In partnership with
Hey honeys and hustlers,
YouTube has been a part of my lexicon and screen time count for many years now. I am far from YouTube famous, but that doesn’t mean I’ve given up on that shiny silver or gold play button. While YouTube leads the pack for me in terms of its impact on the creator economy, there is one main feature I’ve been wishing it would have since I started my podcast in 2020 and began posting regularly on my channel. At the recent Made on YouTube event, the platform unveiled a suite of innovative tools designed to help content creators streamline their video repurposing workflows, enhance the audience discovery experience, and maximize their revenue potential. These announcements signal YouTube's aggressive strategy to maintain its position as the premier platform for video creators, challenging the slight edge Substack has had in that space (more on this later). Let's dive into the key highlighted features from this event that will be going live for all creators by the end of the year. Stay to the end for my most anticipated feature!
P.S. I’m dropping my first signature product, and I’m telling you more about it + opening pre-orders on Saturday. Stay tuned!
Here’s a message from the folks who help keep the lights on.
Create How-to Videos in Seconds with AI
Stop wasting time on repetitive explanations. Guidde’s AI creates stunning video guides in seconds—11x faster.
Turn boring docs into visual masterpieces
Save hours with AI-powered automation
Share or embed your guide anywhere
How it works: Click capture on the browser extension, and Guidde auto-generates step-by-step video guides with visuals, voiceover, and a call to action.
Collaboration posts. Creators will now be able to add up to 5 other channels to a video post. The creator who uploads the video will have the video live on their channel and will receive any ad revenue from the video.
My Take:
This is a really smart move for YouTube, allowing creator collaborations to be more seemless for channel discovery. This is a feature that Instagram has had for a while, and I believe they allow you to add up to 10 accounts to a collaboration post. Having the ability to add 5 other channels to a video feels like a happy medium, and I’m excited to see which new creators gain momentum using this feature. I think this is also smart for creator networks and video podcasters who may have created a second channel specifically for clips. It allows for greater cross-pollination of audiences.
A/B/C testing title and thumbnail combos. You can currently only A/B/C test thumbnails with one title, so this adds functionality to this area of testing.
My Take:
This eliminates the need for a 3rd party service that offers this. I haven’t been super impressed with YouTube’s current AI-generated video title and thumbnail suggestion, but tools like 1 of 10 and Spotter Studio have thrived in the absence of this feature. I think many creators will now opt to make 3 title variations and thumbnails for each video to optimize for best performance.
Auto-dubbing with lip sync. A feature first seen from Spotify, announced to very mixed reviews at the time. Mr. Beast requested this feature from Mark Zuckerberg in a previous Colin and Samir podcast episode, saying that it would help retention and global audience discoverability.
My Take:
While this felt very scary and odd when Spotify announced this feature for podcasters, I think we’ve come to a place where people are less staunch about AI-generated media if they feel that it is not being used to replace a creator. This feels like a feature that will help YouTube be at the epicenter of global audience acquisition for creators in a way that other platforms haven’t been. If it’s as easy as clicking a button, I think many video creators will likely opt-in.
Auto-generated shorts. This seems to be primarily aimed at video podcasts, but could apply to any long-form video. Gemini will now recommend clips to be repurposed into shorts that will link back to the long-form video episode.
My Take:
While many podcasters have signature caption styles and short-form video styles, getting from 0-1 simply by uploading a long-form video feels like a cheatcode. It could mean making 1 video trailer to promote an episode on social media, while you let the YouTube engine do what it does. I’ve seen this feature from other SaaS tools, so I think it is smart that YouTube is cutting out the middle man for many smaller creators and giving them access to this natively for free. Will it be something people continue to use as their shows grow and expectations for production quality increase? I’m not sure, but its a great starting place.
Livestreams will be more discoverable. They are doing this in two ways: viewers will now be suggested live streams in their shorts feed, and creators will get auto-generated shorts following their livestream that will connect back to the published video.
My Take:
I’ve been using the live stream feature on Substack pretty extensively this year, and one reason why is because of the discoverability. Substack places live streams at the top of the mobile and desktop app, making it easy to be found by people who are simply logging on. Substack also gives you auto-generated and auto-captioned short clips, that are auto-shareable to YouTube along with the final livestream video. I’m excited to test this feature out on YouTube and see how it compares for discoverability and new subscriber acquisition.
Dynamic brand integrations. Similar to how podcast hosting companies currently operate, creators will now be able to insert dynamic ad reads at different points in their videos instead of having each ad read baked into a singular video, unchangeable once the partnership is done.
My Take:
AN ANSWERED PRAYER DO YOU HEAR ME. For any YouTuber to do a brand deal for one (or even a series) of videos, that is very risky for both parties. It is a known fact that video reviews of a product or service typically get less views due to the packaging (camera reviews following an embargo being an exception to this), or that viewers simply skip past sponsored segments. By allowing brands access to your archive, even for a set amount of time, you’re de-risking the partnership and widening the audience of viewers that can engage with the ad read. This is also applicable to creators who don’t have brand partnerships but want to advertise time sensitive deals, events, or opportunities to their audience. I’ve used this feature on my podcast to promote this newsletter and affiliate links. Think of how you could use it to promote your own projects and products. This is a very welcome feature I was made to believe would never come, and here it is. What a time to be alive.
This is a sponsored post.
It’s go-time for holiday campaigns
Roku Ads Manager makes it easy to extend your Q4 campaign to performance CTV.
You can:
Easily launch self-serve CTV ads
Repurpose your social content for TV
Drive purchases directly on-screen with shoppable ads
A/B test to discover your most effective offers
The holidays only come once a year. Get started now with a $500 ad credit when you spend your first $500 today with code: ROKUADS500. Terms apply.
My Final Thoughts
YouTube’s last set of new feature announcements fell pretty flat for me. They were largely forgettable and didn’t really impact how I used the platform as a creator or consumer outside of A/B/C thumbnail testing. But even then, I always wondered why they didn’t announce or include thumbnail and title testing at the same time. And what about the split for channel membership payouts? I believe it’s currently a 70/30 split, which has quietly gone under the radar as people make a fuss over the 10% cut that Substack takes from paid subscriptions (which is arguably also too much). And speaking of Substack, I think many people have underestimated the platform’s functionality and discoverability for live streaming and podcasting. In one fell swoop, YouTube has ended whatever claims to greater/easier discoverability they may have had for those two types of media.
Let’s address the Spotify in the room. Does anyone actually watch video podcasts on Spotify? Has anyone received a creator payout from Spotify’s video creator program? Will Spotify’s slight edge in creator payouts be matched or overshadowed by YouTube’s ad sense? At the Made on YouTube event, they announced that they’ve paid creators, artists, and media companies over $100 billion since 2021. Spotify sits at roughly 40% of that, with $40 billion paid out to podcasters and music creators. I’m not even sure Substack has cracked $1 billion in creator payouts, and the lack of ad revenue is likely a factor in this. With all the big podcasting deals Spotify has made, I still don’t think they’ve captured cultural relevancy for indie creators looking for a platform to build a foundation for their business in the way that YouTube or Substack has. It’s really YouTube vs. Everybody, and YouTube is winning by a long shot.
💡Whenever you’re ready, here are a few ways I can help you get the most out of this community.
Book a 1:1 consultation. Get personalized feedback on your creative projects and business.
Purchase a digital product. The waitlist for my newest paid product, CommunityOS, is available now.
Buy me a book. Not literally, but figuratively. The tip jar is open on BuyMeACoffee.
Join the creator database (it’s free). It’s the easiest way to meet other folks in this community and get hired for projects.
