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Deep Dive with Ali AbdaalHow To Make It On YouTube In 2023 - Colin And Samir
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150 min read · 30,000 words- 0:00 – 1:16
Colin and Samir
- SCSamir Chaudry
I had big dreams as a 21, 22-year-old kid. I think you're only lucky enough once or twice in your life to be that naive. And I, I say lucky because I think it's, like, an unbelievable moment in time where I sat down with a pen and pad and I was like, "I'm gonna make a TV network."
- AAAli Abdaal
So in today's episode of Deep Dive, I'm joined by the fantastic Colin and Samir. They are the podcasting duo and YouTube experts who for over the last 10 years have been helping people navigate the creator economy. They got their start building a small online network for college lacrosse, and then they pivoted into helping creators make the most of the online space.
- CRColin Rosenblum
It was those early videos that I made, which were about lacrosse, that Samir saw. And so when Samir invited me to come to Los Angeles for what was gonna be just even three months, I was like, "Wow, someone will pay me anything, $700 a month to go do this?" Because I didn't study this, so it was a no-brainer. It was like, "Yeah, absolutely."
- AAAli Abdaal
Their main channel has over one million subscribers. They've interviewed the likes of MrBeast and MKBHD and Mr. Whose The Boss and me.
- SCSamir Chaudry
We never talk about the start of the Colin and Samir podcast, which is essentially what has become our entire career, which was in 2018 when we were really down and out, having an existential crisis 'cause we couldn't make any money as creatives, and decided as almost an act of therapy to get on mics to have open conversations with each other.
- 1:16 – 3:17
How did you get to becoming thought leaders in the creator economy?
- AAAli Abdaal
You guys are the creator economy guys. Like, you are the seeming-- Y- you've somehow become the experts in the creator economy, where you've interviewed people like MrBeast and Tim Ferriss and, like, all of the big names, uh, and also, uh, me [laughs] on your, on your show a couple weeks ago.
- CRColin Rosenblum
I'm at the top of the list. I'm at the top of the list.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. [laughs] All the big names and Ali Abdaal. Um, how-- In a, in a nutshell, how did you guys get to becoming these, like, thought leaders within the creator economy? What was the-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Hmm. Doing that in a nutshell is going to be very difficult.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I mean, what, uh, uh, how, how I would describe it is just that it, it took us a really long time to figure it out ourselves, and so we found people to talk to, to ask, "How do you do it?" So it wasn't that we're the experts, we just talked to a lot of people who had done it. Um, and granted, we have been in the space for 12 years. I think maybe something that a lot of people don't know about us is that we uploaded our first YouTube video together in 2011, and that is a long time ago. So we actually have been uploading to YouTube for a very long time and have met a lot of people along the way and have had a lot, uh, a lot more failures than we've had successes. And I think that creates an interesting, you know, dynamic when you have the opportunity to have more failures than, than success.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And in this version of us, because there kind of have been two, in this version of Colin and Samir, we spent the majority of the time actually helping other YouTube creators, helping them with their productions. And then once we had a podcast and a place to speak with them, they were willing to come on the show to talk about it.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
So I think that's part of it, is that we were behind the scenes while trying to be in front of the camera as well.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. So I guess you guys have been doing this, this, this YouTube thing for 12 years now, since way before the word creator economy was even a thing.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Since way before. It was, I guess, around about 2012 was when people really started to make money in the space-ish.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Ish. Mm-hmm. Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
From my, my vague understanding of what's going on.
- 3:17 – 6:58
To what extent would you recommend being a creator as a career? Pros and cons
- AAAli Abdaal
Um, it, it feels like a lot of young people these days want to become creators. Um, to what extent would you recommend being a creator as a career? And what are the-- Yeah, what are the pros and cons, I guess?
- CRColin Rosenblum
When I hear that a, a lot of young people wanna be creators, I try and think about what is it that they're seeing that makes them want that. And I feel like, sure, money is part of it, but I think another part of it is confidence in identity. You can quickly assume that a lot of the creators you follow are very confident in who they are if they're willing to put it on camera. And I think those are two very attractive things, like money and confidence in identity. And I think there are many ways to get both of those before you go about pursuing this career. And I think it's important to try and think about how you can pursue confidence in identity perhaps before you embark.
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I, I would, I would wholeheartedly agree with that and also say that i- it's not even s- about, like, us recommending to you if this is something you should do. I think it's just, um, there's, there's people who can't help it, and I would say that, that we are some of those people who just can't help it. We've been doing this since 2011 and, as I mentioned, we've had more failure than success. That is a completely irrational thing to do. To work on something day in and day out that is not working through, you know, your late 20s at times, through not making much money, to get together and get excited about uploading a video to the internet is irrational. And so I think that there's some people who just can't help it, and if you are actually that type of person, you will become a creator because you will just keep going. And I think that, um, you do have to really evaluate what it is you're looking for. Is it the outcome that you're seeing? Is it the outcome of validation, um, recognition, money? Uh, is, is that the outcome you're looking for? Actually, the majority of being a creator is the process of creating.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So you have to really understand your relationship with your, the process of creating.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. In a way, like, are you embarking on this journey for the sake of the journey or for the sake of the destination?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, because I-
- AAAli Abdaal
Because, yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... I mean, everyone can-- You have to see it for yourself, but everyone can tell you the de- there's, like, no real merit to the destination, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like, the destination doesn't exist.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
You reach there, and then you're like, "Now I just do more of this?"
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I remember when f- I felt like we had achieved some level of success, and I was like, "Oh- So success just means doing more of what we used to do, but in a more comfortable way.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
It's the same thing. You know, when we were first starting out, we were figuring out ideas-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... and then filming them, and then editing them, and then coming up with a thumbnail, and then putting it up. It's the exact same thing we do today. [laughs] It's just sometimes more comfortable and sometimes more stressful, and different problems arise from it.
- AAAli Abdaal
There's a nice, um, quote f- I think, I think it's from Zen Buddhism or something like that, which is kind of what happens before you reach enlightenment, enlightenment and what happens after. And so the quote is, "Before enlightenment, uh, chop wood, carry water. After enlightenment, chop wood, carry water."
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And I, I, I-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Exactly. Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... I would think of that in the creator economy, it's fair- fairly similar.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Like, the things that we were doing when we hadn't made, made it and we were making videos and making no money are basically identical to what we're doing now and making decent money from the thing.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
- 6:58 – 10:41
How much money were you making in the early days and how much do you make now?
- AAAli Abdaal
Okay, let's talk about money. Um, you guys have been doing this for 12 years. Uh, at what point... Like, how, how much money were you making in the early days? And if you're open to sharing-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... how much money are you making now? Like, how did it work?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. So in the early days, none. Um, you know, the way it worked in the early days was we started... I, I graduated college and then started a company called The Lacrosse Network, which was a sports media business about lacrosse. My vision was I'm going to make a television network for the sport of lacrosse, which was a sport I grew up playing. Very niche. Um, can't make a TV network, can't pitch it to anyone on TV, so okay, let's make it on the internet. That, that was the, you know, base premise. I had big dreams, you know, as a, as a 21, 22-year-old kid. I was like... I, I didn't... I think you're only lucky enough once or twice in your life to be that naive. And I, I say lucky because I think it's, like, an unbelievable moment in time, where I sat down with a pen and pad and I was like, "I'm gonna make a TV network." That's a ludicrous thought, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like, to have that thought at 34 years old with everything I know now, I'd be like... I wouldn't even allow that thought to go the next step.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Let alone a TV network for a sport that not that many people play.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Right.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And the majority of people who play it actually play it on the entire other side of the country.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Like-
- AAAli Abdaal
And most people probably also haven't heard of it. Like, I heard of-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... lacrosse when I got to university.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
I was like, "Lacrosse?"
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah, exactly.
- AAAli Abdaal
"That's a thing? Okay, cool. Fair enough."
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. [laughs]
- CRColin Rosenblum
At that time, did you think money was gonna be something that came? Like, that's why you were doing it, was like, this is a, this is a money thing?
- SCSamir Chaudry
No, it wasn't money driven. It was like, I'm really passionate about this community.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
This community has given me a lot. Like, I found a lot of identity in that community. I found a lot of friends. I... That was what I did in college. I coached a team. I was, like, very involved in the community, so I wanted to give back to the community. But I'm not gonna say it was fully pure. I was like, "I wanna be in the entertainment business." I know you can make a lot of money in the entertainment business. I grew up in LA, um, and that was a huge part of it. That's not, you know... At, at 21 years old, that's a huge part of it. And I think we talk about a lot that the era that we were in at that time was the startup era.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
The sexiest thing you could be a part of or have was a startup. And, you know, [laughs] when you think about The Social Network, that movie, you know, Facebook, Snapchat, Evan Spiegel, these are 21, 22-year-old startup founders who were becoming mega millionaires. So everyone had, you know, an idea for a startup at that time. Long story short, um, as it sounds like, that was not a quick way to make money, to start a, uh, lacrosse-based YouTube channel [laughs] with another friend-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... and then fly Colin from, you know, uh, Colorado to come live in LA. I mean, this was not a way, a quick way to make money. Um, nor did it ever really make money in the three years that we built it. Um-
- AAAli Abdaal
So how were you, how were you sustaining yourself s- in that time?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. So the, the way we were sustaining ourselves was, was two ways. One, from my savings, and two, from, uh, my dad runs a clothing company, and basically I said, "We're a group of creatives. Give us essentially a contract to do your creative work."
- 10:41 – 26:21
Starting a job for passion vs. money
- CRColin Rosenblum
wasn't sure that money was gonna be a reality.
- AAAli Abdaal
So this is kind of... So a lot, uh, like a lot of people I know who are in, like, their early 20s, for example, would think that, okay, your 20s are for grinding, your 20s are-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... to get the job at McKinsey, and to do the consulting thing, and to set yourself up to maybe then follow your passion further down the line. But it seems like you guys went for the I'm passionate about X, let me do the thing.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Well, I'll, I'll back up. I know the question was about money, so I wanna be-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs] you know, respond to that question. To give you a frame of reference, the deal with Colin was, "Come out for a three-month internship. We'll pay you $700 a month."
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, okay. Nice. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
That was the deal. I don't know if you remember that.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, no, yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
That, that was the deal, to give you a frame of reference-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... of where we were at. Uh, and that was a big deal for us to, to spend that kind of money. Um, so just to back up about, like, how did this come about, I grew up in LA. I was always into film. I was into, you know, performing. I was into, uh, music was primarily what I was into. When I was a kid, I thought I was gonna end up being in a band, a touring band. That's what I thought.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, we'll put some B-roll of you playing the guitar.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
I thought, I thought that's what the outcome of my life would be-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... is like, of course, I'm gonna, I'm gonna be in a band. We would perform, like, a ton in high school and, um, I had a lot of dreams of, of becoming a performer or some type of entertainer. Um, uh- I went to film school. I f- I, you know, ended up being pretty good in my film school to the point where they placed one person in a job in Hollywood, and it was me, uh, as an editor. And so I got placed on a film called Ides of March, um, and I was an assistant editor on that film. Bottom of the barrel assistant editor. A job that today is done by AI, but I was there to, you know, the, the, this thing. I basically synced audio and video. That was it, um, for the dailies. So dailies came in every day. I would sync them and then pass them to the next editor. Um, I sat in a pitch black room every day. Uh, the, the distance from the entrance of the studio to the editing room was probably like 100 feet, but I would walk as slowly as possible just in case a producer saw me and they were like, "There he is. That's the guy. Put him in the movie."
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Uh, never happened. But I would sit in this room, and I just, like, didn't get it. I was like, "This is not the entertainment industry." Like, all the editors were in cargo shorts and hoodies and were kind of overweight and just sitting in this dark room. And I was like, "This is not what I imagined at all." Um, and I, I went out to lunch with the head editor, and he asked me. He was like, "You, you know, you seem a little kind of not into this. Is this what you want to be doing?" And I was like, "I think I wanna make stuff. I don't know how to explain it any further, but I just know that I'm capable. I can edit something top to bottom. I can also film something. I can also come up with an idea, and I can also be in it." And, uh, he said-- He gave me the best advice I've ever received. He said, "So here's the deal. You are an assistant editor for me right now, and you're pretty good. I like having you around. I will hire you again as an assistant editor, and I'll recommend you to my friends as an assistant editor. And one day in 10 years, maybe you could be me. Is that what you want?" I was like, "Absolutely not."
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
And he said, "Okay. So I'm gonna urge you to leave right now and go do exactly what you wanna do. Exactly what's in your head. Go do that because in 10 years from now, you'll get the opportunity to do more of that, whatever that is."
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And I left, and that's right when I said, "You know what I wanna do? Everything. So I'm gonna make my own network 'cause then I can do everything. I'm gonna-- I can film. I can be in it. I can edit. I can make the d- programming decisions. I'm gonna do everything."
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So that's, that's how it came about because then it was like, so what can I talk about? The thing that I know the most about, the thing that I know the most people in the community that I'm organically a part of, lacrosse.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And where can I take this network? The only place where they can't say no, the internet. So that's how that came about.
- AAAli Abdaal
There's so many ideas that are just spark-
- 26:21 – 31:07
A roadmap to success in the creator economy in 2023
- AAAli Abdaal
Let's say you were speaking to, um, a y- let's say someone in their 20s. They've just graduated university. Maybe they've tried a job for six months, and they're like, "Screw the job." Like, "Job's not for me. I wanna become a creator." What would you ... If you, if you had to give this person, if you were their, like, mentors and you, you, you were giving them a roadmap, what would be the roadmap now that it's 2023 to succeed in the creator economy?
- SCSamir Chaudry
You'll have to buy the course to find out.
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, we can't answer that. Yeah. I'll invoice you after. No, I'm kidding. Um, so as I look back on that, I think the one thing that we always agree upon was that we went into, um, making the Colin and Samir channel with being very, like, um, selfish creators, which is completely fine. It's like, "Here's what we want to make."
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh, yeah. Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Right? "Here's what we want." But if you're, if you want to be a creator, then you have to be empathetic towards the audience, and we were not. An artist has no empathy to the audience, right? An artist paints something and says, "This is what I wanted to paint. I don't care what you think about it."
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
"Interpret it as you wish."
- AAAli Abdaal
Okay.
- SCSamir Chaudry
If you wanna be an artist, that is a different thing.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
If you wanna be a creator, you have to be empathetic towards the audience. There's a balance between what you wanna make, what the audience wants, and what the platform wants.
- AAAli Abdaal
Sure.
- SCSamir Chaudry
There's three things that make up, you know, the-
- AAAli Abdaal
What you wanna make, what the audience wants, and what the platform wants.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm. Okay.
- SCSamir Chaudry
That's something that we call content market fit, is finding, you know, that, that right in the middle of that is content market fit. What you wanna make, what the audience wants to watch, and what the platform wants.
- AAAli Abdaal
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- 31:07 – 40:51
Advice for a music YouTuber
- AAAli Abdaal
so let's say I'm like, "You know, I really wanna be a music YouTuber."
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm.
- AAAli Abdaal
"I love Kurt Schneider. I love that Voice Avenue era of-"
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... uh, popular song covers on YouTube, and I wanna, I wanna make money on YouTube playing guitar and singing songs. And I'm, and you guys are my mentors. How would, how would, how, how, how would we be having that conversation?
- CRColin Rosenblum
I would say if you wanna make money, figure out another way to make money-
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs] Okay
- CRColin Rosenblum
... to start. I think that's one of the biggest mistakes we made when we started this YouTube channel, was that we did not really think about where money would come from, and we assumed that it would come pretty immediately from this new pursuit of creating YouTube videos. Because we had just come from a background in YouTube. Why wouldn't it?
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
We kind of thought we understood how that would work. But it, it made us make choices that were based out of fear, taking different production projects and things that took energy away from what we were trying to put into this creative pursuit. So I think if you love music and you wanna make money from it, figure out a different way to start to make money from it-
- AAAli Abdaal
I mean-
- CRColin Rosenblum
... so that you can just focus on the creative side.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
A- and when it comes to the, the video making side, I mean, the first question I would ask you is, who's the audience?
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh. [laughs] I'd be like, "I don't know. Like, uh, people who want covers of Ed Sheeran songs on YouTube?"
- SCSamir Chaudry
Okay, and how much of that is available to them? Like, I would ask-
- AAAli Abdaal
Loads of people are doing Ed Sheeran covers on-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Right
- AAAli Abdaal
... yeah. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
So I'd ask you to scan that, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And say, "Okay, cool. Now go study who else is doing what you wanna do."
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Why are they watching? What's interesting about it? You know, like start-
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, okay. Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... do they have space to watch five of these in a row? Is that the culture of this audience? Where else do they hang out on the internet-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... outside of, um, YouTube? And a lot of what we've learned, I would say, over the past 12 years is this process of studying audiences because we are, again, we are part of the equation, but the audience is... We're playing ping pong-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... with an audience, right? That's what the internet is really great at. We throw something out, the audience reacts to it, and we understand, "Oh, interesting. That's what you, what you guys like. That's what you didn't like. Okay, let me try this. Ooh, okay, now I just learned something new about you guys."
- 40:51 – 47:43
To what extent passion is prerequisite for success in the creator economy?
- SCSamir Chaudry
what running a creative business is, you know? And I think that's, that's the thing. The advice I would give is like just get really smart on understanding what making it means to you. Like what is making it to you? What is, what does that mean to like make it on YouTube? What are you imagining in your head? And then also like, you know, do you deeply authentically care about providing value to the audience that you've told me you, you wanna have? Because if you do, then you can have a long career. Um- Then you're gonna wake up every day and be like, "Okay, this lifestyle is really enjoyable. The process of making videos is really enjoyable. I get to do the thing I'm passionate about. I feel like myself while I'm doing it, and the people on the other side are really happy, and I, I get joy from providing value to them."
- AAAli Abdaal
You can make some s- some sorts of businesses work and some sort of j- like a l- you know, a lot of people have jobs at which they're not fully passionate about.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
But, you know, it makes money. It gets them by. To what extent do you guys think that passion is a prerequisite for success in creator, creator economy land?
- CRColin Rosenblum
I think it really depends what type of person you are.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
You know, if you're motivated by metrics, if you're motivated by dollars, the message or the medium or, or what you're putting into the creative side is not as important, so you're ... It's easier for you to compromise. It's easier for you to make decisions that will allow you to be financially successful.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Also, the, yeah, the passion that you have is towards, uh, entrepreneurship or making money. That's a completely fine passion to have.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
You know? And, like, if the pro- ... We've met creators who say, "I am an entrepreneur. It just happens to be that my product-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... is video." And I think that's a completely fine thing. I just think all of this is, like, a process of self-discovery and self-awareness of, like, if that's the case, that's completely fine. You're gonna make different decisions about video, you know, and that's, that ... You're gonna make different decisions than I would, but I have to understand that I'm the type of person that deeply cares about the craft of the video and what it looks like-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... what it sounds like, what goes out to the, the people on the other side. I deeply care about that, and I would sacrifice, um, the numbers on the screen going up, uh, in exchange for me being happier with the video.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Hmm.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, it's like there's these different approaches. There, there are some people that approach YouTube or whatever the platform is from the perspective of creative trying to make money.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And then there are others that approach it from a perspective of an entrepreneur trying to make money-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yes
- AAAli Abdaal
... who's recognized that there's a niche and there's, like, a, "Ooh, I can make a faceless YouTube channel with AI and stuff-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Exactly, yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... that capitalizes on this high CPM niche-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. [laughs]
- CRColin Rosenblum
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
... kind of thing.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I think we, um ... When the term the creator economy came, I think it was in, like, 2020 maybe. It was the first time I had heard it.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, and it, it was so funny because it was the first time I was like, "Oh, wow, there's a name for the thing that we talk about."
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
"People are calling it something. That's interesting." Um, but I think that word creator got way too, uh, used in a way that assumes that everyone is the same.
- 47:43 – 59:07
What are the commonalities you see among the creators who managed to make it professionally vs. the ones who treat it as a hobby?
- SCSamir Chaudry
So, so you have to actually continue to do the fundamentals of just keeping this thing, uh, alive, allowing it to develop. Um, and I think we overestimate a lot of times, like, how much we can do and how much we should do. And again, I'm speaking from a space of experience myself-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... of, um, really having to learn how to refocus and, and really having to have discipline on, like, we are going to do this. We have a lot of brand building to do. Um, we need to be best in class at what we do first, and maybe that's it. Maybe we will never expand beyond that, but let's try and be best in class.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And can we focus enough? Can we be disciplined enough to be consistent?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Because that's really difficult. I think some of the top creators are all consistent. They've found a way to be consistent, even though in our opinion, creative people are often not consistent people. We ourselves are not-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- CRColin Rosenblum
... consistent. I do think that's our biggest struggle. Can we focus enough? Can we be disciplined enough to remain consistent? Because even now that we've found a format and we're two years in, every day I wake up and go, "Oh, I could do that."
- SCSamir Chaudry
[chuckles]
- CRColin Rosenblum
How do I make space to do that thing over there? What if we cleared three months to do that?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And things that are sort of not in what you, what probably anyone who would be looking at us from a business perspective would recommend.
- AAAli Abdaal
How does this tie in-- Okay, so I, I have two thoughts here. Both are somewhat garbled. The first is a, a fear that I often have, that I've had for a while, and I'm only just realizing it as, as I put it into words, is that what if I got a lucky break? What if... You know, it's, it's unusual to see a YouTuber who is relevant today who was relevant 10 years ago. Outside of the tech guys, like, there's very few people who've managed to sustain that longevity. Audiences are fickle. Audiences' thingies change, like, uh, you know, vibes and, uh, preferences change over time. What's to say that if I just continue making videos consistently, actually next year or the year after, the year after that, I'll, I'll still, I'll still be relevant. I'll still be around. Therefore, should I not focus on diversification and trying to build a platform off of YouTube and trying to build all these things s- just in case I'm not, in fact, relevant, I become a has-been two or three years from now?
- SCSamir Chaudry
That to me is like, uh-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... and again, I'm gonna speak from a, a deep place of experience. That is, like, very fear-based thinking, in my opinion, right? Like you're, there's something that you're afraid of there, of, of becoming irrelevant.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, I think that s- like, my experience right now is, like, I've, I've somehow worked out a way to relinquish a lot of that fear.
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Uh-
- AAAli Abdaal
How'd, how'd you do that? [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs] Um, a mix of, uh, you know, like being married to a therapist-
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
... s- uh, a lot of journaling and, uh, uh, slight help from psychedelics. But, um, I would say that, like, relinquishing some of that fear around y- y- scarcity and abundance is-
- AAAli Abdaal
Ooh, yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... is what I'll say.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So I've grew up in a very scarcity mindset environment, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Growing up in an immigrant household-
- 59:07 – 1:02:28
The fear setting exercise
- SCSamir Chaudry
you write down, um, you know, how... You, you essentially take it. You're like, all right. For example, I just did a 10-day vacation, and I have in the past had a lot of fear around vacation. Vacation is terrifying to me. What if... So here's one of my fears. What if someone emails with an opportunity and I'm not at my email? Okay. Well, that's a, I- even as you hear it out loud, that's a ridiculous fear.
- AAAli Abdaal
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
You just route it to your agent or route it to Colin or route it to someone else-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... to read it. And then it's, okay, well, what if it's an opportunity that we want but I can't do 'cause I'm on vacation? Well, if you value vacation [laughs] , then you are-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... that is a reality that's going to happen.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Oh, okay, okay. That's not actually that bad.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Uh, and then you s- you just keep going down. Okay, how could I re- repair it, quote-unquote? Well, we could just email them and see if we could do it when I'm back, right? It's just like there's so many... It, it sounds ridiculous-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... as you go down and you start to realize, like, oh, these fears are just, I haven't thought them through yet.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
They're very surface level, and so they're, they're, um, eating at me because my imagination is so powerful, and I'm, I'm-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... a storyteller inherently, so I'm able to tell myself-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... a completely invalid story. Um, but if I live it out and write it down, it's like, oh, okay. Actually, it's completely fine. Um, so yeah, that's, that's, has been incredibly-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... helpful.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, man, I love the fear setting exercise.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Any- anytime I feel, uh, any sort of existential crisis about my business or anything, I just Google Tim- Tim Ferriss fear setting.
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Literally just go through it, type it all out, and I'm like, at the end of it I'm like, "Cool." My conclusion from all of this is things are totally fine.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
I enjoy making videos. I can just keep making videos.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And just th- that, that's it. [laughs]
- 1:02:28 – 1:10:19
What is it like to be a duo of co-founders?
- SCSamir Chaudry
What is that, uh, dynamic like? 'Cause it, it's unusual to have co-founders, like a duo in the creator economy. I suppose there's, uh, Rhett and Link, um-
- AAAli Abdaal
Jon
- SCSamir Chaudry
... there's Rhett and Link. Uh, but most of them are couples.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, like Matt and Abby.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Ben and-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Kara and Nate. Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... yeah. I love the couple, yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. And which is why people-
- AAAli Abdaal
So, so for the record, like-
- SCSamir Chaudry
We are a couple.
- AAAli Abdaal
You know.
- SCSamir Chaudry
No. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Sorry. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Because that is the most searched-
- AAAli Abdaal
It's the most searched question
- SCSamir Chaudry
... uh, question about Colin and Samir, are Colin and Samir dating? Uh, we-
- AAAli Abdaal
I think people just see us in a frame and they assume we, like, sleep in bunk beds-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
... in the same room, and-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like how-
- AAAli Abdaal
Or even a double bed in the same room.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
How, how could we not be in this box together?
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, but no, I have a wife and Colin has a fiancée, so unfortunately-
- AAAli Abdaal
Cute. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
... uh, to, to, to quell those rumors, we are not dating.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, damn. [laughs]
- 1:10:19 – 1:15:16
Would you ever start a couple’s channel with your respective partners?
- SCSamir Chaudry
and when I feel like it, I enjoy it. Um, but yeah, I, I am... This to me, like, in terms of amount of recognition we have, I, I feel very fulfilled in it. I feel, uh, like I have enough. I don't, I don't crave, uh, fame, you know, beyond the, the recognition we have right now.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So when I think about that, and I definitely don't crave it in the context of my relationship, what I crave in the context of my relationship is quality time.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And that to me does not include a camera.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So, you know, that changes the dynamic. It's a thir- it's another person in the room. It's another... You're, you're, you are... It's completely different.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, and I think, like, life is very fun, like traveling with my wife and, you know, we just went to Italy and just had a great time, and we walked to coffee shops in the morning. Like, I don't want... Sometimes we, we go to coffee shops or we go to, uh, dinner and, you know, people, uh, is- sometimes more than others, people come up and, you know, wanna talk or take pictures. And, um, that's like so incredibly, like to me, I'm still like that's insane-
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... that people would want to come up and, and chat.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Luckily, our fans and the people who watch our show are like professionals.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
You know? [laughs] And so they come up and they're so respectful, and you do get to have like a really cool conversation. But I wouldn't want that in the context of my relationship, you know-
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... of people looking at my relationship and, and being fans of my relationship.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm. Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like I, that to me is There's nothing about that that sounds interesting or attractive. I- my answer might have been different in my early 20s-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
When I, when I really craved fame. Uh, but I think that's wrapped up in a lot of different things, and I, I don't-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... I don't have that feeling at all anymore.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. Interesting. Interesting.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I love, uh, being on this side of the mic and looking at you and being like, "Where is he about to take this?"
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, I have no idea.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Did I just drop something that he is now-
- AAAli Abdaal
So, okay, so-
- SCSamir Chaudry
... changing his trajectory?
- AAAli Abdaal
I, so I've been, I've been intrigued by the idea of, like, the couples channel as a phenomenon for a while.
- 1:15:16 – 1:21:10
Filming with no commercial intent
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And it was one of the most therapeutic things that we could have done-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... was decide that we would just grab mics and talk to each other.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And that when I think about it is like something I'd like to do with my dad.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I'd like to create that container with my dad. I'd like to do that with my wife. Do I need to distribute it? No.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I could just record it, but, uh, what I actually want is the container.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I want that space. Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. I keep thinking about home movies.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm.
- AAAli Abdaal
The fact that I actually do have from my younger years home movies shot by my mom or my dad-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... that were just sitting on tapes in my house.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And of course, when they filmed them, it was just to hold onto these memories.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And even as I travel with my fiancee next week, or I think about, like, having kids, I don't wanna not have home movies-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... and home video.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
I just may not wanna put them out in public.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. You don't have to distribute.
- AAAli Abdaal
And I think we started the podcast that way.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
In a way it was like, let's just record this because it's something we're going through, something we wanna do. It was like putting it on a shelf. N- not that many-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- 1:21:10 – 1:24:36
Productivity guilt
- SCSamir Chaudry
is my max.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, you can slowly work it up over time if you really want to.
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
But-
- SCSamir Chaudry
3X is insane.
- AAAli Abdaal
I mean, for, for most like nonfiction books, if you, i- and self-help books, if you understand the vibe, you can, you can kind of get through the message. But-
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
... I used to do that quite a lot, and then that would lead to these great videos where it's like how, you know, how I read, how I read 100 books a year kind of thing. It's not that hard if you listen to an audiobook every three days at 3X speed.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
But-
- SCSamir Chaudry
If you bump that up to 100X, you could probably read-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, you could just like-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... blitz through the whole-
- SCSamir Chaudry
You could probably read a million books, yeah. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Whole back catalog. Um, but now increasingly, like even when I'm driving, I'll often just think, "You know what? I'll just like not listen to anything," or go for a walk in Hyde Park and not listen to anything like actively.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And I've-
- SCSamir Chaudry
It's hard
- AAAli Abdaal
... I say it's, it's hard. But I think over time I'm becoming more and more comfortable with it, which then also means I'm like, "Oh man, I used to be the 100 books a year guy, and now it's what, I don't know, maybe like 25 this year. Oh, wow."
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm.
- AAAli Abdaal
Waste man. You know, that kind of thing. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
You know what I've found to be the most helpful, uh, activity if you want to start-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... to practice not being stimulated by audio or video, and that sounds like crazy even when I say it, but swimming.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm. Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Uh, I started swimming, and you're underwater in this flow state just with your thoughts.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And like the first few lengths, it's kind of like you're focused on the swimming, and then after a while it goes like, "Huh, I'm just here underwater with no inputs."
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- 1:24:36 – 1:30:46
Finding the format
- SCSamir Chaudry
uh, I, I don't know how to explain it, but in a way that's like it would never even come into quest- like, it just, it's not even something. And I, I would say that's, that differs from other partnerships that I've been in where you kind of go to bed and you're questioning the value that each person is contributing, or you're questioning like, "Hmm, is this split right?"
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
"Am I getting compensated enough for this? Is this..." Like, i- if you're entering into doing a creative project with someone like the way we do it, you, that-- I wouldn't do it if that ever, if that question ever arises-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... in your head.
- CRColin Rosenblum
[inhales]
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
I also wanna add one thing to you playing Diablo IV-
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... and feeling guilty about it.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
So.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, no. So I w- I was playing it while on my walking treadmill, so I got the steps in.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Okay. There you go.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. There you go.
- CRColin Rosenblum
See, you figured that out.
- SCSamir Chaudry
There it is. Yeah. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
So I tried also playing it listening to, listening to an audiobook, and I was like, "No, that's too much." [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Just those two things.
- CRColin Rosenblum
So there was a, a moment a few years back when I kind of had a similar feeling watching shows on, like, Netflix and whatnot-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... documentaries and things like that, and feeling like, "Am I spending a lot of my time consuming-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... here and not really creating?"
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And a really good friend of ours who was a professional lacrosse player that we met during our time there, still, you know, was a groomsman in Samir's wedding, Paul Rabil, uh, that we've done a lot of projects with, said to me, he was like, "No, that's part of your job. You're heavily on the creative side of this business. You need to be watching, studying, relaxing at times, taking in these inputs that are a bit unexpected."
- SCSamir Chaudry
Hmm.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Like, you need to be exposed to all these things. So if you're staying up late and you feel guilty watching something or staying up late, waking up late the next day, that's okay. Don't, don't be so hard on yourself because try and think about where that actually fits into your creative process.
- 1:30:46 – 1:33:19
Format FOMO
- AAAli Abdaal
like breakdowns. I'm like, "Oh, like what if I could do a breakdown of Elon Musk's productivity?"
- SCSamir Chaudry
Format FOMO. It's such a good term.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Format FOMO.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. I feel that a lot.
- SCSamir Chaudry
It's so real. Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
But, um-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Again, we're not consistent people or creative people.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
So that's why you have the FOMO. You're like-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... "I'd like to do that over there."
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, yeah, yeah. The, um, I would say the, like the Ali Abdaal format, one of the greatest things is I can close my eyes and envision it, right? That's a brand. A brand is consistent. A brand is something that can be talked about. I can say, "Oh yeah, Ali Abdaal, he's a, he's a creator that does these list videos about productivity, about evidence-based studies." You know? Like I can, I can talk about your brand because you have a format. Um-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... if we did a different video every single time, sure, there might be people who are like, "I like these guys Colin and Samir. They make, uh, creative videos."
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
That's hard to, to build. And again, it's, this is all coming from a place of like us articulating what h- it has taken to turn this into, uh, a commercially successful entity.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Not what it has taken to be creatively fulfilled. That is a different thing.
- CRColin Rosenblum
True.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, so like, uh, uh, finding a format in media is the biggest unlock from a commercial perspective. Um, that's, that's the thing that can take you.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Hmm.
- AAAli Abdaal
Do you guys get format FOMO these days?
- SCSamir Chaudry
All the time.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Of course.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, what does it, how, what's it like for you?
- CRColin Rosenblum
Every time I watch YouTube, Netflix, Instagram.
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- CRColin Rosenblum
At all times I think that'd be probably fun to make that.
- 1:33:19 – 1:40:54
Experimenting with formats
- AAAli Abdaal
should, should you experiment with formats even once you've found your format that works?
- SCSamir Chaudry
I think everything's, uh, like you should always be experimenting as a creative. I think the thing about even our podcast is what happened was we were ex- we were making these like explainer videos on our channel. People who've been watching for a while know we found a format that was working, which was Colin and I sit in a car and break down, you know, something about YouTube.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And that was a great format. It was fun. It got way too hot in the car 'cause for some reason we wouldn't let ourselves turn on the AC.
- CRColin Rosenblum
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
We thought it would mess up the sound.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So we would just sweat profusely in the car. It took a lot of writing and a lot of research, and a lot of creativity that, you know, was, was intense. The post-production really sat on Colin's shoulders, which was a lot of work and a lot of effort. Um, and it was hard for us to be consistent within that format. So when we wanted to experiment with a podcast, we started a podcast YouTube channel.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And we started uploading the Colin and Samir podcast to that YouTube channel.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Oh yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
The Colin and, and Samir Show.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Was it? Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Well, it was called the Colin and Samir Podcast.
- AAAli Abdaal
Oh, it was called podcast. Okay, yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. And we interviewed, we gave, we did Airrack's first interview on that channel.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
We did an interview with Graham Stephan. We talked to each other on that channel. We probably did 20 episodes over there.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And then what we realized was, okay, these car videos are working and they're good and people like them, but we can only really make like one a month or one every six weeks. The podcast, while we've been doing that, we've made once a week. So that's the format-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Because we can do that. So now we're ready. Let's bring that to the main channel.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And the views were comparable.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And then on some other ones, they were exceeding what we were doing-
- SCSamir Chaudry
They were explosive. Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... on the breakdown. So it was just like-
- AAAli Abdaal
If you find a format that you can be, it's easier to do, it's more consistent-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- 1:40:54 – 1:49:23
To what extent would you recommend starting a podcast to someone who’s new to the creator world?
- AAAli Abdaal
Loads of people get format FOMO about podcasts-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... 'cause they're like, "I can't believe you guys get to do this for a living where you sit down and talk to people. I want some of that." Um, to what extent would you guys recommend for someone who is completely new to the creator world starting a podcast as the, the thing that they do?
- SCSamir Chaudry
I, I think, uh, having a podcast is one of the most rewarding things you can do. I would decouple it from the financial reward. Um, this was a conversation we had with Tim Ferriss. He talked about there's the, uh, non-financial reward of having a podcast, which is the conversations and the experience of getting to have long conversations. Then there is the performance and financial reward. Those are two separate things. When you first start a podcast, you should not even think about the financial reward. One of the greatest things is that we didn't know that as we were starting a podcast from 2018 to 2021, really, that podcast existed as a fun thing that we got to do together.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So the reward, if you really think about it, guys who are not really making a lot of money were spending time every week making a podcast, editing a podcast-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... because it was rewarding from a lifestyle perspective, from a fulfillment perspective, from just I need to have this conversation. I need to have this- ... format so that we can sit together and talk about the ups and downs of what we're going through. That was rewarding in itself. So I would-- If you're going in as a creator saying, "I want a podcast," remove the monetization and just say, "I'm gonna do this because I want to do this."
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
"Because it is rewarding for me to do this." Making a podcast is one of the least expensive things in the world. It-- For, in the creative world, not in the world, but in the, in the creative world.
- CRColin Rosenblum
[laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, it's not expensive. You know, we, we had two mics laying around that were under $100. Um, we, you know, you could get a USB mic like you have right now that goes-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... into your laptop. You, you can record a podcast on a very small budget. [lip smack] Um, and you can also edit a podcast quickly. You don't even have to edit it. You can upload it through Anchor or Megaphone or, like, any of these. There's, there's services that are free that you can use. Like, it is n- a low cost, low friction thing. You shouldn't tie a ton of stuff to it. You should just have it be a thing that you enjoy doing, and if that turns into something, amazing. But I don't think you even know if you like it until you do 100 episodes. You know, maybe 50 episodes. I don't think you'll know anything about your own podcast until you do that. So leave enough space for it to end at episode 30.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And what do you think is the commercial viability of the podcast format these days for someone completely new to, completely new to it?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Uh, ah, that's hard. Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
I think it-
- SCSamir Chaudry
I think discovery is really hard.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah, discovery obviously is difficult, which is why a lot of people have taken to YouTube, because you can use SEO and find audiences. I think when you find an audience, it can be one of the most impactful ways, obviously, to monetize because you're in people's ears for hours-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... at a time.
- SCSamir Chaudry
You know, I remember there was this time where we, we built to the point where we had, like, 2,000 people listening to our podcast in probably 2019. Um, and that to me was like a lot. That was a lot of people. I think it was, like, between 1,500 and 2,000 people. And we did this podcast episode where, you know, we were experiencing a deep existential crisis, so I didn't know, we didn't know why we were doing what we were doing. We were very confused. So I stayed up at night one night and wrote these, like, 17 questions that we were gonna independently answer that would help us kind of reestablish our why.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Why are we doing this? And so I sent it to Colin. We independently answered them, and then we came on a podcast and answered them. And it was really fun-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... and really nice, and at the end, I gave a URL to download it, at the end, the last minute, and it was a unique URL. And 750 people downloaded it in the first day.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Wow.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Out of 2,000 people.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- 1:49:23 – 2:04:24
The story behind publish press
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
You guys have a newsletter business as well-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... called The Publish Press.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Which was only when you guys were interviewing me in LA that I've, I realized that, oh, that's a really clever name 'cause it's like press publish, but like reversed.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And also it's like, it's like, whoa, that's, that's really clever, and I c- I can't believe I haven't come across that.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Just hadn't thought of that.
- SCSamir Chaudry
That, uh, yeah. [laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. Um, what's the story behind the newsletter business, and why did you decide to start a newsletter business?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. So I, I think, um-
- AAAli Abdaal
And what is a newsletter business? Just for-
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
... people who might not be familiar with, uh, The Publish Press.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah, I mean, uh, uh, our business is, uh, content and sponsorship. That's like to simplify it. We produce content, and we get relevant sponsors to sponsor that content. That content happens in audio form, in video form, and now in written form. Um, that's like the simplest version of it, right? And you look at, um, what the content stands for. Like, what is the, the, the product that we are creating? Um, well, a lot of what we're doing is building a very hyper-specific audience that's interested in a cerp- certain topic, um, which is the creator economy and the business of creators. So as we started producing, you know, the podcast, uh, a- as a video podcast, we were still having hiccups in the process and figuring it out, but at maximum, we were like, "We can make one of these a week." You know, that's, that's maximum for us i- is what it felt like. We can make one really good one a week. Um, and we were aware, we had a conversation with Alex Lieberman, who is the, one of the founders of Morning Brew. We had a nice call with him, talked, and I was like, "I'm curious about newsletters," because I think the audience that we are building spends time in their email inbox.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like, we're building a professional-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... audience. They care about this profession of being a creator, and a professional audience spends time listening to things-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... and reading things.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And we're making YouTube videos. So that attracts kind of the aspirational creator, and we break our audience up into aspiring creator, career creator, and creator industry.
- AAAli Abdaal
Okay.
- SCSamir Chaudry
The aspiring creator is, you know, the creator who knows how to make videos, has probably made some videos that have hit or, you know, trying to figure it out, and, um, they hang out on YouTube. They get their education from YouTube, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, the career creator is someone who is making an income and trying to figure out how to progress in their career, trying to learn from other career creators, trying to, um, figure out how to make more money, trying to understand the career, looking for, you know, a sense of community. They're feeling isolated. Um, and then you go to the creator industry. Those are people who want to work with creators. They wanna join the industry. They wanna understand creators more. Each one of those, um, categories of audience, um, r- has different wants and needs-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- 2:04:24 – 2:09:24
The “Daily Productivity” newsletter
- AAAli Abdaal
doing is launching a daily newsletter called Daily Productivity.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Okay.
- SPSpeaker
Mm-hmm.
- AAAli Abdaal
So I bought the domain dailyproductivity.com.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Like the D- like The Daily Stoic kind of vibe?
- AAAli Abdaal
Like The Daily Stoic, exactly, or like Daily Dot.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Like I'm fully inspired by Ryan Holiday. We spoke to Billy and Dawson from his team-
- SCSamir Chaudry
God, Ryan-
- AAAli Abdaal
... when we were in Austin
- SCSamir Chaudry
... Ryan's so good, yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
And we were like, "Okay, that's really cool." Uh, I had, um, uh, Alex Lieberman on the pod-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... like last year, talked about Morning Brew. I was like, "That's an, an interesting model." It's super inspired by what you guys are doing at the Publish, at the, at the Publish Press. And the idea being like can we do Daily Stoic but, like, the productivity version-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... where we give you-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm
- AAAli Abdaal
... a productive and evidence-based productivity tip or an idea in your inbox every morning for your consideration or something like that.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Mm-hmm.
- AAAli Abdaal
Where it's not tied to my name. Maybe if at the start it's Daily Productivity by Ali Abdaal or something, but like over time we lose that thing and try and build its own thing around that thing. What do, what do you reckon? [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
[laughs]
- AAAli Abdaal
What are the thoughts that you'd be... Like, what, what sort of questions would you be asking? What's... How would you approach that?
- SCSamir Chaudry
How, how would you write the content? Batch? Like would you write 365 before you launch it?
- AAAli Abdaal
Uh, probably not. Um, we are thinking we'd write seven and pilot it for seven days, um, with our audience and see what happens, and then four weeks from now decide are we actually gonna do this, 'cause we're in a bit of a we're not sure-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- AAAli Abdaal
... if we want to do this stage right now.
- SPSpeaker
I definitely highly recommend what we did with keeping it internal.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. Pilot it internally for like three months.
- SPSpeaker
Yeah, like start with just staff.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Okay. And I would think like 90-
- 2:09:24 – 2:12:59
Is going viral a bad thing?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Right? Project through-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... Community or something like that. Maybe I want it as a text.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Maybe-
- AAAli Abdaal
Maybe there's the option. [laughs]
- SCSamir Chaudry
Maybe my productivity, um, doesn't allow me to, or doesn't... I'm not good at opening my email first thing in the morning.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Or I just wanna clear my inbox. I don't want more clutter in there.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
So give it to me somewhere else.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah. Nice.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Maybe it's, uh, what Ryan did with Daily Stoic in podcast form, and-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... you know, you can click a date and hear you say it. I don't know. I, I would really look at, like, the distribution of it and what's, like, what do you like from the distribution.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
But just think about those two things, you know, d- you have to understand-
- AAAli Abdaal
Product and distribution being decoupled.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah. They're d- they're decoupled, and they're different, and you have to understand both. Um, yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Are you glad you have a newsletter business?
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yes.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
I, I think, uh, based on what I talked about with, um, permission and interruption.
- AAAli Abdaal
Hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Um, it's a permission-based environment. The people there have given us permission to be in their inbox. They open it when we send. They click on stuff that we recommend. Um, that is a group that I feel like I have a deeper understanding of, that I have, uh, a depth of connection with because of the permission they've given us. On YouTube-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... I- it's harder, right?
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
'Cause you're like, "I have to interrupt you."
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- 2:12:59 – 2:19:07
“Brand is more important than reach in the long term”
- SCSamir Chaudry
it turns you into someone who is, uh, constantly seeking that outcome of virality. And, um, I think the, the thing to seek is the process, right? And so that, that's, that's my opinion of like I think as creators we should be seeking a, a better, more enjoyable process, not necessarily the outcome. Like, the outcome is a byproduct of that process. Um, and so if we're just chasing the outcome, and I, I'm speaking from a space of experience. The dopamine hit of going viral-
- AAAli Abdaal
Now, how did you, uh-
- SCSamir Chaudry
... is one of, is one of the most intoxicating things ever.
- AAAli Abdaal
How did you guys feel after your MrBeast video? 'Cause that was like 2 million views in like w- two days.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Which one?
- AAAli Abdaal
The, the most recent one, the interview.
- SCSamir Chaudry
Oh. I mean, the thing is, you get to a point where you can look at what you're creating and understand what, you know, the... You understand the, the, the distribution perspective of that. I think we felt some of our, uh, on the production side, like we, we had wished we had, you know, asked a few more questions. We had wished we had taken some different angles and like-
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah
- SCSamir Chaudry
... so there was some of it where we sat down as a team and we were like, "How can we do a better job of prepping?"
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
That, that's what we took away from that. I, I assumed that, you know, there would be a large audience for that.
- CRColin Rosenblum
Yeah.
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah.
- SCSamir Chaudry
You know, that's not, that's not a surprise. Uh-
- CRColin Rosenblum
The, the bigger rush was five years ago-
- SCSamir Chaudry
Yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... when we made a video essay about David Dobrik and-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yep
- CRColin Rosenblum
... he shared it on Snapchat.
- SCSamir Chaudry
And it blew up, yeah.
- CRColin Rosenblum
And it blew up like crazy, and you just... Comments are coming in-
- AAAli Abdaal
Yeah, yeah, yeah
- CRColin Rosenblum
... and you think, "This is it. We made it. This is the moment. Everything will change."
- SCSamir Chaudry
I, I think the r- you know, one of the r- the rushes for me came from, you know, when we did our interview, I felt like it was a great conversation, and I was like, "That was a rush." When we did our interview with Dream, it was a rush.
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm.
- SCSamir Chaudry
When we did our interview with Deestroying, we found places and avenues and, uh, learned things. That was like a total rush. We did our interview with Tim Ferriss, it was a rush. And like all of those have different metric numbers next to them from a distribution perspective, but process-wise, some of those were really, really fun and w- I felt like we were really prepped and we, um, really just nailed what it meant to be Colin and Samir in that conversation. Same with the Try Guys. I think that was-
- AAAli Abdaal
Mm-hmm
- SCSamir Chaudry
... another one that felt really good. And so some of those, those to
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Transcript of episode 9PaJocoOjp0