PLEASE NOTE: Although this exclusive Stage 32 class is no longer live and the teacher is not available on email, we highly encourage you to do any assignments to get the most out of the educational experience.

YouTube is no longer just a place to upload videos — it’s one of the biggest platforms for long-form storytelling and audience building in the world.

This exclusive Stage 32 class is designed to help filmmakers, writers, podcasters, and creators stop guessing and finally build a YouTube strategy that creates real growth.

Over 4 sessions with YouTube growth strategist Sam Sero (Maker Studios, Vox Media, Group Nine, All Things Comedy), you’ll walk away with:

• A clear strategy for your channel and audience
• The infrastructure and systems successful channels use
• Content ideas built for discoverability and long-term growth
• A better understanding of the algorithm and viewer behavior
• Tools to track performance and grow intentionally
• A roadmap to turn your channel into a long-term creative asset

Sam has worked with talent including Jason Alexander, Whitney Cummings, WWE’s The Undertaker, and more — and he’ll help you apply these strategies directly to your own goals.

Your content deserves to be discovered. This class will show you how to make that happen!

PLUS! You will receive the following handouts to help you:

• Debunking YouTube Misconceptions
• Competitor Audit and Analysis
• Companies That Have Successfully Scaled and Built This Infrastructure

The objective of this four part class is to not only address all of your questions and misconceptions about YouTube, it’s also designed to address these next steps:

• Avoid making these mistakes before you get started.
• Clearly define your specific and immediate goals within a flexible timeline.
• Establishing the need for a team and how to build it up.
• Setting yourself up for long term success.

Session 1: Debunking Misconceptions About YouTube, Good & Bad 

Whether you’re feeling pressure to pivot to YouTube or are generally interested in the platform, it’s important for you to understand it better and to prepare yourself for what you may be getting into by utilizing the platform. Below are a few points that will be covered.

• YouTube isn’t just a young person’s platform
• It’s not social media, you can’t expect instant gratification
• It’s a multi-platform platform
• You can’t pay for viewership, you have to earn it
• No, you can’t AI automate your way to success
• There’s an audience for everyone on YouTube
• It’s not about pushing a few buttons, you need a real strategy
• Chasing Growth vs Creating Growth
• The true value is not the RPMs or CPMs, it’s the IP
• Examples as a case study
• Q and A with Sam

Assignment: Write down everything you’ve ever heard from colleagues or read about YouTube that makes it so intriguing to you and how you envision utilizing it.

Handouts: Debunking YouTube Misconceptions

Session 2: Understanding Your Objectives

Now that you have a better understanding of YouTube from the first session, it’s now time to take this information and better understand how to define and even redefine your short term and long term goals. Below are a few scenarios that will be covered ranging from starting your YouTube presence to working with your existing channel and library.

• Achieving Monetization
• Revamping a dormant channel
• Understanding audience viewership activities
• Auditing a struggling channel
• Next steps for a successful channel
• Competitor Analysis
• Examples as a case study 
• Q and A with Sam

Assignment: Find a YouTube channel you watch that you see as a similar model for what you are aiming for and perform your own audit on what you think they are doing right and what they are doing wrong.

Handout: Competitor audit and analysis.

Session 3: Building The Infrastructure

You now have a better understanding of the platform and you now understand what goals you need to set yourself for success. Its execution time. So now you need to put together your team to build your infrastructure. In this session, we’ll dive in more about what to look for in the team needed. We’ll also cover a few scenarios for this stage of the course.

• Understanding what a YouTube Strategist does 
• Talking points to your investors or shareholders to scale this side of the business
• Budgeting to hire the team you need
• Evaluating your current library of IP and optimizing it for YouTube
• Establishing & streamlining the process 
• Evaluating your production needs
• Examples as a case study 
• Q and A with Sam

Assignment: Depending on what stage you are when it comes to YouTube, write down your immediate needs you would need help with and estimate a potential mini budget and time frame.

Handout: Companies that have successfully scaled and built this infrastructure.

Session 4: Playing The Long Game

You have your goals set and your team assembled. Now it’s time to start planning for the future. There’s a lot of decisions to be made and YouTube will keep evolving as a platform. Thinking long term for your 

• Establishing a long term relationship with your new team
• Staying up to date with YouTube’s best practices
• Tracking performance analytics
• Evolving your identity on YouTube
• Focusing on yearly growth over quarterly growth due to season factors impacting revenue
• Pitching your library for syndication opportunities
• Q and A with Sam

Assignment: Take everything you’ve learned from your assignments and apply them to a draft of a plan. 

• Independent filmmakers and content creators looking to build a sustainable presence on YouTube
• Traditional media companies and publishers feeling the pressure to embrace YouTube as a distribution platform
• Brands and businesses ready to leverage YouTube to reach and grow their audience
• Creatives who have tried YouTube but struggled with slow growth or inconsistent results
• Producers and executives looking to evaluate and optimize their existing content library for YouTube
• Anyone who has been prioritizing short-form platforms like TikTok or Instagram and is ready to build something with long-term value
• Managers, agents, and reps looking to expand their clients' digital footprint
• Storytellers and creators who know they need a YouTube strategy but don't know where to start