The Creator Maker Life Podcast

An interview podcast featuring your favourite online creators and entrepreneurs

Culture Roxine Kee Culture Roxine Kee

KATIE STECKLY

You need to have some level of dedication and commitment where you say, like, ‘I’m doing this because I really love it and because I want to grow creatively and because I want to be better at what I’m doing,’ not because you want to gain instant success.

katie steckly.jpg

You need to have some level of dedication and commitment where you say, like, ‘I’m doing this because I really love it and because I want to grow creatively and because I want to be better at what I’m doing,’ not because you want to gain instant success.

Katie Steckly is an OG YouTuber and has been on the platform since 2009. She is also a freelance travel videographer and makes videos for a living full-time for her clients or for her YouTube channel, Katie Steckly. She co-hosts a podcast called The Bossy Women Podcast that celebrates female entrepreneurs in the Waterloo/Kitchener area in Ontario, Canada.

She is passionate about teaching entrepreneurs, aspiring creators, and small business owners the power of showing their face to the world with online video.

In this episode we talk about how Katie went from being terrified of public speaking to regularly making speeches as student council president of her college. We dig deep into why and how you should stick your channel even if it’s not growing as quickly as you’d like — she’s been on YouTube for 10 (!!) years now.

We also touch upon the hard facts about being a female entrepreneur, whether that’s on YouTube or tech, the biggest challenge she’s facing as she approaches her first full year doing freelance videographer, and the benefits she’s gotten from having a YouTube channel, even if she’s not rich and famous.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, or on your favourite podcast platform.

Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Google Play | Listen on Spotify

Enjoy!

Roxine’s Notes from the Interview

If you are starting out on YouTube anytime, you just need to be in it because you really love it. You really can’t let the numbers define your success because as soon as you do that you’ve already lost.

Even if you’re as lucky as somebody like Peter McKinnon to grow within 9 months. The first month is still gonna feel like it’s hard.

-- Katie Steckly

  • The wonderful thing about being an unknown is that you can make mistakes without huge repercussions

  • Some reasons and benefits to do YouTube, aside from being famous:

  • Documenting your life

  • Gaining a skillset to help you break into a career path

  • Confidence

  • Better public speaker

  • More outgoing in social situations

  • Be more articulate

  • How to know if you’re passionate about something: Would you do it for 10 years even if you never get paid?

  • If it’s a Yes, GO for it.

  • How did she get certain that YouTube was her passion?

  • When she started, full-time YouTube wasn’t an option. But she kept doing it even then, and that made her feel certain that she was passionate about this.  

  • Ask yourself: Would you watch this if you weren’t you? If you never got views for it, will you still make it?

  • Some reasons not to monetize YouTube videos?

  • Worse user experience

  • Can’t control ads that YouTube shows

  • Some strategies to grow a channel

  • NOT vlogging (fun, but not effective)

  • How many have you found new channels through a daily vlog?  

  • 3 videos a week

  • 2 search-friendly (how-to’s, tutorials, etc)

  • 1 vlog  

  • Pick a niche

  • People would know what to expect from you

  • Easier to make videos and have ideas

  • To test a new niche: Pick 1 month and do it for a month  

  • Consistency

  • At least once a week

Selected Rapid Fire Q&As

  • What's a podcast or book that you recently recommended to a peer?

  • Jenna Kutcher’s Goal Digger Podcast

  • Who is a someone (could be mentor or online person) whose work has most impacted your life?

  • Her mom!  

  • What’s an achievement you’re most proud of in the last 1-2 months?

  • Flying to Ecuador to do travel videography

https://www.instagram.com/p/BuOYy97AYnA/

  • What's something you think everyone should do more of or at least try?

  • Create and carve out in your schedule to do it

  • Commit an hour a day working on her YouTube videos  

  • Who is one person whose video, interview, or podcast you would 100% click on when you see it on your feed?

  • Sara Dietschy  

  • Since this is The Creator Maker Life Podcast, what's your favorite part about what you do and the life you lead?

  • Being able to look back at the end of the day and say, “I did that.”

Selected Links from the Episode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ieHmLt4gHw

People Mentioned

Other Episodes You Might Like

What Next?

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Culture, Health Roxine Kee Culture, Health Roxine Kee

AUDREY EMBER

I didn’t start being, like, ‘I’m gonna make this a career.’ I started because they looked like [creators] were having fun and I want to have fun, too.

audrey ember.png

"I didn’t start being, like, ‘I’m gonna make this a career.’ I started because they looked like [creators] were having fun and I want to have fun, too.”

Audrey Huyghe or Audrey Ember (not Amber) on the internet is a YouTuber and filmmaker. She’s a member of the #nosmallcreator movement by Cody Wanner and she started her own movement: #CreateHer.

Listen to the episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, Google Play, or search it up on your favourite podcast app.

Enjoy!

Listen on Apple Podcasts | Listen on Spotify | Listen on Google Play

Roxine’s Notes from the Interview

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=q8xK9EJbxPU

  • Audrey started from a place of taste — she had an idea of what she wanted to watch and worked on that

  • She didn’t go into it wanting to be a YouTuber. She just does what she loves and enjoys.

  • I like how relaxed she is

  • Doing what seems natural to you

  • The importance of finding a community — the most important!

  • Helps you improve

  • She just wanted to make stuff and not be bothered You don’t have to make a YouTube channel if it’s not your thing!

  • There’s lots of ways to build an audience

  • You don’t know what or who you can be until you see it

“[Filmmaking] was never really forced [for me].”

— Audrey Ember

Selected Links from the Episode

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YarKjguI94w

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Itaw9xNEmy0

People Mentioned

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8paaQxzUMY

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2ZePvZMFyI4

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