Leveling up to "good enough" - Thank you!

This is about my my Youtube Channel: Crowing Hen and the quest to get to one thousand subscribers before Valentine's day, 2022.

And about life and video games and lots of crazy thoughts.  

But mostly it's about Youtube.  And the way Youtube is like one of those video games where different features unlock as you level up.  You grind and grind, slaying the demons or blobs of slime or whatever, and eventually, you get through the tutorial to level 1.  At that time, the map unlocks and you can begin the adventure.

If it's a really evil video game, they make you slay chickens in the tutorial.  (sad face emoji)

Thankfully youtube isn't evil.  But they are careful.  I can see why.

And now I talk about a childhood memory of sports day.  We would arrive at school early, then walk (past my house, I might add) an hour to the park where sports day happened.  I lost every race and every event and at the end of the hour-long walk to the school (past my house) for the final rollcall and awards, then the 45-minute walk back to my house, I felt the day was a complete loss.  The day was made worse that even I got a ribbon.  The least athletic person in the entire school got an award.  What a joke.  What a waste of time to bring us home to hand out the participation ribbons.  Even my childhood brain understood that participation ribbons just for showing up, somehow lessened the achievements of my peers.  

With this memory heavy in my mind, I am kind of glad youtube has a minimum level for what they think qualifies as worth getting a participation ribbon.  That monetization threshold they call it, or level 1 if it was a video game.  That threshold that says this YouTuber is "good enough".

But it's also frustrating to not be there yet.  To not yet be "good enough" in the eyes of youtube.  

For the next month or so, my focus will be to level up to youtube level 1.  To become "good enough" and to actually earn my participation ribbon (no actual ribbon is involved, it's a metaphor).

I'm kind of hopeful that maybe you guys might help me.
About the only thing in life I've been worse at is sports, are popularity contests.  

If you haven't subscribed yet, please pop over to my youtube channel and tickle the subscribe button.  

And if you have - a huge thank you!  

I would love it if you could cheer me on and help bump this thread from time to time.  

So why do I need to do this by Valentine's day?

Well, the youtube monetization threshold (aka, good enough) requires 1k subscribers and 4k watch hours in the last 12 months.  Watch hours older than 12 months expire.  Since my best watch time was in Feb 2021, I would probably fall below the minimum if I can't make 1k subscribers before... anyway, it's way complicated for my brain.  All I know is that I've got a time limit and hopefully we can make it.  

If you know anyone who loves textiles or homesteading, please share my videos with them.

https://www.youtube.com/c/CrowingHen

The big reason for me to push this is that I have some epic videos planned.  I started filming over a year ago.  They are taking a long time because I'm working with nature to grow the materials to make the thing to make the video.  

But focusing on getting through the 'tutorial' to get to level 1, to get to youtube's "good enough" - this is taking most of my energy.  

I can't wait till I get there and then I can focus a lot more time and energy on these larger videos.

I just watched a couple and subscribed. Lovely gentle content.

A few thoughts - feel free to do with them as you will.

1) Your videos hang together with a nice consistent style. This works well. But…

2) You aren’t coming through strongly as a person…

I’ve been watching a lot of tutorial type videos recently, and the ones that I want to subscribe to are those that are shot and edited well (your have this), but there is something more that means the person behind the production comes through.

For example, there is one guy who makes a “thing” out of being Russian and playing up to the stereotypes. Bottles of vodka feature prominently… but used in slightly subversive ways. In one his vodka bottle contains cleaning products. In another he sets up a dodgy looking trade - two bottles of vodka left in some alley, then in a later shot he picks up a brown paper bag with a freshly cut gear for the machine he is working on.

Through all this you get more of a sense of the guys humour and irreverence.

There is a another one who makes great silent videos - just workshop noise, no voices. But he includes great captions. One that stuck in the mind:

While bashing on a stuck part with a sledge hammer “patience and a delicate touch is needed”.

Best of luck with your deadline!

My fb post, today:

Michael Cox wrote:
2) You aren’t coming through strongly as a person…

I hear what you're saying.  I've been working on this.  I feel that now that I have enough courage to speak on camera, it's starting to show.  But I'm also feeling I can do better with more time per video and more practice making videos I am passionate about.

This getting to "good enough" requires a lot of time and energy spent with the self-promotion side of things.  I could make the best videos in the world, but unless I spend time 'training' youtube what kind of people want to see my stuff, it's almost impossible to get discovered at this early stage.  That whole "good enough" threshold.  Youtube does very little to help (and often does things to hinder) the channels that haven't proven themselves to be good enough yet.

Once I get to that level and approved by their system, I won't need to spend as much effort self-promoting.  I can just focus on making better content.  

I'm really looking forward to that.  

Carla Burke wrote:My fb post, today:

Thanks.  You rock!

Getting closer!

And here's where you subscribe: https://www.youtube.com/c/CrowingHen

:)

:(

Must have been a bot purge.  Youtube has issues with bots subscribing and will go through every few days and double-check any new subscribers for duplicates or bots.  

but still, it hurts when the numbers go down

 https://www.youtube.com/c/CrowingHen  

In other news, I was wondering what should I give away when I get my approval.

I know the permies community is the driving force behind my youtube and you give me such encouragement and motivation to create more.  So I thought having a giveaway on permies would be the best way.

I have my book I could give a couple of copies away...

or???  

I know many YouTubers have live streams when they get there, but I can't imagine I would have anything interesting enough to talk about.  

What else might be good?  

I imagine having the giveaway on permies something like the book giveaways we do.  Or maybe a random number generator of everyone who posts to this thread?  

any ideas?

You're inching back up! You're now at 945 subscribers!

I know the permies community is the driving force behind my youtube and you give me such encouragement and motivation to create more.  So I thought having a giveaway on permies would be the best way.

I can't speak for anyone else, but getting a spindle and your book in the mail was one of the coolest things! It's like: here's a book on how to do this thing, and here's the thing to do it with! It's really easy to read a book and never put it into practice because the materials aren't available and you never get around to buying the thing to do the thing with.

There's a special sort of magic to getting a tool AND a book. Tools are cool. Books are cool. Together? Even cooler!

One of my happy moments of life was when I got your book and spindle, and then spun some really funky, thick yarn on it



And you said to me

r ranson wrote:you made yarn



your very own yarn!

Gorgeous!

And that made me so happy for weeks and I still love spinning on that spindle.

Maybe I'm weird, but if that book and spindle made me that happy, maybe it'd make someone else's day to get a book + spindle+ maybe some small amount of something to spin on it.

(Though, honestly, you've given SO MUCH to this community, that I don't think you need to do a giveaway. But, giveaways are one of my favorite things, so I won't try to dissuade you from doing one!)

Just made it 950 - you'll get there, Raven!
Not sure why I hadn't subscribed before, but glad to be there now. Maybe while I'm covid-recovering, I'll have some time to tea and tube!
Rooting for you!
L

Subscribed! You are involved in so many interesting things. Looking forward to watching and learning more. Thanks for doing this.

Subscribed.....and passed along the TARDIS to my Whovian friends...

you've got 961 now.

As another opinion,  from another personality type,  i absolutely adore your character and identity in your videos.  It is real, authentic, calm, clever, and exactly the type of videos i click on.  I am not the type that responds to gimmicky, overblown, overacting, or stereotypes, or fake anything.  I think exactly as they are appeals to me.

Of course they are well made and all of that,  you know by now.

Some people prefer this vibe to the garish and glittery (and cheap) Hollywood formula prevalent on YouTube.

I shared to all my family.
(Have been subscribed for a while and always thumbs up)

My only advice is that, while i prefer the longer content,  the more shortz you can add,  the more clicks you will get,  because that is the YouTube trend.

Awesome work, awesome channel.  

Subscribed.  Best of luck with your channel!

Subscribed! So much great knowledge in your videos! You're getting so close!

I also understand the difficulties of trying to get to that 1k sub threshold and watch time. Just so people know, youtube recently made the polices such that they can put ads on your videos even if you don't want them. And if you aren't approved for monetization, you don't see any of the money. Which means google gets the money that could be going to so many good permie projects.

Maybe we should start a thread where people people can showcase their youtube videos so we can get more monies in the permie pockets.

I have watched in the past and your videos are lovely  I second the 'you need to come through as a person'...although I must admit there is a bit of intrigue since I still haven't figured out what you look like.  Kinda like the neighbor on the old Tim the Tool Guy shows.  😂  But I have now subscribed.  Good luck to you!

Thank you, everyone.
Such a great treat to wake up to so many new subscribers!

I do appear in a few videos, both partial and a couple of full shots.  But, yeh, I'm shy.

The latest video is out and it is about dressing a distaff.  

The thing I'm struggling with the most is my intonation.  My natural state is to have a flat voice.  Sardonic is the word most people use.  So it's hard to tell when I'm excited or not.  I've been looking for ways to bring the intonation into my voiceover.  I feel I did much better on this video than I have in the past.  

I've subscribed, I found your flick carding video very helpful!

I knew you guys were amazing, but I didn't expect such a beautiful jump so quickly

John just subscribed, and said he made 996!

Time is running out to be one of the first 1,000! Better hurry everyone!

Wahoo  - You just passed the 1 K mark !!!

Congrats!!!

Congratulations, r!!! W00000tt!

Subscribed.  Don’t know anything about textiles, but I love your teaching style.

Late to the party, as usual (or maybe I am early to the next party? ) Subscribed and clicked the bell.

What a treat!

hehehehe... I'm off to do a happy dance.  

I made it to level one!  
Woot!

So, what happens next is I apply to youtube and they spend a few weeks assessing me.  
Some of the paperwork is not easy, so I hope I got it all correct.  But I pressed the buttons and have my fingers crossed.  

From there, I can level up and get access to some more tools.  

This is such a great treat.  

Thank you everyone!

Next up, brainstorming the best way to say thank you.

I thought about an online class or live feed, but... I don't know what I would talk about or if I could have the confidence to do it.  

I could do a book giveaway here on permies.  That would be the best from my point of view.  Books are making it through the mail pretty easily right now, but larger parcels seem to have some delays.  

Yay! Well done! I'm so glad you made it.
I already subscribed weeks ago, though under my "work name" (my writing pen name) because that's the name my Google account is in. :)

That's awesome, I got home to check on this and subscribe, and I see it's at "1.03K" subscribers!

Fibers are not my thing, but you give so much to this community that I think you deserve it.
Even if you have already made it, have my support too!

A quick update.
It looks like I got the first two stages done, now for the really long wait of having a real human look at my content and make sure I meet the requirements.  

The estimated wait time is one month.  
But given all the troubles of the world, I would expect this to take 6 weeks!  

r ranson wrote:Next up, brainstorming the best way to say thank you.

A book giveaway is super, but just a thought: pics of awesome things (i'm thinking lambs, chicks, ducklings, etc) with a wee thank you message work just fine for me. I've seen some youtube channels do this as a slideshow. Takes less work than a video or a live, and people do like cute.

Some ideas.

- a live class in how to spin yarn (limited entry, maybe 3 or 4 students)
- question and answer video (talking head style)
- Or a vlog style video based on your requests of what you want to see on the farm?

You guys are the core of this youtube adventure.  Without you, I wouldn't have even started, level on gotten this far.  

I like how easy it is to send out copies of my book and that it's a permanent thank you.  But, I also worry about the postal system as it's not doing so well these days.  

Well done and deserved! Fingers crossed you get through the next youtube hurdles. I'll get round to setting up a subscription I guess soon. I'd quite like to share a few home videos.

I was looking at your sewing bird video (That looks really helpful for hand sewing - who doesn't need an extra hand sometimes!) but I love your tea infuser! They seem to be unavailable now, but I may have to find some stainless sheet and have a go at making one - so cute!