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Jul 25, 20207 min read

YouTube from the Perspective of a Small Channel - Megan Chan

Hello! Right now you’re reading “The Creator Confidential”, a blog where famous YouTubers share their stories and tips they have for growing a YouTube channel. Today’s post is something special and the first of a series called “YouTube from the Perspective of a Small Channel”. In this series, small YouTube channels share their successes and struggles, how they got their first subscribers, why they started, and more! If you want to be featured, you can send me an email (thecreatorconfidential@gmail.com) or DM me on Instagram (@thecreatorconfidential). Over the past week, I had the pleasure of interviewing Megan, and here is the finished result. Enjoy!

Introduce yourself!

Heyyo! I’m Megan Chan, but my friends call me Meg irl, and I post lifestyle videos, which range from fashion to how I edit my YouTube videos. However, I have recently started to shift my content from basic lifestyle videos to more of an experimental lifestyle channel (How to Sell on Poshmark/Depop, Facetime Photoshoot, etc.).

Ever since I first started watching Bethany Mota’s videos when I was about 6 years old, I have wanted to start a channel. When I was in elementary school, I would film “hauls” of random products I had laying around the house and create little lookbook videos with my friends hahah. I’ve always had this creative online-type mindset, but since my parents are SUPER strict, I wasn’t allowed to start my channel until the summer before I started high school, which was just a little over two years ago. My favorite YouTubers who inspire me everyday at the moment are RYAN TRAHAN (!!!!), Haley Pham, Jade Darmawangsa, Emma Topp, and Luca Whitaker.

How did you, personally, become more integrated with and interact more with the YouTube community/fellow YouTubers?

When I first started YouTube, I created a bunch of Instagram engagement groups, and from there, I started making connections with some people who I still talk to today. I mostly got acquainted with small YouTubers through Instagram because, for example, I would talk to one person and then, I would start talking to that person’s friends and so on. I definitely would say that commenting on people’s posts, sliding up on their stories, and DMing these people are the easiest way to become more integrated with the YouTube community.

Megan's Instagram Post

Can you talk about premiering videos rather than just uploading them? Why should YouTubers premiere their videos?

Oh my goodness. I think premieres might be one of the greatest features of YouTube. It is SO SO important to premiere your videos instead of just uploading them. Throughout the time that your video is premiering, it will be placed at the top of all of your subscribers’ subscription boxes, so this feature helps you gain so many more views. The premiere feature allows you to not only communicate live with your supporters, but they can also comment and give your video a thumbs up before it even goes live. Premieres 100% help give your videos a little extra boost in engagement.


One of the videos you made back in 2018, "How to edit Instagram pictures", blew up and has over 37,000 views. Was this growth overnight? What was your reaction?

Hahaha I still CANNOT believe the success this video has built up over time. Many YouTubers will say that their first few videos were terrible, and MANY of my first videos were awful ahah. This video just happened to be one of those terrible videos that got lucky. The color grading in this vid is so bad haha, and I literally look completely different now too.

The growth was most definitely NOT developed overnight, as I remember waking up one day and suddenly the video gained about 25 views after not gaining any views for months. From then on, the video started gaining about 50-100 views each day and now has over 37,000 views. This video is just complete proof of why you should NEVER delete your old videos, since you never know if it can become a trend in the future or randomly start gaining attention.

What's your experience with tags and SEO? Which tags do you use to help your videos be more popular? Any advice for people who have no idea how to use tags?

Ever since my first YouTube video, I have been so so focused on tags and SEO, which is actually how my “How I Edit my Instagram Pictures” video blew up through YouTube search. I use Tubebuddy, which is a free extension, to rank my tags and I actually spend a minimum of 30 minutes before posting a video to research tags. I have also used VidIQ in the past, but Tubebuddy works better in my opinion.

For those of you that don’t have much experience with tags, especially for smaller channels, definitely focus on longer and more specific tags. For example, it would be so difficult for your video to rank under “summer haul” than “Goodwill summer thrifting haul 2020.” BE AS SPECIFIC AS YOU POSSIBLY CAN!!! I also try to throw in a tag or two that are not specific just in case my video somehow blows up and ranks under one of these popular tags. Make sure to always put your own name in your tags so when people look up your channel, your new vid will pop up! At the bottom of my description box, I always include a “disregard keywords” section where I will paste all of my tags and add even more keywords. I will also retype my title in the first line of the description box. I hope this was helpful for y’all!

Do you have any apps that greatly helped your filming/editing process/overall YouTube experience?

I think people focus way too much on the technical aspects of YouTube such as equipment and editing softwares. You cannot expect to have your channel blow up just from amazing camera quality, but actually horrible content! This is why I always recommend people to use iMovie, especially if they already have an Apple product on their hands and are first starting out on YouTube. You wouldn’t want to waste hundreds of dollars on an expensive software and then end up hating creating videos. iMovie is completely free and there are endless possibilities as to what you can do with it.

However, once you become extremely serious with video editing, I would get Final Cut Pro X, which is what I use. I have yet to learn Adobe Premiere Pro, but that is the program that most professionals use. For graphic design, I use Picmonkey, which used to be free and was SO AMAZING, but now sadly, it is not free (it still is amazing, but you just have to pay for it now). I believe that Canva is free, so definitely check that out! I get my copyright-free music from Thematic and the YouTube audio library. I have also heard that Bensound is very good for music!

Have you encountered any types of hate because of your channel? How do you deal with this?

I haven’t experienced bullying, but I have definitely received some snarky comments and statements with negative intentions behind them. Especially when I first started off, almost everyone I knew doubted me and somewhat treated my channel like a joke. I actually had a conversation with my cousin the other day during which she told me that when I first started YouTube, she doubted me a bit, but now sees the “success” (whatever that may mean haha) that I have now and is actually proud.

Others have asked me how much I earn from a sponsorship, which is absolutely none of their business. I often receive this exact question in my DMs and I always tell people that if they are genuinely passionate and happy about the content they are posting, then they will know who they are. If one is truly and GENUINELY passionate about YouTube he/she will be proud of his/her content and will know that people’s comments are untrue. This is also a bit of a self-worth type thing, so working on confidence is a huge aspect of it. I BELIEVE IN YOU <3 YOU HAVE SO SO MUCH VALUE JUST FROM BEING YOU!

What are your hopes for the future of your channel? What will your channel look like 2-10 years from now?

Geez haha this is a question that I’ve never been asked before. Hmmm...I want to definitely make videos that are a bit more experimental like Ryan Trahan’s videos, which are fun, experimental, entertaining, and give back to his community in Texas. His channel is my absolute fav!!! I want to eventually start my own business (not sure what it would be yet), so documenting that process would be amazing. At this moment in time, it seems like I will probably be studying business in college and I want to transform my channel into more of an inspirational, young entrepreneur type one. I want to give back to others, while inspiring young people to convert their dreams into a reality.

Finally, why should people subscribe to your channel (why is it unique)?

By watching any of my videos, I hope that you will either be entertained, educated, or inspired. I put my ALL into every. single. one. of my videos, spending 4 to 12 hours editing a single video to make it the best it possibly can be. I want my channel to be a source of light in your life no matter what you may be going through or even if you want a break from schoolwork, my videos will always be on the Internet for you to enjoy. Every one of my videos is fueled by PASSION and HARD WORK. I have so much love for you, and SUBSCRIBE (only if you want to thogh… no pressure)!!! <3

Thanks for reading! A huge thanks to Megan for taking the time to answer all the questions. Here are the links to all her socials:

Please subscribe to be notified whenever a new post goes up! If you want to contact me with an idea for this blog, want to be featured, or want to send some feedback, then you can email me at thecreaterconfidential@gmail.com OR scroll down and send a message :)


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