#131: Daniel Wall – 1.6M followers on TikTok using this viral framework

Jay Clouse  00:00

It's no secret that short form video has really taken over the world for content creators. TikTok lead to Instagram reels, YouTube shorts. So if you aren't doing short form vertical video yet, why not? Maybe you're just overthinking it.

Daniel Wall  00:13

A lot of times when creators first start, they look at production value as the most important thing. What do people actually care about? People care about story. They care about relatability and they care about community.

Jay Clouse  00:25

And that's Daniel Wall. Daniel has 1.6 million followers on TikTok and nearly 800,000 subscribers on YouTube, all because of his short form video showing behind the scenes stories of music and entertainment.

Daniel Wall  00:39

I don't know if you've heard the biggest meme song ever. Because it's now been sampled by today's biggest meme artists. The craziest part is Yung Gravy actually left off someone's name.

Jay Clouse  00:51

But Daniel wasn't your overnight success on TikTok.

Daniel Wall  00:53

So I was making content for two years while working a full time job. I was really bad at making content in the beginning, I didn't really figure out how to make content until posting 150 times.

Jay Clouse  01:04

So in this episode, you'll learn the most important ingredients to short form success, Daniel's framework for creating attention grabbing videos, the full process he goes through to create a video on TikTok and why he thinks storytelling is the most important ingredient of all. I'd love to hear your thoughts on this episode. You can find me on Twitter or Instagram @jayclouse tag me, let me know that you're listening. And if you're here on YouTube, leave a comment. Be sure to subscribe to the channel. And now let's talk with Daniel.

Jay Clouse  01:46

Tell me about the name Daniel's Wall. Your name is Daniel Wall, correct? What is the origin story of Daniel's? There's literally Daniel's Wall, what is the origin story here?

Daniel Wall  01:56

But it's funny that you asked that. So my real name is Daniel Wall. And my middle name is Seth. So when I originally tried to get Daniel Wall on TikTok, on Instagram on all these platforms, it was taken. So I put Daniel S Wall. And then I thought to myself, hey, I could call it Daniel's Wall. And they could be like little fun easter egg for those to know about that, like, wow, this is actually your name, but it works. And then it got to this whole idea of like, welcome to my wall. And I thought that was a little bit too possessive of, of, I wanted to make it more about the community. So my goal with this new channel of posting more like raw unedited stuff is more behind the wall. So that's where I went immediately in my head. And I I'm really excited to start moving into that kind of content. But I don't want Daniel's Wall to ever go away because it's something that I'm really proud of building and creating.

Jay Clouse  02:51

I'm glad it's not like an homage to the original Facebook though.

Daniel Wall  02:55

It's funny, it's funny that you say that the only reason I say that is when I originally made a Facebook, I thought that the last name was what appeared when I it's when said wall so it would be like Clouse and so yes, it's definitely not so much to that.

Jay Clouse  03:12

How did you get to TikTok? How do we get here? How did you get to be somebody with this type of following? When did you start posting?

Daniel Wall  03:18

I think TikTok itself was a very important stepping stone for me as a creator to figure out how to create and I think it was all the way back to I probably say before I graduated college, it was around probably say April of 2019. I started getting these, these things thrown at me by my own college saying 99% of our students had jobs before they graduate. And I didn't. And I felt like a failure all my life. I was told Daniel, you should get a nine to five, it has job security. So you know what, I'll listen to them. But the same time while trying to get a full time job. I started posting on tick tock around May of 2019. I for the first time didn't have any judgments from friends from family. I was just kind of able to create anything on tick tock because no one I knew was really on it. And I also wasn't getting a lot of views. So the fact that I could able just make whatever I want and fail, like not having any pressures and doing whatever I wanted. It was fun. Like the process to create was really fun on the app, which was one of my favorite parts. I wasn't trying to make this a full time thing. I wasn't trying to do anything. I was just trying to make content that I enjoyed.

Jay Clouse  04:33

And what did that look like in the beginning?

Daniel Wall  04:36

Really stupid stuff. I was really bad at making content in the beginning. I didn't really figure out how to make content until posting 150 times.

Jay Clouse  04:46

150 TikToks?

Daniel Wall  04:47

Yeah.

Jay Clouse  04:48

Oh, wow.

Daniel Wall  04:49

So at the beginning I was making really stupid videos. I kind of did what everyone else did at the beginning and that's just posting really random pieces with random audios. But then I I around after posting around 10 times I realized I really liked telling stories more than anything. And it eventually got to this place of wanting to tell stories around the behind the scenes of the entertainment world. And the where that really started is biggest lawsuits in music.

Jay Clouse  05:16

Oh.

Daniel Wall  05:17

But even before that, 150th post was really stupid. The reason I like to bring this up is because it's so dumb.

Daniel Wall  05:37

I'd never had a video do super well before. And all of a sudden, I remember going, being in work opening up my phone randomly. Because the day before I posted I think 10 videos, which was crazy. I've never done that before I just so many. And so one of them just took off. And I was like, Oh, this is this is interesting. The fact that it went viral wasn't the piece that was really interesting to me, it was the fact that people were were interested in kind of like more of a format. And I was like, maybe I could talk about things that I was interested in. And then I started going over biggest lawsuits in the music industry. And where that came from was this interesting story and interesting pieces that people were interested in kind of hearing two different songs that sounded similar. And so I did maybe like 10 episodes of that. And then I started doing songs that sound the same. Mm hmm. And my favorite part of that was the community was really involved in that series. And it actually didn't do well at first, if you go back to 2019. On my Tic Toc, I made probably 110 episodes of songs that sound the same. It's a lot. And it didn't do well at first it which is one of my favorite parts. The fact that I posted three videos, and they didn't do well the fourth one took off and all the ones before started doing well, the community got really involved, it was really interesting to see people really talking about these two songs that sound the same. And then it went into more like samples went into the different aspects of like how songs are written stories behind songs. And I just got into this niche of stuff that I was really interested in. Because as a songwriter, producer and singer, I was really interested in the behind the scenes of stuff. And I was thinking if I was interested in this, maybe someone else out there is to.

Jay Clouse  07:14

If that fourth video from the series of like songs that sound like other songs didn't take off, do you think you would have continued down that series or were you getting to a point where like, this isn't gonna happen, I'm about to give up?

Daniel Wall  07:26

I think I would have kept going. Because they like once after that also flopped. And again, like it would just continue because it was something that I just liked doing back then. And it was fun. For me. I'm sure that like views had a hand in like continuing to do it, of course. But I think if you find something that you're passionate in and that you enjoy, while also something that other people can connect to build conversation and community around. I think that's a winning formula for creating content, at least in the beginning.

Jay Clouse  07:57

I love your TikTok because it is it is perfectly curated for somebody like me, and I don't even know how to describe like the types of things that I'm into. But it is this. It's like storytelling with obscure details that just like make your mind light up like oh, seriously, like, really, it's like my favorite thing. And then the content creator side of me, is so jealous, because I'm like this is this is so brilliant. Once he knows that there's a story here, he can just research that, and then tell that story in a visual way. But the hard part, in my opinion, the thing that I've never really, really cracked is you have this tip talk about how Jeff Goldbloom was almost the voice of Apple? How did you discover that? Like, where does the nugget of the story come from? Are you just trolling around? And how are you trolling around for stories.

Daniel Wall  08:46

So I was making content for two years while working a full time job. So a lot of my content creation came after work and a lot of batching ideas as well as batching videos. So a lot of research comes from throughout the day, writing them down in a notes folder. And then like making all the videos at night to post the next day, which is what I did for two years straight. And so like, I kind of still have that same mindset. But it's funny because a lot of times ideas will come when I'm not looking for them. So the Jeff Goldblum one was interesting. It was a Mr. Who's the Boss video, and it was like a video of what you didn't know about Apple. And one of the facts he talked about was this idea that Jeff Goldblum could have been the voice of Siri and was just like, he talked about it for five seconds. And he moved on away line. Yeah. And I was like, Oh, that's interesting. I mean, why don't I look into that? That's fun, because I didn't even mean to find that, that that one just came up.

Jay Clouse  09:38

Is that how most of them are because a lot of times, it's also like, Hey, you probably didn't realize that this person was also a singer and like, where do a lot of these things come from? Or if are there days where you're like, I'm going to find some stories. And if there are days like that, how do you go about achieving that?

Daniel Wall  09:54

Researching stories comes from anything that might be interesting. to where I go. So I immediately go to a couple different places I look on the internet most of the time for different pieces I go to tick tock viral for the songs that are going crazy. And I look at where like if what songwriters are on this song, anything like that I go to articles online, people often sometimes they send me articles to look at. Oftentimes, ideas come throughout the day randomly, because I've just been doing it for so long that I definitely need a well crafted story to make this happen. But then I need two other things in order to make a good video. And that is a hook and a payoff. And the story is what allows us to get from the hook to the payoff. If I can't come up with all those three things. I probably won't make the video nowadays. But that came with a lot of practice and failing and trying to figure that out.

Jay Clouse  10:49

Well, what comes first the hook or the payoff? Do you get the payoff yourself personally and you say how can I make a good hook for this and then I'll fill in the blanks of the story or do you think the hook comes first more often?

Daniel Wall  10:59

Oftentimes, the hook comes first. And the payoff comes along with the research. And sometimes the payoff isn't good enough to finish the video. Sometimes I need to like restructure what this payoff could be. For example, I'm making a video right now about Steve Lacey. That one was a little different because one of the songs he made is called bad habit. It's going really great right now for him. It's really pushing him into the limelight. It'd be really easy for me to make a hook for that and be like, Have you heard this song just playing the song bad habit? Or it could be like, I don't know if you know about the singer who has this viral song, but did you know that he used to make all of his songs on his iPod, because he didn't have enough money to afford a MacBook Pro. And then that payoff came first because I didn't want to make the video until figuring out that this artists who has a Grammy nomination was produced for Kendrick Lamar was produced for Jay Cole. He made all of his beats at the beginning on an iPad that to me is the coolest thing ever. Like I could make a video about just the song bad habit. We could talk about his his history. But I would rather make that video to show Hey, like this artist was able to make the this incredible music, this incredible art on an iPod. This should be inspirational to all of us who are artists kind of thing.

Jay Clouse  12:07

And it seems like you have like a few styles of hooks that you know work and you're used a lot like you'll you'll say like, can we talk about this? Or did you know that? Or have you heard this song like and it's so quick. And it's so like obvious what's happening next? And it's so engaging? Do you have any other hooks that you like and use a lot?

Daniel Wall  12:26

I usually go with the lately I've been going with the I don't know if you know, because it seems like it's more conversational than the other ones. But what's interesting is recently is I did a presentation on hooks in short form content. And I had to study all the hooks I was making. And I was looking at other people who are really good at at short form content or long form content even because hooks are really important for that too. And what I noticed is even though there's a hook in the beginning, there is usually a second hook that keeps you to the end. So what I've been trying to do is putting the second hook either in like the first five seconds to bring someone to the end, which is basically I don't know if you know one of the biggest songs of all time plays Mr. Brightside. But did you know it actually didn't do well at first, you're like, Oh, it didn't. This is one of the biggest songs ever, but and then you go into the store and you continue it on. So in my in my head I've I think a lot of people give advice on hooks, at least for short form content, and they say, you know, use the word you in the first second psychologically, it'll get someone to stop, do do this thing, ask a question. But I think most important, it's provide value, create intrigue, and a viewers head, getting them throughout the story. And that doesn't have to come in the first second. Your goal. It's like a hook in the first second is how do I get them to the next part of the story?

Jay Clouse  13:43

So good. It's like, hey, you know, this familiar thing? Did you know the surprising thing? Is that's a pretty good formula. That's a good way to perform because it's like, yes, I do know that familiar thing. Oh, wait, what about it? That's so good. I love this framework of hook story. Pay off in the story part of your videos. Do you have some similar like beats or framework that you're hitting within that story to move that along towards a payout? Or is that still kind of like an intuitive gut feel type of thing?

Daniel Wall  14:13

I think it's more intuitive gut feel because I I do something very different. A lot of other creators I know they script their videos. I usually do the I don't. I've just been doing it for so long that most of the time. The research and video piece happens at the same time, like video recording and research happens at the same time with me. And then I usually re edit the video to create the story after it's been recorded. And it's clipped out if there is a chance where I'm watching this video back and I say this could be better. I'll just rerecord that certain clip and figure it out until the video hits to where I'm comfortable. And I'd be like, this is interesting to me. It's probably going to be interesting to the maybe a couple other people out there hopefully more.

Jay Clouse  14:52

After a quick break Daniel and I get into the specifics of his process for creating short form video and later we talk about his thoughts on long form as well. So stick around we'll be right back.

Jay Clouse  15:03

Welcome back to my conversation with Daniel Wall. Now, I have a small confession to make and that is that I am pretty ignorant when it comes to TikTok so I asked Daniel if he could humor me and actually take me through his specific process for how he makes videos on Tiktok.

Daniel Wall  15:17

What I do personally as I do definitely the first one because I think that helps me more when creating content marking on a couple of videos right now for example, I have the Steve Lacey video half done it's not all the way done, but like I'm putting out Elton John had a song called cold heart which feature do a LiPo which is this song It's really crazy because it has five different samples in it Okay, fine. He just put out a second song with Britney Spears that also samples three or four of his other songs. Now what's interesting is the first one is with Dua Lipa and what and when you look at these like really old artists, Billy Joel, Paul McCartney, all these people, they always put out new music what this new generation of artists are doing Nicki Minaj Jack Harlow, Lil TJ, they're taking really popular older songs and they're recreating them as a marketing tool as a tool for nostalgia just like movies do. I'm thinking Elton John is taking that formula and applying it with his own songs called Heart with Dua Lipa, a song that samples four or five of his other songs, in a sense, shouldn't do, well, formulaically. But the song got number seven on Billboard, which he hasn't achieved in like 10 or 15 years, it got a billion streams on Spotify, and is being played and introducing Elton John to this new generation of music listeners. He's doing the same thing now. And he brought on two other music producers a guy named Andrew watt and another producer named circuit or incredibly talented guys who've made some of the biggest songs in pop music. And they basically took the stems from Tiny Dancer and tried to make a new song and a new version out of it.

Jay Clouse  16:53

I heard that on an airplane recently, I was like, this is nuts. What is going on? This is Tiny Dancer. What is it? Why isn't the song called Tiny Dancer?

Daniel Wall  17:05

Great, great question. And so in my head, I'm thinking this could be a really fun and cool video to talk about how like where music is headed from an artist standpoint. But then how can older artists use this to apply it to their own music and what he's doing specifically is that it's just interesting to me and I'm like, I can make this into a video.

Jay Clouse  17:25

So you have the Steve Lacey video in progress. This Elton John thing inspires you. Where does the In Progress Steve Lacey video sit? Did you actually record parts of that video? Are they in drafts is that even functionality TikTok has? This is where my ignorance comes in.

Daniel Wall  17:40

100% so I have drafts from the beginning. Not anymore, because I've actually like cycled through them. But at one point, I had a lot of drafts and tick tock basically, you can edit a video to its ending point or halfway through however much you want, save it into drafts, and have it in there. You can also edit it outside of tic toc and then put into drafts and save it. My whole thing was when I was working full time, I was thinking how do I make this process as easy as possible? I need to do everything. So all I need to do while I'm working full time at a call center or as an account rep at a tech firm, all I need to do is open up the video and click post because it has the caption has text it has everything on there. So nowadays, sometimes I do it that much makes it easier. But what can I do to make it as easy as possible for me to put out content, and that is setting up batch time creating all the content, putting them into draft. So all I need to do is click post and it's up.

Jay Clouse  18:36

How much time do you put into one video do you think?

Daniel Wall  18:39

I think it depends on the video. But at the same time, if it's a very easy concept at one point I was doing how artists got their name. At one point I was doing artists who hate their own songs that that one was pretty easy, because there's all these articles of artists who hate their own songs, I was just taking one of them and just putting it into a video form. And if you watch those videos, it's really interesting because the format of that of that concept changed at the beginning what I was doing is I was talking about an artist who hates their own song and then I would show the song and I realized, hey, this would be a lot more interesting if you don't know what the song is until the very end.

Jay Clouse  19:11

Hmm, yeah, yes, I remember listening to pour some sugar on me or something like that one of those 80s hairband videos are like this is their biggest song and this guy hates it. And right at the end when you have that payoff of and this is the song it just really hit for me. And it almost makes you want to loop it then too because you're like, Hold on, let me let me now rewatch this with the knowledge of what that song was.

Daniel Wall  19:34

So those videos probably take 30 minutes, maybe an hour, but for example, I made a video about our money YT who had a song called Billy Eilish it's really going crazy on across social media across everywhere and just doing really well for him. That video ended up taking like five or six hours because the story just kept unfolding and going crazy. That was one of the longer videos I've make, but on average, I'd say anywhere from one and a half to two hours for everything.

Jay Clouse  20:01

Something that I've really come to believe is that the experts know where to put the majority of their time and what to ignore. And the thing that blows my mind with a lot of your videos is, it's just like you on your iPhone recording your computer screen. I'll be like recording a video that's playing on your computer. And I'm like, this is so low production. But also I don't care. So what do you think about in terms of what's important to put time and effort into to actually move the needle and content on TikTok?

Daniel Wall  20:33

I think this is a really great question. Because I think when it comes to creators wanting to create and wanting to be successful, a lot of times when creators first start, they look at production value as the most important thing. And I was the same way for YouTube for music. When I was creating my own things like that I was really passionate. The thing was, is those videos that that audio, the music, it would never come out, because I was always such a perfectionist. So when I had the mindset of making short form content, it was like what can I do to lower the barrier of entry to make it as great as possible? What do people actually care about. And while I was making these videos, now, I've made probably like 3200 videos, in that time, I've learned that people care about story, they care about relatability, and they care about community. So if you can have a video that gives them two or three of those things, and then have production quality on top of it, that's just a bonus. At that point, they want to engage with something they want to add value, they want to be entranced with the story. So in my head, I was like, How can I provide all those three things with lowering the barrier of entry as much as possible for me to just make the content for it? And in my head, it was like I started with an iPhone six es on a 2015 MacBook Pro? Two recording Exactly. It was recording a screen, I was like, how do I make this as easy as possible? I don't want to export this footage onto a MacBook and then re export it onto my phone. I just want to record it directly. How bad is it going to be? Are people even going to join it is the audio bad? And I remember recording it one time and I was thinking, you know, this doesn't sound bad at all. This actually sounds pretty decent. And you know, it's even more relatable because it's like I could do that I could I can make these kinds of videos and I enjoy them so.

Jay Clouse  22:16

That's such a good insight. That's where we're like relatability comes in. Can you tell me more about what you mean by community in this sense? Is it just like something that people are going to want to comment on or what what do you mean by that?

Daniel Wall  22:26

In this sense for short form content, I would say though, people who kind of come to the con, to the content that I make are the ones who are really interested in music really interested in like the behind the scenes of music. And if you comment on these kinds of videos, most likely someone else that's a part of it is going to know at least a little bit or want to learn a little bit and people are going to be in the comments kind of answering questions. And it's a different side of platforms. So if Nicki Minaj posts a video of her dancing to her new song, there's probably not going to be talks about like the sample that's being used. But if I make a video about it, maybe someone in there is gonna be able to ask a question where it's like, what exactly is interpolation? And why is that different than a sample? They want to kind of engage with it. I think tick tock in short form content, it's very difficult to create community on right now. Maybe that'll change in the future. When I say community, I kind of mean that or engagement, stuff like that, too. But I think that's good point.

Jay Clouse  23:20

How much do you think about captions and hashtags on TikTok or Instagram, of all short form, I should say?

Daniel Wall  23:26

Personally, I never look at captions when I look at content, but I have a lot of friends and other creators and other people I've talked to that do. So I'm thinking to myself, what can I do here to provide entry just in case that they do. And I've just been using hashtags since I started. So I just never stopped I believe in a method which is, it's called C fool. This is something that I kind of made. And attribute to my success. It stands for see consistency, e experimentation, F failure, l learn from those failures. I try something if it works, I double down on it. If it stops working, I try to experiment on something else.

Jay Clouse  24:05

How much do you think about time of day, or the number of things you post per day?

Daniel Wall  24:11

I used to try to keep a quota when I was first learning. So I tried to post three times a day towards the beginning. And now I'm more focused on how do I start expanding into other things. In order to do that, I may need to take that quota down which I already have. So one point I was going once a day when when I tried every other day. And at the end of the day, my thought is how do I just continue making great content. If that means that I have to go down and focus more on quality of each post I'm for that, but also with the goal of wanting to get more into long form content and other things. The actual consistency component with posting every day may have to go down in order to allow for other things and with balance of life.

Jay Clouse  24:53

I actually didn't realize just how big your YouTube is and looks like it's pretty much entirely shorts so as your job juggling tick tock shorts, reels. How do you think about the trade offs between those like is a pretty simple process where you just download the raw of the whole clip that you make for tick tock and upload that to shorts and reels also. And what happens happens or is there more thought behind it?

Daniel Wall  25:15

I started posting long form content on YouTube around October of 2019. At the time I was I didn't have the time to make long form content, and short form content, and work full time and work out. So I was like, What are these things can't be a priority right now. And right now in my head, I remember editing my own videos, and just not loving the process of editing long form. That was me personally, other people can, that's great. How do I focus my time in the things that I find a priority. So to me, that was short form content. So I post content on Tik Tok, I would then take the video and put it on YouTube, as well as Instagram took a bit longer, but I was posting on YouTube short form content for a while until anything started taking off. And it wasn't until around September of 2021, one of the videos I posted which was a video on Simlish, in song, so Katy Perry, doing Simlish. And that video didn't do well. And then a couple of weeks later, it just started taking off. And then it would get to 10,000 views and then 50 and then 1,000,010 million, then 15 million, and all the videos around it I posted before I started doing well. And then all of a sudden, I was like, let me just take these videos and put them on YouTube. And I started doing that on other platforms as well like Snapchat, like Facebook, like Pinterest, a lot of people try to push people to other platforms, which I think is great, great. Keep going with that. In my mind. It's it's like if I have a product, and it's only in target, but the people that I want to reach are only shopping at Costco, am I going to tell people to go to Target? Or am I also going to get the product in Costco, I'm thinking I'm just going to start posting on YouTube, on Instagram on all these platforms if I have the capability and the bandwidth to do so.

Jay Clouse  26:56

What is the goal here? Like it sounds like at the beginning, you were just posting because it's fun. You want to make stuff as you started to grow this following in short form, what was the model that you're trying to build to support you as a creator and also, you know, give you some some reward for the 100 and 4 million likes you have on TikTok and the 754 million views on YouTube. What was the model look like for you?

Daniel Wall  27:25

Right now the model is income from brand deals as well as income from like the funds that every platform has, in terms of what has been the highest paying, it's definitely been YouTube. And I'm very thankful for that very grateful for that. I'm trying to branch out different revenue streams to be able to not have views be the main factor for income at this point. And that's something that took me a bit of time to figure out and now that's why I'm trying to branch out into different forms of content this at this point.

Jay Clouse  28:01

Thinking about YouTube shorts, TikTok, Instagram reels, if I'm a short form creator, or an aspiring short form creator, do I need to change the way I approach these three things? Because on the surface, they seem very similar and it kind of feels like if I have raw video, I can just post all three and and they should do well everywhere. But do you think differently about those three platforms?

Daniel Wall  28:25

Oftentimes, yes, I at the same time, I think that a short form audience is going to gravitate to different things. But for example, if I make a video, there's a video that I made about Mr. Beast, one of his guys named Chandler. He started out as Mr. Beast janitor, I know that that video isn't going to perform very well on TikTok. Because people may not know Him, they may not know Mr. Beast as well. They may not know who Chandler is, but if I posted on YouTube, it's probably going to do much better because people know who Mr. Beast is they know who Chandler is. So it depends kind of on the platform a little bit more, as well as I've noticed that longer videos are starting to perform a lot better on TikTok, because they're relying a lot on watch time. But YouTube doesn't allow you going past a minute. So what I've had to do is I've had to split up videos and do part one and part two. I don't love doing that. But my favorite thing is linking the video saying like part two and I pin it to the top so someone can easily go to it if they wanted to.

Jay Clouse  29:23

When we come back, Daniel and I talked about how he's thinking about adding long form video into his content strategy. Right after this.

Jay Clouse  29:31

Hey, welcome back to this point in the interview, Daniel and I have talked exclusively about short form video, but Daniel was actually thinking about getting into long form video as well.

Daniel Wall  29:41

I think it was a change in why I had to figure out why I was making content and what the goal was in my head. It went from posting a certain quota per day to wanting to tell amazing stories to wanting to inspire the next generation of music creatives as well as other types of Creative by showing the behind the scenes. And where that really started was I made a video about the greatest showmen. There is a song called Never enough with a singer and an actress named Rebecca Ferguson who's actually lip syncing the words and the actual singers named Lauren. Alright, so I made a video about that was January of 2020. I did really well so well in fact that she actually found out about the video and got on TikTok.

Jay Clouse  30:24

What, she got on TikTok because of your video highlighting her song. That's awesome.

Daniel Wall  30:31

We start talking. And a year later, she reaches out she said, Hey, you're in Arizona, right? And go Yeah, sure. Like, listen, I'm coming to Arizona for a tour with David Foster David Foster one of the biggest music producers ever. Whitney Houston, I will always love you. Michael Buble has so many other songs. Do you want to come? And I say yes. The only thing it's my mom's birthday. Can she come to? She goes yeah 100%

Jay Clouse  30:57

Happy Birthday Mom.

Daniel Wall  30:59

So my dad ends up coming to we end up going to the concert. We go I don't have tickets. So she texts me. She's like, Yeah, just go up to the counter say what your name is so okay. So I go to the front. I say Who am I name is and they go? Oh, yeah, here you go. And they give me three backstage passes.

Jay Clouse  31:17

Okay, go on.

Daniel Wall  31:19

So we go into the concert. I'm not expecting any type of seats, but they see us right in the middle with like two seats next to us. And I'm like, wow, this is really nice. This is I'm like so thankful and grateful for this right now. She goes on she performed. She's incredible. David Foster is up there. He performs all the songs he's ever done with other talented singers who want American Idol and whatever looking at that, then I remember being told, okay, after the show, just come backstage. So we all end up going backstage and I'm thinking to myself, is there an idea I have for this? Like, if David comes back? Do I have an idea? I meet Lauren, super great, super nice. David comes in and everyone just crowds around him. Everyone wants to take a picture with him. Everyone wants to meet him. Lauren says, Hey, Daniel, come with me. So she walks me directly up to David says like, this is Daniel like I want you to meet him is like, Can we take a picture real quick. She's She asked for me. And I'm like, Okay, this is cool. So while I have him with a picture, I know, I know, if I don't ask this right now he's probably going to leave or like go be mobbed by other people. I say, can we make a video real quick? He goes, Yeah, why not? And so I grabbed my phone out, I take a video and I asked, What's one piece of advice you have for your past sell for any future songwriters, producers, anyone out there?

David Foster  32:32

Are you ready, Daniel?

Daniel Wall  32:33

I'm ready.

David Foster  32:33

Okay, are you ready? Good is the enemy of great. Anybody can be good. Try to be great every day.

Daniel Wall  32:40

So I took that video, and I put it across different platforms. And people really resonated with it. They said, Wow, this is really great advice. I can't believe you met this person. But I'm going to take this and I'm going to apply it to my life and everything like that. And I thought, you know, I could do this with other people. I could do this with one of my favorite bands of all time. And so I made a video about one of my favorite bands of all time, Coldplay, and it ended up going super viral. Their team ended up seeing it, they reached out I'm going to their concert already. So I was like, I'd love to make a video with you guys. Oh my god. So I ended up going to the concert, get the whole full backstage tour, get to meet them do an interview with the lead singer Chris Martin. It was really funny because at first when I arrived at the actual stadium, we walk to the middle of the stadium. They say Daniel, we're so sorry, you can't record right now. And I'm thinking I'm a content creator, like recording is what I do. Like I don't know what to tell you. And so Chris, like while they're doing the soundcheck, Chris Martin goes up to the microphone. And he says, is that Daniel? Daniel wall? Because Daniel, I love your tiktoks. And right then and there, the manager runs down. He's running down, he goes down the stairs comes up to me with a big smile on his face. He goes, Daniel was so happy to have you. And I asked him Can I Can I record this please? Please do. He's like he's like, You know what? Follow me. So he takes me on stage to go meet the band, do a full backstage tour of everything, meet all these people. I get to see everything that they're doing have a a and he takes the camera and records me and Chris having an interview, which I'm really grateful that I'm thankful that he was willing to do that because I didn't have a this is my first time doing anything like this. I didn't have a videographer coming. I didn't have anything like that. I remember going through all these questions I had And my last question was, I had this I had this dream of singing on stage with Coldplay. There's a video that came out about it. There's this really popular thing on TikTok about how many likes to whatever, sometimes kids will do it for their parents who want them to stop smoking. So it's like how many likes to get my dad to stop smoking or whatever that is. And I said how many likes to sing on stage with you because it's a dream I've had since I was 14. They helped me get through a lot of hard times in my life. One of my favorite videos I've ever made. Chris Martin says 100,000 and the video ends up hitting that in seven hours when it comes out. I was like wow, this is incredible. People said like the video You're connected with them so much. And so now Coldplay and I are looking at doing that next year. Wow, I'm making it happen when it come back to the US. So it not only that happened, but it kept it kept evolving. So then I met Rick Astley from Never Gonna Give You Up. I asked him to Rick, roll me and that video is coming out. And then I met Ryan Tedder of One Republic, and that that's a really funny story because I ended up blowing him up on Tik Tok and met him. And it just kept spiraling and becoming really great. So I was thinking myself, how do I make the content that I'd want to see when I was younger? This is what I would do.

Jay Clouse  35:33

Wow. So you're telling me the ultimate hack to meeting all of our favorite people is just to be super successful in short form video and highlight them. I usually people when they think about doppelgangers will tell me I look like Chris Elliott, which I hate quite a bit. But twice in my life. People have said that like Chris Martin. I don't think they're right. But I'll take it over Chris Elliott. Okay, weird aside. So you're moving into this different form of content? And am I correct in assuming these are going to be like longer form videos, kind of going back to your YouTube roots and doing longer videos or just a different type of short form?

Daniel Wall  36:08

I'm thinking that if I can take the short form content and stretch it out longer, and they also make videos instead of about artists and singers and songwriters. But with them, I think I'd be able to provide a lot of value to those out there who are interested in becoming professional creators, whether that be in music, movies, TV, Broadway, whatever that means.

Jay Clouse  36:30

When you're trying to get in touch with these people. You obviously have like impressive credentials, because you have like these huge followings. So if these people see like, Oh, this guy's interested, he seems legitimate. I'll take him seriously. But it still seems like there's probably quite a bit of distance or a wall between you and those people. So how do you how do you think about crossing that chasm and actually getting in touch with these people who usually probably have like a line of handlers and managers to get through?

Daniel Wall  37:00

I think it comes from making the process as easy as possible for them. When it comes to getting in touch I'm very thankful to have as someone who's been in the music industry connections, as well as I have a manager who runs a record label, and independent record label he is is pretty well connected with certain people. And if there's anyone we need to, like getting contact with, I found the best way to do it is to voice message them on Instagram or voice message whoever part of their team and telling them the story telling them the reason and explaining to them why I want to make this happen. So a lot of the times, what I found is providing value to the person creates a lot of success. So the reason Ryan's header even happened was providing value to him. I'm thinking how do I make this process as easy as possible for them, you're coming to Arizona for a show, I can buy tickets or I can be there. You let me know when to go, where to go how to go. All I want to do is like make a video with you. Whether that be a short form video, long form video, I'm gearing more towards long form. Now there's this creator named airac. And he made a video early on with Logan, Paul. And I remember he went on a podcast and he explained it's common in summer podcast. And he explained that when you're when you're working with a creator, or working with another person, you want to make the process as easy and to provide them as much value as possible. I'm trying to take that same thing a lot, I live in Arizona, there's not a ton of press, and there's not a ton of things happening here. I can come to their show, do this stuff with them, and then take videos of their actual show showed of the performance and be able to provide them as much value as possible. So how can I make this process as easy as possible to make it happen?

Jay Clouse  38:47

That's amazing. I've tried to same approach with this show. Because you know, I'll meet people and like, Hey, should should I be doing like a release form from my podcast, and they'll send like this questionnaire ahead of time to try to make the research easy. And it's just like you're dealing with people whose currency is time and you got to make this the lowest lift possible on these people. Like if they say yes, that should be all that's required is like you said, Yes. Awesome. Pick a time that's convenient for you. Like, here's how we'll meet, and I'll do all the legwork. I 100% agree with that.

Daniel Wall  39:18

Recently, I did a video with Andy Grammer. We drove out like two hours away. I flew out a videographer to be there. We brought three or four cameras, we brought lighting equipment. We brought everything we set up the entire room ourselves. We arrived two hours early. All Andy had to do was walk in, sit down, we already have the labs ready for him. And we did a 30 minute interview. And then that was it. He left for the show. We talked we hang out with the band. Then we went and we got to watch the show. So in in that area. It was a lot of work for us but the end of the day, it's how do you make it as easy as possible and in my head going to them is what has allowed it to make it as easy and just do doing all the work for it as long as they let us.

Jay Clouse  40:02

Are you worried about moving a short form audience to potentially long form?

Daniel Wall  40:08

I believe that when making any type of brand change, there's going to be quote unquote, failure, there's going to be stuff that may not be as successful. But in my mind, if I just continue the consistency of it? Sure, maybe people will fall off. My plan isn't to stop short form altogether. It's just to add another element in my mind, I'm not trying to be a short form or long form channel, I'm just trying to create a brand showing stories of the behind the scenes of music, and if short form videos and long form videos can help me do that, then I'm going to use them.

Jay Clouse  40:51

I am absolutely an amateur when it comes to short form video. So not only was it great getting tactical advice from Daniel on short form, but he even lowered the barrier to entry talking about how high production isn't necessary. So maybe I will get into short form video in 2023. If you wanna learn more about Daniel, you can find him on TikTok, YouTube or Instagram @danielswall. Links to all of those of course are in the show notes. Thanks to Daniel for being on the show. Thank you to Connor Conaboy for editing this episode and Nathan Todhunter for mixing our audio. Thank you to Emily Clouse for creating our artwork and Brian Skeel for creating our music. If you'd like this episode, tweet me @jayclouse and let me know I love to hear it. And if you really want to say thank you, please leave a review on Apple podcasts. Thanks for listening, and I'll talk to you next week.