One of the biggest things I see creators struggling with is feeling like you have to be inspired to create content, when what you need is a content system that works no matter how you feel. That's one of the biggest challenges with being a content creator: you need to live your life in a way that you can crank out content no matter what else is going on in your life. I did these vlogs on my website where I fell in love with this girl and I was all excited, and then it all went downhill — partially because I was so excited and I communicated that to her — and I was just in agony some of those days. I was on some of my videos crying and talking about messages I shouldn't have sent and all this stuff. And people are like, well, how do you do your videos? On some of those same days, I went through and filmed ten different videos that day. People ask, you feel so bad — how do you keep creating videos?
You Don't Get Sick Days as a Content Creator
Here's the truth: if you're a content creator, you don't get sick days. You don't get to feel bad and skip doing your work. If you have a company job and you need a mental health day, you can take it. But if I take a mental health day as a content creator — and this is why so many content creators burn out — I don't get any of the views that I would have gotten if I had actually created my content. So it's important as a content creator to set up your life and your content creation around being able to always produce.
And yes, I take days off. I keep a spreadsheet with my actual video publishing schedule, and it tells the story. I've had days when I took a trip and didn't film any videos — but even so, I was on a trip all four of those days and I still filmed. I had some days that felt miserable, like the 26th of July. Miserable. I had just realized things were not going to work out with the woman I was dating, the queen. And I filmed a 26-minute video after that. I was in agony that day, and I'm like, I've got to film a vlog at least. So I filmed a vlog. The day before the trip, I filmed three videos for 55 minutes. The day I got home, I filmed two videos, including a livestream for an hour. Some of those days I was still hurting over her, and I was grinding out videos. Then the other day, I didn't really feel like I was doing anything — I didn't feel like creating anything — and I filmed 120 shorts. Those are getting like a thousand views each. And yesterday I was a bit down for a little while. You know where I felt better? Once I started filming my videos and I did my vlog. Then I'm like, okay, I feel better.
A lot of content creators think, well, I've got to wait until I get inspired. No — some of your best videos are going to be when you feel like crap. It's like being a professional piano player. You play the piano, and that actually helps give you some stability. It doesn't matter if you wake up and don't feel like playing the piano that day. You play it. Because if you want to be a professional, you do it.
My System: One Long Video Every Day on Six Channels
The key behind this is having a system. My system is that I crank out one long video every day on all my channels — all six of my channels. On my Jerry Banfield vlogs channel, I crank out a vlog every day. Doesn't matter how I feel. I have a dating channel — I crank out a long-form dating video. Doesn't matter how I feel. Jerry Banfield Games — crank out a gaming video. I'm going to get back to doing some music too; I haven't put a new album out in a while. I have a YouTube coach channel and I crank a video out on it every day, no matter how I feel or what mood I'm in. And I have two crypto channels.
Some days I'm not in the mood to do crypto content. But the crypto channels are my main paycheck channels. Those are the main channels where people come to my website and spend money. I just set up a leaderboard on my website that shows it. When you spend money for the lifetime chat — which is awesome, because if you're a YouTuber, you can just talk with me and ask me any questions anytime, and you know who you're talking to; in my experience as a buyer, a one-time payment like that is a great deal — you show up there. The guys that paid for the chat within the first week of launching it are followers from my crypto videos. So I made hundreds of dollars in the last week with a soft launch, just starting my own website. And then people have also dropped some tips. Some of those came from the vlogs.
Paycheck Channels and Passion Channels
If you want to make money, you are going to need to have some channels that are paycheck channels, and you do those channels like a job. But if you want to be sustainable and not burn out, you can't have all your creativity be about just grinding out content on something you're only doing to make money. That's why most of my channels are passion channels, like my YouTube coach channel. It's a passion channel that also makes some money — it's a channel where people go to my website and schedule one-on-one calls with me to talk about YouTube and content creation. But I'm passionate about it because there's so much garbage advice out there, and so many people selling courses that have nothing better in them than what I have to offer. I could rip you all off with a several-thousand-dollar course and convince you why you need it. But a lot of the people doing that are stressing themselves out and burning themselves out doing it. What I do is create every day in a way that allows me to make content that makes money and to have fun. You need a system where you can have fun, love and enjoy your content creation, and make money off it. And what's essential is that you do it every day, no matter how you feel. In fact, some days when I feel bad, it's creating content that makes me feel better.
Catching Feelings From All Directions — and Filming Anyway
Yesterday I was kind of down. I wanted to go to this event where there's a bunch of single women wearing wristbands — a bunch of easy, cold approaches all in one place. And my ex-wife's boyfriend asked her to go to that. So I'm ending up at home with the kids, and I'm catching feelings from all different directions. I'm sad that I'm not enjoying the time with my kids as much. I'm jealous that my ex is out with her boyfriend instead of me. I'm jealous that I'm not out with a girlfriend instead of her. I'm annoyed that I wanted to go — I've been trying to go to that event for months — and then she goes to it, and I can't go to it without running into her. So I was catching all these feelings. And on top of that, I had just gone on a date that was really nice the night before. I got really, naturally, euphorically high going out on that date. It was an awesome date. Fantastic connection. Beautiful, intelligent woman. Very sweet. She seemed to really like me. We exchanged numbers and we're planning a second date. So with all of that swirling around, yesterday I was down.
And as soon as my kids left, I turned the camera on in my studio. I turned the camera on, stepped up, and started filming videos. If you watched the vlog from yesterday — which is not out publicly yet, because I do my vlogs a few days in advance so people can't snipe my life anymore and know exactly what I'm doing in real time, and so I have a little leeway if I can't film a vlog one day — you could tell I wasn't in the mood to film a video. I didn't feel like talking about my life. And I talked for 30 minutes. By the end of the video, I felt fantastic. I was back to myself. My full power flowed back through.
Again, it's the same if you're a professional football player. You get out there and lift weights, you run, you do your practices — you do what you need to do every single day, no matter how you feel, no matter if your body's hurting. Obviously, if something's seriously injured, they work around that. But you get out there and do your work every day. And often, it's doing your work that helps you feel better. So many content creators have a hard time with this — managing your emotions and your feelings around creating content. For me, creating content helps me feel better. It helps me want to do more.
Warm Up With Passion, Then Get the Paycheck
But here's the thing. In 15 years on YouTube, I've learned that I can't do anything I'm not used to. If I had only done crypto videos on a day like yesterday, it would not have gone well, because I need my vlogs channel. That channel I just applied to get monetized, and I should start getting hundreds a month in ad revenue from it within the next few days. I need to get to a thousand subs on that channel too, so I'll start pitching it more on my other channels that are already monetized, like my crypto channels, to pick up more subs and get over the threshold. Up until now it has been mostly a fun channel. But if I didn't have that channel, I would burn out, because when all I have are crypto videos and I don't feel like doing videos, the thought of doing a crypto video is like — ugh, I can't stand to talk crypto right now. So I warm up by doing a vlog. And I don't care how bad your life is — you can talk about it every day and it'll help. Then after doing the vlog, I was like, all right, let me talk about dating. So I filmed some dating videos. And after the dating videos, it's all right, let me do these crypto videos and get my paycheck. Then I cranked out a crypto video — and my crypto videos get the most views of anything I make, and they funnel people over to the other channels.
So when you've got a setup where your bad moods, your down times, your apathy, the days you don't feel like it — where your well-rounded content system supports you in creating when you don't feel like it — then it just becomes a habit. And I have a spreadsheet to track what I'm doing, which keeps the habit honest. I'm concerned with maximizing the numbers and the time on that spreadsheet. To me, the number of videos I record is important, but the raw amount of minutes I put out is important too.
Shorts Are Extra Discovery
I'm mixing up some shorts now as well, because shorts are just extra discovery. Some of these shorts are simply getting extra discovery, and on average, over time, they'll get at least a thousand views each. Occasionally you'll get one that does 10,000-plus views. So I do these shorts, they get people over to my long videos, and it's a system that's sustainable.
But my whole life is also set up to run this system. I have a lifestyle built around it. I got my own house, so nobody's bothering me. I literally borrowed money so I could set all this up and get in position, because there's no better way I'm going to make money than doing YouTube. I'm really good at YouTube — especially with getting everything set up on my website. I'm in position and I'm all in on YouTube. I've committed to this because out of everything I've done in my whole life, I'm best at YouTube, and I give the most value to the world doing YouTube.
Hobbyist or Professional — You Choose
Burnout is one of the biggest risks. But burnout only happens if you can even get past creating when you're not in a good mood. So I hope I've shared something here, because this is the kind of thing people don't even address in the courses they pay all this money for. It's very important to know how to manage your emotions and to set up your system if you want to be a professional. You can just be a hobbyist and do a video every week — who cares? You can do a vlog every day of your life. But if you want to be a professional like I am, if you want to do this full time and not have to work another job, this is what you've got to be handling. It is an assembly line of cranking out video after video after video, no matter how you feel, no matter what else is happening in your life. I hope I've helped you see how to do that.
Where to Keep Going From Here
For the best experience, you know where to go already: go to jerrybanfield.com and join the chat, so you can talk with me and everybody else in there. I just launched it. You can go in and be represented — you create your name and your profile, and you can be represented on the leaderboard. If you want to send a message, you can drop a tip.
If you want to talk to me and have a call, you can jump in for a one-on-one Zoom call. Or, whenever I'm available, you can use Talk to Me Now — a cool feature I've been able to build on my website where I can set that I'm online, like when I'm filming videos. The last guy that bought it, I was talking to him face to face on WhatsApp within six minutes of him buying it. He bought it, I messaged him three minutes later, and he talked with me real quick for ten minutes. If you're in a pinch with your YouTube channel, you can talk to me for ten minutes or thirty minutes right then if I'm online.
I'm also setting up to sell everything on my same website. Because as a content creator, it's very important that you crank out videos to get the audience, but then you need to get people somewhere they can keep going — somewhere you've got control of the platform.
I do have a Skool community as well, where you can DM me in there if you want.
If you want more of my honest lessons from 15 years of doing this full time, watch my YouTube Coaching playlist. Thank you for reading, and I hope to see you on jerrybanfield.com soon.