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Lots of Nigerian self-employed people want to be on YouTube these days and to make a business or a career out of it, but haven't properly considered what it is that it takes. And so on today's podcast episode, we're going to be looking at some of those questions, how to get on YouTube, how to make money on YouTube, whether you should be in fact on YouTube. So those are some of the things that we're going to consider if this is your first time listening to the podcast.
My name is Tavis Shema Ayede. I am a former lawyer now turned business consultant and I solve business problems. And so that's what I do over here on the podcast almost every other day, right? Sorry, excuse me. There will be some interruptions in the background because I'm making today's recording at home. So expect to hear interruptions in the background. Now, the reason why we're looking at these sorts of issues today is because listen of the show reached out.
Let's see, what should we call him now? What should we call him? Let's just call him Kingsley, not his real name. So anyway, so Kingsley reached out. He said he listens to my podcast on Spotify and he's thinking of starting his own YouTube channel, but he doesn't know how to structure the YouTube channel. And the reason why he reached out is because I've been saying on the podcast a lot that we should move from dreaming and start executing because too many people stay stuck in this whole dreaming, dreaming, planning,
planning. Too many people are, you know, planning to execute, dreaming to execute, and, you know, just stuck in weird faces. And since I am a sales coach and business development consultant, my own primary concern when dealing with my clients is to make sure that people actually start getting work done. Because it's only when you start getting the work done. It is only when you execute on the things that we agree upon that we can validate the idea to be sure that this is a good thing you ought to be doing and you ought to be spending your time in.
So my chief concern is to make sure that you guys get traction on your ideas quickly so that if this thing will work, we will know quickly. If you're no longer interested in this thing, let us finish. Let us figure it out quickly. Either way, let's get all the data that we need so we can start making future decisions. Then I noticed that Kingsley, again, not his real name, is a fan of Gary Vee. And I, I think that's one thing we have in common because I also like Gary Vee's approach.
But a warning for those of you who like to listen to Gary Vee and, you know, other such kinds of people. OK, well, not a warning, but here's a perspective that I want you guys to have. A lot of times people see Gary Vee and figures like Gary Vee, and what you see is the finished product and you fall in love with that and you want to be that exact same thing. But even Gary Vee himself says it. Gary Vaynerchuk. Now, you ought to look at these things in perspective.
Now, the reason why he is where he is today is because of actions that he started taking 1520 years ago. All right, so Gary Vee is big today, but he started his journey 2025 years ago making content. So Gary Vee has blown up today, but this is a journey that has taken roughly 2 decades, 2 1/2 decades depending on how you count it. So it is enough to be in love with these individuals who have blown and who are big. But just remember that there is a prior context.
So Gary Vee has said it himself. Now, the proper way to look at it is you don't look at somebody that you like and admire today and then you want to be that person today. But rather you ask yourself, this person you love and admire, where was this person when this person started their journey? close to my own circumstance. So if you are in love with Gary Vaynerchuk, just like Kingsley is, again, not his real name, the challenge for you is not to figure out how you can be like Gary Vaynerchuk today.
But the challenge is to try and figure out what Gary Vaynerchuk did 20 years ago when he had no following and when he had no name. All right, So please just bear that in mind. It doesn't matter whether it's Gary Vee or Jay-Z or who else. OK, let's look for some Nigerian alternatives, Mr. Macaroni or who else? Shay Shay or Burner Boy or whatever the goal is not oh, I love burner boy. How can I be burner boy today? The question is when burner boy was at my level, what did burner boy do?
You start from there. OK, so that's just a warning just to make sure that we have the proper perspective then. Now one question that I asked the Kingsley, again, not his real name. I asked him, why are you in love with the platform? The reason why I'm asking is this. Lots of you are trying to be on YouTube because you want to make money. If you're listening to this podcast, I'm assuming that you want to make money. Now, the problem is a lot of you are making these business decisions, but you're not thinking about the strategy first.
You're thinking about the platform first. Now, some of you, like Kingsley would say, what's the difference? This is the difference. First of all, you think of the strategy. Who am I? Where am I heading? What am I good at? How am I going to make money? It is the strategy that will determine whether you get on YouTube or that will determine whether you get on TikTok or that will determine whether you get on Pinterest or that you start a blog or whether you should be on a radio station.
Hope you guys are listening. You don't fall in love with the platform first, you don't say I love YouTube, therefore let me be on YouTube. This is not a love thing, this is a money thing. I want to make money by doing XYZ. What is the best way to make money doing XYZ? Working backwards, you will now be able to figure out that OK, the people that I want to talk to spend all that time on TikTok. Therefore, I should start a TikTok account.
Maybe I can now republish videos on YouTube, but the strategy will determine that you'll be on TikTok and then other things will follow. So don't start this journey by falling in love with the platform. Now I hope Kingsley, if you're listening to this again, not his your name. I hope you honest appreciate what it is I'm trying to say now for those of you who reach out in the future and I'm going to ask you this question, why XYZ
platform? It is because we shouldn't fall in love with the platform first. We think strategically first. Who am I? Where am I heading? What are my skills? What am I selling? How will I make money? Where are my potential customers at? That is what will determine what you will do next, not the platform. So that's one of my questions. Be him, why YouTube? And also to try and get him to think, what is your strategy? So let's see what else?
Oh, then some side talk. He said that Gary Vee is his mentor. And I thought that was really good. Then later on he said Gary Vee was his idol. And so I had to check him. I said, Kingsley, you say yes. I say Kingsley, take it easy when say somebody's your idol. That's going a bit too far. You can say the person is your mentor, but the guy no, be idol. Sure, you understand? You know, Kingsley laughed and he understood. And I know some of you say I'm nitpicking, but I'm not.
How will I put it? Now, how will I put it? How will I put it? Let us put our loves in the right perspective. It is OK to love Gary Vee. But The thing is everything, how will I put it? There are different things we love, but we love everything in the right order. OK, so there's a place for God, there's a place for family, there's a place for relationships, there's a place for influencers, there's a place for neighbors, there's a place for everybody.
We just make sure make sure that everything in the right place. So if you love Gary Vee, cool, but he's not your idol, OK, He's your mentor. Very good. Dan Gote is your mentor, Very good. Let me see, what else? So anyway, let me move on because this is not a spiritual podcast. This is actually a business broadcast. Now, Kingsley, again, not his real name. He said he wants to be a public speaker. And then, of course, I had some questions for him.
I wanted to know why he wants to be a public speaker, what he's interested in. And Kingsley, again, not his real name, says he has a passion for psychology, that he wants to talk about things like religion, things like politics. He wants to explore ideas around actualization, how you get to be live your best life and some topics in financial freedom. So those are the things he's interested in. And then he said that he wants to learn by teaching.
And yes, that's a valuable option. You can become the expert eventually by teaching people and sharing the little that you have learned today. In fact, it's a similar strategy to what it is that I'm doing over here on the podcast. I was not born a sales expert. I was a wedding photographer. I was a lawyer first of all. Eventually I became a wedding photographer and then I was in an export business with my brother. Along the way, people said, oh boy, you're good at this sales thing.
And then I started studying and then I started teaching and I was getting better and better and better and over time getting results for people. So it's a similar approach that I took. So it's equally valid. That's one reason why I say that for those of us who get on social media and share, you know, don't position yourself as an expert. Some people say, oh, I'm a thought leader. I'm a this. I'm like, relax, take it easy.
The time will come when people salute you and call you thought leader and call you expert. But just bid your time, you know, relax, be humble, be patient. Don't try to oversell yourself. If you're learning, you're learning. If you're growing, you're growing. If you're sharing, you're sharing. Don't go and say Nigeria's number one top most expert in something, something, something. Relax. You haven't gotten there yet. You will get there.
And then of course, I had the money, the conversation with Kingsley concerning money. So I asked him, now look, all these things that you're trying to pursue, it takes time. It takes time to have a public speaking career. And then if you're going to publish content by sharing content, by learning and growing, it takes a while before things pop off. Content marketing and all these sorts of ideas, these are medium to long term strategies.
So in other words, these are things that if they're going to make money, you're not going to see money in in about, you know, let's say three years or so. If it happens quick, it will be between one or three years, but either way you're going to be making content for like a whole year without people noticing, without you seeing any results. So I asked him what are you going to do for the money? And he responded, I work full time and I said very good.
Now for those of you who don't have full time work, we don't have any source of income. Can you see the reason why some of you start and then you struggle and then you fail? Money is a fact of life. You have to pay house rent, you have to pay for fuel, you have to pay for Internet, you need food, if you have kids, you need to pay children's school fees and stuff like that. If there is no money coming in from another place, you will struggle in this your enterprise.
OK, it is so clear to see. I don't know why I have to explain it to people, but I still have to. Where's the money going to come from? Ask yourself, if you're trying to get into business and you're trying to make a living, but you're pursuing all these routes that involve you being an influencer or that involve you being a thought leader. The money has to come from somewhere. In the meantime, luckily Kingsley works and this is one of the reasons why I know he's going to be successful because he is currently paying the bills through something else.
So the level of discouragement that he's going to go through will not be as high as someone who doesn't have anything doing. But the person insists that they want to be a public speaker. They insist that they want to be an influencer. All right, so where's the money going to come from? If you're going to work full time like how Kingsley is working full time, very good. Be working full time. You close your work 5:00, then you jump in traffic.
You're stopping in traffic maybe 2 hours. You get home, 8:00, no problem. 8930, eat something. You chill with your wife, you chill with your girlfriend for a bit. Everybody goes to bed. You make your content between maybe 9:00 and 11:00. You sleep, you wake up, you start the whole process over again. If you don't, if you don't have money coming in from anywhere, excuse me. If you don't have money coming in for anywhere and you don't have what it is that you're doing that's putting food on the table.
My brother, my sister, this thing is going to be hard. Then of course, we discussed other options concerning, like I said, this whole thing about the platform YouTube. Why YouTube? The audience that you're running after, where are they? Is the audience on YouTube? Because you can't be in love with YouTube. But if your audience, the people who actually pay you money or the people who need to hear what it is you have to say, if your audience spends all their time on Facebook, you are wasting your time.
Let me repeat this thing that I said in the beginning about being strategic. Part of your strategic considerations are where is your audience? If your audience is not the in the place that you're in love with, you are wasting your time. If you love YouTube, you want to put things on YouTube, but your audience is on Facebook, you're wasting your time. If you find out that your audience is on Facebook, you're better off doing Facebook Live,
Facebook, real Facebook, whatever, whatever, whatever, and connect with your audience. If you want to now figure out a way to migrate them from Facebook to YouTube, that has a different question, but needs to be clear, where's our audience? So please be strategic. The reason these things well, well, well before you begin. Then the conversation started getting a wieldy and I told her, look, you know what, I'm in a hurry.
I'm going to have to run for podcast listeners. I answer one question if you want, but if you want me to walk through this, then we need to book a consulting session and I can start walking you through all these things so that we solve this, all these problems bit by bit by bit to make sure that you start your successful YouTube show. And I haven't given the example of my most famous student so far or my most successful student,
at least when it comes to using content. Her name is Mobila Adekola. She is a former classmate of mine back in the UNI days because remember, I'm a former lawyer. Mobila is still a practicing lawyer. Then Mobila has a broadcast that is called, also called Trade Beyond Borders, and it's about the African Free Trade Continental Treaty, I think. I think that's what it's called. And then the AFCTCA or something like that.
So the AFCTCA, the Free Trade Treaty basically is the law, is the legislation that governs how goods and services are going to move across the African continent. So how are Nigerians going to sell into Ghana? How will Ghanaians selling to Cameroon? How will Cameroonians selling to Congo? How will Congo leads people selling to Uganda? How will people in Uganda selling to South Africa? How will South Africa do business with Nigerians?
That essentially is what the AFCTCA is, the free Trade Treaty. And so my former classmate Mobila wanted to start the podcast around that topic. And her first concern was, would it work? And I told her the same thing that I told Kingsley because Kingsley also wanted to know, will it work? See, this is the answer. Truth of matter is, anything can work and he can. Anything can flop. It all depends on the execution. All right, So is this a good idea?
Is this a bad idea? You know, it depends. Are you executing well and have you done taken steps to validate the idea to ensure that people are interested? There is no shame with starting something and figuring out that there's no demand, there's no market, there's no shame. At least now you know, you stop and then you go and do something else. You pivot as or you both brothers and sisters like to say. So for Mobila, the answer was very simple.
Now look, this is a niche topic and because it is niche, it's the chances of it succeeding are high. Some of you think I didn't hear you correctly. Let me repeat, you heard me correctly. Because it is niche, the chances of it succeeding are high. The thing with niche topics are not everybody likes it, but the people who like it, they care a lot about it. Let me give an example. My wife likes to crochet. Crocheting is when you knit like you take wool and you take those two fancy sticks and then you start knitting.
You need sweaters, you need teddy bears, you need you need all kinds of things. My wife loves to crochet, right? But guess what Nigerians is Nigeria is not really a crochet place. But when you find a Nigerian who likes to crochet, they like crocheting. Die. My wife has spent money buying wool, she has spent money buying pins, she subscribes to different channels and one of my sons has also taken up crocheting and he likes it.
So if you go to 9, if you go out to Nigeria and you say crochet, people will be like like Croat Crocini, They don't know what you're saying. But you meet a Nigerian who likes to crochet, they like crocheting, die. That is the thing about niche, niche communities. The people who don't care, they don't care. But the people who care, hey, they care about it. So I told Momola that, look, this thing is perfect. The average Nigerian won't give a hoot about the free trade treaty because what do they care?
What do they know? But for the lawyers who like international trade, especially trade on the African continent, and who are looking at things from a policy perspective about how can we develop Africa through international trade, they would like this team die. And she started and my idea was correct. Her podcast will never be a top ten, will never be a top five. It'll never be spoken about, you know, on a national stage because it is niche.
But among those lawyers, they want to hear what she has to say. She has been invited to speak in different African countries. Excuse me about this topic. And if my prediction pans out correctly, after a while, they will start to call her in the UK and in the USA to say, Madam, you are a specialist in the Free Trade Continental Treaty. Come here and educate us on this thing. You are an important voice. You're a stakeholder in this space.
And another reason why I told her I was going to work was because there was nobody else who was podcasting about it. The last time I checked, she still has the only podcast around the African Free Trade Continental Treaty. So I knew it was going to work because it's niche. So for those of you who have an idea, are you afraid because you know, it's niche, that actually is the idea why it's going to succeed. So if you like to crochet, you look around and you see that you're the only person who crochets in your family.
Don't worry, the Nigerians who love to crochet, when they see that you have a podcast or a YouTube channel, they will love you die because you're the only Nigerian who is podcasting about those sorts of things. The people who don't care. They can't be bothered. The people who care, hey, they will love it, they will love you. So the thing can work. But remember, we always strive for validation. So we will start if we see that this progress will continue, if we see that there's no progress.
You've been doing this thing for like 9 months, 10 months now. Not only your Mama with the watch your mom, she's the only person that is supporting you and maybe it's time to bring it to a close, but generally shall. If it's niche, you stand the chance because there are people who niche things have very strong, very strong communities like this podcasting thing. You're listening to this podcast right now, You're enjoying it right now, but you know that Nigeria is not a podcasting nation.
You don't believe me. Go talk to your family members. Go talk to your dad, your uncle, your cousins, your classmates and say, oh, there's this podcast. I like most people who say, what is the podcast? That's the question most Nigerians will ask you. So the Nigerians who love podcasts, they love podcasts die. They listen to podcasts every single day. The other ones can't be bothered and don't even care. So my mother, you will never get her to listen to a podcast.
Never. Even if you drag her, she won't listen. I listen to podcasts and so I listen every day. My wife listens to podcasts and so she listens every day. You listen to a podcast and guess what? You listen every day. That's how it is. OK, So what was that? So I told him, look, time is running. I have to run. I've already given you enough advice as it is. I remember I told you guys that anybody who reaches out to me, I definitely will answer one question for you.
So you can call, send me a text message or a WhatsApp message on 08064662140. I definitely will answer one question to make sure that we set you up on the right path. But then if you want us to go in depth, come on now, let's be fair. There's a certain amount of work that has to be done through it. If you're going to create your YouTube channel, we're going to come up with a content calendar. We want to make sure that strategy is right.
You want to implement correctly, You want us to discuss all the technology issues, you know, recording equipment, you know, blah, blah, blah, stuff like that. You want us to come up with a selling framework for eventually when you start getting audiences, how you have conversations with them so that you can end up selling your course or selling yourself as a public speaker. There's a lot of work that is involved, so let's be fair.
You guys shouldn't stop trying to be smart, All right? Don't try to be smart here. There's a lot of work involved. So it's only fair that we sit down, we'll come up with the session, and then we start discussing some numbers. If you're afraid that I'm expensive, don't worry, I'm reasonably priced. And there are different options. We can have hourly or daily coaching sessions, weekly coaching sessions, monthly coaching sessions, or quarterly coaching sessions.
But either way, just reach out if you don't get money. No problem. I'll answer one question for you. So my advice to him was, look, don't overthink this thing. Begin because he was worried about being different, being distinct. And look, excuse me, let me say this in loud and clear. Too many of you are worried about having a distinct voice. What are you worried about? You are overthinking this thing. The fact that you are a different person means that so long as you stay in your lane,
you will already be different. Like look at me, I'm not trying hard to sound different, I just am different. I'm a Nigerian kid. I love sales. I love business problems. So I'm just being me on the microphone. I'm not trying hard to be different. I just am different. All the other people, excuse me, all the other people in this space are Americans talking about American business problems using American, excuse me, American case studies, American problems, American concerns.
Sorry, excuse me. So I'm not having, I'm not trying to be different. I'm just talking about what I know and I'm just being me. The thing will come out different. So stop worrying about sounding different. You're worrying too much. Just begin. So long as you are different, the thing will sound different. It's that simple. OK, now of course, yes, it gets more complicated when you gain some traction and maybe you discover that there are other people in your space and maybe they sound similar and OK, no problem at that level, we'll cross that bridge when we get there.
But in the beginning, you have not started, even though you conceived of the idea six months ago, because you're trying to worry how you're going to be different. You are making things unnecessarily difficult for yourself. Just start. So that was my advice to Kingsley again, not his real name, Just start. So I told him, first of all, consider the format. Which format do you like? Some people like video good. Some people like audio good.
Some people are very good at writing good. Just decide. If you're a good writer, then please, by all means, write and have a blog or a website. Don't force yourself to be on YouTube. If you're a talented writer but you're forcing yourself to do video because you think video is is the thing that'll make you pop guy, you're, you're going to be mediocre. You'll be mediocre because you're struggling to be good on video, but video is not your thing.
I do audio because audio is my thing. And that's also the reason why I'm on the radio, because I can grab a microphone and I can talk. So I do just that. And that's the reason why over the last seven years I've had over 1400 episodes because I'm doing what comes easy to me naturally. Now I can also write, but the problem is writing requires too much time. But try to build a business and then having kids and all that, writing is not possible.
Because to put together a solid correct piece on the blog post will need I'll need about 3-4 hours every day. And honestly speaking, I can't do that at this stage of my life right now. It's easy for me to just pick up a microphone and then talk for 30 minutes and then just upload the damn thing and I'm done. So format. Which format do you like? Which format are you good at? OK, not like which one are you good? If you're good at writing,
please write and forget what other people say. People say video is the biggest platform that is popping off in 2025 and blah blah blah blah blah. OK, no problem. Video might be the biggest platform, video might be popping off. But if you are terrible at video, why are you putting yourself at a disadvantage? So format, writing, audio, video, graphics, Think about it in those terms and then go accordingly. If you're good at graphics,
good. Ignore all the others and then open Canva, Begin the design. It's that simple. Then after that, next thing you have to worry about is a content calendar. In his own case, he has already been putting things down in Google notes. Whenever he hears something interesting, he writes it down. If he hears something that he disagrees with, he writes it down. So he already has a bunch of questions. I told you we look, No, I think it you already have a list.
Happy you guys say yes. I told you copy and paste all those things into one single document. Then you start from the top and then you start answering questions are recorded and keep going all the way down. That's it. You have begun. Let's start. We can refine things later as we go along. So yeah, that's that was my advice to Kingsley and it's my advice to those of you who are listening who want to build a business using YouTube, using content, using whatever.
So that's the simple answer. So just like I told Kingsley, you want free advice, OK, Ask your question. He asked his question. I gave him his answer. You want a whole lot more than that. I can work with you just like I worked with my friend Momola to make sure that her show was a success. By the way, I do not claim credit for her success because she did the thing she implemented. So the success really is has. So even if you reach out to me and all you want is free advice,
no problem. And I give you the advice, no problem. If you do not execute, you will go nowhere. It's up to you. If you pay me money, no problem, I will take your money and I'll do my best to hold you accountable. But if you do not execute, you will go nowhere. So executing is the main thing I beg. So I'm not claiming mobile as success. All right? The success was all up to her. Now, whether you will succeed in this or you will fail will be all up to you.
So I think that's just a summary of. Let me scroll through the chat that both of us had. Yeah, that's it. I think I've exhausted all the topics, all the things that we spoke about. And I hope that for those of you who are listening to the show now for the first time, you're thinking, this sounds cool. You want to start something similar, You're hoping to make some money off of it. You want to make a living off of it. You want to build a career on it?
Sure, no problem. You have questions to ask? No problem. Call me. Send me a text message or a WhatsApp message, 08064662140. I will answer one question for you for free. If you want me to walk through this thing with you every day or every week, it's only fair that you drop something. Let's sit down, let's discuss money, and let's get started. But either way, whether you drop money or you don't drop money, do not complicate this thing.
You probably have a content calendar already because you have been noting down things you like, things you disagree with, things that you are clear about. So if you want to go the writing route, that's it, just start writing. This is me. This is what I'm learning, this is what I read. This is my own opinion on it. This is why it's correct. This is another alternative source post that is your podcast. That's sorry. That's your blog post for today,
and then tomorrow the process will be the same. You were right. I thought about this. These are the different perspectives about that. This is what I think. These are the reasons why I think you should be like that post. Don't overcomplicate things. Just begin, but please do not fall in love with the platform because too many people are telling me, oh, I want to be a YouTube, I want to be a podcaster on Spotify. No, don't start with the platform.
We start with strategy 1st and then we'll figure out all the other things along the way. So thank you very much for listening. I'll catch you all some other time.