Feel like giving up?? Watch this: YouTuber Camille Collazo on How it Took 7 Years to Grow to Over 100k Subscribers: The YouTube Power Hour Podcast 264
“I was determined to make it work. This was going to be like my 10th try, but it was going to be my last one, and I was going to make it work.”
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Camille Collazo’s story is one of true resilience and dedication. Originally from Puerto Rico, Camille moved to the United States at the age of 18 and joined the military, despite not knowing any English. In 2013 while attending film school to study cinematography, Camille started a YouTube Channel. After 6 years of being on YouTube, she rebranded her channel at the beginning of quarantine to share content on frugal living, saving money and personal finance after a 90K loss of income due to COVID, and her channel FINALLY started to grow. Her channel now has over 100K subscribers.
When Camille was a film school student, she was an avid YouTube consumer and she had all the equipment anyway, so she decided to start a channel as an outlet to be creative and experiment with video without the barriers of film school. Despite film school, she realized it was a boys club and that she didn’t belong, but she felt a sense of belonging and connection with YouTube, so she wasn’t ready to give up. In film school, Camille felt like she didn’t have a voice, but on YouTube she could say whatever she wanted to say. Her channel was all over the place at first – recipes, makeup, beauty, talking about school, you name it (her very first video was a tutorial for upholstering a chair). She didn’t have a consistent schedule. In 2015 she delved more into beauty with makeup and hair tutorials, posted more frequently, and took her channel more seriously. Camille got her first viral video, which was a hair tutorial, that got her a big (at the time) influx of subscribers. She took that as a sign that she could grow on the channel, and she continued in the beauty niche for 4 more years. In 2019, she started to pivot to commentary videos on pop culture, celebrities, and social and political issues surrounding race, but then her subscriber account started to decrease.
“There was something about YouTube that just kept pulling me back. I always knew that this was what I wanted to do.”
Just before the pandemic, she left the freelance world and joined the corporate world, but then she immediately lost the job in March, so she decided to pivot her content to frugal hacks and sharing money-saving tips in quarantine. The videos did well, so she continued to make them as she learned about the business side of YouTube and SEO. YouTube helped Camille stay busy and alleviate her pandemic anxiety, and sharing helped her connect with other people who were going through the same thing. It was then that Camille really started to approach YouTube like a business. She put herself on a schedule, even waking up at 5 or 6am every morning to work on her channel, and has maintained a consistent uploading schedule. Even while she was losing subscribers, Camille was still enjoying the creative process of putting something together and releasing it to the world. Camille has now learned how to generate multiple streams of income and treats her channel like the business it is. Her goal is to segue her content from saving money to making money and show her subscribers how to build a business and how to build wealth!
“My channel took off and I’m chasing it. I’m being dragged by it while I learn how things go.”
3 Key Interview Takeaways
- Self-Awareness. When Camille first started on the beauty route on her channel, the niche wasn’t nearly as saturated as it is now. But as she continued, she had the self-awareness to know that she didn’t have what it took to be in the beauty niche and compete in a market that was becoming more and more saturated. It’s important to know whether something is for you or not.
- Time management. When Camille began treating her YouTube channel like a business, she had to set herself on a schedule and budget her time to do everything by herself. When you’re a one-woman show, you have to wear many hats and learn as you go. When you know how long something will take you, make sure you budget your time accordingly.
- Don’t give up! Camille never gave up in her YouTube journey, despite dipping her toes into several niches and having a channel that was stuck and stagnant for years. She didn’t give up because she was passionate about the creative process of YouTube and she knew that YouTube was a place for her voice to be heard. Her resilience has paid off! Trust the process.
Mentioned in the Episode:
A BEGINNER’S GUIDE TO FRUGAL LIVING: Here’s where to start!
FRUGAL LIVING HACKS: Saving Money in Quarantine
Connect with Camille:
Resources
Add your name to the Zero to Influence YouTube Bootcamp waitlist so you are notified when space becomes available!
Watch my replay of my FREE Zero to 100k Subscribers Masterclass
FREE GUIDES:
Creating Content During Crisis: How to Create Impactful Content During COVID-19 Pandemic
Getting Started on YouTube: YouTube Niche Workbook
How to get onto PR lists and receive a TON of free product even if you have a small following: PR List
YOUTUBE OPTIMIZATION PLUG-IN I RECOMMEND
TubeBuddy [Use the code ErikasBuddy to get 20% off]
MY FAVORITE BUSINESS TOOLS
Course Creation: Looking to create a course? Kajabi is the BEST platform hands down. I use this for my course after extensive research on all the other platforms.
Live Calls and Interviews: I use Ecamm for my podcast interviews, both audio and for YouTube that you see here on YouTube. It makes it super easy to share my screen and create the split-screen with my guest. I’m not super techie and this software is really easy to use!
Webinars and Live calls: I use Zoom.us for my group coaching calls in my private membership group for female YouTube creators. It’s also the software I use to record my Road to 100k YouTube Subscribers Masterclass!
THE BEST YOUTUBE/PODCASTING EQUIPMENT
After interviewing HUNDREDS of successful YouTube creators, these are the pieces of equipment that hands down get mentioned time and time again. You can’t go wrong with anything on this list!
- 4k Camera: Great for starting out and vlogging
- Lens: This lens is recommended highly by many of my podcast guests, it gives the blurry “YouTuber” background look.
- Audio: If you want to upgrade your set-up, audio should be one of the first investments (after a good camera). This microphone is unanimously the favorite amongst my podcast guests.
- Podcast/Voiceover Microphone: If you are looking for a great microphone for a podcast or video voiceover, this is it! This is the one that you see in all of my videos and the one I’ve recorded my podcast on for years.
- Webcam: For my interviews, that you see in my videos, this is the webcam that I use. Super inexpensive and easy to set up!
- Inexpensive Lighting Kit: Need to pick up some lights but don’t want to spend a ton? This is a great set that will get you started and help improve the look of your videos.
- Ring light: Looking for that beauty look? Invest in a ring light! This is an inexpensive light that does that trick!
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**Disclaimers: all opinions are my own, sponsors are acknowledged. Links in the description are typically affiliate links that let you help support the podcast at no extra cost.
