an epiphany: if I stayed in line with Google's goals, I would get ranked every time. I didn't have to fight the system (or Matt Cutts) anymore. It sounds so simple now, but it was a big aha moment for me at the time. I looked at everything that Google was trying to accomplish. I read every blog post and watched every talk by Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin, and Google CEO Eric Schmidt. I started to listen to what they really wanted. They talked a lot about organic ranking and tracking. They also talked about the future of Google, with artificial intelligence that would look for patterns to predict what people would want. I made sure I met all of the requirements when it came to what Google wanted.
It was then that I noticed some patterns from my clients' data. Remember the 865 videos I made and embedded on their websites? Most of them were on the front page of Google without any hack or help. WOW! You mean, I didn't have to fight Matt Cutts? And I didn't have to get frantic calls from clients? Sign me up! All I needed to do was make videos that were search‐friendly. So I created a plan of attack. I made a series of videos for a few select businesses and focused on generating a lead. My brother‐in‐law is an optometrist, and I asked him to let me market his practice with videos. I was able to rank for some hard key terms that would have taken a lot of effort for a website but showed up easily in the results in a matter of hours when I used videos. Crazy! To make sure this wasn't a fluke, I tried it with a second business, a personal injury attorney. We got the same results: a high Google ranking and the phone ringing with leads.
I had done it; I had solved one of the biggest problems for my company, and I wanted to go all in on video and YouTube. I needed to become the expert helping businesses by generating leads and sales with video. I kept my big clients who were paying thousands of dollars a month, but I sold everything else. It was my point of no return. Like when Spanish commander Cortés sank his ships and conquered the Aztecs. In sinking the ships, he gave himself one option: succeed or die. There would be no means to turn back. Likewise, I sold all my website and Internet marketing clients to an SEO company in Salt Lake City, with the clause that I could keep all the video marketing work. They agreed because they didn't know what I knew, that videos ranked in Google without any blackhat hack or strategy. They were being promoted because YouTube was owned by Google. Google wanted videos to be found, so they moved more users to YouTube. So I shifted my focus from website creation and marketing to video creation and marketing … and I watched my clients' rankings and revenue skyrocket because these videos were ranking on page one of Google.
By this time, I was itching with excitement for what I was witnessing in the evolution of marketing: online video was going to be a big deal, and I wanted to be a part of it. Video power outweighed word power by an overwhelming margin. Viewers were much more likely to do what advertisers wanted them to do—pick up the phone and call, make a purchase, or sign up for a service—after watching a video. And these videos could be made by regular people who were getting incredible distribution to millions of viewers … using inexpensive camera equipment. This had never been done outside the realm of television studios and movie sets.
In my videos, I hyperfocused to dial in messaging with the goal of getting the phone to ring. It was so important to know everything about the person making the phone call. I would grill my brother‐in‐law and his office staff on all the things people would ask and what they needed help with. Then I would take those questions and turn them into talking points for the video with clear solutions on how we could help. I asked a ton of questions to get a good handle on the niche and what would work. Then I would make 10 solid videos that would show up in search. Once the messaging was working—the video was ranking and the phone was ringing—I would go to another city and do it all over again. (I only worked with one business per niche in each city.)
I had started with my optometrist brother‐in‐law, but I replicated my work in that niche hundreds of times in hundreds of locations. When I got a system down for one niche, I could rinse and repeat for any client in that niche. Why re‐create the wheel when I could slap a new logo on what was already working? I had my systems dialed in so well. The clients were happy, which meant that I was happy. Matt Cutts was no longer the enemy; he was my best buddy! Talk about a win‐win.
Uniting People around Their Passion
At that time, my relationship with YouTube consisted of creating videos and uploading them to YouTube for the sole purpose of getting a Google ranking for lead generation. Little did I know that this was a fraction of the potential of YouTube. There was a huge opportunity to reach millions around the world, and I was about to witness this with my next client.
One day I got a phone call from one of my clients, Wade Beatty, who had a lead for me. Wade owned a local pest control company, and I had done some successful video marketing for him. He had gone to spray a piano store for cockroaches, and the store owner asked if he knew anybody who did YouTube, websites, and marketing. Wade said, “You have to talk to Derral.” So I talked with the store owner, Paul Anderson, who showed me the amazing videos they were making to try to sell expensive pianos. They put grand pianos in beautiful locations outside—on top of mountains, in the desert, in a forest—and the music videos were amazing.
I asked Paul what his goals were with his store “ThePianoGuys.” He told me he wanted to make enough money from his YouTube videos that he didn't have to work at the store anymore. He didn't actually want to sell pianos, he wanted to make awesome videos that people would love. With the talent of Jon Schmidt at the piano, Steven Sharp Nelson on the cello, Al van der Beek producing the music, and Tel Stewart doing the videography and editing, they had the recipe for success. Their musical passion turned into a channel, and the channel turned into a business that was making so much money that they didn't need the store anymore.
When ThePianoGuys’ YouTube channel exploded, I was able to be a part of the true power of YouTube for the first time. They had had minimal subscribers when we started, and they had grown to more than 1.8 million subscribers in 12 months and had over a hundred million video views. They had developed a passionate, dedicated audience. (They never sold a single piano! But they did sell out stadiums worldwide.) This success shifted my focus 100% to working with creators to help them build YouTube audiences, and I never looked back. Yes, I sank my ships again, and I haven't regretted it for a second.
Uniting people around a similar passion was exhilarating. It was an intense realization that I could help people find their own dedicated global audiences. It didn't have to be confined to a geographical location like my previous work had been, and it didn't have to be all about business. In fact, it had to be about more than the business. You could find passionate followers in every corner of the Internet and bring them together around your content. This was about more than generating leads. It was the perfect crossover between money and passion, something I had been missing all those years leading up to this moment. I had learned a lot about algorithms and rankings and the mechanisms that worked, but now I could see the other side of the coin. Creating content to inspire, educate, or entertain was the missing link. Everything I had learned about algorithms, people, and messaging came together in this new moment of clarity. Audience development was my thing. I realized I was really good at creating a community around content, so I dedicated my career to learning what makes an audience click.
To date, I have created and developed a plan and content strategy for 25 different YouTube channels. I have helped them grow from zero subscribers to more than a million subscribers each. With my formula, we've generated more than 59 billion video views in total. I've seen this change so many people's lives: they not only become full‐time YouTube creators, but they build sustainable businesses and brands.
For businesses, this can be a game changer for your bottom line. Here's where the magical ice‐cream‐pooping unicorn comes in. I was executive producer on one of the most viral video ads of all time, and it was for a step‐stool called Squatty Potty. It showcased this magical unicorn demonstrating the advantages to using the toilet stool while “pooping” ice cream. Yes, the stool is a real product (unfortunately, the unicorn is not), and it did more than $45 million in sales in one year. That's a powerful ad! After I watched its success, I knew it was time to share what I know about YouTube so that others could learn how to tap into this resource as