gunnarolla:

Hi everyone.

I have a favour to ask. It’s not money, but it is your help and your time. If you don’t want to help, or if you don’t have time, I completely understand. My content won’t change at all.

I’ve been thinking a lot about where I’m heading with this YouTube thing. I want to keep making stuff. But I’m constantly having to focus on paid work (i.e. not YouTube) to sustain a living. As a result, it takes way too much time to get things done (see: VEDA, #22songs) or, worse yet, I just don’t even get to do them at all.

In the past, we’ve suggested that I make some changes to my content to make it more accessible. But I don’t want to have to change my content. I don’t want to have to resort to gimmicks and lowest common denominator to build an audience, and I don’t want to have to talk about every current event or cover every popular song to grab views. That’s not what I do well, and that’s not what you expect from me. It may have short-term benefits, but I know that’s not what I want to do in the long-run.

It’s true that my content might be a little hard to get into, but that’s not to say that it doesn’t have some appeal - you’ve been watching, after all. I just need to focus a little more on my marketing. Gone are the days when you could make cool shit, sit back, and wait for it to be discovered.

Given the recent success of my latest BuzzFeed post for our music puns (it was just posted on Jezebel today), I’m starting to think that it might be a good idea for me to build campaigns around videos with common themes (e.g. songs with user-generated lyrics, how to shut down a racist) and my bigger videos in the months to come.

I debated on whether I should create a mailing list, or text you with info (!!!) but I finally settled on a Facebook group. Please join it if you want to be a part of my “screen team”
https://www.facebook.com/groups/350050145072190/

Basically I just need you to help engage/upvote/comment/whatever when I have a new post. I’ll have more detailed instructions depending on the campaign. You don’t need to do anything more until I ask you to.

I hate asking you for this shit! And I promise that once I get to a point where things have stabilized again, all my calls to action and all my millions of tweets about my videos will disappear. I just need help getting noticed, and I don’t want to have to do this the stupid way. Please save me from having to do this the stupid way! Or worse yet, from having to abandon YouTube all together.

Thank you for being the most amazing group of supporters that I have ever had.

-Andrew

The power is definitely in the hands of the people who watch videos now. Super popular YouTubers don’t need help, but for people like Andrew, or me, staying-power is almost entirely up to sharing.

We make a living creating videos that hopefully you love, and the only way we can do that is through views. If you notice views don’t match up with subscriber counts, or are progressively dwindling, you can help! You have no idea how much it helps when people post our videos on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, email them to their favorite blogs like Jezebel, Mashable, Buzzfeed, etc. Well, I guess now you do because we’re letting you know.

Basiclly, all the power are belong to you.

Thank you for your support in advance! <3