EPISODE TRANSCRIPT:

OUR INTERVIEW WITH Kelsey

Nick Lange

Okay. Well, hello, everybody. Welcome back to the podcast. Today we are interviewing Kelsey of the very popular channel that talks about how she built her channel teaching premiere and After Effects and post production in general.

Kelsey Brannan

Thanks for having me here. Nick. I’m excited to chat with you on this podcast.

Nick Lange

Kelsey, you and your channel have come a long way since that first video teaching captions back in 2016. You now have almost 400,000 followers, over 25 million views. What have been the milestones along the way?

Kelsey Brannan

Well, first of all, to comment on that first video, I’m always laughing at that video, because I actually recorded my audio with just my built in laptop microphone, and I was just in my like, studio bedroom apartment. And I didn’t really know like the tone and kind of casual vibe that I wanted to portray, which is actually just like being yourself, right? And instead, I was like, trying to be all like, “Hey, everybody, welcome to Gal,” like it was such a weird voice that I did, like, why did I sound like that? But it’s just funny to reflect back on that first video and kind of how there were different periods where I would want to be like, super perfect in the videos and try to say everything correctly. And now I just kind of like, record and keep in the imperfections and make fun of myself more, kind of like how you are when you’re like hanging out with your friends, you know? And you mess up, or like you say something funny, and you react to it, you know, so I’m trying to embrace more of that now. And I think that I’m enjoying the process more as I’m creating these tutorials, but at the end of the day, I still enjoyed it before. It’s just now I’m focused more on just the actual creating part, not the perfection part of you know, editing, you know how it goes. So, it’s been a journey, and at first I was, you know, working full time as a video producer, I always say in my interviews that I was a “shreditor,” a shooter-editor-producer. And while he was working, I got some opportunities to do some training, and I really enjoyed it. And that’s what kind of got me curious about creating a YouTube channel around the idea of helping and educating, because I didn’t really vlog. I thought that was awkward for me, I just wanted to showcase my talent and share these cool tips because I know that like a lot of my job was like, trying to figure things out. I always say that editing is like problem solving, like how can we fix this? And sometimes there’s not an easy solution, you might have to do some research. And I was like, I could share this with other people and hopefully it will help them out. So here we are almost 400,000 subscribers, and I know there’s still so much more growth to happen. And it’s exciting every week, you know?

Nick Lange

Have you ever made a mistake during that recording that then you had to fix in post or that you just ended up publishing anyways?

Kelsey Brannan

Well, I think recently, I’ll like say something and I’ll like, mess up the word. Like, for example, I think I was saying – it was for the audio fading tutorial, like three different ways to do audio fades. And I said “ushing” instead of using, and usually I will make fun of myself and do like a funny voice. Tthen in the last video that I just published, I said “reshently” instead of recently, so my editor had fun with that where I like turned my head and I said “reshently” and like cut that in. So it’s kind of like a funny moment where we do that and then we try to do kind of like meme editing now where it’s like for example, in a recent video I did on the fish eye lens effect like how to create that in post production where it looks like you shot with a fiseye lens. And in the beginning I’m like oh here my timeline. I have this really cool music track and stock video and like I start like, you know, bobbing my head to the music while I’m like playing it back in the timeline just to start the intro and the song that I use, which actually was David Guetta’s song, and the sponsor of that video was Lickd, where you can actually license mainstream music for a very low fee. I think it’s like $8 per track. You can use that mainstream music in your video without getting a copyright strike, which is really cool, and eight bucks – I mean, yeah, you don’t get demonetised. So it’s pretty cool. Anyway, that’s a side note on why I had this music and it was the song “Memories” with Kid Cudi. So that was a pretty cool like electronic beat, I was like walking my head back and forth, and he actually took a stock video clip and masked my face to a dancer, so it looked like I was a jib-job dancer, like dancing to the music. So it’s little funny edits like that we’ve been starting to do because learning can be kind of dry. And watching back on some of my stuff, it was very dry – for any level, right – for beginners, advanced, you have to have a little bit of comedy in it to keep that viewer retention up. So those are just like a couple of examples.

Nick Lange

I love that. How do you pick your topics for your videos?

Kelsey Brannan

Oh, man, it’s sometimes like last minute, and thank God for my sponsors, too, for having deadlines. Because sometimes I’m like, I need to come up with a topic and I forced myself to just like, think of something and sometimes it just doesn’t happen in that moment. And I will just sleep on it. And you know like when you sleep, how people say that your brain is always working subconsciously to think of ideas. Sometimes I’ll be inspired by something that I see, like we were talking about how potentially we’re going to watch a trailer and break it down. Sometimes I’ll be inspired by the things that I see like, “How can I break down that effect?” So sometimes it’s related to the topic of the sponsor. So, for example, I think audio fades, what was it, Epidemic Sound? I can’t remember. But I was trying to think of an audio topic that would make sense for people that maybe want to get unlimited music and sound effects. So it’s like, oh, audio fades are really cool. And, you know, I haven’t done a video showing three different methods. So I’m always trying to think, “How can I make the video as useful as possible showing as many different techniques without getting unwieldy like a full course?” So trying to keep it simple and sweet, but also related to that particular topic that I’m covering.

Nick Lange

How often are you surprised by which ones become very popular?

Kelsey Brannan

Oh my gosh, it’s always a gamble. It’s so weird. Sometimes I’ll put in all this effort and then the video’s ranking number 10 out of 10. And you’re like, “What did I do wrong?” Sometimes those videos are really bad in the beginning, and six months later, they take off. This is what’s so cool about our genre of educational content, they’re usually like evergreen for several years afterwards. So you’re going to get like, for example, the best video on my channel is actually a Photoshop tutorial, and it’s how to restore an old photo. I used an old photo from like, the 50s of my grandpa on his wedding day. Yeah, and it has over a million views, and it’s helped a lot of people. I was actually worried about that video, I thought it wasn’t going to do well, because it was over 17 minutes, and at the time, YouTube wasn’t really pushing like long-form content. This is like before people started doing those, like 20 minute vlogs, this isn’t like 2016, 2017 but now you see like videos that are 30 minutes, an hour, and people are watching, right? So it was a different era. And then that’s the best video on my channel. So you can’t really predict it, but what you can do, is do the best that you can to show your passion in that video. And hopefully, people will relate to it over time. It’s different, there’s a lot more competition now on YouTube, so the viewership is getting divided up. So it’s hard for me to predict, how many views I’m going to get. I’m not like a vlogging channel where some people are consistently getting like a million views on each video, because they’re following a story, because all of my videos are kind of separate entities. And it’s not like every subscriber is like, I’m going to watch this video every single week. There are a few, but not all of them are following that story, right?

Nick Lange

Yeah. What other types of content have you considered posting on the channel? Will you ever do like your own narrative series or something showing showing your skills?

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, like I’ve thought about different ways to make the content more engaging rather than just in the studio and doing a tutorial. One that I really enjoyed doing was a few years ago, when I was living in Portland, Oregon, and I wanted to do this 360 camera effect but with one camera, and we showed me going to a Walmart and buying a mini trampoline and getting all the props and like preparing. It was like a journey process, and the effect didn’t actually turn out that great. But the process of the video was really cool. So I was hoping to do more things like that. It’s just, it does take a lot more time. So you have to plan, because there’s so many different elements of that production that you’re putting into the edit. So what I’m hoping to do is get ahead by like, I don’t know, a couple months of videos, that way I can plan for more productions. And then in terms of more personal content, I did one video where it was called my $100,000 mistake. And it was a more personal story about my student loans and getting a master’s degree and like, it was to go into video, but I kind of talked about kind of that impact and how it changed me and blah, blah, blah. And some people really enjoyed it. So it was a different type of perspective on, you know, my more personal story, rather than just showing how to do an effect. But I haven’t really found anything else that I was like, oh, what can I talk about? So it’s definitely, I think it’s more challenging. And it’s just, I want to have more of a challenge. Because right now it’s super comfortable for me to just be like, okay, I’m going to sit down and come up with this effect, and script it out, and I’ve gotten really good at that. And it’s easy for you to stay in that comfortable space, right? So it’s like, how can you challenge yourself, and I know that there’s so many cool ideas I have, it really just comes down to time. And so I hope getting ahead will give me a little bit more time to think about those ideas, because sometimes with week to week production, you really have to just get things done, because there’s other things going on in life, you know? So, yeah.

Nick Lange

Tell me about grad school. Tell me about your $100,000 mistake.

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, so you can watch the video, too, for more detail; but basically, when I finished my undergrad, I went to UC Santa Barbara, the Film and Media Studies program there. And you know, at the time, it was recently changing that, you know, University of California schools did get a little bit more expensive. And I was able to get a couple grants and scholarships, but I think I ended up still leaving with some debt, I can’t remember how much, but I had some undergraduate debt. And then when I was trying to figure out what I wanted to do, like all of us, when we graduate college, you know, there’s internships you can do, you could move to LA, and just, you know, try to make ends meet and all of that. But I really enjoyed the film history and the study side of the theoretical side of film that I also learned, in addition to the practitioner side of like editing and producing that I was like, I really just wanted to explore this further, I really enjoyed writing papers about it, like, breaking down different films, and it was like, maybe I should go to grad school. Maybe I want to become a film professor, you know. And that’s kind of what I did, I applied to these different programs. And I got into this program called Communication Culture and Technology. It’s a Masters of Arts program that’s interdisciplinary, which means you can choose your own discipline, it doesn’t have to be one set, like master track, you can integrate sociology with film, history, you know, all sorts of different things. So I did that. And the reason why they got me, because otherwise I wouldn’t have gone, is I got a fellowship to work in this facility that was right next to the department called Candles, which is actually the acronym for the center of new design in learning and scholarship. It’s a very long acronym. So they actually were like, centered on like, new ways of like teaching through technology and design. It’s very interesting. And I was like, oh, I got this fellowship, but it didn’t really pay for my tuition. But it gave me a job. So I can pay for my living expenses there, but still, Georgetown is expensive, like you need to either come from money or have a scholarship to to afford it. So it’s quite expensive to go there. And that plus interest and, you know, my master’s arts, it was like over $100,000 I had by the time I graduated. And I was like, gosh, I can’t go on to like get a PhD now. I wouldn’t be able to make it like make ends meet. So I was like, I have to get a job now. And that’s when I ended up working in DC as I was telling you before we started recording, that I was like, okay, I need to make money. So let’s find a full time job and video and let’s like pay off this debt, you know, and I thought that I would have to be paying it off for like 30 years, like a lot of people do. It’s like scary to think about it when I was so young. So I went straight from undergrad to graduate school. I was like 21 when I signed this loan agreement, I was still like, a kid, I can’t believe it’s actually legal for me to sign something that that age. I know you’re an adult at that age and everything but it’s still like when you’re younger, you’re like, oh, it’s gonna be no problem, you know, but it’s different when you get older and you think about it differently. 

So yeah, I, that that’s changed and shifted. And I was like, she is like, I really need to figure out something. So actually, Gal was kind of like a way for me to think about how can I, you know, pay off this loan quicker. So while it was like a passion project, it was also trying to be creative with like being an entrepreneur to see how I could make more income through my passion. And so I’ve been able to monetize this channel through my own store, through sponsors and everything. And yeah, I’m almost done paying off that debt on the side.

Nick Lange

And it’s been how many years?

Kelsey Brannan

How many years? Gosh, 2013, I graduated. And actually, this is something to say that it’s, it’ll be good for people to know, the first few years my interest was more than I paid off.

Nick Lange

Oh, brutal.

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, it was brutal. So I’ve refinanced. So if you guys are, you know, struggling with this, and you’ve had this, once I got it down to a certain amount, I was able to refinance to lower the rate. So when I came out of grad school, it was at 7%, which is huge for a hundred thousand. More than that, actually. And so I got it down to 3.5% recently. I’ll be done next year, paying it off. So it was really I would say, 2016 is probably more accurate, because of the interest, you know, but yeah, it’s pretty crazy, you know, the interest sucks. And coming to Europe, you know, my partner here was like, why would you spend that much money on education. And, you know, while it was, it may seem like a mistake. And to maybe some people who are also struggling with debt, it’s like, it did lead me to where I am today. And I don’t know, if I would have ended up creating Gal, to be honest. It did push me to think more creatively, how can I pay this off? And it gave me like, a purpose, if that makes sense. So otherwise, I would be screwed. I was like, What, you’re just gonna pay this off. I didn’t want to be that type of person. I wanted to enjoy my life. And you know, it felt crushing, but I didn’t let it crush me. I was like, I’ll overcome this. And like, look at it as a positive thing. You know?

Nick Lange

Yeah, very good, but I understand. I was in a similar situation. I went to grad school. I studied film as an undergrad. And it was a very expensive program in New York. For that entire first semester, I couldn’t concentrate on the classes, because I kept checking my balance, which kept increasing.

And I would see these kids, you know, two years ahead of me that we’re coming out of the program with like, almost $300,000 of debt. Including the tuition and the housing, and I kind of said, how do you start your film career like that? No one’s waiting to hire you when you when you come out.

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, it’s like a different profession, right? I mean, I think I talked to somebody who was like, if you’re not a doctor, or like a lawyer, you shouldn’t have student loan debt. And it’s like, yes and no, but I still think that when it comes to education, it should be free. You know, and I think that it can be crushing. And it’s as you said, it was distracting. And some people got really depressed because of it, you know, and it’s kind of sad, and I’m not anti-education now in higher ed, because I went through it. And I think that it did give me the connections that I needed and the support system that I needed to go on and find my full-time job. But there has to be a different way of doing it. Like where you don’t feel pressured. And I think I grew up in that era where there was kind of this pressure to like, do well on your ACT’s, your SATs, and all your you know, and like get good grades, so you can get into a good college. And it was this whole, like ideology that you need to go to college to have success in life. But that’s not necessarily true now. And I think that’s different in today’s culture. Right.

Nick Lange

Do you think people realize that now?

Kelsey Brannan

I think it’s a little bit different. Well, in Europe, it’s, I think, more different than US culture, for sure. But in the US culture, I’m not sure because I haven’t spoken to like Gen Z right now about what they’re doing. But as I can see with a lot of online classes now, and especially because of COVID, like things have shifted as well, where you can like, still get a higher education, but not at such a high price. If that makes sense?

Nick Lange

Yeah. And so when people ask you if film school is worth it, what do you tell them?

Kelsey Brannan

If they should go to film school? Well, I think, so I had some people that went to like MFA programs that are mainly just focused on like the practice. And you know, it’s a tough decision for them, because it really does come down to the money of it, when you could really right now, with social media and the right connections, you could probably raise enough money on like GoFundMe or Indiegogo to like produce its own project, and then create the network connections around that whole system rather than paying somebody else. And getting in debt to do that. But I mean, there is so much value, it really comes down to the professors, or the people in the program that inspire you, that will make it worth it. You know, because when I was going to school, at UC Santa Barbara, especially the professors, and the people that were running the department were just so great, so friendly. So in touch with the students that it was just like, you felt uplifted, you know, the support system versus when you’re by yourself, you’re kind of like more isolated, you can have more self-doubt. And I’ve gone through that too, especially in grad school where you’re more isolated, because it’s kind of like, on you to do what you need to do, you don’t have as much support as you did an undergrad. So you know, you have to think about that, you have to look at the pros and cons of each. And some people work better in a system. But if you’re a self-starter, entrepreneurial spirit, you know, you may not need that. You could start interning and working and like offering to help, there’s so many different directions you can take. So if you’re if you feel like that if the money part is a concern, I would definitely explore the pros and cons of like other ways of doing it as well. So it’s not a very direct answer, I would just say explore your options, you know, and be creative with it.

Nick Lange

Yeah, that’s great. If you were just coming out of, let’s say, undergrad, right now, and you knew that you wanted to be an editor, and you were going to do anything else in that world other than creating the Premiere Gal channel. What would you do?

Kelsey Brannan

Oh, man, I think for me, like, in terms of other goals that I would have, I mean, of course, from an editing perspective, I’d love to be an editor for a Netflix series, or some sort of TV show, like that would be super cool for me. And I’ve been trying to reach out and put energy in that direction, try something like that, because it’s always still possible, you know. I don’t know, I like to try new things. But other than that, gosh, I love so many different other aspects of life from cooking, gardening, dogs. I have two dogs. There’s so many different paths I would like to take. I mean, from a medical perspective, I’m really interested in mental health and physical health. I don’t know if you’ve heard about osteopathy, but it’s like healing the body through touch. I just love all that stuff. I don’t know, maybe I would go the more yoga instructor, osteopath route. I don’t know what would happen. But I think something about editing and producing and creating something just excited me the most, because I got to share that final product. So I think finally, through the connections, and the friends that I made through that process, I was pulled in that direction – while there were so many different things that make up everyone’s life, just like anybody. It’s like you just are drawn more in that direction. So I think no matter what, video editing is going to be a part of my life at some point. I do know that, I think the editor of the Titanic, I forget his name. But he edited the whole film, he had all the footage sent to him and I think he lived in Northern California, at the time, away from LA. And when he told this story that he was able to edit and win an Academy Award for editing – while editing and home in Northern California – I was like, “That’s what I want to do.” I want to be like him, you know? Be in the comfort of my own home, be creative and have those connections and do that. And I guess I’m kind of doing that, but on a different level right now. I think we all want to have that sort of freedom to live where we want to live and and do what we love, you know? And that’s kind of the goal right now for me. So we’ll see. If I can edit remotely for Netflix somewhere, if anybody’s listening to this, let me know. I mean, I would love to do that.

Nick Lange

What show would you edit?

Kelsey Brannan

Oh, gosh. I think I would have fun with starting with reality TV in the beginning. But then I also really love the Sci Fi or – not Sci Fi sorry – those mystery documentaries that are on Netflix where it’s like, found footage, voiceover. You can get really creative with the media when it comes to documentaries. So either reality TV, or some limited series documentary would be really cool.

Nick Lange

Yeah. And so if you were fresh out of school, how would you try to get that that type of editing job?

Kelsey Brannan

Fresh out of school, I think what I would do is I would probably either become an assistant editor, or an editing intern for I don’t know, I guess I’d have to do research to see. I actually did an edit. If you’re looking for edit internships, I actually did an ad the internship for the Hollywood Reporter, where I was editing short form documentaries – well, not really documentaries, they’re more like entertainment promos with some found footage. I’m not quite sure what the genre was. But through that I was able to meet new people. So like, you could find something that’s like editing internship, and then work your connections because connections are everything, right? And then you could find more opportunities in that network to maybe, “Oh, somebody’s looking for an intern.” “Oh, that’s perfect. I would love to do it. When is it happening?” LA is really about that networking. So, it may not be the perfect thing that you’re finding at first, but it could lead you to that next thing.

Nick Lange

Tell me more about that internship. That was here in LA>

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, it was in LA in 2009. I was still an undergrad and it was with one of my professors friends that worked at the Hollywood Reporter, and they were looking for an intern that summer. It was actually quite funny because my friend went to USC, and she was living at a frat house that summer. I don’t think you’re technically allowed to live in a frat house if you’re a woman, I’m not sure. But she was like, “Oh, I have an extra bed.” and I didn’t have any money so I was like, “Okay, I’ll live with you.” So I ended up living at a frat house and borrowing her car when she wasn’t working to go to this internship and edit. It was actually quite funny. It was Final Cut 6, 7 we were using, to edit and I was comfortable with that program. And really nice guys I was working with. I got to go on set with them a couple of times, we got to go to the – what is it called? It wasn’t Family Guy. Was it The Franklin Show? It’s an animated series that kind of was a spin off of Family Guy –

Nick Lange

Oh, I don’t know this one. 

Kelsey Brannan

Cleveland, was his name. Cleveland. So I got to meet the guy that does the voice of Cleveland and a bunch of other voices, and we got to go to a roundtable of them doing all the voices. It was so cool. So we got to film that, and then edit a little recap story about it. Yeah, it was a really cool experience. It wasn’t paid, but you just live a different kind of life when you’re younger like that, you know? It was very cool. Yeah. Very, very happy memories. 

Nick Lange

What came about of it? Did you meet people that you’ve stayed in touch with? Or did some door open as a result of it?

Kelsey Brannan

Good question, actually. Yes, there was opportunities to go back, but I didn’t take them. Because well, for one, I didn’t really enjoy living in LA that much. Maybe because I was living in a frat house. Maybe you could have tried a little bit harder there, Kelsey, to expand that opportunity. But I don’t know, I was busy with school at the time. I was really into my program and I found other opportunities. Oh, I wrote a script for a film, and the class that was focused on production, ended up producing that film in my last year, and I was applying to grad school. Sorry, I’m remembering now. So I came back 2009 and it was my junior year. It was that year I had applied to study abroad in Australia and I got accepted. That January, I moved to Australia. So, now I remember why I didn’t go back to LA. So, I lived in Melbourne for eight months and I did screenwriting and I learned about Australian TV and art painting history. So it was kind of a whole cultural immersion experience there. It’s different. It’s not like I had to learn the language like here in Warsaw, Poland, where I am right now. But it’s lovely. I loved it and the people that I became friends with, we’re still in touch on Facebook. And yeah, it was like the Aussie way, you know.

Nick Lange

Yeah. I see. So, you finished that program. And then what?

Kelsey Brannan

I finished that program and when I returned it was my senior year. I actually got a job, kind of managing a digital editing lab at UC Santa Barbara. Teachers could integrate video with their core curricula, so they would reserve the lab and I would help with any technical support. And I would have lab assistants that would format the drives and manage the equipment checkouts and stuff. So that’s kind of interesting, cause it kind of connects me back to that whole idea of teaching, you know? How do you integrate video with teaching? And I think that kind of stayed with me always. I think that’s why I’ve kind of always had that intersection of instructional design with video production. While my experience with Hollywood reporter gave me more video editing skills, it wasn’t necessarily my dream job to edit short promos about like LA photographers and short TV shows, but it gave me that working experience. 

Nick Lange

So on the topic of teaching, what is it you love about teaching? And what are the things you’ve learned over the years? What are the principles for doing a good job teaching someone editing or anything else on a video based course? 

Kelsey Brannan

It’s like, how can you explain something that makes the most sense? When I try to think about explaining something to somebody I’m like, how can I either use a metaphor or like break it down? Cause I remember what it was like when you’re first learning. It can be anxious, like a lot of new things in front of you. And it’s like, how do you focus on just one thing at a time? How can you be clear? I always remember this and I think back to my teacher that taught this to me when I was in seventh grade, it was learning how to do the scientific method in biology or chemistry class. I can’t remember. But it’s a how-to procedure of how to do something. And then one time, we were given a task to explain to somebody how to make a peanut butter and jelly sandwich. This is in middle school, right? So it was kind of a fun exercise. You had to write, line by line, how to do it. So somebody was like “Okay, stick the knife in the peanut butter and then put it on the bread.” So the teacher took the knife while it was still inside of the jar, and then put it on the bread with the jar. So it’s kind of like, how do you break down those steps? And I think that stuck with me and I always wanted to make sure I was clear. I always go back to scientific method when it comes to teaching and try to be as clear as possible, but also integrating some fun. It was scary at first to be honest, like being in front of people cause I’m not a naturally good public speaker. I would say I still get nervous in front of a group of people. So it did take some work for me to be able to be comfortable to stand in front of people. But the technology was always there and that gave me the comfort, cause I would always be able to point or say “Oh, this and this” and get excited about the software. So I focused less on them and more on what I was doing and sharing it. Then that fear would go away and I wouldn’t worry again. So I guess the scientific method and just being excited about the things that you love kind of makes that other fear go away. And that’s kind of what I focus on when I teach. 

Nick Lange

Yeah. That’s great. So what do you think is the future of online learning? Video learning? 

Kelsey Brannan

Well I think you can see just from a lot of people online now that are big. For example, NAS Daily, who does the one minute videos, he grew a massive following on Facebook and he recently started NAS Academy where there’s workshops, and there’s online courses and a lot of creators sharing their courses. You can see a lot of people selling courses instead of going to a traditional school, and I’m actually teaching a workshop with NAS Academy and it’s completely free. So I think that at first, some people were like, “Oh why are you offering all this stuff for free?” I think when I first started out, it was a change from like Linda.com where you would always go and take those courses. I think now, people are using YouTube and it is becoming a more reliable source to get educated, especially when it comes to technical things and how-to kind of topics. So I definitely think it’s shifting, you’re just gonna see a lot more people relying on online courses now more than ever.

Nick Lange

Are there any courses that you take?

Kelsey Brannan

Not so much recently. I have reviewed my friend Valentine V’s interview course that she did, and I really enjoyed her tips and tricks on the difference between different types of microphones to use. Like, I’ll try to take a couple courses, but a lot of the stuff I learned was from being my freelance-editor(?) 35:33  self. Of course, there’s always new things to learn. I have an open mind, but I try to, when I get a chance to, read up on some YouTube tips, like on YouTube creation or new new trends that people are teaching some of the people that I follow. But Valentina V has some great courses. And then I’m also trying to design my own courses too. So I don’t have a lot of time, but I try.

Nick Lange

Tell me about those. What are those courses that you’re working on? 

Kelsey Brannan

Well right now, I’m working on two different courses and then potentially one for next year. Well the live workshop I’m working on too, with NAS academy, is YouTube Editing Tricks – YouTube tricks to help with viewer retention, what you can do to kind of spice up your edit, basically, through comedy editing or motion graphics and sound effects and stuff like that. Then the longer course, I’m doing one on Premiere Rush, which will be coming out this fall. It’s basically the kind of stripped down version of Premiere Pro and you can use it on your phone, tablet, and then on your desktop as well. So I’ll be teaching how to edit social videos in Premiere Rush. And then the other one, I’m actually focusing on YouTube stuff. So how to grow a business on YouTube, like the different pillars you can focus on in terms of your revenue streams, based on my own experience.

Nick Lange

That’s awesome. Can you give me a preview of that? What were the first revenue streams that were meaningful for you that allowed you to start paying off those student loans?

Kelsey Brannan

The student loans. So the first one, of course that was terrible in the beginning, was the ad cents revenue that you earned from the ads. But actually with the how-to videos, once you get a lot of videos up and a lot of watch time up, it’s actually quite good in terms of return. Cause every different channel, depending on your topic, will have a different rate per thousand views. And I think mine is 20 plus dollars per thousand views, which was pretty good. So ad revenue was one stream, and then there’s Patreon and crowd funding, and then there’s merchandise and store that you can create your own products, and then there’s the sponsored element and affiliate marketing as well. Right now, it’s ad revenue and sponsorships and affiliate marketing are great. I’m kind of working on like the store part and kind of experimenting with courses too right now. Because courses, it’s kind of in your own product pillar, but it’s also a little bit different. It’s almost like it’s own category, right? Because you’re saying, “Oh, I’m offering all of these free resources here on YouTube. Do you wanna take a more in-depth? Look with me.” But you’re only gonna get a fraction of the audience that will buy into that. But I think it’s like returning the favor for all the free resources, you know what I mean? It’s kind of like that. So it’s kinda like those four pillars that I’ll be focusing on.

Nick Lange

That’s awesome. You have a ton of  brand sponsors. How have those relationships started? Is it them reaching out to you saying, “Hey, we love your content.”? Do you reach out to them, ever? 

Kelsey Brannan

In the beginning, I reached out to folks and was like, “Hey, I love to review your product. Would you be interested in sending me a free license and I’ll check it out?” And then those relationships just kind of grew over time. Now, we get inquiries all the time from different companies and it’s a blessing, you know? We also get some really strange requests, like reviewing electric toothbrushes and stuff like that that’s not related at all. But it’s really great. Nurturing those relationships are wonderful and it’s taught me a lot about negotiation, too, like, there’s that whole banter back and forth. How do you like negotiate your deal? How do you value yourselves? Because there’s not really a standard in YouTube, right? That’s kind of the beauty of it, but it really does become a craft and Onya (?) is really good at it. In the beginning, I realized I was way undercharging and I’ve undervalued myself. So really, you have to develop that confidence. Like no, they came to me because they value my expertise. And I had all this self doubt, like, what do I charge? What is it worth? What we end up doing is every quarter, we kind of evaluate our fees and our return to the partner, and we end up creating a rate card with also analytics, which is helpful. So if you’re a creator creating something like that for yourself. I have a photo. I have how many subscribers, how many views engagements I get. And then on the other page, I have screenshots of my geography, like my top five geographies, gender, device. Sometimes, it matters because of the technology. Some people are Windows or Mac-only software tools. You get the idea. It’s great to just have a rate card that you can update to reference. 

Nick Lange

What is the weirdest brand deal you’ve done?

Kelsey Brannan

Gosh. I think once – it wasn’t really a brand deal, but it was when I was kind of new starting out, but somebody sent me a butt pad for your chair that you sit on. It’s supposed to help with your posture. And I made it into a joke. I used to have this rolling knee chair that would move. So I’d be sitting on my knees. Have you ever seen them? Like you sit on your knees and and it has rollers. I would roll around the park with the butt pad on and I’d go place to place, and then I was just like talking. It was a joke thing. Well, they didn’t pay or anything. It was just, they sent me the butt pad and I made a joke out of it. I think I wanna do more stuff like that, cause it’s pretty hilarious actually.

Nick Lange

They probably were happy to see their product getting air time. 

Kelsey Brannan

They were like, “This is great Premiere Gal’s rolling around the park using the butt pad.” So that’s it, in terms of weirdness. 

Nick Lange

Okay. Do you ever do client projects or is it purely your own products that you work on?

Kelsey Brannan

I did last year, for a bit, do experiment with some client projects. I helped edit a few passion, YouTube projects that people were doing on the side, like when COVID was happening and they just started a podcast channel and they wanted to help grow. I would edit that and have some of the editors that work for me edit that as well. After some time, it just got too much. I would almost need another person managing that and to be honest, the editing, the money that I can make doing advertising and YouTube work on my own is far greater than what you can get with the client work. It depends on your client and the client value and the reach. I mean, I would still consider sponsors my clients, right? Cause in a certain form, they are kind of reviewing and you are promoting their product and there is some sort of guaranteed return, hopefully, from that. So I like to say I’m still doing client work, but just in a different platform. 

Nick Lange

That’s great. What has been the biggest challenge of your career? Have you ever hit a wall or a low point where you maybe were going in a different direction and that you power powered through?

Kelsey Brannan

Hmm. Gosh. I don’t know. I mean, I feel like the low point was actually grad school and overcoming that, but it wasn’t ever really a low point, I guess. It all depends on your perspective, right? I try to stay positive when I can and try to look at everything as kind of a new opportunity, but I think it’s still always a challenge right now because there’s always a certain point in the YouTube channel where you would hope you would get X amount of views. It’s still a challenge for me to try to make every video feel like it’s a success. So I feel like every week, it’s almost like that still because I’m trying to appease the sponsors, promote my own products, but nothing feels like it’s a failure. It’s just more of just trial and error and trying out new things, but I’ve never felt there was ever a super low point. It’s just every week is its own challenge. If that makes sense. 

Nick Lange

That’s a great answer. What’s your workflow for making your videos and how long does each one take you?

Kelsey Brannan

I mean, it can vary. If I get ahead, which I’m a few videos ahead right now, I can think about an idea for a week and figure out what I’m gonna do, and then write the script in an hour, like just really quick, bang it out. Then filming, depending on the video, it can take a couple hours, maybe a little bit less, here at my desk. Editing it is a little bit different. I actually work with two editors now. I’ll send them the footage and we work off a Google drive and then they’ll send me the version via Frame.io or Webster and I’ll leave feedback. That usually takes probably around four or five days. I like to give them, just to get everything done. And then the thumbnail is its own story, but I’m trying to get ahead to actually take photos for them, or have an idea for the thumbnail. I started doing more art boards in Photoshop. I don’t know if you’ve used art boards before, but it’s really cool. Cause I used to just do a version, and then I would create a new Photoshop document and do a new version, but you can actually have them all together. You can create 19 x 20 art boards and you can compare all of them side by side. So I started playing around with texts more and different colors. I would say on average, it’s about a week and a half per video for everything. It could be a little bit longer or quicker depending on how long that video is.

Nick Lange

Okay. I’m gonna let you go. Kelsey, this was great. Thank you so much for coming on. Excited to see these courses and really appreciate you coming on.

Kelsey Brannan

Yeah, no, thank you so much. I hope it’s useful to folks who are trying to navigate their world right now in video. So it was really nice chatting with you.