This transcript was generated from the episode audio and may contain minor errors.
[Music]
Here's an interesting way to think about your next side hustle or small business idea. If you want to teach what you know, like if you like the idea of, okay, I'm gonna create some kind of educational business, maybe it's a channel, maybe it's a series, maybe it's a new social account or some kind of product I developed. The question is, do you begin your search with the idea of the topic or the format? In other words, do you say, I wanna start a podcast, what should my podcast be about? Or do you say, I wanna teach people about scuba diving or backgammon or programming Python or any other topic, whatever it might be, and then figure out, okay, what is the platform or medium?
Well, I would say that in general, that second approach might be better, but you're still gonna end up at the other decision one way or another. In both scenarios, you have to have a topic and a format or a topic and a medium, if you prefer. So in today's listener question, we've got, it's kind of a throwback question. We first featured it a few years ago. I've got an updated answer because I do think some things have changed since we first talked about this, but the decision is between a podcast or a YouTube channel.
And they're wondering, Grace, our caller's wondering, should she start a podcast? Should she start a YouTube channel? What are the pros and cons? How does she make the best decision and so on? I'm gonna do my best to give her an actionable answer in just a couple of short minutes, of course, 'cause I wanna respect your time.
And I think this can be helpful for anybody out there thinking about topic, format, how do I decide, what do I do next? Stay tuned for Grace's question and my answer. [Music]
Hi, Chris, this is Grace, and I've been following your work for a couple of years. Thanks to you and your team for the helpful content. After a rough 2020, I have some time on my hands and I'm committed to starting a new project this year.
I'm torn and I'd like you to settle this internal debate. Should I start a podcast or a YouTube channel? Which is best for me right now? I know I could record the podcast and then upload a version to YouTube, but if I do a YouTube channel, I wanna do it properly with content that was designed with video in mind from the ground up. So in other words, it really is one or the other.
Which would you pick or better yet, how would you decide? Thanks again for your help. [Music]
All right, Grace, thank you again for the question. We first talked about this a long time ago. My answer is different now from a few years ago because YouTube has changed.
And not just YouTube, the platform, but how people experience content has changed as it does. These days, most new podcasts are also on YouTube in addition to the known audio formats on Spotify, Apple Music, et cetera. Now this is an interesting thing because some people are really into it. A lot of listeners/viewers prefer to get their podcast content through video form. Whereas a lot of people are still perfectly happy with audio form on Spotify, Apple Music, et cetera.
So when you design a podcast to be multi format, then you can reach both audiences. But of course it's not a simple thing to do that. There's a lot that goes into video production. So if you are not set up to do that, then I think it is perfectly reasonable to say, would this work just as an audio only podcast? And if the answer is yes, then that's great.
Save yourself some time and effort and hassle. You can't just think about what format is best for the listener, although that is important. You also need to think about your own needs, your own personality, your skill set, how complicated is it going to be to get this thing up and running? And if the complexity prevents you from moving forward, then I think you are better served by moving forward with a simpler format. However, if you can do it, you know, if it's equally feasible, why not?
Because that is kind of the expectation for a lot of new shows these days to be both audio and video native. So I'll leave you with that today. Grace, let us know how it goes. I'll look for you on YouTube or Spotify or somewhere. Listeners, thanks for being out there.
If you have a question, a comment, sidehustleschool.com. Notes pages for every episode there. Download or stream every archival episode from the library there, always completely free. And of course, subscribe or follow for new episodes daily. My name's Chris Guillebeau.
You're listening to Side Hustle School. [Music]
From the Onward Project.
