Create Your First YouTube Video | Tuts+ Live Masterclass

In this course, you'll discover everything you need to know to be successful on YouTube. You'll go from creating your very first YouTube video to running a popular channel with dedicated followers. I'll share my own insights as an experienced video producer, as well as some of the secrets of how Envato Tuts+ grew to 1.2 million subscribers.

Here's the structure we'll follow in the course:

To create a successful YouTube channel, you'll need to use stock images, graphics, video templates, and more. You can download all of those from Envato Elements—get a massive 70% off your first month by using the following link:

Try Envato Elements

It's a wonderful time to be starting your YouTube journey! The technology for creating high-quality video is now widely available, with more than 6.9 billion smartphones in existence around the world—that's 86% of the global population.

In this course, you'll learn how to use your phone and some simple software to create powerful videos.

You'll also learn how YouTube works, including the workings of the famous YouTube algorithm.

So you need intriguing titles, thumbnails, and content ideas to get people to click on your videos. Then you need to provide interesting, useful videos that keep people watching and liking.

We'll look at all of these elements in more detail later in the course, but for now, here's one more important point to keep in mind as you start your YouTube journey:

So now you know the basics of getting started on YouTube. But to actually create your first video, you'll need a good idea. And where do they come from? Here are some ideas to help you generate awesome video ideas.

Group Chat With Mates

One idea is to kick around ideas with your friends. This could be a group of people who are also YouTube creators, or it could just be friends who are supportive of your goals and can help you brainstorm ideas.

Create a Writers' Room on ChatGPT

You can also use artificial intelligence to help you generate ideas. Watch the video to see how I use ChatGPT to generate ideas for YouTube videos, and then refine those ideas and produce a catchy title and a detailed outline for my chosen topic.

Think about your favourite YouTube personalities. No matter what subjects they cover, they probably all have one thing in common: a strong, distinctive voice.

If you want to succeed on YouTube, you'll need to find your own voice too. To do that, here are some questions to ask yourself to help find the right voice for your videos:

• Why are you getting into YouTube?
• What's your target audience?
• What kind of personality do you have, and what kind of personality do you want to project in your videos?
• Who are your favourite YouTubers? What kind of voice do they have, and what do you like about them?
• What niche do you want to target, and how will you add value?
• What can you do to stand out from the crowd?

Even if you're planning to create long-form videos on YouTube, you can learn a lot from short-form video on platforms like TikTok. Here are ten tips on creating short-form video from Hannah in Envato's social media team:

1. Film videos vertically.
2. Start off with a strong hook.
3. Jump on trends early.
4. Keep your videos as short as possible.
5. Use diverse angles and shots.
6. Add any background music you want in the app.
7. Don't post content from Reels to TikTok with a watermark on it, and vice versa.
8. Use high-quality keywords in your titles and text.
9. Always use subtitles for accessibility and searchability.
10. Be original and have as much fun as you can!

Once you've started creating on YouTube, you'll need to grow and evolve. That means analysing your videos, listening to feedback, and learning from what you're doing right and wrong. Here's my 20-video recipe for success:

Here are some more tips for growing and evolving:

1. Personal Interest: Broaden your horizons by watching channels you wouldn't normally watch. Follow your interests and passions and see what you discover.
2. Trends: Keep track of emerging trends, e.g. through the annual YouTube Trend Report.
3. Follow the Algo-Brick Road: Understand what the YouTube algorithm wants, and keep delivering that consistently, using statistics to measure your progress.
4. Go With Your Audience: If you've built up a decent following, you'll start getting comments asking you to make particular types of video. Give them what they're asking for!
5. Refresh Your Process: Change things up from time to time. Try a new style, invest in new equipment, or make other innovations to keep things fresh and avoid stagnation.

YouTube gives you plenty of statistics to help you understand how well your videos are performing. Here are some tips from Joel in the Envato Tuts+ video team to help you get the most out of YouTube's analytics, using real data from one of my videos.

1. Are Your Titles and Thumbnails Landing?

To measure the success of your titles and thumbnails, check your click-through rate (CTR), which you can find in the Reach section of your video's analytics page.

But don't just check the overall percentage—click See More and then click Traffic source to get details on click-through rates for the main sources of traffic. Then you can understand how many people are clicking through from YouTube search, suggested videos, etc.

2. Is Your Video Engaging?

Start by checking watch time, found in the Engagement tab. But although watch time is important, you'll also need to check out the satisfaction metrics below.

3. Is Your Video Satisfying?

If people find your video satisfying, they'll keep watching it. So look at Average view duration and Average percentage viewed, and compare them with your other videos.

Here are some pro tips for troubleshooting your videos and improving your performance:

1. Check your retention graph. Where are you losing people? What can you learn for your future videos?
2. Check your Audience tab. How many of your viewers are new vs. returning? Was this video a hit with your existing audience or did it attract new viewers to your channel?
3. Dive deeper. Remember to hit See More and go to the Traffic source tab on any metric to explore further. Make sure your videos are performing well in YouTube search and are also getting suggested by YouTube.

As your channel grows, you'll need to keep adapting. If you want to turn your channel into a successful business, here are some tips for future success:

• Time: Make sure you set aside enough time to keep working on your channel, engaging with the community, and creating great content.
• Strategy: Have a clear strategy for your channel and be ready to update it as necessary.
• Always Be Learning: YouTube is always changing, so you need to keep your knowledge and skills up to date.
• Invest in Yourself: Although you don't need complex equipment to get started, it can sometimes make sense to invest in new gear to help you get to the next level.
• Process the Processes: As your channel grows, you'll need to put better processes in place to stay on top of everything. Consider outsourcing tasks or even hiring staff to help you.
• Monetise: When you hit 3,000 hours of watch time and 500 subscribers, you can start to monetise your channel. Keep using all the other tips from this course to keep your audience growing and make the most of the monetisation.

Now let's look at the nuts and bolts of producing your first YouTube video. Here are the steps to follow:

1. Come Up With an Idea

As we discussed before, ChatGPT is helpful for coming up with ideas. In this case, I asked it for ideas for "how-to" videos, and it suggested a video on how to chop onions without crying. So that's what I'm going to use for this example.

2. Pre-Production

This is the planning phase. Ask yourself:

• Where am I going to film it?
• What am I going to film it with?
• What props do I need?

For this video, it's quite simple. I'll film it in the kitchen, and all I need is a knife, a chopping board, and a bag of onions. I decided to film the intro and outro first, and I wanted them to be spontaneous so I just wrote a couple of bullet points but didn't script them completely.

3. Production

When it came to the production, I shot the intro and outro first, and then I filmed myself chopping onions in various ways.

4. Post-Production

This is where we take all of our footage and edit it together into a finished video. My editing software of choice is DaVinci Resolve. It's a powerful editing app that's free to download and use. If you need help getting started, check out my earlier course:

I started by slotting in my intro and outro, and then I filled in the gaps by sequencing the rest of my footage in the way that made the most sense to tell the story. I then did a quick colour grade, and then I went over to Envato Elements to get some royalty-free music and sound effects to use in the video.

5. Deliver & Upload

Once you've edited and exported your video, it's time to upload it to YouTube. Now's the time to come up with a catchy title and an eye-catching thumbnail. I went with "How to Master Chopping Onions: Don't Be a Crybaby" for the title, and an image of me holding a bag of onions for the thumbnail. Adding text is a good way of helping it to stand out.

Schedule the video for a time when you've found from your analytics that your audience is most likely to be online.

So that's it for this course on how to create your first YouTube video. We covered some useful tips on all aspects of getting started on YouTube and building an audience. Then we went through a practical example to show you how to create your first video, from idea generation through pre-production, production, post-production, and upload.

If you have any questions, feel free to watch the Q&A at the end of the course, where audience members from the original live stream asked their questions and I answered them. If your question isn't covered there, please leave a comment on the video on YouTube and I'll try to answer it.

We have plenty more tutorials to help you learn more about producing great YouTube videos. Here are a few great videos for you to watch next: