Building a Self-Help Empire on YouTube with Eddie Pinero

In This Episode

• [02:21] – Stephan welcomes Eddie Pinero, an international speaker and founder of Your World Within. Eddie shares his hero’s journey of changing the world through personal development.
• [07:06] – Stephan asks about monetization and building a sustainable business, and Eddie explains his approach to creating content and the importance of authenticity.
  
• [10:52] – Eddie reveals insights from Evan Carmichael’s masterminds, including the significance of longer videos and better titling and thumbnails.
• [24:36] – Eddie discusses the use of B-roll in his videos and the importance of it complementing the story rather than being the main focus.
• [27:44] – Eddie underscores the necessity of having a strong hook to engage viewers and the process of writing and recording his speeches..
• [32:57] – Eddie recounts his journey of improving his public speaking skills and the importance of making keynotes more interactive and engaging.
• [40:32] – Eddie provides information on how listeners can follow his work and connect with him on social media and his website.

Jump to Links and Resources

Eddie, you are prolific, and it’s so great to have you on the show.

Thanks, Stephan. So good to be here, man. I appreciate it.

Yeah. So we know each other through Genius Network, Joe Polish‘s mastermind. I think highly of your work. You’re revealing light in the world very powerfully, not just with your view counts and subscriber numbers but also with your presence and intentionality. So, I’d love to start with your hero’s journey story and your origin story. How did you get into this whole changing the world through a personal development video sort of route?

The goal is to connect with people through storytelling and share my wins and losses so that you can grab something and be like, ‘Okay, there’s value here.’

That means a lot to hear that because the goal is to connect with people through storytelling and share my wins and losses so that wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, you can grab something and be like, “Okay, there’s value here.” This applies to my life. So it’s just a nice way to put that. But, yeah, it wasn’t something I sought out to do necessarily, which is funny because it’s like my life purpose, and I love it, and I’m just so immersed in it. But starting, it was more of a process of chopping off the things that I didn’t like so much. I want to say, you know, quote, unquote, traditional track or career trajectory in the United States, where it was like getting good grades in high school to go to a good college, to find a good job in the corporate financial sector for a little bit, and insurance and kind of work my way up the corporate ladder.

I just looked around and felt like I was learning a lot, and some incredible people were there. I’m still friends with many of them today, but it’s not where I should be. It’s not where I could have the most impact. I just left for a year and really delved into my creativity. And so it was the scariest year of my life. But I think it was the most important thing. I played acoustic guitar, played shows around Boston, sang and songwriting stuff, took the video camera out, made videos and little documentaries, and wrote creative writing for different outlets and blogs. In reality, things changed when some time passed, and it went from, it’s cool to leave your job and be the creator slash entrepreneur, but then you’re like, “Oh, it was great to have a paycheck.”

It was great to have money and not be scared when you get out of bed every day or worry about many of these things. I wrote this speech called Ode to Excellence, which was a promise to myself. Hey, I was about 26 and 27, and it was like, for the first time in your adult life, to put your back against the wall, be bold, and take a risk. Because I had a feeling I wouldn’t let myself down or I’d figure it out. That’s only a hypothesis. You don’t know until you test it. Right. And so I put this together, and it was.

I got to do a little bit of it. All these things I loved were the music creation and taking the speech, writing the speech, and recording the speech. Right. Because of my music background, I had access to Pro Tools, and I could edit the vocals, mix it all together, and create this little cinematic movie. And I just had a blast. And it meant everything. It was so indicative of where I was. And I released it on YouTube and started getting this feedback.

It was like, you have no idea how much I relate to this. Thank you for this. I need courage right now, or I’m doing this. Maybe it’s a divorce, or it was an athlete or a student who just failed the test or whatever. And you know, right at that moment, it’s like, “Okay, I love doing this. It’s helping people. Let’s go. And that was sort of the inception of the brand and the idea behind what I do.

Yeah. And so, what are some of the heartwarming success stories that you get via email or voice memos or whatever, however they come in?

Yeah, there’s some beautiful. And it’s cool because, you know, I think you mentioned the numbers. So much of what we do is so digital that it looks like views, downloads, and listens that you can become numb to it. It just feels like statistics. But when you get an email, it’s like it makes it real. You know, it’s really nice. But just some really incredible things like creating things for people’s weddings, helping folks going through different things, or I was lost, and this happened, or I’ve had people that said they were on the verge of suicide and through coincidence came across one of my speeches or talks. People who listened to something and were overweight started running, and they’ll send a picture of a medal at the end of a marathon.

I mean, stuff that makes me choke up thinking about it. It’s just such a beautiful thing. And it’s just this reminder: Everyone’s fighting a battle. Truly, that is the best part—getting to hear the impact.

Everyone’s fighting a battle. Truly, that is the best part—getting to hear the impact.

So, how do you monetize and build a business that isn’t just you? You’re not self-employed; you’re building an asset called a business or a corporation so that you could eventually, perhaps, sell it. And it’s not so tied to your brand.

You know, I’ve gone back and forth and made a lot of moves in the past year, even very recently. A lot of it has just been for about ten years, and for about eight of the 10 years, it’s just been a shotgun approach, right? It’s just me being self-educated in editing and video production and all these things kind of mixing it. And I love the art of it. But then there’s the pragmatic piece to your point, where it’s like, if you want to build it into a business, it can’t all be you, right? 

So I’ve begrudgingly removed myself from some parts of the creative process, just had someone come in and sort of create some standard operating procedures, some of the back and forth with my editors and social media managers, and sort of tighten it up a little bit. But I keep finding myself dialing back that structure because I do think it’s necessary.

But also, I think I don’t consider myself an entrepreneur as much as I consider myself a creative. And I know that might sound like semantics, but when I think about myself as an entrepreneur, I act in a more outcome-oriented way, if that makes sense. When I think about myself as a creator, I think more of the process of making something as beautiful.

When I do that, like the revenue and the audience, all that stuff has been a lagging indicator. It’s like following your heart and making things that matter; good things tend to come. Which I know is sort of a controversial thing. It’s a little bit. But that’s been my North Star. And I monetized primarily through ads, just like a TV station would. So it’s like AdSense on YouTube. The podcast’s sponsorships get millions of views a month.

And so there’s a lot of ways to monetize that in terms of advertisements. The beauty of something like YouTube is that it generates income. And that’s an important part of what I do. But what’s often overlooked is that it’s a window to the world. I mean, that’s the best marketing out there. I get dozens of speaking inquiries a month just based on people seeing videos and things like that. So, a lot of the speaking I do is part of the process and supplements everything else to create one big overarching picture.

Right. Do you have an agency that produces videos and optimizes YouTube for clients, or are you primarily doing it for yourself?

I have been a student of Evan Carmichael for a long time, who’s helped me with YouTube, sort of titling and SEO and optimizing just for YouTube. But in terms of my help, it’s been people I’ve found. My social media manager is a long-time fan who’s like, “I’d love to contribute.” At the time, I didn’t have room for it. And then when I did, I gave her a shout and ended up being. She’s one of the most brilliant people I know and a huge part of the success of the channel and the brand. But the editors are people that I’ve found and sort of trained. So it’s, yeah, a culmination of a lot of different folks.

Authentic storytelling might mean a slower growth process, but it ensures you stay true to your core values. Share on X

Gotcha. And what are some of the best tips or gems you’ve gotten from either Evan Carmichael or your internal team, from attending Masterminds in various events, or just from figuring stuff out on your own, like reverse engineering?

One of the biggest things is understanding that winning on each platform looks different. So YouTube, for example, watch time is king. And so, as a creator, you have to adjust your content for that. It was actually one of Evan’s Masterminds. I showed this chart, and I talked about it all the time. It was just a profound moment, like a light bulb moment, when I wrote three-minute speeches. They mimic songs where you’ve got a slow build and then a crescendo at the end. Very short and very emotive.

And I was posting these for about six or seven years. I startens a lot to hear that because the goal is to connect with people through storytelling and share my wins and losses so that wherever you are, whatever you’re doing, you can grab something and be like, “Okay, there’s value here.” This applies to my life. So it’s just a nice way to put that. But, yeah, it wasn’t something I sought out to do necessarily, which is funny because it’s like my life purpose, d working with Evan, and he’s like, look, YouTube values longer videos. So even if everyone watched 100% of this three-minute video, you’d be better off if they watched 40% of a 20-minute video.

Trusting your process doesn’t mean being ignorant, but you have to stay aligned.

And so, I started to adjust how I wrote and create compilations that were a little bit longer in nature. And my channel went like boom, straight up. So I remember showing an audience that at a Mastermind, thinking they would look at the chart and say, “Eddie, how did you do the thumbnails? What was the difference in titling?” But the only thing they were asking was, “How did you not quit for seven years?” I was like, “How did you hang in there for so long before you got that payoff? Because it really was a long time.”

And it was just loving seven-year overnight success, right?

Oh, my God. Yeah. And it didn’t feel like that long, Right? When you’re in it, it’s just like your life. But it’s fun to look back now, and yeah, and the changes that made it pop off, like I said, it was the watch time. It was titling things. I was titling them. Very artsy, dancing before the music plays, and it’s like, look, I Get it. That’s nice.

No one’s going to search for that. Not only that, YouTube doesn’t know what it is. They don’t know how to categorize it. So, like being a lot more methodical about titling and identifying, here’s what this video represents. Here’s how it can help you. The thumbnail matches that. It’s clickable. Things like that were where I wasn’t crazy about making those changes. But it’s like you can be stubborn and have your stuff hidden on the bottom of YouTube for all of eternity, or you can be pragmatic and win. And yeah, that combination was a turning point.

Are there any things that you refused to give in to the YouTube algorithm and just did your way regardless? So it didn’t pay off with the view counts and the watch time, but you did it your way anyway.

Yeah, I mean, the, the writing process, it’s like, I think one of the challenges of being unknown is you’re unknown, and you’re in a space where people are sharing Tony Robbins and Denzel Washington and some of these people. And so the. In a lot of ways, it could have been beneficial to mix their stuff into mine or take ideas or things like that. And I was like, well if this is a slow burn, it’s a slow burn. But I really loved the authentic storytelling. I’m either going to win or lose doing this, but I want it to be an electronic journal of my life and the things I’ve experienced. So there were. There were shortcuts.

By the way, sometimes I did. I’d bite and do things because they were shiny objects. But I always realized and kind of reeled it back in. Eventually, it’s trial and error.

Yeah, some things were just moment-type opportunities that disappeared as quickly as they came, like challenges. Challenges were all the thing. And then they weren’t 

There are just so many of those things. And you hear someone say, “Hey, I’ve had so much success with my audience doing X.” And so it’s like, “Okay, X is the way to go.” And then you realize, “Hey, I’m not them. I’m different than them.” Trusting your process doesn’t mean being ignorant, but you have to stay aligned. And I think that comes first and foremost.

YouTube is an evergreen platform… The video on my channel that does the best is from four years ago

Yeah. One thing that I think makes all the sense in the world, and a lot of people are not seeing this, is that YouTube is an evergreen platform for social media content. TikTok and Instagram are other platforms that are very much the moment type platforms. So if you’re going to post something, you have this short shelf life, and three weeks or three months later, you’re not going to get any views or any play-off of that content anymore. So, how do you decide what to work on and how much to invest in each platform, considering how different they are from each other and how YouTube is the standalone platform for evergreen video content?

The video on my channel that does the best is from four years ago, and still today, over the last 10 years, ten videos make up 90% of where the subs come from and the revenue. It’s an asset. I mean, it truly is. And understanding that’s really valuable. I always place way more priority on the long form. The depth of the relationship you get with your listener is so much deeper. I no longer put reels of short-form content on my YouTube channel. It’s just a different type of viewer.

It costs nothing. It takes no time to watch 10 seconds and flip, flip, and flip. But if you sit down and watch a 40-minute video, let alone a few times a week, the connection you have there and the community you’re building is just super powerful. So that’s always where the crux of my attention goes. But also, I’m not an idiot. I understand the value of Instagram and TikTok. It’s just a different game, and I don’t think I’m playing it. I’m not optimizing for that as well as I could be.

Right now, I’m taking a lot of pieces of the long form and posting them there. And it does well, and there’s an audience for that. But TikTok is about raw authenticity. It’s picking up the camera, saying what’s on your mind in your car, and responding to things. It’s a lot of back and forth. It’s sloppy, intentionally so. We have that on our radar to start transitioning to soon here. But I just don’t value them the same.

I almost think of TikTok as a hook to get people to the long-form content.

I almost think of TikTok as a hook to get people to the long-form content. I don’t see it as a means to an end in and of itself.

Yeah. So what’s the end game?

To continue to grow and cultivate a community of people looking to improve their lives. And it’s, you know, through storytelling on YouTube and on the podcast, it’s live engagements and speaking engagements. I’m also building a community/academy where I realize a lot of folks, some of whom I’m in touch with pretty frequently, but some of it’s just observing. They’ll watch videos every day. And I’m beyond grateful for that.

I listen to motivation every morning in the shower, whatever it is, just for a few minutes or so, just to prime the mind. But there’s a so-what question: If you’re just going for the dopamine hit and not improving anything, there’s no value there. And so I’m trying to build a community of people that can help each other get from 0 to 1 in whatever area of their life and sort of supplement the media side.

What’s your creative process? Scripting, the narrating, the B roll, the editing, and the use of AI, perhaps? What does it look like?

Yeah, it’s a big opportunity for me to leverage AI. I really haven’t done much with that other than thumbnails. But the creative process is like off of Evernote, just as I’m going, you know, about my day, I’ll write down thoughts, things that happen to me, things I hear, for example, our conversation before we hit record, just different ideas that I’m like, this is a great 8 to 10-minute thought that could help someone see things a little bit differently. And so what I’ll do is when it’s time to write, I’ll go into Evernote, pick one, and decide based on the theme. Is this sort of an intense crescendo-esque thing, like a pre-game before your team goes out onto the field type thing? Is it slow? Is it thought-provoking? Is it philosophical? Then I’ll pick music that I feel works for that, put the music in Pro Tools, loop it, and write as the music’s playing so that the message matches the music’s intensity and feel. Because people aren’t practical, we’re emotional. And I just think to get someone to act, you can’t tell them.

You have to make them feel why they should. And so that’s my thought process around the actual pouring of words onto the screen. It is as simple as grabbing the mic, recording, and sending the audio to my video guy. He goes and grabs the shot of me speaking, as well as some B roll. He is very good at putting the story together. And out it goes, out the door.

And how do you do the thumbnails, the titling, the playlists, and all that sort of stuff that Evan teaches? And by the way, I’ve had Evan on the podcast, so his interview has some great tips.

Oh, nice. Y’all have to check it out. Yeah, that’s. That’s stuff we’ve been going over for a long time. So, the important thing about YouTube is that you essentially win or lose on YouTube, depending on YouTube’s willingness to recommend your videos. So you. Very rarely will people search for you, particularly if you’re in an evergreen space like I am. If you’re truly going to win, it’s because videos similar to yours, while they’re playing, are recommending you underneath them.

YouTube isn’t just an income stream; it’s a powerful marketing tool that opens doors to speaking engagements. Share on X

And so the question goes, how, as a creator, do I make that possible? You choose titles that are similar or maybe even the same and give your own. Take thumbnails. It’s understanding that faces tend to do best, but silhouettes sometimes do. And there’s a lot of testing. I sometimes test as many as 10 or 15 thumbnails daily on my back catalog because that makes a big difference. If one thumbnail is clicked 4% of the time and another is clicked 5.5% of the time, that equates to thousands of views on that video. And then YouTube goes, “Okay, well, we’ll start sharing the other stuff. And there’s sort of this ripple effect.”

So, you should be cognizant of what’s working, how YouTube is categorizing you, where your audience is coming from, and how to maximize that exposure.

I’m seeing a certain style of thumbnails these days that’s pretty different from what I’ve seen recently. There is the big close-up head of whoever the guest is and a few words next to it that are punchy, enticing, and captivating. I’m seeing more and more thumbnails of Mr. Beast‘s new style showing up. And they look almost cartoony and a little outrageous, maybe over the top for me. I haven’t implemented any thumbnails like that. I’m curious what your thoughts are on that.

If they work? Sure. And there’s an Overton window. There’s a window in which I’m willing to flex. Right. Because you have to test, you have to try things. But motivation in and of itself is sort of a serious thing. And so I think of serious faces and sort of darker colors.

If I started doing the Mr. Beast kind of sloppy text and funny faces, there’s just. It wouldn’t. There’d be too much dissonance. So, I’m aware of what’s working within the space and willing to push a little bit beyond that. But yeah, staying within the realm of what I think fits the content. And then, what I’ll do is test a bunch. And it’s funny; I did silhouettes for a long time before Evan said, “Hey, make their faces. I guarantee you it’ll work.” I tested that, and he was home run. So. Right. That was a big part of why I got so much visibility. But now I’m testing silhouettes, which are doing better in about 7 out of 10 cases. So it’s like you’re chasing your tail, but when you see those sorts of patterns, you go, okay, so let’s create ten more silhouette thumbnails. Let’s put those out there, and let’s test those.

So, we’re always trying to determine what works and what has the best click-through rate.

Yeah. And the way you test thumbnails is with what TubeBuddy is.

I did for a long time. Evan has a similar program called Brandlytics.

Got it. So you’ve been using Brandlytics for how long?

A year, maybe.

Okay.

A little less.

What are some of the benefits of Brandlytics over Tubebuddy or Vidiq?

I think so. There are five categories in Brandlytics if I’m not mistaken. One of the things that I kept making this mistake on TubeBuddy is that you’ll test two videos or two thumbnails, and one thumbnail will have a better click-through rate. And so TubeBuddy will say, that’s the one. But when you pull back the hood, it’s like, “Yeah, this one has a better click-through rate,” but the other one, YouTube decided to show a hundred thousand more times, and it reached the right people, and the watch time was longer. And all these things that are so much more important than the click-through rate, it’s like, “Yeah, if you expand the audience by 300,000, the click-through rate will decrease a little bit.” So there’s just a lot more to the story. And I think Brandlytics does a better job of painting that picture in totality.

If you’re just going for the dopamine hit and not improving anything, there’s no value there.

Gotcha. Okay, and what about B roll? How does that fit into the end of the equation? How important is it? Where do you get your B roll from? What would you advise our listener who’s interested in getting more traction on YouTube to do regarding the B roll?

Yeah. How important is it? The question is a fun one, one that I don’t necessarily have the answer to, but I had some war stories. So one of the things that I’m learning is, and I don’t know how many people this would be a one-to-one fit, but a lot of folks listen to my content while walking while running. It’s on in the car. It’s sort of background noise. And I always joke about this because it was like life giving me a little slap on the face. 2017, maybe, when certainly the funds were tight, I’ll put it that way. I scraped up what I could and spent a few thousand bucks in the desert with some friends. We had a drone and all of these cameras, and we made this high-production thing run through the desert.

I was. They were following me in a jeep, holding a camera on a stabilizer, and released it. And it was a very underwhelming response from the audience. You win some, lose some. But it hurt. It hurt. And then the next day or shortly after that, I wrote a speech talking about how disappointed I was that it didn’t work and didn’t even use B roll—just put like a thumbnail.

It was just like one image with the audio going on under it, and I did 10 times the views and got great feedback. And Eddie, this is so relatable. And that was my light bulb moment where it’s like, “Okay, maybe this doesn’t matter as much as I thought it did.” It’s the story, and it’s the audio, and it’s taking people on the journey. So, I like to use a B roll to help paint the picture. I think it has to supplement the story. But to me, in a lot of ways, it’s filler. I don’t think it will make or break the video or the reception of the video.

People aren’t practical; we’re emotional. To get someone to act, you can’t tell them. You have to make them feel why they should.

It adds some ambiance. And that’s the ROI there in terms of where I get them. Bunch of different stock libraries. I’m subscribed to ArtGrid Film Pack. There are a few more TechSmith assets. There are so many now. And it’s great because you don’t need to pay. I don’t know if you remember the old days; you’d have to pay per video.

Now, for most of its membership, you pay upfront and just kind of get the clips, so it’s very easy to do that.

Are you exploring using AI to create these B-roll videos? Because these AI tools are getting quite good.

No, I haven’t. I think there’s room to play around there, but I just haven’t given that the attention it deserves, definitely with thumbnails a lot. I mean, I would say everything we use is generated through AI, not video.

A lot is happening in the AI world in terms of video creation. It’s really impressive.

Yeah, it’s probably not something you want to ignore as a YouTube creator. So it’s some sort of for sure.

So, let’s talk about hooks. How do you get the right hook, the right kind of foreshadowing, and string the viewer or listener along for an entire episode or long-form video?

Yeah, this is a change that I made not that long ago. So when you talk about a process continually evolving over time, I would have a slow musical fade in with some B roll, and then it would go to me talking and framing it. And now I’m a lot more methodical. About 0.1 seconds, it’s my face asking an intriguing question or framing what the video is going to be about. And that has helped retention. When I have a theme or a story or something I want to tell, she’s positioning it in a way right out of the gate that’s relatable, something that people will understand or that will pull them in. Because, again, it doesn’t matter how specific the example is. A lot of us go through some of the same ups and downs, just in different contexts.

So I just painted that picture right out of the gate.

So, do you get these ideas coming into your head while you’re meditating or sleeping, and then you wake up and quickly write them down before they disappear? Or do you have a more methodical type process for coming up with the hooks and the story ideas? You mentioned writing stuff down in Evernote, but is there more of an on-demand process? If something just presents itself, you’re at a mastermind or having a conversation with somebody, and it’s like, wow, that’s a great idea. Those are like little gifts. But how do you intentionally grab that out of the universe?

It’s impossible to shut off when you tune your brain to look for those things or find metaphors in daily life. It’s like you’re always looking for these little stories. For example, I was on the rooftop upstairs in the sauna for one I just wrote yesterday that’s going to go out next Monday. And you can see in Scottsdale that there’s this Ferris wheel, right? And so, just sitting there in the sauna, and it’s like, “Well, what is a Ferris wheel?” It’s not fast; it’s not an adrenaline rush. It’s people driving a long distance, paying money, waiting in line simply for a change in perspective.  A different view of the same streets they were walking, the same city they lived in. It’s simply perspective. So, the idea is that you can then connect those dots to that, which is essentially life. When you’re down and out, or you’re not feeling good or lost or fill in the blank, it’s not that what you want isn’t there; you’re at the bottom of the Ferris wheel.

It’s impossible to shut off when you tune your brain to look for those things or find metaphors in daily life.

Starting from that notion, one, it’s a relief. But two, you just come at life differently if you know there’s a solution. You just have to change the way you think so that you can get there. So, like, that’s a good example. So I took that and wrote it on my phone, and I knew that. How do I want that to feel? To me, it’s sort of a slower, emotive, expressive thing. When you’re in pain, you’re not lost; you must step back, reassess, recalibrate, and get to the top. And I found some sort of calming, kind of slower music.

I played the music and wrote the script, and I’m finally getting to your answer here. It’s like when it’s all in text, right before I record, I hit pause on the music, and I can look at what I’ve written and ask myself, do the first two sentences pull people in? If that slashed in front of me, would I want to go along for that ride? If not, change it a little bit or make it more. More enticing. But, yeah, the words are right in front of me.

How do you monetize that with, let’s say, sponsorships? You won’t have some brand placement in the middle of it, interrupting their flow state or their meditative state, right? Or are you?

Yeah, well, you have to be very careful with that. So generally, and this is the sort of. The beauty of YouTube is watch time is king. Right? So if I write that speech in eight minutes and release it, it will see a fraction of a fraction of the audience, as if I took that same speech and added six older ones with the same feel, the same type of messaging. Maybe someone in the same situation would fall under the same umbrella. It’s going to get a lot more distribution. That creates very easy gaps between speeches to drop ads or promote or whatever it is. Yeah, because the last thing you want to do is have someone be in the Zen state or come into an epiphany and have, like, one of my buddies just started an athletic like a running sock company, and it was a blast.

We took the camera, went out into the desert, and made these running videos, and it was fun. But there’s a perfect, perfect, intuitive spot. You wouldn’t want that coming right in the middle of a speech, selling someone’s socks as they’re parsing through life’s mysteries. So yeah, I’m thoughtful about it.

The last thing you want to do is have someone be in the Zen state or come into an epiphany and have a commercial interrupt.

Yep. And how do you promote your speaking keynotes and availability for high-ticket opportunities if you don’t pitch that in the video itself? Do you have mid-roll ads for your own services, your own speaking? I don’t know if you have a high-level coaching program or anything like that, but do you work that in as part of your monetization strategy?

Not directly. So in the description of YouTube videos, there’s a hire me to speak portion on my website. It’s definitely there on Instagram; for example, every so often, I’ll post a shot of me or a video of me on stage speaking to an audience. So subconsciously, they sort of priming people like they know and understand. But I’m at the point where I’m saying no to more inquiries than yes in terms of speaking engagements. I’m pretty selective about that. So there may be a point where it’s like, “Hey, let’s be proactive about this.”

Let’s get a speaker reel. Then, we can take that and start doing targeted advertising, whatever that may be. But right now, I’m not called to do that.

Gotcha. And have you raised your speaking fees since you get more than you can handle?

I have. I mean, that’s sort of a beauty of when you’re not tied to something, you can just sort of throw a number out there, and it’s like if it’s yes, then it’s yes, that’s exciting. And if it’s no, okay, you keep moving on. But over the years, yeah, I’ve definitely increased it.

Yeah.

And hopefully, there’s still a lot of ceiling, a lot of room up there to raise it, too.

So, I don’t know if you feel comfortable sharing what you charge for a keynote speech, but I think I heard somewhere that Malcolm Gladwell, or maybe it was Seth Godin—I don’t remember—charges like a hundred grand. I don’t know. That’s. That’s pretty.

Building a business that doesn't solely rely on your personal brand allows for delegation and scalability, yet maintaining a connection to creativity is vital. Share on X

I’m not. Not there yet.

Yeah, that’s a lot of dough.

I’m in the 25 to 30 range.

Okay. Are you working on improving your ability to get pricier gigs? For example, I took a program called Heroic Public Speaking by Michael and Amy Port. Amazing program. A lot of professional speakers in that who are looking to charge much higher rates for their gigs. My speaking ability certainly improved from doing that program. It was a multi-month program. I had to fly a bunch of times to New Jersey to their offices and do multi-day training with a small cohort.

Feels really good.

Yeah.

By the way, Michael Port on this podcast is phenomenal. I highly recommend listening to that episode.

Yeah, I will. And we’ll check them out. So, what I’m trying to do is make it more interactive. So I have a setup here where there’s always been dissonance in my brain where so much of I feel like the impact and why I love what I do is because it feels like an emotive journey. It feels like a creative process. I’ll do some of these keynotes, but I’m biased. I think they’re powerful, and I get good reviews and have had great conversations about it. But it feels like something is missing.

It feels like two different things. So, I’m trying to find a way to make the live performance more performative with a backdrop. I’m thinking about integrating my guitar and some things that just make it stand out and feel more like a concert, in other words. So I’m playing with that right now, like every day, spending some time on that. And it’s funny you mentioned The Alchemist earlier; it feels like a story of a boy just going through life and learning all these things. Like, I want something that will follow that timeline, so I’m sort of writing out that progression, and yeah, I’m really excited about it. It feels like there’s a long way to go, but I think if there’s anything that will take a keynote from 30k to way up there, it’s unique and immersive.

Yeah. Like a one-man show. Almost like.

Yeah. Anyone can say that. The question is, can you execute? That’s the question here. But I’m confident that I’m on the right track.

Yeah. I think Michael Port could be a great resource for you on that journey.

Yeah, I’ll definitely look him up.

Yeah. If you want, I can make an intro. But yeah. And by the way, for a listener who wasn’t privy to our discussion about The Alchemist, would you want to share a little bit about that? Because that was before we hit record. We had a really great conversation about The Alchemist, among other things. So, what do you want to share about that for our listeners?

The idea of detaching from outcomes, doing what you feel is right, following your intuition, and trusting what’s written is a beautiful way of seeing things.

Yeah, it was a cool conversation. So, I talked about missing an event right down the street and three speakers that I love. And I was just so upset about that. And Stephan was basically like, well, you know, you only missed it because it’s a story you’re telling yourself in your head. Basically, it was the idea of detaching from outcomes and doing what you feel is right, following your intuition, and trusting what’s written will be. This is just a beautiful way of looking at things like following your intuition, doing what you believe matters at the moment, and letting the chips fall where they may instead of creating all these extra scenarios and things like that. And there’s a word. What’s the word from The Alchemist that you said? Sort of mirrors that.

Yeah. Maktub. Arabic. I’m probably misspelling it, but I shared a great article on Medium and its relevance. So Maktub in Arabic means it is written in the Quran, but it’s also in The Alchemist. And that’s where I first heard of this word. And grok to this concept that everything is already written. I love it.

I just think it’s profound. And if you’re meant to meet somebody, then you’ll meet them. If you’re not meant to meet that person, why cry over spilled milk? I missed a bunch of opportunities from this event that I couldn’t attend or whatever. You weren’t meant to attend the event, and those were not real opportunities. That’s just a mirage.

Yeah, I love that way of framing it. It’s like the Serenity Prayer. It’s like there are things you can control; there are things you can’t understand the difference.

Yes. And it’s the difference. That’s where wisdom is. Right. So, understanding the differences, please grant me the wisdom to differentiate between these two; that’s hard. So, anyway, I know we’re at a time here, so is there any last bit of wisdom that you want to share with our listeners or viewers about taking their YouTube presence or their online presence more generally to the next level?

I think just understanding that it’s a process and being patient with yourself. It may be extreme that it took me seven years before things popped, although I’m grateful for that time in that I was able to sort of hone my craft. But there’s a lot of patience in self-belief and being gentle with yourself, and it’s also like being patiently aggressive. So Nietzsche quotes “And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music”  So my thought is, whether it’s YouTube or any type of business, just give yourself grace and understand that it’s. People are going to say it’s crazy, and it’s not going to make sense. You have to be the one who sees it.

Yeah, that’s a great quote. It’s awesome. So, if our listener wants to follow, learn from, or subscribe to you, where do we send them?

You can go to YouTube and search Eddie Pinero, and I’ll have a huge catalog there. If you have any questions for me or anything like that, Eddie Panero on Instagram as well. And I’ll certainly get back to you as soon as possible.

Yep. And your website, yourworldwithin.com.

Yes, sir.

Awesome. Well, thank you, Eddie. Thank you for sharing your amazing story and all these great bits of wisdom and strategies. If our listener actually applies this, they’ll get a result. If they just took this as entertainment or edutainment, then they get zero value out of it. So, this is a nudge to my listener. Please implement at least one thing from this episode; otherwise, you’re wasting all of our time—your time, my time, Eddie’s time.

Just don’t do that. And, of course, have a great week. We’ll catch you on the next episode. I’m your host, Stephan Spencer, signing off.

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Your Checklist of Actions to Take

Focus on what I truly enjoy, and financial success will naturally follow over time. Revenue should result from my dedication to my passion. 

Utilize YouTube to gain speaking engagements and expand my brand’s reach beyond the platform. It isn’t just an income stream; it’s a massive marketing tool. 

Shift to more descriptive and searchable titles that allow my content to be easily discovered and categorized on YouTube.

Produce longer videos to help utilize YouTube’s algorithm to get more distribution and viewer engagement. Long-form content is king on YouTube. 

Stay true to authentic storytelling, even if it means slower growth. Genuine content that resonates deeply with audiences is far more valuable in the long run.

Engage with everyday moments and document ideas promptly to create relatable content. Inspiration is all around me. 

Incorporate ads strategically in my longer videos. This maximizes my revenue while ensuring I don’t disrupt the viewer’s engagement or flow state.

Recognize the differences between content platforms. Use YouTube for evergreen, long-form content and TikTok/Instagram for short-lived, moment-based interactions.

Hook my audience right away. Start my videos with a compelling question or strong message to capture viewers’ attention immediately.

Invest time in testing thumbnails to improve my click-through rates. Tools like Brandlytics offer comprehensive analytics, enabling me to refine and optimize my visual strategy.

Reach out to Eddie Pinero through his website, yourworldwithin.com, to find his contact information and potentially explore personalized content or offers.

About Eddie Pinero

Eddie Pinero is an international speaker, video producer and the founder of Your World Within (over 250 million views worldwide). His goal is to inspire others to live their best lives.