You got a win, now what?

Greetings trailblazers!

The three of us came together last week and realized… that Log was kinda dark.

So today, we decided to talk about a time we won on social media and how it changed our view of this whole game. You will inevitably hit a win and what you do with it is crucial for the longevity of your career as a creative.

As our journey enters the desert, let’s come together and ponder upon the Oasis of Success we‘ve hit.

Take yourself back, one year ago – January 2021. For most, it was another average pandemic-day but in the financial industry, this month was history. Without getting too into the weeds, GameStop and AMC stock were skyrocketing as normal people were fighting evil Wall Street, and the good guys were winning… for a bit.

At this time I had 2,000 followers on TikTok, didn’t have any niche, and created stories I thought were interesting. Except for one day in January where I decided to talk about GameStop stock. My edit felt different. The story came together better than anything I’ve done before and my passion was very evident. I didn’t want people to lose money and was animated throughout the 45-second spiel.

I posted it. Five minutes go by, a couple of views, normal. 30 minutes go by, 1000 views, abnormal. One day goes by, I’m suddenly up 100,000 followers and my TikTok hits 750,000 views. Extraordinary!

I doubled down on creating financial content and this moment to me was the start of my journey as a creator. Many see it as “this kid got lucky, one TikTok and kaboom” but none of those people saw the six months prior of experimentation and relentless drive to figure out that damn app, TikTok. By no means do I have it all figured out, but I am learning 1% more, each day.

Although finance is a passion of mine, I noticed my content pigeon-holing itself, where in reality, I wanted to post other educational stories that impacted me. That’s my goal for 2022 - to transition from a 20-year-old financial guru to a storyteller of whatever lesson I find interesting.

All it takes is one oasis to change your life.

This job I’ve found myself doing every day is stressful, unstable, and most of all - disheartening. Content creation can seem like the toss of a coin, and when luck doesn’t strike, it sure dampens motivation. But when you chip away and reveal a tiny glimmer of gold between the rubble, just that taste - it’ll propel you forward. 

Like the other two here, I decided to finally start taking YouTube seriously in 2022. I have big goals for the platform. So when just two days into the year, a video I posted hit the front page of the site, got noticed by my favourite creators, and increased my following by over 500% - I knew I was on the right course. 

The video was a 6-minute essay on the brilliance of Corridor Crew. Not only are Corridor my favourite YouTubers, they’re one of the reasons I even started this whole thing. So when they took the time to watch, comment, and subscribe, you can imagine my excitement. The guys at Corridor own a tiny slice of the internet - everyone with a platform does - but what we do with it can have a humongous impact. Raise money, clean an ocean, or at its simplest - inspire others. 

As tiny a slither of the web I might own, this year I’m hoping to leave my mark. I don’t mind if it’s just one person deciding to get into editing because of me. Corridor have shown me what happens when we simply care about our followers, and how much of an impact that can have. 

I found my “oasis” when I posted my first try at a series in March of 2021 - “Testing Your Attention.” At the time, it was nothing more than a gratified meta money-grab, but in this case, the “money” is the user's attention. I open the video by explaining the premise as “something you probably won’t be able to finish,” a slight comment on the pace at which content is both created and consumed, causing our collective attention span to ultimately hit an all-time low. The video continues with me rattling off facts about attention span for a whole minute straight - the equivalent of a feature-length movie by TikTok standards.

My cadence of batch-creating content at the time fogged my vision towards the implications this video might have. I woke up the next morning to that video boasting a million views, and my account at a meager 100,000 followers - about 80,000 up from 12 hours ago. Ahh… oasis. Something that finally “worked.” The fruits of my labor had finally ripened, and I basked in the glory (for about a day or two, before the internet forgot about me once again).

Although it might be easy to write this piece off as hack-y - sure, it might be - the entertainment and educational value it provided to users who watched the video far outweighed its gimmicky nature. Once I saw the impact that video had, the direction I was to pivot became clear and has remained my ethos to this day: make videos that help.

We would love to hear a win that you’ve had in the comments below! As we are still growing, we promise to respond to every single comment. Take advantage, while you can!

See you next Monday, blazers. Stay frosty. 🤠

-Tejas, Daniel, and Sean