i think one thing that's very interesting that everyone does always say is that booktube has such a community aspect but i never really realised how true that was until i started my channel.. like, i have all of 18 subscribers so i hardly think i'm god here, but already within that pool of 18 i have had one lovely girl who i had never heard of before reach out to me and say that she wanted to challenge herself to read all of the books i recommended during inktober so i was really shocked by quite how true it is that booktube is first and foremost a community where people want to build connections. i love that something so simple as reading can really bring ppl together like that !!
Thank you for this video! As a new booktuber, I have been having fun and I'm working hard at it and enjoying it.....but this week it's just been....hard and discouraging at times and it's helpful to hear from others!
Thank you so much for the awesome support on this matter, i got a lots of inspiration for my favourite booktubers i followed before i even started to think becoming a booktuber myself but your video just gave me so much courage for to actually start doing it! Thank you 🙏
coming to this years later but just wanted to say thanks for sharing this kind of real talk about the choices & emotions behind starting a booktube channel. I want to be more involved in bookish community but this video really confirmed for me that I made the right choice by starting a bookstagram instead of a channel. I'm stilly getting to enjoy honing my book review writing, learning about photography & tags & just started to dip my toes into making reels. But I think its a much smaller time commitment than making videos. And I have a high commitment job that I love & community commitments that are important to me irl that mean that I don't have the space to carve out the time needed to do booktube well and this video helped me to really have peace about that
Thanks for doing this video and being so open about some of the realities of booktube. I’ve recently started my booktube channel and have shared this with other new booktubers I know because I think it has a lot of value for newbies and people wanting to see growth in their channels. ❤
Helpful video, thanks. :) I am active in the online bookish community, but so far not including my own bookish youtube content as part of my online bookishness. Probably starting posting bookish videos is long overdue for me, but I have a handicap and until Covid I avoided being on video. During Covid I discovered that Zoom is not that scary, and I (hugely astonishing for me) liked what I looked like in zoom calls where I didn't have video turned off. So, maybe 2023 is a good year to poke at becoming a novice booktuber finally.
I'm so glad I found this video (years late I know!) but its still nice to hear some advice. Thank you for doing this video for those of us just starting!! I will be joining your discord and poke around to see what else I can find.
This is good advice for starting any channel. I just started on booktube but i do have a different channel with success but it took a year to break thru. Honestly posting often is helpful starting out
Thank you for this in depth and helpful video! I’m a librarian and have wanted to start a book tube channel for oh... four years now? I just can’t seem to get the courage to begin (and, you know, time between work and family.) I have been watching you for a while, but I’m not much of a commenter. I found you because of the wide varieties of genres you read and that appeals to me both because I read across many genres but also professionally purchase things not in my wheelhouse.
I watched this when I started back in September and have just watched again just now (December), there is a lot of real authentic information here, this is the best video I've watched on how to Booktube.
This was really useful - even if you know some of this stuff, it's useful to be reminded. We can always be doing more to grow our channels. Thank you xx
I just started a few days ago, and I just want to grow enough to have a group of people to vibe with. I don't have any others readers in my life, so I want to talk about books, characters, story, etc.
I love the tough part of this conversation. When I first discovered Booktube romance was NOT being talked about, NOW, it’s gradually on its way to be all over the place so I feel what you said on a whole other level. I’m constantly thinking about, how do you stand out when there are so many other romance creators? Which is amazing but if you want to grow, you really have to bring it!!
YES, it has been really interesting to see the amount of romance content really grow in the last 18 months or so! I feel like Booktubers are more willing to just come out and identify as romance readers
I’ve watched 3 of your videos so far and have subscribed after this one. First because you’re just oh so helpful, second because you remind me a lot of one of my fav RU-vidrs Arden Rose and I love that. Thank you for tips on my channel “hygiene” 🥰
Thanks this video was helpfull. I have been watching booktube for 8 years now and thought of starting a channel almost as long. I have seen many booktube newbie tips videos, but it was still nice to see this one. I am always unsure how to tag videos. So that was a great tips. I have lots of ideas for tags, as in original tags, some I have made alredy some I have planned. Still I dont get many views, but yes you have to think of blind luck and that things take time. I have been doing readathons partly because I want to and partly so people can discover my channel. I know I look up videos in connection to readathons.
Thank you for these tips!! Something I have been thinking about is the fact that I read so many different random books and whether that is positive or negative. I started a little over a month ago and you are right the people who did the booktube newbie tag around the same time are people who I check in with consistently. Thanks again!
Watching this 9 months later and when you say you’re approaching 10k it just makes me happy to see you’ve more than doubled that since this was filmed 🥺💕
You like positive comments? You are a fine human being and I am grateful for finding this video. Now that I am aware of your existence I have one more thing to smile about in this world.
This is my second day of thinking about starting a Booktube channel. One interesting thought that you brought up was the over-saturation of Booktubers. That seems quite remarkable since I just learned about Booktube myself so I thought this was a newish thing. The best advice that you gave at this point was creating an idea list of 52 videos to make. As I finished my day yesterday that was exactly my thought. If I’m going to do this I need to have at least a list of starting points so that my videos do not become redundant and boring. So much to ponder here…
That is so awesome that you film on your phone. How on earth do you keep it from not filling up so that there's no more space on your phone?! I used to try to do it on my phone but I couldn't rely on it for space so I stopped! Such wonderful advice about having books in the thumbnail. I've seen that in many other thumbnails obviously but didn't figure it was that important. This is definitely the most honest Booktuber 101 video I've seen. I loved what you said about your "Booktube Class" because it's so totally true!
Even though I only have 34 subs on my channel. I really enjoy Sharing my thoughts on what I've read. Whether it's a novel or manga. Thanks to this channel I've made my reading speed has improved quite a lot which is a good thing. 😊❤📚
Thinking about it... I've been thinking about it since starting my channel two years ago, but focused on Disney-ish stuff and never branched out. I chose the name I did though because I never intended it to be focused on Disney. Now I haven't posted anything in two years and I'm nervous about videos that are more face heavy. Lol.
Thank you soo much for this. It is definitely hard trying to grow a new channel now with all the things you cant control swimming in the back of your mind. Our filming location sucks and we struggled so much building the courage to actually start our channel because right now there would be no way to go on camera, but the amount of money needed to relocate for filming seeing we were brand new didn't make sense right now. So that not spending so much in the beginning from you really helped calm my mind. Booktube itself can be a daunting task without all the external stresses over life. Just figuring out how to edit the videos properly is task and a half but I believe that by continuing to learn from advise from larger channels like yours and enjoying what we are doing we will grow.
I found this really helpful! I just started making bookish content. I want to connect with other booktubers and make friendships. Thank you so much for sharing this video!
Thank you so much for sharing this information! I've been contemplating starting a BookTube for quite sometime, mostly for fun. I appreciate that you took the time to break it down to the nitty-gritty.
I am so grateful for this video. Thank you so much! I'm in the process of getting myself together and creating my own "booktube" channel. I truly seek to connect with people and simply build a community; like a virtual bookclub of sorts. Lol. Once again, thank you some much for all your insights. Truly appreciated. Btw: Love the "real talk." There's nothing like transparency and honesty. You just can't put a price on it. (:
I can certainly say you've given me confidence me to begin my own booktube channel added to the fact I have already begun my my own channel. Thank you for reminding again that, you are supposed to grow connections with people. Such a positive message. Thank you so so so much maam
Thank you for the tip of having the thumbnail text different from the title. I was making them similar. Will try it out. Got a new sub. Love the natural flow!
i've been on YT for 10 years or more, and always wanted to start recording and sharing videos. i just don't have the want to edit, even though i appreciate good editing. i just started my bookish content, so glad I finally got it over with
I'm no expert in terms of booktube advice, with about 800 subscribers, but I agree about the description info being important. With this I'm thinking as a viewer I hate when I watch a video and afterwards want to check out the books on GR, and then I can't remember the title/author of the book, because it's not mentioned in the description. I try to put the info in the description, but sometimes when I'm in a bit of a hurry to upload I forget.
Thank you for this video. I have been playing with the idea of starting a channel for a while and always putting myself down cause it feels "pretentious" of me. But actually you're right, it's a great way to connect. I just found your channel today and I already feel less lonely because of it
Hi. I just started my booktube channel and I felt the burden of time, effort, money and creative ideas (investments) in making videos and all of that. I'm really interested in knowing how to grow that's why I am here. Thanks for the honest advices and tips! 🖤✨
When you said booktube hygiene - brushing your teeth.. I LOLed because I literally brush my teeth before I film 😅 I just have this crazy fear that I'll see food stuck in my teeth. I love your advice!!! Especially on not investing in $$$ because when I syarted in 2018.. I literally stopped posting after 3 videos and didn't get back to it 2 months ago. I'm loving it right now, though!
Very good advice. I like your approach to what it takes to start a channel, manage expectations, and good ways to make community connections. I am 6 months into my RU-vid content creator journey. I am enjoying it so far. It is not a BookTube channel, although I do include chat about what I'm reading and bookish stuff. I have gotten better about editing my videos and found that I actually enjoy it. I am never going to be super produced and highly edited. I don't want to. It is kind of fun to be able to have this as a record for myself of my crafting and my reading. I also enjoy watching other BookTube and Crafting channels. I like chatting in comments and participating in read-a-long events or craft-a-longs.
Thanks so much for this video, it's really helpful! Going to edit my descriptions real quick lmfao they're not that detailed right now I've been watching BookTube for a long time and always heard people talking about how awesome the community is, but I never really saw that until I finally started my channel a couple days ago. I posted my first video and within minutes had a couple people welcoming me to the community, it was so nice! This is definitely a space where those around you encourage you to do your best and have fun doing it, I can't wait to make more videos and make some friends in this community!
This was a fascinating talk. I'm not sure I'll ever start a channel on anything, but it's incredibly useful advice and interesting to hear 'behind the scenes' info. It was also interesting to hear you want to improve your thumbnails as I think you do a great job with them already. 😊
I was so thrilled to find your video amongst all of the ones on growing your channel. I totally agree that being in a niche is great and hard at the same time. I have found that being known at the Cozy Mystery person is great but I also read other things and want to talk about those now too and I'm finding that some of my long time followers are sad because I want to build and grow my bookish community talking about other reads, but I am still creating content that is cozy. It is trying to find the balance.
This was such a helpful video. Some things I knew from being on RU-vid in the natural hair community but I'm learning so much now that I've switched to the booktube community. Thank you! 🖤
Because of your approach to help us finding books we’ll love and because of your personality, you are my favorite booktuber. By a lot. Not even close. And I really like a couple and enjoy many booktubers.
Love how you put this video together. I'm still figuring things out on youtube and booktube and I've been here for years. It can take so much time and effort but it fascinates me to no end. I just got into the idea of captions for my videos which is so time-consuming but for accessibility... I want to grow more inclusive.
Thank you so much for your advice! I've been wanting to start one for a while, waiting for that 'right' moment, and I think these tips will definitely help! ❤
Thank you for this! I'm about to start a channel simply to connect with other readers and this was extremely helpful. I've been doing a ton of research before I actually bite the bullet and I've been figuring out my goals before starting!
This was so helpful to me! I can't believe that I never knew the algorithm favored 1080p. I've always filmed on my iPad so maybe I will switch to my phone. Completely agree with everything you've said. Consistency was so hard for me to wrap my brain around for the first six months and I've since wished that I'd made a list and a schedule before ever starting to film. Great video, as usual!
ahhhhhh i've been subscribed to you for a while but i somehow stumbled across this and i want to say thank you!!!! this was practical and real and has me rethinking things!!!! your energy and insight is much appreciated. time to go do some "youtube hygiene" things!!!
So glad you are still filming on your phone! I film on my iphone10 and even edit on the lumafusion app and I think my videos look pretty good, but sometimes wonder if I should be upgrading at some point. I started my channel about 8 months ago and have had a very positive experience. Luckily I wasn't working when I started my channel so I was able to devote a lot of time. The best advice I would give and you gave as well is to engage with other new people or really small channels. During my first two weeks I made a goal each day to engage with about 20-25 other new booktubers and within 2 weeks hit my first 100 subscribers. But I also really worked on trying to make engaging content and being fun and enthusiastic in my videos, which I continue to try to improve on. Because even if someone gets good at connecting and collecting new subscribers, if those subscribers aren't watching your videos then what's the point, right? Really great video, definitely need to work on the tag section of my videos!
Yes, that's definitely a great point-- subscriber growth is only meaningful if there is also growth in engagement. Glad you are enjoying your booktubing journey!
Wow great video, and still so relevant years later. Really loved your advice at the end about how the newbie tag is kind of like your graduating class. What a great frame. --Nat
This was very informative! Ever since I found booktube I have thought about joining. I have a handful of ideas that I haven't seen other people do that I want to make but I know that I don't have the time for a channel right now. Even if I did, I don't know if I feel passionate enough about it to keep making videos in the long run. I suspected that running a channel was very time-consuming and you just affirm it so I think I will just stay a viewer! Also can I just say how grateful I am that you always list the books you talk about in your videos? It makes it so much easier to look them up after hearing you talk about them without having to pause the video or have to go back to where you mention it. I hope that more people start doing that as well! I really appreciate all the work you put into your videos!
While I knew most of this, it's still a great reminder, and I did learn a few new tips. This is so insightful and I just love hearing what "veterans" have to say on this topic. Thanks for sharing and helping. =)
these are really good bits of advice and as a small booktubers i really appreciate it! i find it difficult to film sometimes because it’s weird for me to talk to a camera still, and looking back on my own footage i feel like i sound like i don’t know what i’m talking about haha. being consistent is 100% what i want to focus on next year and to just write down 100+ video ideas and do that. the marketing bit you mentioned it especially true because it’s a fact that booktube is pretty over saturated. i’m interested to see how it looks a year or two from now and how different it will be. also in regards to marketing, i do have big creative ideas but figuring out WHEN to make those videos is important too (at least i think it is haha). making an arguably creative video when you’re bad at editing and making thumbnails etc etc it will never get picked up by the algorithm. sorry this is a long comment haha but i love videos like this and really enjoyed it!
Yes, timing of videos is a tricky thing-- you don't want to "waste" really great ideas before you have any traction with growing your channel, but you also have to have interesting content as a part of growing the channel. Delicate balance!!
Thanks for the vid, Mara! This is my first time watching your channel. I’m about to start mine back up after a year break and wanted to get a little inspiration. This was perfect!
I started doing videos again this year after a years long hiatus. Booktube actually brought me a few well paid jobs in the past. I moved countries this year and took that as a good point to do videos again, this time in English though. It took me years to come to this point where at the moment I am only doing it for fun and getting back into filming/editing without any pressure or expectations. I even downgraded to only using my phone and imovie. I want to take it more seriously again in the future but right now I am enjoying myself by slowly getting back into the swing of things.
Thank you for all the advice I'm trying to implement it but I'm I'm old and not real skilled on computer so my channel just basically shows the books without me in it I appreciate the advice on putting booktube and newbie and all that in the description box to help people find me most books that I read are true paranormal books because I'm a professional Ghost Hunter serial killer books because I want to know what makes them people tick and why they're so evil and books about the Nazi Holocaust I have several hundred books on the Nazi regime and I also enjoyed books that tell about the dead body and what happens to the dead body after death morticians and stuff like that also read a few fictional horror but I'm I'm thrilled to death to have 12 subscribers right now and I'm extremely happy to be starting this cuz I read for 5 hours 7 days a week plus I listen to audiobooks as I drive my 18 wheeler cross country for 11 hours per day 7 days a week so I hope my channel will grow I really appreciate your help and I'll try to implement some of it if I can figure out how to do it thank you so much
Great advice! Being consistent really is so important, and it's also unfortunately the thing I am the worst at. I never expected to have a big channel by any means because I know myself, but I have made a couple close friends through this and I am glad I started. I am also really excited to have a safe space for my moving vlogs I am going to make after graduation!
I loved this video and all the tips you gave! I’ve been thinking about starting a booktube channel for about ... 4/5 years now? 🙈 I always chicken out in the end because I don’t know what I could have to add. But I really wanna try it this year. Right now I’m stumbling on picking a name. I could go with my book blog name but I’ve thought about changing that forever, too so ...
Although I'm not a booktuber (and don't wanna be) but this is really interesting. I love that you take this so serious and indeed how you talk about books and the kind of books you read. It's only annoying that it is hard for me to get some of the books you recommend, but that is not a problem that can be solved 😅
Useful advice, think it would be great to chat over coffee. Ok, I've got my coffee, 'cept you can't hear my responses. I didn't realise quite how much time it would take to make each video (I've made 4 now, I'm a real newbie), but it's fun so far. Booktube does seem a very positive place but I realise I have white male privilege. I'll stay off Twitter on your comments that there is too much drama there. Liked and subscribed. Now I'd better go and read some books. Oh, look my coffee has got cold!
I've definitely had some trouble continuing to grow my channel and seem to have stagnated a bit lately. I knew that booktube was a time commitment going in, but I didn't really know just how much time it takes to do everything. In general, most of the comments I get have been great. I've definitely gotten some bizarre ones though, but I just either don't respond or delete them. I mostly read adult fantasy and sci-fi and while there's definitely others out there who also read that, it took me a while to really find more of those channels. I think the thing that has helped me the most to make friends here is that I try to leave comments on every video I watch - even if I don't get responses, I like to think that people notice that I'm here and have similar book taste, etc. A lot of the people who started around the same time I did (only a few months ago) have kinda stopped making videos, so I think I've generally ended up becoming closer friends with people who started earlier than me.
Yes, there is definitely an attrition rate with channels as they are just getting started-- whoever survives those first 6 months are the ones who end up being in that "class" together. If you are enjoying making content still, don't give up! Stagnation is a normal part of the channel growth life cycle
@@bookslikewhoa That's really great to hear! Thanks for the encouragement. :D I've definitely had some struggles lately with finding the time to film, but I do enjoy it and want to keep doing it! I'm also super excited about the urban fantasy/paranormal romance recommendations series that I recently started, so I definitely want to see that through.
Such a great resource! Thank you! I just made my first book-related video but was still deciding if I want to go all in and be a real booktuber, but this video inspired me to commit! Love how confident you are on camera btw and am now probably going to binge through some of your videos:)
This was really helpful. I've been considering starting a channel for a while but have been hesitant about it as I would probably only be able to do one video a month consistently.
