10 Things Every Smart YouTuber Does IMMEDIATELY After Uploading (With AI)

So, there are certain things that smart YouTubers like myself do with Claude that almost every beginner messes up on. And this is stuff that used to take myself or my team hours after every upload. And now, it takes about 10 minutes. And by the way, this is coming from someone with over a million subscribers, and last year I made $477,000 from AdSense alone. And what you do after you hit publish matters just as much as what you do before. And I'm going to show you the exact prompts I use live right in front of you. So, if you appreciate me making this type of content and you want me to make more in the future, then let me know by gently cheesing that like button, and let's jump in right now. Now, before we begin, some of the skills or prompts that I talk about in this video will be given away. It'll be the third link in the description and the pinned comment below, so you can click down there, get those, and follow along if you'd like. All right, so number one, the very first thing that I do after I uploading is I audit my title. Because here's the thing about YouTube, your title is doing two jobs at once. It has to, one, get the click, and it also has to be found in search. So, most people only think about one thing, and that is the reason that most of their videos die, and then they never get views in the future. So, just like this one as an example, you can see right here. So, obviously with this one, you would want to take your title, you want to put it into Claude with a prompt like this, and you can see what it comes up with. Clickability six out of 10, SEO five out of 10. So, this is a score for both versions, and it gives you five rewrites that you can actually choose from. But, I'm not just going to grab the first one that I see. I'm going to be looking for one that does both, right? I call this the Moneyball method. I've talked about this in other videos, but what you really want is you want a searchable keyword near the front, but the rest of the title needs to be very attractive so that it can get the click on the homepage. So, the way I think about this, getting promoted on the homepage is like hitting a home run, because you could potentially get millions of views. And you want your title to be attractive so that it can actually get promoted on the homepage. But, if that doesn't work, you want to at least make sure that you hit the ball and get on base, right? That's why I call it the Moneyball method because of their obsession with getting on base in the movie Moneyball. And the way that you hit the ball or get on base is you make sure that your title is SEO friendly, not SEO optimized, SEO friendly. Because if you SEO optimize your title and you just stuff it with a bunch of different keywords, there's pretty much a 0% chance that it's ever going to get promoted in browse. Plus, even when people search stuff and they see it, it's not going to be a very attractive title to click on. And if you haven't seen the movie Moneyball, by the way, it's great. So, Brad Pitt plays Billy Jean, and he is the GM of a broke baseball team that couldn't afford the big star players. So, everyone else is out there chasing the flashy guys, the ones who look the part, the ones who swing for the fences and they hit a bunch of home runs. But, Billy did the opposite. He looked at the data and built his whole team around one boring stat that nobody cared about, which was getting on base. Singles, walks, the unsexy stuff that just keeps the runners moving and keeps scoring points. And it worked. That team went on one of the longest winning streaks in baseball history despite having a much lower salary cap than so many of the other professional baseball teams that they were facing. So, here's how that maps to your title. The searchable keyword at the front, that is your on base, right? It's the singles, the steady search traffic that shows up every single day, whether the video pops off or not. And that traffic is honestly worth more in many cases because they have what's known as search intent, meaning they are actively searching for a solution to their problem. But, the hook that's the rest of the sentence, that is your home run. That is the swing for the fences that might make the video go viral. So, a weak title will do one of those. A great title does both. It gets on base every single time and it can hit it out of the park. Now, additionally, on top of that, your title needs to be congruent with your thumbnail and the entire niche of your channel. And if you want to go deeper on titles, idea selection, niche selection exact, which is basically picking videos that actually win before you even hit record, that is exactly what I'm going to be breaking down in the free workshop that I'm doing this week. And when you show up, I'm going to be handing you the niche validator pro tool for free. That is a super powerful cloud skill that's been trained on thousands of hours of coaching. So, click the link in the description and the pin comment below to check that out. So, yeah, put your your title in here, use the AI, and it'll tell you how clickable, as well as how SEO-friendly your title is. All right, next we're going to talk about an SEO-optimized description. Now, now this is one of those tiny things that quietly helps your video get found and almost nobody does it. So, here's what I'm going to do. I'm going to grab the full transcript right off the video. You can find that in your description at the very bottom and I'm going to paste it into Claude. And then I'm going to use this prompt right here. And boom, it is done in seconds. So, you copy it and you paste it in your description and you're good to go. Now, here's the key. And most people get this wrong. You don't put this at the very top. You put it just under your most important links, the ones that you actually want people clicking so that those stay above the fold. And think of this like an old-school newspaper, right? Stick with me here. The big headline always goes at the top, above the fold, because that's all anybody sees before they decide to pick it up. But the boring stuff, that goes below the fold, down where only the curious ones bother to look. So, your YouTube description works the exact same way. Obviously, you want people clicking on your links because that's how you can actually make money on YouTube. So, the links you want clicked go above the fold. But the rest of it, the SEO-optimized description, you do want to put it pretty close to the top. So, this stuff is going to tuck in right under it. So, small move here, but it makes a big difference, especially when you're a smaller channel and every click counts. But next, let's talk about chapters. Now, I'll be real with you, the timestamps are hit or miss. On some channels, they help. On others, they actually hurt your watch time. So, test it, don't just assume. But with that being said, here's how you do it. So, what you want to do is you want to copy the transcript of your video. Now, you can just copy the normal transcript or ideally you want to copy the transcript with timestamps. Now, if you go to the bottom of your description and you go to show transcript, of course, that way you can just copy the transcript. But you can also copy the transcript with or without timestamps using various different plugins. VidIQ is one of them that I use and you can use that to copy it with or without the timestamps. Now, if you copy it with the timestamps, then this prompt can actually label all of the chapters with the timestamp. But if you copy it without the timestamp, then you're going to have to label the chapters with the timestamp yourself. But, either way, I'm going to go ahead and do it here. And uh there it is. Clean chapters formatted exactly how YouTube wants them. And this one is already done for me by the last prompt. So, I'm just going to go ahead and grab it. Now, another thing you want to do is go into your settings and uncheck automatic chapters. And then just give the timestamp for each one, right? Now, one thing you want to do here is don't give away what's in it. Just tease it, right? It's kind of the same energy as the title. You want them curious enough to jump to that part, but not satisfied enough to skip it, right? And that's it. But, then this prompt should do a pretty good job doing that. And that's pretty much it. Don't overthink this one. Seriously, just move on. With that being said, make sure you split test your videos with and without timestamps. We have found that some types of channels actually get lower watch time when they put timestamps in. All right, next section is going to be tags. Now, I'm not going to lie to you and tell you that tags are some magical hack because they're not. Uh we probably spend about 30 seconds on ours. But, it's 30 seconds, it's free, and it doesn't hurt, so why not? So, I'm going to go ahead and paste this prompt here. And then you just got to answer the questions. Give it some information. And there it is. 15 tags ready to copy. Now, heads up, YouTube makes you paste these in one by one. Uh kind of annoying, I know. Um so, here's a little move that'll save you a ton of time. Go into your upload defaults and save your tags right there. That way, they're already loaded on every new video, and you never have to do this again. And you set it once, then you forget it. Copy, paste, and then move on with your life, right? Don't overthink the small stuff. With that being said, all the goofballs that say that, "Oh, you shouldn't put tags in your videos." Yeah, you should because even if it doesn't make a difference now, which it probably doesn't make a lot of a difference, but it probably does make a bit of a difference, what if something changes in the future, right? It takes you 30 seconds to put tags in. And you just have to do it one time and then just save it for the future. So, there's literally no reason to not do tags. And if And if it just makes it 1% easier for YouTube to figure out what your channel is about or for advertisers to figure out what your channel is about, then obviously it's worth it to do it. But with that being said, definitely don't overthink this. Spend a little bit of time doing it. Make sure you got your upload default set, and then you're good to go. All right, the next one is one of my favorites, and that is the pinned comment. So, we do this on every single video every single time, and this is the one of the ones that I think makes a huge difference, okay? And here's why it matters. Not everyone reads the description, but almost everyone reads the comments. So, a good pinned comment can boost the clicks on your links significantly. So, I'm just going to go ahead and paste this prompt here, and I'm going to let Claude generate the pinned comment for the video. So, yeah, it basically opens a conversation and it points to the link. Two jobs in one comment. Now, you might be noticing, "Well, Shane, you don't do that on your videos. Why are you telling us to do it on ours when you don't do it on yours?" Well, the reason I don't do it on my videos anymore is because I don't need extra engagement. I have a 1.5 million subscriber channel, and I have tons of people who comment on my videos all the time. However, whenever I start a new channel, this is exactly what I do, and I also recommend it for other people who have a new channel as well. Now, one thing you need to do, which does kind of suck, is you need to pin this comment right when the video goes live. And I highly recommend replying to comments right when the video goes live as well. Obviously, you would reply to comments on the video itself, but even reply to other comments on other videos on your channel right when the video goes live as well because they're going to see a little red notification at the top right, and they're probably going to go and click on that and see that you just uploaded a video and be much more likely to watch it. And after a period of time, people are going to notice that you publish videos at the same time, which by the way, you should definitely be doing that, but also they're going to notice that you actually reply to comments right after the video is posted as well. And this is especially important in that first hour. And so, basically, what this will do is it will kind of almost be like an event, like a party every single time you upload a video. People will grow to expect you to be there and answer the questions. So, I did this a lot when I first started on YouTube. Of course, I typically don't do it anymore just because there's way too many comments, but it is super valuable and super effective for a smaller channel. Now, by the way, sometimes people get really mad and you're like, "Wow, you can't even take 5 seconds to respond to comments." And I remember my brother Zach even said that, right? I remember when he posted his very first video, he goes, "Bro, watch me. I'm going to reply to every single comment on my channel." And you know what? He did. For a while, until that video took off, and then the comments started rolling in faster than he could type. Hundreds of them a day. And he had to wave the white flag. But, here's the thing, that was a good problem to have, right? That's the problem that you want. He showed up early, the algorithm noticed, and then that first video did 800,000 views. So, the free engagement stacked up right when it mattered the most, and then everything else snowballed from there. And YouTube loves that stuff, trust me. It will reward you for that because it really creates a sense of community, right? When you're actually responding to your comments and and interacting with people, it really does create a sense of community. Now, of course, I do respond to some comments, especially if it's a particularly clever comment or a really good question, I'll respond to it. But, when you first begin, you want to respond to every single comment every single time. So, don't just post and ghost, all right? Show up for that first hour, reply till you literally can't keep up. It is one of the cheapest growth hacks out there. Or, of course, you could just hire somebody else to do it for you if you're a business owner. All right, next is the community tab, and they call it the post tab now. I don't know why they changed that, I thought the community tab was great. But, the second your video goes live, you can post it here and drive a chunk of your own audience straight to it, and this is insanely effective for a brand new channel. So, you want to go ahead and use this prompt right here. You want to fill in your information, and it's going to spit out the exact post that you're going to use with some really nice copy that creates intrigue and curiosity, and is probably going to make a lot of people click. Now, you can make this even better with one small move, which is just very simply dropping your video's thumbnail right into the post as well, because pictures in general tend to do better than just text. And yeah, you're just going to go ahead and copy it in there, and then you can paste the photo if you want. And you see the vibe here, it really does have that new upload energy, right? It has a little bit of urgency, and that's all you really need, right? Don't overthink the wording, but at the same time, you do want to alert people right when your video goes live, because some of them are going to click and watch your video and it builds that party feeling right when your video goes live, which you really want. Because when people watch your video right when it drops, that is one of the strongest signals that you can send the algorithm. It tells YouTube this thing's got heat, so you should push it. All right, next section is the first hour comment replies. So, I kind of mentioned this already with the pinned comment, but not only do you want to reply to people the first hour, but in many cases, they may reply to your reply and then you want to reply to their reply of your reply of your video. If that makes sense. Because this will count as even more engagement than if just one person comments on your video. So, instead of one engagement, it could end up being three or five. So, keep replying until they stop. Now, one thing you can do is you can just screenshot the comments, drop it into Claude, and then use this prompt as well. Or you can just copy the actual comment itself and drop it into Claude and use it, too. I recommend screenshotting it, especially if you have multiple different comments on your video. So, yeah, I'm going to paste the prompt right there, put the comment in, and boom, it gives me a conversational reply. Uh sounds human, not robotic. And you can just copy and paste it right in. All right, so the next section is all about repurposing. Now, YouTube loves it when you send traffic from other platforms back to your video. Even a little bit, right? They reward you for it with more impressions. So, I take that same transcript and I find the best moments to clip. So, what you want to do is you want to take the transcript of your video, ideally with the timestamps, and then find the best moments to clip. And you can just do a simple prompt like this. And like I said before, the really good stuff is going to be in the description and the pinned comment below, but a simple prompt like this will suffice. And it gives me three clip suggestions. First one is the subscribers more money clip. And I can tell you from experience that this is really good. Now, the second is the $7 skin test. And the last one is your thumbnail is attracting broke teenagers, right? So, all three of these are good. They're also giving directions on the exact places to clip. And then you can hand it to your editor or you can cut it yourself, doesn't really matter. One of the easiest ways to do this is with Descript. Uh is really good for making clips. And there are automatic options with Descript as well as Opus Clips, but I believe those are paid. So, if you don't want to pay, you can just use these instead and just do it manually. But then you can syndicate this content to YouTube Shorts, to Instagram, to TikTok. There's even other platforms you can do it on as well. All right, next is your thumbnail text, right? Now, I've got one hard rule here, and it's non-negotiable. If your thumbnail has words on it, those words have to tell people what the video is about without reading the title. Now, there are some advanced YouTubers that do not have to follow this rule because they know what the hell they're doing, okay? Uh but beginners should follow this rule 100% of the time. Now, this does not mean repeat the words that you have in your title in the thumbnail. In fact, you absolutely should not do that. However, it does mean that you should be able to tell what the video is about just from the thumbnail alone without even looking at the title. And here's a dead simple way to test this, right? Cover up the title with your thumb, literally right now on your last upload, and then can you still tell what the video is about, right? Just from the thumbnail alone. If yes, you nailed it. If you're squinting and guessing, it failed. So, you need to go fix it. And think about it like a billboard on the highway, right? And stick with me here. You've got people flying past at 70 mph. You get half a second of their attention, and if they can't get it in that half second, they're already gone. So, your thumbnail is that billboard. Your title is just the fine print that nobody slows down to read. And the thumbnail does the heavy lifting, but the title backs it up, and it doesn't rescue it. So, keep the words short, four words max, and make those few words earn their spot. So, I'm going to paste this prompt right here, and there you go. It's going to spit out five text options. All of them short, all of them punchy. And notice what I did here, every single one passes the rule that we just talked about. Four words or less, tells you what the video is about without the title. But if you look at number two and three, uh 1,500 subs, six figures, and 2 million subs still broke, those are the ones that I'm going to be testing first. Why? Because they've got specific numbers, and the math doesn't add up in your head. So, how does 1,500 subs make six figures? How is 2 million subs broke? That gap, that is what stops the scroll. That's what makes the thumb hover, and you want to tap that, right? So, specific numbers beat vague hype almost every single time. So, don't just grab the first one, pick the two that make people go, "Wait, what?" and let them fight it out. All right, now the last thing is your end screen pitch. At the end of every video, you should be telling people exactly what to watch next, every single time with no exceptions. Think about Netflix, right? You already know where I'm going with this. The episode ends right where it gets good, then the next one auto plays before you can even reach for your remote, and that is why you accidentally watch six episodes in a row. Your end screen is that auto play. Build the cliffhanger, then point them straight to the next one. Don't lose them in the last 5 seconds. You worked too hard for that view. So, you can paste your whole transcript in here, if you'd like, and then you can use this prompt right here and put the next video title. And it's going to make some copy for your end screen transition that's going to be irresistible for them, and they're going to have to click on the next video. And it's going to do it in a way that contextually makes sense with the video that you just made. Now, in this particular example, I didn't actually give it any contextual information cuz I didn't copy the other video, and I didn't even put the name of the next video. But, you can definitely do that, and it'll be even better. But, I think this one is pretty self-explanatory. So, look, here's the truth. The people winning on YouTube right now aren't smarter than you, they're not more talented than you, they just have a system, and now so do you. And 99% of you are just going to take this free content and run with it, and that's fine. I like to give away more value than I receive, and that's why I make these types of videos. And that is also why I'm hosting my live training this week, where I'll show you guys exactly how to grow and make money on YouTube. And when you attend, you get the niche validator pro, both the ChatGPT and the Claude versions, for free. Plus, you get to ask me your questions live on Zoom at the very end, and we'll give you a step-by-step guide for getting started on YouTube and building your personal brand. So, click the link in the description and the pinned comment below to attend that. But, for the 1% of you who are dead serious, right? You're either business owners or you want to treat YouTube like a business. If that is you, I'm opening up three to five spots to work directly with myself and my team, and you can access those by clicking the link in the description and the pinned comment below. Now, this is for people who want high-touch one-on-one coaching, or they want us to just do the work for them. And obviously, this is a lot of work for us, so it's going to cost some money. So, only book the call if you're very serious about growing and making money on YouTube, and we look forward to talking with you. If you want to see an example of someone who worked with us and got incredibly good results, you can click right here to see an example from Sean. See what I did there? That's the end screen. But yeah, Sean worked with us and this is a video of me interviewing him and talking about his experience working with us and how we helped him get to $500,000 in a single month. So yeah, click right there to access that.