Episode Transcript
[00:00:05] Speaker A: Hello, welcome back to Rogue startups. I'm your host, Craig Hewitt. Today I'm joined by George Blackman. George has worked with folks like Ali Abdal to help script the videos for their channels and help folks like Ali grow to millions and millions of subscribers on YouTube. This is a continuation in our YouTube series. George and I talk about all things scripting and really preparing yourself to be successful when you turn this damn camera on. George drops a ton of great knowledge about why to script, how technically to do it, using a teleprompter and going from the riffing kind of methodology that I use on my channel to really being intentional about planning out your content ahead of time. George has a lot of good frameworks around things to look for in your script, how to evaluate it, and even how to use AI to improve your script writing and the finished product of your videos. Hope you enjoy this conversation with George.
We were talking before we started actually recording about this kind of chasm that I have with recording my content, which is like, I know what I want to talk about generally, but especially with a solo video for YouTube, as opposed to a podcast episode where we're sitting here talking and there's this, like, me staring into this camera is so daunting if I don't know exactly what I want to talk about. And I think this is the barrier that so many people have to get into. YouTube is like, fuck, I turn this thing on and something happens. What do I do? Now I sound like an idiot. For the next twelve minutes, maybe we can walk step by step through how you've worked with your clients and how you kind of advocate folks go from like, okay, I want to talk about creating a repeatable sales process as a founder, like something I might want to talk about to actually doing that for a video.
Let's just break that down a little bit.
[00:02:05] Speaker B: Okay, that sounds good. Yeah. I mean, the first thing to say is that is a very normal thing to experience. And I think there's a lot of variation even in the people that I've worked with, even people that have done really well, people even in the millions of subscribers. My whole thing is that I'm like, people should script everything. People should script more. I'm always like pushing people that way where it makes sense. But some people, there's always exceptions to the rule. It might just be the case that for some people it's like it feels more natural to riff. And for other people, maybe more like what you've described, unless you have the kind of word for word there, the crushing weight of trying to kind of improvise your way through based on a half formed idea in your head or even some bullet points can feel a bit too much. So it's definitely worth saying that you kind of need to just get a feel of it and see, okay, I've tried sitting down, I've tried doing bullet points, and it's really, really not working for me. Maybe fully scripting something is the way to go. But equally, yeah, I work with people who I've had the displeasure, shall we say, of watching a really decently sized youtuber who I was really excited to work with. I've watched the a roll of him trying to read word for word through a script that I wrote, and he's just having a miserable time. And so it happens. And for some people, it just is not the fit. But, yeah, you kind of got to judge it for yourself.
[00:03:23] Speaker A: Okay, let's take the tact of you selling me on scripting everything. So right now I'm a riffer. Actually, I'll tell you my current process. And this is, I hope some people hate this because I did it first.
So we're doing like a series on YouTube, and you're the fourth person we've had on. And it's amazing series. It's like a master class in YouTube because we're kind of covering all these bases. And this one is super important because people just get stuck here.
One of the former guests said, hey, if you're stuck as you're like, hey, what do I talk about this week? Find a channel that you like and just create all of those videos.
[00:04:03] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:04] Speaker A: So take somebody's existing stuff that's doing well and say, well, shit. Okay, topic a and b and c obviously did well. I'll create a video about that. So that's my process right now. I have a channel around sales and marketing that I really like, and I'm just kind of taking all those topics and creating my own versions of them. Okay, so it's kind of like the skyscraper technique in SEO.
[00:04:26] Speaker B: Right.
[00:04:26] Speaker A: I watch a couple of videos about this. I make an outline of what I think are kind of the best parts of it.
And then I shoot the video. They're somewhere between like seven or eight and 20 minutes.
[00:04:39] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:04:39] Speaker A: And there is a lot of me just riffing based on the bullet points. I just have a notion, doc, and I'll shoot kind of a bit, a couple of minutes, and then I'll look at the notion, doc, and then I'll shoot and then I'll look at the notion, doc, and then I'll shoot. So that's my current process, as janky as it is.
If I were to go to a scripting process, how would you suggest someone go about it?
[00:05:10] Speaker B: Yeah, really good question. So it sounds like what you do so far is really good. And I think it's really just about the point in the conveyor belt where people choose to jump off. And right now you're kind of jumping off about maybe a quarter of the way through. And like we said at the start, that can work for some people. But if you wanted to start converting it, I think the first thing, and actually a kind of skill that tends to be really important throughout the script, whether you're talking about the hook or the main body of the video or whatever it is, is you need to become quite comfortable with cutting essentially a large portion of what you have written down. So in your case, the one major thing you need to do from those bullet points that you have is kind of figure out what the kind of, like the key punchy moments are from all of those bullet points. And this is where a lot of self awareness comes in, right, where it might feel intuitively like, okay, I'm really interested in all of this stuff, but specifically, who am I aiming this video at? And to them, what are going to be the, well, let's say in a ten minute video, what are the three or four really killer points that they're not going to have known before or that you can sort of gradually reveal to them in a way that makes them feel excited to keep watching?
And often this is like you'll have all the kind of material there that you need. It's just about figuring out a way to identify what those moments are and then arranging them in a way that means they feel like they need to just keep watching from point to point to point. Whereas I started out writing some bullet point scripts for some people and all that material is there, and it's fine to do it in that way, but it just, after a while, you start to need to think, okay, what of these bullet points can I just remove essentially, or subsume into these kind of punchier individual.
[00:07:00] Speaker A: So, so I have my outline. From there you would flesh it out to say, these are the three really important parts. I write several paragraphs about each and then write the hook and the CTA at the end. Is that the process?
[00:07:16] Speaker B: That is the process from a kind of a really top down overview perspective. But I think one of the things that people often don't think about is within each of these points. So in the course that I'm releasing soon, and generally across Twitter and elsewhere, I refer to these things as mini payoffs. So these are essentially like the building blocks that you use to get to this.
Well, in your case, it'll be this understanding at the end of whatever the topic is about in more of an entertainment video. It might be like the biggest explosion happens at the end, or the thing we've been waiting for, the skydive happens at the end, or Mr. Beast, whatever it is. Yeah, exactly. So in your case, it would be those building blocks. Those are the things that people need to understand in order to gain this comprehensive understanding of the topic at the end. But where retention often falls down and what people struggle with is in sewing those pieces together and in not losing people in between. When you get from Mini payoff one to mini payoff two and what that really comes down to, and I find with these, when I have these discussions, it's always, like, quite nebulous in the way I'm describing it. And it probably pays to have really specific examples of this. But with each mini payoff that you have, I will always break it down into setup, tension and resolution. So, essentially, let's say you've just finished the hook of your video. In fact, maybe you could give me a video topic that you might be writing about. Maybe then, like, a couple of what you would think could be some mini payoffs throughout that video.
[00:08:43] Speaker A: Yeah. So how about five things you have to do with cold email?
[00:08:49] Speaker B: Okay, so that's cool. So you'd finish your hook. You would have implied in the hook that this is obviously going to be essential for scaling your business. And without it, you're not going to hit the revenue goals that you have. Maybe you'll never buy your house, however deep you want to go with those kind of stakes. So then with a listicle, it's actually kind of easier to do this stuff because each point is like, it's fairly simple to do. Set up tension, resolution. So the set up for what's 0.1, what would .01 be on your list?
[00:09:18] Speaker A: Like, defining your customer Persona, like, who are you talking to?
[00:09:21] Speaker B: Okay, so the way you'd set that up and what people often will do wrong, especially in listicles, is they will say, point number one, defining your customer Persona, and then you'll talk about it for two minutes or 30 seconds, whatever it is. But that's essentially giving resolution first. And if you remember what I said, you kind of need to do setup, then tension, then resolution. So the setup for something like that might be if you don't know your customer Persona. I'm trying to think of a way to say it without saying it.
So there's a huge mistake that a lot of people get wrong. And it comes down to before you've even started creating your product or creating your service or whatever it is, you're kind of teeing up this thing that you're implying, okay, lots of people will make this mistake, but you're not saying what it is. Then you might drive some tension by really kind of doubling down on what the issue will be for your business. Again, maybe that'll be reiterating some of the stakes. You mentioned in the hook about the fact that you're going to struggle to get sales without this thing. And then eventually, towards the end of it, you will resolve that point by saying, and it's having a really clear customer Persona because once you have that, you can xyz.
And then I think, especially if you're doing a listicle, if you've got another four points, it's then figuring out, okay, while I've got their attention with this point, what's the next? Kind of the most tangentially related point that I can then say really seamlessly transition into that next setup to start getting people excited and curious for what that next point on the list is going to be.
[00:10:50] Speaker A: Yeah, got you. And do you try to kind of stack or escalate these? Do you start with the biggest, most important one, or do you say like this and then this and then this?
Or is that not important?
[00:11:03] Speaker B: No, that's a really good question. So with a listicle, yes, I would tend to go for something that's really good at the start or like a really impactful point at the start. I think you tend to want to have a really big punchy thing at the start and something again in the middle, just to reiterate and remind people that you have in the middle?
[00:11:22] Speaker A: Okay.
[00:11:22] Speaker B: Yeah. Because otherwise they'll think, okay, I've heard the most interesting thing. The next two points have been less interesting than that. But equally, you do need to give them something really good out the gate just to make them. Yes, I totally am pleased that I clicked on Craig's video. I am down to keep watching this. But just again, we're assuming all of these points are going to be good points. But yeah, if you can really think that's a killer one, of course. But then also you might want to have something that you set up in the hook that you've probably seen this classic thing that people do where it's like, make sure to stick around for point number five so that you don't xyz because it's the most important thing I've ever learned since I became an entrepreneur or something like that. Right.
I'm not necessarily in favor of always doing it that on the nose, but maybe it's that you could even hint at the subject of this really important point that comes right at the end without having to just say and make sure you stick around for this point. You could kind of imply it. Something like, and there is a mistake that lots of people make in whatever subtopic of your video that you're talking about.
And I'm going to reveal that towards the end of the video or something like that. So that's with a listicle in terms of how you would structure those points. It's punchy at the start, something again in the middle, and then something that you're reserving for the end that's going to keep them watching. But then if it's not a listicle video that we're talking about. And again, can you think of another topic that you might do on your channel that's not necessarily a listicle?
[00:12:52] Speaker A: Put me on the spot.
Maybe like a whole process like, hey, here's. Let's walk through a typical ideal sales process for customers.
[00:13:03] Speaker B: Okay.
[00:13:04] Speaker A: A to b kind of thing.
[00:13:06] Speaker B: Yeah, I like that. I like that. So with something like that, I think a lot of the time the temptation can be to kind of blast into it and say, well, almost like turn it into a listicle and say, first you need to do this. Second, you need to do that. But what often helps with a non listicle type video is if you can start to thread in elements of story to it. So potentially taking a step back and saying, but before we talk about any of this, here is this critical context that you need to know for this. Or here is what happened the first time I tried to set up my complete sales process or something like that. That just gives people more of a personal window into the topic. So you're not hitting them with lots of jargon and lots of specific instructions early on. You're really kind of tapping into how they're feeling emotionally and trying to recognize who you're talking to and to draw those emotions out of them. So once you get onto the actual process and the tutorial part, for want of a better phrase, they're really emotionally invested in the video and keen to keep watching it all the way. Whereas elliptical is a bit more like, punch, punch, punch. And that's kind of easier to keep people engaged with.
[00:14:12] Speaker A: So you've mentioned retention, like, several times, and I know that click and stick, right? That's everything, right? It's like, get them to click on it, and that's thumbnail and title and things like that. And the retention is the actual content.
Yeah. I'm not sure what the question is there, but obviously scripting is hugely important to keeping someone watching. Is it just because I sound like a smarter human being if we've scripted this out and I've thought through it and maybe recorded the audio once and listened to myself, or is that like, the big benefit is like, hey, we can, in a moment of sanity when the camera is off, really think about this.
[00:14:49] Speaker B: Yeah, that's pretty much bang on. I think there's always the chance that if you go in without having scripted it, with a lot of editing at the end, you could form the same diamond that you could have written beforehand. But it's just a difference in effort, essentially. And especially if you're outsourcing your editing or even if it's you doing it yourself, it's essentially choosing. Okay, which end of the process do I want to give myself more time, essentially? Do I want to do it when this is something that is amorphous and on the page and I can change things by just typing it? Or do I want to load all this work onto my editor, who now has to try and cut through all of the spiels that I've gone on to make sure that we're really targeted.
So, yeah, that's kind of it at its core. And I think even if you don't feel like you can fully script a piece of content or if it doesn't lend itself to your niche or whatever it is, I just think that the more time you can think about planning it and really, really focusing on who your audience is and the things that you need to say to them, the much less you're going to have to cut at the end.
[00:15:57] Speaker A: Do most of these big youtubers that we watch, do they all script their videos?
[00:16:02] Speaker B: It varies. So it depends what if we're talking about entertainment or education. You'll see a lot of with an entertainment video. I'll get this out of the way because it's probably less relevant for your guys, but it's like they will often plan out roughly what they think is going to happen on the day. They'll then go and do whatever the thing is on the day, and then afterwards, a lot of scripting comes in, and that's what I've done for the entertainment creators that I've worked for. It's then thinking about, okay, all these scenes that we thought would be relevant. 90% of them aren't, but these 10% are the really relevant ones. Now let's write some voiceover and thread it all together.
That's kind of a parallel with what happens when you don't script something for an educational video. It's like you end up with just all this other stuff that you kind of eventually find out you need to cut. But with entertainment, you've kind of got no choice. You've got to just go and see what happens and you can mold it. But, yeah, with education, again, it's really, really varied, and this is something that I found. I started out working for Ali Abdal, who is an educational youtuber, and talks about productivity and entrepreneurship and that kind of thing. And even when we were there, there was a lot of kind of back and forth on what he preferred to do. So some videos on his channel are fully, fully scripted, and then other things that maybe rely on his zone of genius to a t, he can kind of just riff it. But that only comes with six, seven years, maybe five years, I don't know, of experience on camera. And even then, there's still editing to be done with some of them. And again, it's deciding whether you want to load that onto yourself at the end or your editor at the end.
[00:17:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Interesting. Let's talk about time. I had this tweet ready today, and I couldn't exactly figure out the best way to say it in a tweet, but I was curious how people, if you're editing your own videos, how long it takes you. And I think about, like, a multiple of the finished duration as the barometer. The scale is like it's three times or it's ten times the finished duration.
If we're looking at the whole process, right, from research and scripting to shooting and editing, thumbnail and all that kind of crap, would you propose that scripting actually shortens that whole thing?
[00:18:21] Speaker B: Yes. Generally speaking. Again, this is all with a pinch of salt. It's all like, if it makes sense for your channel, but there are a few benefits to it. So, yes, the script writing is a time sync. And I think that's why a lot of people are reluctant to try it because it feels like it's a risky kind of switch to make where you think, if I'm going to put two days into writing a script, it ought to perform better, and it ought to save me time somewhere else. So I understand that it's a bit of a mindset shift that's required for it.
But the advantage you have, if you've scripted a few videos, it means on shooting day, not only will the video that you're shooting be done significantly quicker, again, I've watched lots of long footage of people attempting to kind of riff either in front of, like, a talking head camera or maybe it's entertainment stuff. They're kind of on set during the day, and they vaguely planned out what the scene is going to be. And you'll see them over and over again trying to g up this scene and get people excited, but they don't really know what they're going to say. And so they look at their feet, they kind of figure it out for a bit, and they're kind of closing their eyes.
I'll try that one more time. I'll try it one more time. And it adds a lot of time to the process. Not to mention it can be difficult to remember which tangents you've actually gone on. And I don't know if you will have experienced this with your script, but you might look at a couple of bullet points and think, right, I'm going to talk about that now. Then you kind of get carried away with it a bit. And then you look back and you say, I've kind of covered some stuff from the bullet point underneath, maybe something from bullet, .5 and where do I go? So it removes all of that, which means, back to my point as me going on a tangent. A, it gets you through each script quicker, and b, the byproduct of that is that you can then batch shoot 510 scripts in a day or in a sitting, which, interesting, helps move things on. Obviously, then that's like ten x as much work for your editor or for you editing. But it certainly gets you through that phase quicker. So it really just depends. But then the byproduct is your editor now has much less to do. They have the script that they can look at, and they can basically follow that word for word and just cut around the very precise words that you've said, essentially.
[00:20:34] Speaker A: I love this. So I'm currently in my home office. We just had to take a short break because the dog was going nuts because my wife just got home.
I'm thinking of renting a video studio or a studio where I can shoot video once or twice a month to shoot my videos.
We're recording this January 2, and I have a goal of releasing 200 videos this year. So this channel will have one every week. My personal channel, I want to do two. And then for the Castos channel, I want to do one. So four videos a week.
[00:21:07] Speaker B: That's a lot.
[00:21:08] Speaker A: I don't know if. I mean, these are easy, right? Because we just get on and talk, and this is pretty easy. The rest of them will have to be like, I have to research and script. And especially on the Castos channel, there's a lot of walkthrough, like screen share walkthroughs and stuff.
But I think that I have a pretty decent set up here. But I would love to be able to just go somewhere and shoot. And then it's like, I look at this light. I have a big light box that sits off the. And I look at this and I just get anxiety. It's like having your desk in your bedroom, you know, it's like, fuck, I gotta. I got. I gotta do this. As opposed to every Tuesday I'm at the studio and I shoot a couple of videos.
Easier. I don't know. What do you think about that?
If I'm recording or reserving studio time, I would have to script, I think. Because you got to have your shit together when you go there.
[00:21:59] Speaker B: Yeah, I think so. And we shot one of Ali's courses in a hired studio thing, and that was, like, a really rigorous process of working out to a t which lessons we wanted to have done by which time and whatnot. Because of being kicked out at 05:00 p.m. ET cetera. Yeah, I think definitely. But one thing I would say with that is, especially if you're investing money into it, is just maybe getting familiar with what practicing essentially doing it at least a couple of times at home with this new style just so that you can get used to reading off a teleprompter, for example, for the first time. That feels kind of weird and unnatural. And maybe you've got one of those little remotes that you have to kind of press to scroll through it as you're doing it. And I think just making sure that's not fresh when you get in there for the first time would be good. But, yeah, I know the feeling, and it's a weird one. And it's probably why I haven't fully returned to YouTube myself yet is because I need to build that muscle up.
[00:22:56] Speaker A: Yeah, yeah. Let's talk about everyone's favorite thing is gear and setup, right? So, like teleprompter, I understand there's a foot pedal you can use, or there's the your, if you're advising someone on like, what's your kind of go to setup?
[00:23:13] Speaker B: I would have to defer to a friend of mine called Gordon, who is like the tech person. I just ask him everything that I need to know about.
Literally, I've seen and used the kind of remote one. Hadn't even heard of the foot pedal one. So yeah, I'm probably not the person to ask, but I can link Gordon's information below.
[00:23:35] Speaker A: Yeah, we'll link up Gordon. Arvit call suggested the foot pedal thing to me because then it's always like, under your.
[00:23:45] Speaker B: That makes sense.
[00:23:46] Speaker A: So interesting. Okay, so I've literally never used a teleprompter. I shoot all this stuff on like a canon DSLR. So it goes and sits and does all this.
Yeah. How does it work? It scrolls, like, the teleprompter scrolls. And you're reading any kind of practical things about, like, I understand if you move around some, it's less obvious that you're reading any tips you have for folks. First time using a teleprompter?
[00:24:15] Speaker B: Yeah, good question. I think to be honest, it would be that as much as you've made this investment and you're like, okay, I'm a teleprompter person now. I use a teleprompter. I'm a professional youtuber. Here I go, reading it word for word. With all that time I put into the scripting, you are still just as allowed to kind of go off track a little bit or even, well, I was going to say a lot. Scratch that last not a lot, but a little bit, because I think the pressure that comes with suddenly thinking, okay, I had all this freedom before. It's like, the grass is always greener. When you had all the freedom, it felt like too much freedom. And now you feel restricted because you feel like you've got to stick to these exact words, but you still need to feel natural, it still needs to feel comfortable. And if you do go slightly off track, I think that's fine. And I think it's being comfortable with that and kind of like, I don't know if you've ever done meditation, but where they say if you notice the thought coming into your head, that's fine, but just gradually nudge yourself back. And that's kind of where I sit with it. And I've watched creators that I've written scripts for, and for the most part, they're kind of absolutely on it, word for word. And then just now and again, maybe through not having read it, out loud before they've sat down to record. There'll just be occasional bits where they'll skim over a phrase and rephrase it slightly. And you'll always find little things like that. On the day that you think, even though I did read this aloud and I thought it sounded like my voice, maybe in the moment, it just feels natural to tweak it slightly. So, yeah, I just say be relaxed about it, essentially and don't worry.
[00:25:41] Speaker A: Yeah. Okay.
You mentioned reading it aloud to me. That would be, like, the thing. So I research, we write, revise it, and then when I feel like it's ready, I would just read it, record it, and then, whatever, listen or watch myself.
Is that the step?
[00:26:00] Speaker B: Yeah, and I think it's good to do that. And people, I think, will often say they do that or say they've done that, but it needs to be kind of like, I'm talking to you now, and it needs to really be as though you were putting the intonation in that you would put in in the actual moment, because it can be easy to. You start reading it, and then you kind of just gradually, that's fine. But actually, if that happens, you're not getting a sense of how it will feel in the moment. So, yeah, I think even if it's literally switching on a camera or like you said, just recording it on the audio, doing it like you're doing it on the day, and, hey, maybe you get a clean take, and then you can just skip past it. You've got the video filmed, but that's probably the best way to do it.
[00:26:43] Speaker A: Okay, got you.
How do you think about to me, in the process, I'll research about bullet points. I'll write it out, and then the editing, like, the written editing and revising of the script has to come in.
How do you approach that? Because to me, I'll have whatever, a few pages for a ten minute video, and then how do you think about all that stuff to cut out and improving the hooks and the bits for retention?
How do you generally approach that?
[00:27:14] Speaker B: I guess, yeah, that's a really good question. And there's kind of a lot that you can talk about when it comes to kind of really getting the retention up and really tightening up the script. The last 20%, I've got my list, so I have this checklist that I basically go through once I've got the finished or draft. Let's call it draft one or two. Maybe it could be filmed at this point, but it's not necessarily in its peak condition. So the first thing I look for, and again, this is a fairly sizable chunk of what I discuss in my course. If I might be so bold as to plug it a second time in this.
[00:27:52] Speaker A: Please do.
[00:27:52] Speaker B: Please do.
[00:27:53] Speaker A: You hinted out of it for but tell us all about it.
[00:27:56] Speaker B: Good segue. Yeah. Okay, cool. So it's essentially that the course is around systemizing the entire process of creating a script so that questions like this, where you're like, okay, what are the things I need to worry about during retention? And what are the things I need to worry about during the hook? It can feel like there's all these kinds of questions at every point throughout the script where I could take this road or I could take that road, but is this one more engaging or is this one better? Should I say this, or should I say that? It kind of gets a little bit tiring. So the idea of the course is to reduce that decision fatigue, essentially, and give you really clear frameworks and checklists throughout the script for things that you can then say with certainty. Yes, this is the best way that I should do this. And one of the things that we talk about and kind of one of the real cornerstones to any good script, and this is the first thing that I will check for at the end when I'm doing the kind of retention edit, if you will, is this idea of progression.
And I think what a lot of people, and maybe this is getting slightly better. Like you say, we're at the start of 2024, there seems to be this move towards slightly more personal content, and the idea of, like, cut, cut, cut. Shouting, explosions, all of that is maybe a thing of 2021, 2022.
But certainly I've hinted at it. I may as well just say, Mr. Beast, that kind of content, I think, has made people assume the wrong thing about what makes a script compelling, and that it just means you need to get through the content as quickly as possible and say things more loudly and whatever else. But progression is actually the thing that if you look past all the kind of insanity in one of his videos, there is basically one of four things happening. And this is the progression category, if you like, for the retention edit. So the first thing is that there will be new information being added. The second is that there will be progression. The third is that there will be regression. And the fourth is that there will be new emotions being introduced. So in any higher retention script, one of those four things is happening at any one time. Information, progression, regression, or emotion. Okay?
And this can feel like overkill when you're trying to think about, say, it is just a five minute tutorial about SEO or something like that. I get it's not always going to feel like this stuff. You need to go this in depth with how you're thinking. But at the end of every one of my scripts, I will go through it and think about the fact, okay, of all the sentences that are in this script, is every single one doing one of those four things? Am I introducing new information? Am I progressing towards the goal? So, in the case of the video we talked about, it's that goal of them understanding how to create a really strong audience Persona in the case of an educational video regression. So, like, moving away from that goal might look like highlighting the stakes again and showing them what their current process looks like and why it's bad and why that moves them further away from their goal. And then emotion kind of can be elicited from any of those three other things. It's like, am I making the audience curious about something with this sentence? Am I resolving that curiosity and making them feel happy or angry or whatever it is that I'm trying to do?
Basically, every sentence should be doing one of those four things. And so that's the first thing I check for. Sometimes. If you got the time, you can highlight it. And if you're highlighting the whole script in those four colors and there are some sentences, you think, I can't highlight these because they're doing none of those four things, chances are they are good to go. And so that's the first of the four.
[00:31:31] Speaker A: This is the first time in this whole conversation that I feel really like it's daunting, right? If you're saying, I think that's my fear of scripting, is every word has to have a purpose, whereas I think there's less pressure on me when I say, oh, I just have this one page of bullet points, and I can just talk, and in eight minutes, it'll be over, for better or worse.
But, like you saying this, I'm just, like, anxiety ridden with, like, fuck, I got to get every word right here. I mean, obviously, I don't have to, but if I want to write a really good script, then you're saying, that's the benchmark we want to go for.
[00:32:09] Speaker B: Yes, to a point. But then I completely take what you're saying, and this is something that the pre launch students of the course had said. It was like, okay, this is cool, but it feels like a lot. And how do I implement this, and what do I do to convert what you're saying into results? For me. And so there are these kind of jumping off points that I have throughout where it's like, hey, if you've done all of this stuff up to now, just keep doing that. And when you're ready, feel free to, when modules one to three say, come effortlessly, then worry about this other stuff.
So it's definitely, definitely not essential to do all of these things at once. And to be honest, that's my retention checklist. But that first one is probably the most anxiety inducing, so maybe I could give the other three and then it might reduce that feeling a bit.
[00:32:55] Speaker A: Please do.
[00:32:56] Speaker B: Yeah. Okay, cool. So the second one is what we've already spoken about. It's the idea of payoffs it's going through and making sure, okay, I've broken my script up into these, say, three or four sections. I know what the mini payoff is at the end of those sections, and then all it is is going to each of those mini payoffs and checking. Okay, when I've resolved the last 01:00 a.m.. I, immediately setting up the next one so the audience isn't left in limbo and they're not sure where the video is going next. So as soon as you've told them that, again, I'm trying to think of the examples we were talking about, but you resolve zero one, and then you immediately set up what .2 is. Sure. And then again, you're driving tension right up until you then resolve that mini payoff. And as soon as that's resolved, you check the next one is set up right away. What happens when an audience member feels like they've lost the thread of the overall video and they've kind of forgotten? Even if your hook was really compelling and the title is really good, if they get lost in this kind of quagmire of the middle of the script and they don't know what's going on, that's the kind of first key to thinking, I'm probably going to just leave this video. So check your payoffs. That's the second one. And then after that, it's just repetition and clarity. Those are the last two things. So checking, you're not repeating any information, say, a minute apart, you're not saying basically the same thing twice again. That's something you will just start to notice as you're reading it through after, say, a day away from it. And then clarity is just things like, am I writing this like an essay? Are there things that when I read it aloud, just don't trip off my tongue naturally? And that's really the last thing. It's not really a discussion about dumbing your scripts down and making the language really basic, but it's just about thinking, okay, would I say this conversationally? And if not, maybe I should just change it.
[00:34:43] Speaker A: Yeah. Interesting. The last two points really hit home for me. It's the reason I would consider scripting is so it just is better. Like, it's better content. It sounds clearer. It's not repeating myself because that's a big one, is when I'm riffing, I know the bullet point and I just want to go and say the words of the bullet point so many times. But that's the whole point, is to expound on that. So, yeah, I repeat myself a lot, and I've done 500 episodes of this and it's like there's anxiety of like the camera is on and I'm shooting and I'm supposed to say the right thing. And if I know that the next three words out of my mouth aren't going to be right, then the ten words after that are going to be wrong too. So I think just from my perspective as a creator, I'm more likely to script to not have the anxiety with a camera and have it on paper ahead of time, for whatever that's worth.
[00:35:42] Speaker B: Yeah, that totally makes sense.
[00:35:44] Speaker A: You mentioned the course a few times. Where can folks find out about that? So we don't skim over that.
[00:35:49] Speaker B: Yes. So depending on when this is coming out, well, maybe it'll be the case that today is the first day of the course being out. So I would go to my website, which is georgeblackman.com, where you can find it. I say that because we don't yet have the website, the domain for it set up. We're still, hey, a week to go and there's still some pretty fundamental things being. Exactly. But the course is already. The course is all there. So if you just go to my website, georgeblackman.com, you can find it. And if you are watching this, between the twelveth and the 15th of Jan, there's a 10% off if you use the code, launch ten. And that works for any of the tiers of the course.
[00:36:32] Speaker A: Okay. I love the four step process and we'll include a summary of that in the show notes. I think one of the questions that I have is I use AI quite a bit with my content creation.
It's not doing it for me, but it's helping me. Right. It's helping outline, it's researching, it's giving feedback on stuff. How much are you using chess, GPT and AI in your scripting process?
[00:36:58] Speaker B: Yeah, really good question. I think I am still on the lower end of usage when it comes to, certainly people that I know in this economy. I think that this little bit of old man syndrome set in and it was like, oh God, I can't be bothered to learn this. Is it really necessary? And now I'm gradually learning, obviously, how useful it is to the extent that I use it. Titles. First of all, I'll often use it for titles. What I tend to do is go through and model titles that are working well. That could be really in three places. First of all, it'll be on the channel that I'm working on. Second of all, it'll be in tangential niches.
Sorry, I should say the same niche, but a different channel. And then the third most important would be looking at just any channel, any title that's working well, and essentially creating what this title would look like if you replaced all the specific phrases with just x. So my X routine to ABC or whatever else, and then pretty much giving it a list of the ideas that I have for the channel, and combining the two, essentially, and telling it to substitute these ideas into these title formats in a way that could make it go viral or whatever the goal of the client is, I suppose. So a little bit with titles. I've tried using it to outline some stuff like full full script, or even just the bullet points of the script, and I found that to be less successful. But there are some people in my community who have been using it to basically relate to the things we've talked about here, with kind of mini payoffs and the emotions that we're trying to evoke and things like that, where they have come up with different prompts, which maybe we can get in the show notes or something like that, where they're essentially saying, this is my target audience. Here are a couple of their key features. What sorts of emotions should I be trying to evoke in a video about X?
Or little things like that? Or considering the grand payoff of this video? The ultimate thing they're going to find out is this. And this is my audience avatar. Here are their key features. What would you suggest would be the key mini payoffs I should use in the build up? Things like that. So I think beyond structuring and brainstorming, I'm not sure it's particularly good. Again, I've tried to use it to write my newsletter and things like that, and even training it on past transcripts and things like that. Slightly less success there.
One other one that I have found useful, speaking of transcripts, is if you're looking to even figure out what your idea is in the first place, you can use the transcript of other videos that have done really, really well. So you copy the transcript from YouTube, tell Chat GPT to get rid of the timestamps, to format it in a way that is readable or whatever, and then you basically tell it to break down the style or the tone or the key ideas or whatever else within that transcript so you can figure out what's working well. But then one step further, you can then ask it to identify what's not being talked about in that transcript and things that maybe have viral potential that haven't been brought up in there. And that's then a way to potentially figure out the direction for your idea and tackle something in a way that hasn't been done yet.
[00:40:14] Speaker A: Yeah, no, I love that. I use chat GBT similarly. I use it for writing some, like, hey, give me. This is my kind of ideal customer Persona, my audience. These are the things they want. Help me write something about this topic. So like quite a bit of training and templatizing to post formats, like for post for LinkedIn.
Yeah, I agree. It's not there to just spit out a whole script about a topic. I agree. It's really good for analysis and brainstorming.
We're similarly old curmudgeons in that respect.
[00:40:52] Speaker B: We will see, though, in a year or two years, maybe this will be the kind of the last relic of my career as a script writer before AI completely took away all my.
[00:41:04] Speaker A: Think so. I don't think so.
I want to zoom out a little bit from script writing talk, just in general, about YouTube, because I think I was having this conversation with a friend the other day and I was kind of saying the big opportunity with YouTube is that it's so hard, right, easy for someone to just get on Twitter or LinkedIn and spout off about something and achieve decent success, or seem like it, at least. But with like, you have to have decent lighting and a good camera and a decent backdrop and be able to perform on camera exponentially more than podcasting, which is kind of like all of my background.
One. Do you agree with that? A big part of the opportunity is the barrier to entry?
[00:41:44] Speaker B: Yes, I agree with that. But I think the barrier is less about the gear and the setup, but is very much about, like you said, being able to perform on camera.
That's one element of it. I think it's just the idea generation and then being able to execute that idea on camera, even if the camera isn't very good, I think particularly low effort in quotes can be. You can almost use that to your advantage to create little motifs that are particularly yours. Like Ryan Trahan is a really good example of content, that it's edited deliberately badly in a way. He has these really janky editing effects that he uses, and that's kind of become his shtick. And I think that's a technique that plenty of people have used. So I don't know if it is so much about the gear, but I agree, it is very much about how you do on camera, and that ultimately comes down to what idea are you trying to execute? But you're right, it's not a cash cow thing. And I think a lot of people, especially today, are starting to think, oh, okay, wow, youtubers make an absolute ton of money, kind of money that they didn't make seven, eight years ago. And so maybe this is the thing I should get into. But you're right. It's like, unless you have the passion for it and an ability to really put the time in, think about the ideas and execute on them, then for sure it's not for everyone.
[00:43:10] Speaker A: Yeah. Cool. Last question I have is specific to our audience.
Everyone in our audience would make what you call education type videos, as opposed to just entertainment and a fair amount of talking ahead, but also like screencasting, when you're approaching educational or product like software, product demo type video. What things are different about that that we all should think about as opposed, know my son watching Mr. Beast or his Minecraft videos or something that are just fireworks and stuff all the time.
[00:43:47] Speaker B: Yeah, that's a really good question. Really good. I think the first thing is to think about what kind of format you're using. So I've worked with some people who, their whole thing is like just screen sharing and their face doesn't even appear. Maybe it pops up in the hook, but it's kind of like a really basic one take, screen record type thing. And so in that kind of situation, I think it comes back to what we've talked about, that self awareness thinking, even though I kind of want this to be like a one take thing, which information can I cut out? What does my audience really want to get out of this, and how do I kind of get to that desire as quickly as possible?
So that's one thing I'm trying to think. Could you give me an example of how you would format one of your, like, in an ideal world, what would the format of your videos look like if you had infinite time and whatever else?
[00:44:40] Speaker A: So I'll give an example from my channel. All of my videos would be talking ahead.
And I think, interestingly, that doesn't all mean it's the same format. I think one thing that would be interesting is like whiteboarding, or the one I really like is where you have a camera from above and you just have a piece of paper and you're writing Sicily alley do this right? He's got the paper and he's writing out the bullet points.
I think that would be some of the stuff that I would want to introduce, but basically it's just talking, head educating or educating about a particular topic around SaaS and founder marketing and stuff like that.
[00:45:19] Speaker B: Sure. Yeah. I think you need to just kind of see what happens in your analytics and see what your audience is enjoying. Because again, there's always people that buck the trend with this stuff. Again, I'm always about script everything as much as you can and cut out anything that doesn't speak directly to that audience. And then you look at someone like Alex Homozi, who now does these two hour long videos where clearly there's editing and there's cuts and things, but he's doing that thing where he's got a big whiteboard and he's talking and he's got that unfair advantage that he is just very good on camera. He's obviously got that experience, but that clearly works for his audience and that's what they kind of expect of him now.
So I don't know.
Without wishing to refute the premise of the question, what I've found certainly in working with all these different creators across all these different niches and doing script reviews and retention graph reviews for dozens of different people at this point, is that these same principles tend to underlie everything. And ultimately it's about figuring out who your audience is and what they want from you. And that applies as much to the information you're talking about as how you're presenting it.
If it turns out that the audience you have cultivated really dig one, take screen recorded videos, maybe like your face is in the top corner or something, and that's what they want to watch. They want to just kick back and spend half an hour with Craig to learn whatever Craig is teaching on that particular day, then that's kind of what you need to keep serving them. But really, I think it's, if you're noticing that things aren't working or the channel isn't growing, or the retention is always really bombs off in the first 30 seconds. That's when you need to start thinking, okay, maybe this needs to change up a bit. What does my audience want? Can I ask them in my community section what it is they want more of? Can I see which videos have performed well and identify what's working in those particular videos? And I don't know that there is much difference in that regard between education, entertainment, edutainment even. It's always just about listening to the audience and seeing where you should pivot and where you should keep going.
[00:47:26] Speaker A: Sounds like YouTube analytics is maybe our next episode, because that's something that I hear over and over and I literally just never look at it. I look at listens and subscribers and none of the rest of the kind of granular stuff, but I hear it over and over. That's so important. You got to really understand it. And cohort analysis and all this. And I'm not there yet, so maybe sometime this year.
[00:47:47] Speaker B: To be honest, I'm really in the middle with this stuff as well. I feel like I know what I'm doing up to a point. And then I see the kind of the deep dives on data that people like Paddy Galloway do and Mario Juice is really good for this kind of really data driven stuff. And yeah, I think I've also got a lot to learn there and I'd love to keep learning more, but there are certainly these top level things that you can start to identify again how your retention is doing after 30 seconds. That's a really easy one to think, okay, these hooks work. These hooks don't. Why people keep on my graph is like really spiky like this. And it goes down, down and down. That implies people are skipping ahead to each new point I'm making or each new chapter. Why? And it's always, yeah, self awareness, introspection, and looking at those top level things. Click through, rate all of that.
That's an easy place to start. Yeah.
[00:48:39] Speaker A: Cool. Awesome. George, this was amazing. Thank you so much for your time. Your course, georgeblackman.com. And what the name of the course is?
[00:48:48] Speaker B: What? It's the YouTube script writers playbook.
[00:48:52] Speaker A: Awesome.
And this episode will be coming out on January twelveth, 2024. And folks can get 10% off with discount code launch.
[00:49:01] Speaker B: Ten. Yes, that's the one.
[00:49:04] Speaker A: Cool.
[00:49:04] Speaker B: That's the one.
[00:49:06] Speaker A: And George website, obviously good place for folks to check you out. You're on Twitter at George Blackman.
[00:49:13] Speaker B: Yes, that's the one. Yeah. Really awesome. That's that. But yeah, I really appreciate you having me on.
It's been an exercise in remembering all the stuff that I talk about after a long holiday season. So, yeah, it's been really nice to get back into it on January the second.
[00:49:28] Speaker A: Lovely. Thanks so much, George.
[00:49:30] Speaker B: Cheers, Craig, you.
