This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
What's up, my friends? Welcome to Sadduceville School. This is Chris Guillebeau. Yesterday's story about the fire protection engineer came in hot. Today's story is lit as well.
Well, it's not really about fire this time. It's just a good story. That's what I mean. It's lit, you know? So we'll have to change our metaphors as we go along.
But in this story, a university professor manages his depression by sharing a gift for gaming and community building on YouTube, racking up millions of views and earning a good side income in his alter ego form. It's really an awesome story in all the ways. Lots of good detail here as well, just like yesterday's story. And if you would like to get started with YouTube or any similar medium, but don't have a lot of followers, don't have a lot of platform and you're like, "Man, I really love the idea of doing this, but these people have been doing it a long time. How am I even gonna get people to subscribe?" Well, listen, I'm gonna give you a strategy for doing just that.
In fact, the strategy is right in this episode, but to be super clear, I'll break it down a bit more at the end. So get excited. Professor Starts Marvelous YouTube channel is coming right up. [Music]
Shane Hoffman leads a double life. Each morning he gets up, puts on his clothes and drives to his job as a multimedia journalism professor at Oklahoma State University.
He loves his work and his students love him. But once the day is over and the sun sets on the city of Stillwater, he transforms into a character known as Prof Hoff, a game-playing, Oreo-reviewing, dad joke-cracking YouTuber with over 12 million views. Much like Peter Parker and a plethora of other superhero alter egos that came before him, Shane has an origin story with pretty humble beginnings. Back in 2017, he found himself at one of the lowest points in his life. He'd just broken off an engagement and was fighting an uphill battle against depression.
He felt like he'd spent all his time and energy on the wrong things. So he wanted to focus on something he enjoyed and he wanted to help people. Most of his free time was spent playing a strategy-based video game called Marvel Contest of Champions. In the game, players assume the identity of a Marvel superhero and go to battle against other people the world over. He was pretty good at it.
One day, he was chatting with his twin brother, who suggested that he try turning his gaming into a YouTube channel. It would give him something creative to focus on and bring him closer to a wider community. Shane had spent the past few years reviewing Oreos and pizza on his channel, without much success. So he figured, why not try and mix it up? After that encounter, he went home to play the game, recorded a video of what he was doing, and then posted it on his channel.
He didn't expect much, but to his surprise, the video gathered more views in a couple of hours than any of his Oreo videos had in the past three years. Seeing the views and comments gave Shane a rush he hadn't felt in years. People actually wanted to watch him play, and they also cared about what he had to say. Still surprised, Shane decided he would run an experiment. He would make a video every single day, post it on his channel, and review the results.
He invested around $2,000 into this venture. He bought a new desktop computer, a laptop, and a gaming microphone to improve the quality of his videos. He also picked up a few tools like Final Cut Pro. Shane likens the videos he makes to watching someone play the slot machines. There's a lot of luck, strategy, and anticipation built into the contest of champions game.
Each video shows players what Shane is doing and how they can improve their own experience in the game. But it also documents the surprise characters, upgrades, and bonuses he receives. Because these elements come from in-game crystals, it's like a Marvel lover's version of unboxing. The more videos Shane uploaded, the more his channel started to grow. He's done little in the way of marketing outside of starting a Twitter feed.
Instead, he relies on YouTube to recommend his videos to people who are interested in similar topics. He optimizes for this by using relevant keywords in his video descriptions, as well as enticing headlines and video thumbnails to increase clicks. This simple approach has enabled Shane's ProfHoff channel to grow from 100 to 32,000 subscribers in just two years. He's been able to reach people in over 100 countries, many of which get involved in discussions on his channel. He invests between 20 and 30 hours a week into the project, which is split between playing, editing, and interacting with the audience.
He says one of the biggest contributors to the growth of his channel is how much time he spends talking to his subscribers. He prides himself in how active he is in the comments, how he answers all their questions and takes time to hang out whenever he can. But let's be clear, Shane's YouTube channel isn't just a passion pursuit. He's also generating a healthy income. Because his content is safe for work, he rarely has issues with videos being demonetized, a common problem that some other YouTubers have experienced.
Shane also receives donations from fans who enjoy the videos he makes. So how much money are we talking about? Well, this year, he's on track to earn $36,000 from his side hustle, which is almost the same as his teaching income. And if it keeps growing at this rate, it won't be long until he surpasses it. He says the only downside to running his channel, as many other superheroes have come to realize, is that the YouTube comments section can be a cynical, unfriendly place.
He's had to grow a thick skin to deal with it. However, none of it compares to the love and community he has found through the channel. Shane has had the pleasure of being invited to events all over the U.S., including the wedding of a couple who watches him every day. He wants to keep growing the platform and share a positive message to all the people who follow his work. [Music]
Well, my friends, I'm clearly living in the wrong age because as I may have mentioned a couple of times, I used to play video games a lot, at least when I was in my 20s.
Well, my teens, my 20s, you know, when I was two, three growing up. And the idea that you can actually get paid to play video games was like a joke, you know, for a long time. We actually did another episode once, number 654. Nestle employed double salary by playing video games at night. It was about a guy named Doug Vini who had a very similar approach of engaging with his audience and just really focusing on community building.
You know, so in the end, it's not so much about just playing the games. It is about building community, you know, establishing this rapport and kind of taking people along with you in the journey and so on. Now, between that episode and this one, here's your strategy, okay? So if you want to do something like this, even if it's not playing video games, even if it's not even YouTube necessarily, but let's talk about YouTube specifically, since that's what this story is about. The strategy comes straight from Shane and here's how he puts it.
I would say something very similar, but he says, "Make a video every day, even if it's just you staring into a camera talking. Nobody will watch it first and that's a good thing. You want to make your mistakes when no one is watching and then find your own voice and platform before you really take off." So the strategy is to make a video every day. The strategy is to figure out what is this thing I'm going to do and commit to doing it for a hundred days or 300 days, 365 days, let's say. Whatever it is, it is this consistent making and putting something out, especially when it's a universe or an ecosystem like YouTube that just kind of rewards that regular content.
Then you learn how to do the keywords and you learn about related videos. You kind of learn as you go along, but ultimately it's not the hack. It's going to make it successful. Ultimately it is the work. So I always think it's so fun to find projects like this.
This guy is on track to make, what, $36,000 this year. Presumably he's going to exceed his day job income because he's found this synergy, this convergence between something he loves and something that other people are interested in. They enjoy following along and learning from him. So wonderful project. Congratulations to Shane.
Thank you so much for allowing us to share this with our community. I appreciate you guys as well. Inspiration is good, but inspiration with action is so much better. Today's show notes, including links to everything I mentioned, are at sidehustleschool.com/872. That is 872.
Much more is on the way. Do come back tomorrow. Be sure you're subscribed. It's completely free. My name is Chris Guillebeau.
This is "Side Hustle School." [Music]
- From the Onward Project.
