin (17:35)
Yes.
Amanda (17:47)
But this is what kind of we were talking about this like fork in the road and actually didn't know this about your story before this recording. But the fork in the road I was talking about kind of at the beginning of the episode where there's, you know, I should do this and everyone's telling me I need to do this. And like, this is the path. This is the tried and true path. It's like already been blazed. You know, all the barriers are down, but you're looking over
and you know that your heart is pulling you toward that. That's what you're meant to do, that's what you want to do, that's what gives you joy, what makes you want to actually get up and go to work in the morning as opposed to feeling like you're going to have a heart attack. And so I have mad respect that you took a massive risk, chucked the safe thing, went in on your own without a team or just like, I'm going for it. So I love the competitiveness, sort of coming in from your athletic career and you have such an internal motivation and drive.
So this is all kind of coming together for me in terms of like how you got to where you are after a relatively like quick stint. I mean, once you figured out what you wanted to do, it was like head down and then you are just motoring toward massive success. I think we've only begun to see what you're bringing to the table here, Yasin and the business that you're building. So kudos to you for going with your gut. And that's the cool thing about the creator economy, right? And this is what you're helping other people do too, which is what I love so much.
So what were the, yeah, what were some of the most important lessons that you learned? Like if you were to look back just about what happened in 2023, what were your top learnings from that year?
Yasin (19:07)
Yeah, thank you.
Know thyself, I think is like a huge lesson for business and for life. Like, you have to set yourself up for success. And so a good business for one person is a terrible business for another person. And I was kind of playing this playbook that wasn't meant for me. And that's why it was causing me so much friction. And it's easy to feel
the story I was telling myself at the time was, you're just not meant for business. And, you know, if I'd listened to those mentors, that's the belief that I would have held is like, I'm just not good at business, I'm meant to be an employee. But there's different people and they will thrive in different environments and die in other environments. And so
really understanding yourself and your strengths and weaknesses and then finding an environment where your strengths are maximized and your weaknesses are minimized is huge. That's a big lesson and something I am constantly reminded of. And anytime I forget it, it costs me, you know, like in terms of another example, I was doing my accountants, doing my taxes myself.
And then the month I gave them to an accountant to do, my business doubled and then doubled the month after that. And it's because the things that don't bring you joy, this doesn't mean that you should never do anything. You're still a business owner. You have to do stuff that you don't always enjoy. But when you do a lot of things that don't bring you joy, it drains you. so
you just do way less and you're not good at it. Like I could have spent hours taking tax courses and things like that. That's a poor use of my time because there's someone out there who from the get -go is like, taxes, I love them. And that was just never me. whereas like social growth, marketing, storytelling, film, TV, education, these things like really
Amanda (21:25)
Ha ha.
Yasin (21:37)
motivate me and light me up. And so rather than trying to be all things, try and just be the things you're good at. And as soon as you possibly can, I think, hire away the stuff that drains you and that you're bad at because it will just cost you time and health and peace of mind.
Amanda (21:58)
Yes.
I love that. Those are great takeaways. And yeah, that aligns with this 80 % rule that we teach, try and spend 80 % of the time in your business doing the things that the highest leverage activities, right? The things that only you can do. Everybody's got to do the 20 % of crap that we all hate, but that's where you start delegating, right? Is when something bleeds into your 80%, you've got to move that off. If someone can do it 80 % as well as you, that's kind of like my rule.
blatantly misuse that 80 -20 rule all the time, but I really like the way that I slice and dice it. I think it resonates with people, so I'm gonna stick with it. Tell us how you think about monetization. mean, you knew that this community was something you wanted to do pretty much straight out of the gate after you pivoted away from marketing on a broader scale to social media growth. So what are sort
maybe you're written or unwritten rules that dictate which revenue streams you pursue, which brand deals you take, which consulting gigs you accept and so
Yasin (22:59)
Yeah, so I've only worked with two brands in the entire time I've had the account. Instagram and honestly, I can't remember the other one. It was either Starling or some other bank. And that's been it. And I get probably somewhere between five and 30.
offers a day to like work with a brand. Most of them just don't make sense. And then also I've seen many times where a creator will lean too much into sponsored content. It's a very different game on short form, whereas on long form, you can have the standalone piece of content and then insert and add and it's all good. People are happy.
On short form, the ad is standalone. And so it's much more disruptive experience for viewers, right? And if you start leaning into that as your primary mode of monetization, in my mind, it slows growth. And I've seen this firsthand with creators I've worked with and creator friends that the ones that seem to post two sponsored posts per week or something.
their growth stops. And it makes sense. I don't want to see you selling me stuff all the time, especially stuff that's not yours. And the lines often become very blurred in terms of your values and how much due diligence you're willing to do in order to ensure the product's good enough. And so you start seeing products that you're like, you're
you're an accountant or you're like a, you teach Excel and you're selling like a banana milkshake machine or something and you're like, how does this relate? Yeah, so I stayed away from that and I did it with Instagram because of the exposure, not because of the pay.
And yeah, I found that the pressure is extremely high as well. I've also spoken to many creators about this. Like the ones that have a heart and care about like delivering value. It's extremely pressurized, right? Okay, now you really have to get views. And if you don't, then other brands are going to look at that and go, okay, well, the last time you did a brand sponsorship, it didn't perform.
So we're going to offer you less. And then also like the niche I'm in, I constantly have to perform. But for most creators, if you don't get too deep into brand sponsorships, you actually don't. Like you can have ebbs and flows and of course you have your emotional attachment to views, but no one else is like looking at your account and judging you because of it. But if you get deep into sponsorships and that's how you make your money,
then now you are extremely stressed every day like, that video got 10 % less than normal, I'm going to get less money. And that's true if that keeps happening because brands average your last five to 10 posts depending on the brand and then use that as a litmus test for like how many views they can expect and how much money that will then give them. And then they use that to decide how much to pay you.
For many creators, I find that it turns it into a stressful process. And I think to be great in a creative act requires you not to be stressed, but actually to be in a state of play and fun and joy and collaboration and all of these things. And it takes you away from that. so...
There's many mechanisms happening behind the scenes that I think slow the growth of your account It doesn't feel like a long -term good good idea for short -form creators. There's obviously many many exceptions, but anyway, I didn't do it for that reason I I went into calls as the primary thing at the start with
with the social growth stuff and the community. And the community was brutally painful to grow. I was DMing people, like, somewhere between 10 and 100 people a day, some of which I knew, some of which I didn't know. Hey, like, do you want to grow on social? just, it was painful. It's like so outside of my character. And then I would supplement that with calls. And people would just want to have the calls.
more often than they wanted to join the community, even though the call, let's say, was a hundred pound and the community when it started was one dollar a month and people would be like, nah bro, like even though they got way more access to me. So, there was definitely some teething problems at the start in terms of trying to make, make it clear that it was hyper valuable and being completely transparent is still, there's still a gap between
the value you receive and the perceived value you receive from the outside looking in. Yeah, just in terms of how much access you get to me and other amazing creators and how much that would cost you in any other situation. For context, like I charged 700 pound an hour up to a thousand pound an hour and that would get you like a year worth of community access.
Yeah, so I'm still working on it, we're in a much better place in that regard. And then I added a course and the course has outperformed the community since the get -go. Like within two weeks, it was bringing in more revenue than the community was, which was really painful because the community is like my baby.
and didn't want to do the course. was like, no, you need specific personalized feedback. And they're like, just give me the course, bro. So anyway, sometimes you have to put your own feelings and thoughts to one side and like give the people what they want. And so that that's been doing well for me too.
Amanda (29:35)
Right. And like you mentioned just a few minutes ago, sometimes you have to put your own opinion and aspiration aside and like be responsive to the market. This is a business. so listening to your customers is smart. yeah. Okay. I love all the things that you said about brand deals. That was really, really interesting and hopefully illuminating for some people who are listening. Obviously this podcast is
thought leader type creators, like you are sharing your area of knowledge, expertise and passion online and that's what people are gathered around your account to hear about from you. going back to the point of leverage, it's kind of like becoming the umbrella theme of the podcast. I'm so glad you kind of kicked us off with that, but your highest form of leverage, if you are a creator who is also a thought leader, again, you're teaching people what you know online and people are gathering around you to hear from
Your biggest leverage is not brand deals. Your biggest leverage is selling your own information based product, just exactly like Yassin is doing with course community. And we haven't even talked about your small group program to this point, which is totally okay if you don't want to touch on that, but you are so calculated in how you are going about building your creator business and building it sustainably and like working on these messaging issues, right? Like I'm in your community. It's insanely valuable. The level of creators that are in there. mean,
wow, it is mind blowing the level of advice that is being given and the level of interaction that you have, just kind of what's generally going on. And so we talk about you having an amazing product, but then making sure that the messaging is right on the back end, like your entire marketing campaign that supports the flow to that. And so you've got your product ladder pretty well in place. And so like I teach this all the time. Once your product ladder is in place,
running your creator business is a game of conversion optimization, like having visibility into your full customer lifecycle, the entire funnel, and being able to go in with really incisive surgical precision and like turn this knob and we're gonna try this to try and move this level. this is where people are falling out of the funnel. So I think it's great that you've pinpointed, it's probably just a communication issue because your product is amazing. So that's all super interesting. Thank you for sharing sort of how
how you think about that and how you've approached that. That's hopefully very, valuable for everyone listening.
Yasin (31:49)
Yeah, my pleasure.
Amanda (31:51)
And I'm curious, you've kind of touched on parts of this throughout our discussion, but what are the hardest lessons you've learned throughout this growth process, especially over the last year or so, that you wish someone who is a few steps ahead of you would have shared with you before you went through them so that that could have sort of spared you some difficulties and heartaches. So let's pass some of those lessons on to people who are a few steps behind
Yasin (32:16)
Yeah, I think the biggest lesson is to trust your gut. That's a really big lesson. And there's been a few times with agencies and with people I've hired where my gut said, and I just didn't listen because, you know, but if it did work out and I am quite a hopeful person, a positive person. So and it's like,
the reality and what I wanted were different and I would just focus on what I wanted which was like imagine if they were like that and so I would yeah ignore the warning signs and every single time I've done that in the last especially 12 months I've got burned every single time without fail even recently I I
Remember I went into a coffee shop, a local coffee shop, I'm friendly with the owner. He's like, Hey, what are you up to? I said, I'm gonna trial a new videographer. And he's like, how are you feeling about it? I'm like, not good. Like, he's like, why are you doing it then? And I was like, I just want to give him a chance. But really, that was
me trying to justify it but beneath the surface was the dude was really close to me, like he lived just down the road and so it was very convenient for me and so I was trying to force something to happen. I'd already met him before which is why my gut was like no and then you know an hour later my camera was broken so
and the guy didn't offer to replace or, you know, get it repaired or anything like that, which is whatever. But the point is, is that I've had situations like that along the way, some of which are like more costly or damaging or like a lot of the time emotionally draining because it takes you into a place of conflict. And to be a content creator, once again, I think you have to come from a place of joy and fun and play.
and just to be creative in general. And I think the same applies to business. And from all the content creators I've worked with, a vast majority of the best ones are quite emotional, sensitive people. I think that's how you tap into insights that other people can't see and express yourself in ways that others can't, is that
unlock and access painful, you unlock the whole spectrum of like joy to pain and depression and sadness and everything in between. And so it just, they tend to be more sensitive day to day and I am too. And so conflict like really drains me and so.
Anytime I've not listened to the warning signs, it's slowed my business growth, not even just in terms of now I'm focused on this thing, but also when I then go to work on the other things, I'm not as sharp. I'm not as like energetic or I'm just not in as good of a place as I could be. So that's been like a really big.
lesson. Another one is also around hiring and a lot of my lessons are around hiring because it's an area of weakness for me. Like I don't know what I'm doing. I don't know how to. I've thankfully hired two really really great people but like it feels like I'm just you know sort of running in the dark and occasionally like some great person starts running with me and I'm like that's nice but I don't know what doing.
But yeah, another thing that's similar to this is rushing things. Like when an outside thing, person or event is happening, something where it's like, no, you need to make a decision right now or it's never gonna happen. Most of the time, just don't make the decision. Don't rush a decision. if there's downside like.
you have to spend money or you have to redo something like take your time. This is a big lesson for someone with ADHD who likes to jump in the deep end immediately. It's like go slow, make sure it's right the first time, like sharpen the axe before you chop down the tree. These are big lessons for me in terms of business. And then maybe one from social is like sell more in the content.
just sell more, sell more. It's okay. Like you don't have to sell all the time and you don't have to sell in a gross way. If you raise the creativity of how you sell, people will actually like write comments like, this is the, like, I'm so glad you sold to me. This was so creative. This was so fun. This is so amazing. And when I've done that, it feels great and I get sales. and yeah.
sell more, like if you have a product or a service and you want people to purchase it, sure, if you get enough views you will win anyway, but there were many people with way less followers and growth than I had and way less knowledge than I currently have that were making much more than me purely because of that. And so
If you need to romanticize it or make it like about the audience or the people that are going to purchase your things, then I would say if you really are trying to be great and you really back your products and services and you know that in every industry there's sharks and charlatans, then you have a duty to,
get your stuff in front of them if they are looking for that sort of product or service. And I cannot tell you how many times I've interacted with people, especially with the boot camps. So that's my higher ticket thing. I would say like 60 to 70 % of the people that came through that had already been burned by a high ticket social growth program. That's insanely high. And so...
And most of those people that went through it had incredible growth. so, yeah, I think you have a duty to be as loud, if not louder, than the charlatans and the sharks.
Amanda (39:11)
Yes, thank you so much for saying that. I talk about sales a lot. We have a course in creator school called how to sell for creators who hate sales or something like that, but it's spot on. That's exactly right. If you are an altruistic person who has value that you're bringing to the table and you know that there you're maybe industry has bad reputation or other people have done a really shitty job and done your own followers wrong.
You're exactly right. You do have a duty to bring that forward and leverage social proof, testimonials, statistics, and things like that to help sort of help make your case for you. But I love that approach and POV. I hope that helps kind of make a mental shift for any creators out there who are very, very uncomfortable with the concept of marketing and selling your own products and services. And we are going to come back to hiring in just a second, but because I'm very interested in your approach, we've spoken a lot about that, but one interjection.
Yasin (39:56)
Yeah.
Amanda (40:06)
You're obviously pretty famous at this point and there are a lot of people and companies you said five to 30 inquiries just for brand deals a day and companies who are vying for your attention and for your business all the time. And while I'm sure that's maybe flattering for a while, I know you're not super into this whole like fame thing. How do you cut through the noise and decide who you can actually trust and rely on versus someone with maybe
somewhat ulterior motives and I'm sure your gut feeling has got to be part of your answer here, right?
Yasin (40:37)
Yeah, yeah, it's definitely been that more and more. And yeah, the same thing. Are they trying to rush me into a thing? Oh, if you don't if we don't do this now, your business is going to implode. Okay, I probably I'm good with your business. then yeah, exactly. Other signals like I mean, even this morning, I so brand deals, let's say five to 20 or 30 a day.
Amanda (40:52)
Red flag.
Yasin (41:03)
People asking to work with me or get paid to do something for me is in the hundreds probably. I had one this morning, a guy with 34 followers saying...
bro, your content's shit, let me sort it out for you. And it's like, get the following up before you insult me, you know? And I see the same with editors who have two videos in their portfolio and neither of those videos have views. it's these, this kind of, that's like the vast majority is just noise like that, like.
people that have taken some sort of course and then going around saying the exact same thing about how they'll be a setter, know, or do sales for me. So a lot of it's noise and it kind of filters itself out. Or they'll say, I love your stuff and they don't follow you. like, I've gone through it a few times like back in the day where it, cause I do like to give people the benefit of the doubt, but every time someone's not following me and they say they like my stuff, it ends up.
And I go, thank you. Then they're like, what are you doing with email or something? And I hate this fake sleazy intro into like, I want to sell you something. I would say the people that I've worked with, the agencies or whoever else, like my executive assistant, who's absolutely amazing, she
just chilling in the community, heard about the job on Instagram stories and was like, hey, I'll do it. And I was like, I already like you. Same with the agencies. It's like, maybe I see them for a few months on social. I like the way they think. Maybe they signal in one or two ways that they're trustworthy and that they're maybe ethical and that they care more than just about money.
And I kind of want to work with people that have similar values to me. Not, they don't have to be identical, but like, like we can have different opinions on the environment or whatever, but like in terms of like how we do business and how we show up as humans, I want to work with people that have similar values. so it's, it's a slow process.
of not even consciously thinking I'm going to work with this person, but just like over time, seeing them show up, how do they think when they post content, or maybe we hop on calls and they just seem good and they're not trying to sell me. they've been the best experiences is when it's much slower. So I don't know if there's any agencies listening, but I wonder how that like slower lead time could lead to like maybe less money in the short term, but like
way higher retention because you're actually building like deep way way more depth in the relationship. And that depth will will stand to you in the stormy times which will come right like hey we're 26 days in and I haven't got results if I don't know you like you're gone you know I don't know why should I trust you but it builds a lot more trust of like hey
I've seen yourself on social. know the way you think. I trust you. You're a good person. So you just give a longer lead time for things to manifest or for outcomes to be achieved.
Amanda (44:34)
Yeah, that brings up a really good point. Desperation is the ickiest, yuckiest thing you can bring to a selling conversation in any profession at any time, no matter who you're talking to. If the prospective buyer can sense this desperation, deep need from you and a sense of urgency, I mean, that's a huge turnoff. Same thing in our personal relationships, right? People who are super needy, clingy, and codependent, it's a turnoff.
And so I think you bring up a very good point there. That's a really, really great litmus test and people are rushing you and don't follow you, but say they like your content. Those are all really good, you know, individual standalone nuggets that people can take away and apply to their own businesses. But I think, yeah, that's sage advice. Thank you for sharing that. So we've got to wrap up here in a few minutes,
I'm so glad that you have a key person on your team now that you hired from your community. You know that I'm a huge fan of hiring from within your community and that started with a relationship and it made the sort of bridge to becoming an employee much simpler and easier. And there's already that foundation of trust, like you said. But would you mind sharing kind of your approach to growth in your business as it relates to hiring people? How are you deciding what work to do yourself
maybe some more specific examples than what you shared broadly earlier. So what you do yourself versus what you delegate.
Yasin (46:03)
Yeah, so I delegate videography and editing now. I'm still very much involved in that process because you have to be like, I need the quality level to be a certain, I have very high expectations of how the content will come out.
And I have a vision and obviously no one's a mind reader. So I need to express that vision and then tweak things. yeah, so, but the bulk of it is done by someone else, but he's an awesome dude. He comes over every Friday we shoot and then he goes away and edits everything. And then we have like feedback days and that sort of thing. And then,
Yeah, I need, I feel as though I will always need to have my finger in the pie of content creation, like across the full spectrum. And actually I'm trying right now to level up my videography and editing skills because it will inform my ability to educate. And sometimes the vocabulary and the language
that the videographer speaks, I don't always speak. And then that can mean that he doesn't get things to where I need them to be. like, say fonts. I have a very good eye for design. And sometimes we'll do like captions and it'll just be like off in some way when we're trying to like combine caption styles and font styles and different placements and sizings and things like that. And I'll just be like, it's wrong.
And he's like, in what way? And I don't have the vocabulary yet to go, it's this and it's that. So I'm trying to upskill in those ways so that I am better able to give feedback. But I will be able to produce more content at a higher level if there's more minds working on the content.
I'm thinking about how I can do that. also think brainstorming and working together with other people in a sort of writer's room style is like really great for content creation and like coming up with innovative ideas. And then in terms of the backend stuff, the business, it's anything organizational I'm trying to offload because it's not my strength. Anything to do with taxes. We're
We're paying, we're doing VAT internationally now and that's a massive headache and our current accountants are like not good at international VAT. you know, trying to figure that out is, is not so fun. So ideally I'd have someone in the team who's like always looking at these things focused on finances, money, revenue, kind of stuff, payroll, community management.
I'm in the community throughout the week, but having someone in there who's there like, you know, all day, every day is hyper responsive, will really elevate the level of service that we're able to provide. so that, just trying to one, remove myself from, from the lower value things like the, or the things that will have less impact on the business's ability to grow.
and or things that are not so fun or that I'm not so good at. They're kind of the areas I'm trying to outsource. And then the only exception to that is the content creation process, which I enjoy the entirety of it. But we still like, we want to be the Harvard of social growth in order to do that. It's not going to happen alone. We need a team of exceptional creators and thinkers.
Yeah, that's the only exception to those rules.
Amanda (50:10)
Yeah. And then, I mean, you've hired my firm to do episodic work, like one time projects. like, OK, I've got course community. I need funnels for those. Can you guys come in and put those funnels in place? And then we're working with your in -house team to turn over the full management. And here's how the system works and how to get in there. And so how did you think about that before you approached us at the end of last year? I think it was.
Were you thinking, I know this is kind of a one and done sort of a thing. They'll put it in place and kind of pop in, pop out. Or how did you think about bringing in, I mean, agency firm, whatever people want to call us is fine. But what was your thought process there?
Yasin (50:52)
Yeah, trying to minimize risk is a big thing for me. Like one of the start, well, many of the startups I worked at were very poor with money management and they would go, we have this problem, let's buy that, let's pay for this agency, let's pay. And then there's just so much money going out the door and
Money is like the laziest way to solve a problem, like the least creative way I often find. and a lot of the times it doesn't solve it. For instance, I worked briefly with a strategist and I came away with like, and this is another time where I didn't trust my gut. He's an amazing guy, incredibly smart. It just wasn't the right time in my business. And
someone who had a bigger business told me I needed it and months later I can say categorically I didn't need that. And I came away with no value produced, nothing tangible that I could like use really. It was all like all you know pie in the sky kind of high level stuff that wasn't grounded in like okay now do this and do that. And it was
quite expensive. And so that was like a painful but extremely valuable lesson of like, minimize, one, minimize the risk, and two, like, only do the things that will, I think it's like, like you were saying, where it's like, where in the funnel is the weakest point right now, and then focus on
And business can seem extremely complicated and it's like, my God, I have to do this and I have to do this other thing. it's a, yes, you do, but like right now there's probably one thing that will most, most move the needle for you and just focus on that. And then once that's moved to a place that you are happy with, it's like playing whack -a -mole, like somewhere else is going to now be very evidently the problem.
And so for me, was like, let's contain this, this problem. Like I knew I needed to get into emails. Let's contain the problem. What does a small collaboration look like so that I can validate that I like working with you and that I can get the results that I want to see in order to do more work rather than, you know, here's a hundred K and then, you know,
do whatever with it. then, yeah, so that's my approach in general now with hires as well. It's like, let's do some freelance first. And with agencies, let's do something small first. If that works, let's do some more. And that's been a much better way for me, for me to do it. And probably because I don't have as good a gauge of like, whether someone's legit or not. And maybe other people have that sixth sense and I don't, but.
This is what's working for me.
Amanda (54:09)
that and I mean that's a key mental model that I use all the time. You work in low -risk iterations that have the opportunity to yield medium to high rewards. Not high risk high reward but like what's the lowest risk thing that I can do in order to stair step this process so I don't lose my freaking shirt making one bad decision right? Like you doing things you can walk back fairly easily. Okay I've got one more question for you I know we're at time
But since you are the king of social growth through short form video, I'd be kind of remiss and I think people would be disappointed if I didn't ask you to share your top advice right now to our listeners who are also trying to grow via short form videos. This is like summer, fall 2024.
Yasin (54:50)
Top advice.
I mean, the main main thing is get started. feel like I don't know what level are we speaking to here? Like, is it a full spectrum?
Amanda (55:05)
I don't know. Whatever, whatever rolls off the tongue for you right now, whatever's top of mind.
Yasin (55:07)
Thank you.
Okay, so I'll say the first thing is to create and to not overthink content creation. feel like creative acts have this weird special place in our minds that is different from like physical acts like basketball. You like basketball, I like basketball, so let's use basketball. Like with basketball we know...
that the main way to improve is like actually play. Like it would be weird if you just sat at home for six hours a day watching basketball tutorials and then hoping that you that would make you good. Like you actually need to do a lot of the thing and then tweak along the way. so like, if you do it that way, you're going to have
much more success much sooner because the things that you do learn you'll actually apply right so it's like make a video assess what went wrong unless it all your stuff goes right and then don't assess anything but assuming it went wrong assess why and
see what in the world you need to learn in order to get one step closer to where you're trying to get to, right? So it's the same thing as the funnel. It's like, don't try and solve all things at once. What's the biggest weakness you have in terms of content creation right now? I would say that's one piece of advice. Just post and then try and get better each and every day. I would say work on your mindset.
As I spoke about before, content creators tend to be a sensitive bunch, and it is hard when you've poured your heart and soul into something and then it underperforms what you expected. And I've seen many creators with so much more skill, talent, intelligence, creativity than me who fall off because they've never got their mindset right.
and I even had a guy in the boot camp who he gained 80k in a month and then that's he's 20 years old he won't mind me speaking about this because I asked him if it's okay in general but he 80k in a month and then started like not being able to handle the haters and then started
adjusting his strategy very randomly, the type of content he was making was changing every day. There was some like very weird stuff in there too, like Jane smoking and then going for a run to the series and stuff like that. Just like odd things. And then he started losing followers and that made him desperate. And then it became this like downward cycle.
and it was actually a very worrying situation and I don't say that lightly and other people from the bootcamp reached out worrying about him as well and in the behind the scenes I continued to work with him to like you know get him to understand that it's a long game and there's ups and downs and even after the bootcamp ended
We would chat often, sometimes have some calls. And eventually he managed to get his mind in the right place. And as soon as his mind was in the right place, gained, I think in the last 30 days, he's gained 230 ,000 followers. And he always had the skill. And the only thing that tripped him up was the mindset. And so...
Amanda (59:02)
Cool.
Yasin (59:12)
I've seen it in him and I've seen it in so many other creators where the ones with the right mindset will outperform the ones with the right skill set because it it matters over it's not what you can do today or tomorrow over the next 30 days it's like can you show up every day for the next five years you know through the ebbs and flows that will inevitably come like just like meta
stagnated for many years and Microsoft stagnated for like 20 years in the stock market. Tesla, like all these billion dollar, some trillion dollar companies had periods of stagnation and plateau with the smartest people in the world and unlimited resources. And you think that you won't plateau at some point. That's a little delusional. So embrace it, that it is part of it and that
if you can find actual joy and maybe bit of competitive spirit through the plateaus of like, interesting, and then you roll your sleeves up and you're like, okay, let's see what I can do, know, and treat it like that, then you can actually have fun through that process too. But yeah.
It's not going to be fun. if you are extremely emotionally reactive to down cycles, to less views or less followers coming through the door, and then that ironically means that you produce worse content. And I've been there in the past too, where you start, I started creating content outside my niche to try and get views. And it's like, I don't know, it's like someone who is
trying to date people and can't get attention. So then he goes around in a chicken suit or something. It's like, that's not the right approach. Like you will get attention, but the wrong sort of attention. Like, so, and this is not like an easy fix. It's like day after day, speak to yourself and remind yourself of like what matters and why you're doing this and remind yourself of the different huge businesses that go through the same things.
remind yourself that it's a long -term game and that most people don't stick with it. so if you do, and importantly, if you learn the things you need to learn to get better, then trust in that process that like, if I become a better content creator over time, the results will come. Not,
Amanda (1:01:38)
Yeah.
Yasin (1:01:56)
on my schedule. You know, I can't say today will be 10 ,000 followers, tomorrow is 15 because I've said so. It will happen as it happens, but it will happen if you get better. That's a guarantee and that's the only thing I can guarantee is that you will get better results when you get better. What else? I
Depending on your skill level, if you're like a little less experienced, lean on formats that are known to be easier to get views with and also easier, like require less skill. So green screens is a good one. Reacts is another good one. Street interviews, although that would require an additional person, but these formats are hyper viral. They work and they've worked since before the days of TikTok and Instagram, like they worked.
on YouTube long form and they continue to work because they tap into things like social hacking and trend jacking and green screens work because they allow you to be dynamic and move yourself around the screen and show many things behind you which is all about like keeping engagement high without you actually having to have the skill that you would have to do that in any other form of editing so
that kind of stuff. Yeah. And then if you're more advanced, would, even if you're an educator, look into storytelling. I think if I was to ask you how many videos you remember on short form in the last week or last month, it's going to be very, very few, but you'll remember movies and TV shows and they would have educated you in a different way. And so
If you storytell, and that doesn't necessarily mean that you're telling a story, you can take like a storytelling technique like a metaphor or an analogy or the power of three or Pope in the pool or save the cat or adding stakes or you know, there's like promise of a payoff. There's like an unlimited amount of different storytelling techniques that you can inject without going.
In 1965, it doesn't have to be that in order to be moving towards storytelling. And then, but still educate or still talk about your business, but weave in the story. People will remember it longer. And this is what the whole game is about. It's like, can I take up real estate in someone else's mind so that when it comes time for them to want to purchase the sort of thing that I have that they go,
I should buy that from XYZ. And so if you just create empty, meaningless trash, then that won't happen. And I see a lot of creators do that. They're like, I'm going to get into five second reels. And I know that works for some people, but for me, it doesn't teach you the skill that you will need long term to win.
Yeah, I think sometimes we focus on the opportunity that's right here in front of us. That's a small fry opportunity. And when we do that, we lose sight of the huge opportunity that's ahead of us if we become incredible storytellers and learn how to use these platforms and to connect with people on a deep emotional, psychological level. And we can't do that if we focus too much on. Yeah.
three second reels where you're dancing and pointing your finger.
Amanda (1:05:48)
Wow, that's a huge mic drop there. That was some amazing free consulting. Thank you so much for sharing that. And if it is not abundantly clear at the level of expertise that Yassin has that he demonstrates both in his course and community, you have not been listening closely. thank you, Ken, for joining me today. And we will make sure that we have all those links in the show notes. But Yassin, do you have a quick parting shot? And where can listeners find you online other than the we'll put direct links to your course and community in the show notes.
Yasin (1:06:19)
Yeah, viral video club, viral video dot club is where you can find me. That's what it is on Instagram, TikTok, YouTube. That's the name of my website. So if you want to check me out on any of those platforms, then head there. If you want feedback on all your ideas, hooks, videos, scripts, definitely check out the community.
I really, it's my baby, like I'm in there constantly. You and you know, I work with brands like Red Bull and you get access to me for like an incredible fraction of the price in there. And the course is actually, I would say it's a supplementary thing. I would like choose a community over the course, but if you're the sort of person that does well with.
self -learning then that can be a great place to go to for learning more about short -form video content and like how to actually make it work without selling your soul.
Amanda (1:07:28)
Yes, I love that line. Thank you again so very much. I really, really appreciate it. And thank you listeners. We know that time is precious. We appreciate you sharing yours with us. We help creators like Yassin at Level Up Creators, our consulting firm, and also levelupcreatorschool .com, where our team becomes your full stack team of fractional advisors and includes no fluff creator courses, a vibrant creator community, and more, all on a subscription basis. See the show notes for more information and a suite of high value free resources.
Yes, and we'll throw yours in there as well. And we'll see you next time on the Level Up Creators podcast.