#306: What 16 Years Behind YouTube's Biggest Channels Taught Josh Mattingly About Hiring And The Current State of YouTube

Josh Mattingly [00:00:00]:
Let's not forget where we want to go. Let's keep those really big goals in mind, especially if they're achievable and they feel like they're in reach. Those are the things that motivate, you know, Those are the things that can get your team to walk to the ends of the earth.

Jay Clouse [00:00:26]:
Hello, my friend. Welcome back to another episode of Creator Science. Today I'm speaking with Josh Mattingly, the founder of Upright Media. Upright is an operating partner for content creators. They do operations, consulting, recruiting and post production for some of the biggest channels on YouTube. They're behind the scenes. Josh describes himself as a creator without a channel. He's been working with content creators for 16 years.

Jay Clouse [00:00:50]:
Creators like Erak Smosh, Emma Chamberlain, dude, perfect, Matthew Beam, and Chris Williamson. And 16 years means he's been doing this since. Since before most people had even heard the word YouTuber. He now runs a team of 11 full time staff and about 40 contractors around the world. I wanted to talk to Josh for a few reasons. First, at the time of this conversation, I'd been sitting at this crossroads for a long time. Do I staff up and fuel the ambitious side of me, or do I stay lean and keep the anxiety at bay? I've since moved into hiring and this conversation certainly helped me feel more confident doing that. But I.

Jay Clouse [00:01:27]:
But I wanted to talk to somebody who has watched a lot of creators make that decision and seen how it plays out on both sides. Second, Josh has a really clear framework for how creators think about building their team, starting with positioning, building towards a mission, and hiring in service of a goal rather than in service of panic. It's practical stuff that I think a lot of creators either skip or get backward. And third, honestly, I just like talking to Josh. I think he's really enjoyable to talk with. I think he's really thoughtful. We ended up going on a long tangent about what YouTube actually wants right now and the difference between entertainment, education, and what I call companionship, content, and why so much of what we consume today feels like being in a shitty flow state. That experience where you look up from your phone 35 minutes after you open Instagram and can't tell me a single thing you saw.

Jay Clouse [00:02:14]:
That part wasn't really on my agenda, but it's one of my favorite parts of the conversation. In this episode we talk about how to know when it's actually time to hire, how to build a hiring committee. If you're a solopreneur, why you should almost always hire generalists for. First, what YouTube is biased towards right now and how to build a team around a goal instead of just building a team. If you enjoy this episode, I'd love to hear about it. Tag me on Instagram or Xclouse and let me know. We'll get that full conversation with Josh right after this. To start, I would love to just hear what's a day in the life of Josh Mattingly?

Josh Mattingly [00:02:53]:
That's a great question. It depends on the day. So right now we're working with several big creators across all of our lines of business, which are operations, consulting, recruiting and post production. So fortunately, I've got department heads that kind of COVID each of those lines of business. And so I'm not necessarily in the weeds fully across those things, but certainly working with the teams to achieve whatever goals are right in front of us day to day. That could look like anything from, hey, we just sent out an offer for a creative director and we're trying to get that person in the door for one of our content creators. It could also be on the same thread. I'm jumping into interviews to make sure that I'm doing kind of a culture check by proxy for the creator as one of the people on their hiring committees.

Josh Mattingly [00:03:43]:
That's kind of the recruiting and team building side of things. Operations consulting, I mean, that can be so many things. Installing new systems and processes that could be training managers, helping Chris on my team, who's our project manager and system specialist, finish out a series of sops for somebody's production bible that we're finishing up for them all the way up to, hey, we're about to go live on the launch of a second channel that we helped a creator stand up. Each day is a different fun challenge. For the longest time, I've considered myself a creator without a channel, which ties really nicely into the main objective of Upright to be the operating partner to the creator economy. We're building with the creators. And I'm kind of obsessing about the same things that creators are obsessing about. We're looking at the same metrics, we're tied to the same KPIs.

Josh Mattingly [00:04:38]:
If we win, they win. That's why we exist. So it's never a dull moment. The post production side, we have several big creators that we. We actually are their de facto post production team. Yeah, so we've got some, some folks who, who come to us for one off projects that's fewer and far between these days. Normally we'll be on regular cadence with a creator. So that could look anywhere from one video a month to two Videos a month, all the way up to the creator who we're working with the most, which is six videos per month across two very big channels.

Josh Mattingly [00:05:11]:
We also started working with some brands in 2025 going, which is really exciting. I posted about on LinkedIn, but we're working with Red Bull Motorsports. So, you know, our post team is inching into the brand and more traditional world. And the cool thing there is people are looking to us as a bridge to go from traditional into digital. Our editors are just primarily focused on YouTube. Most of them have only ever worked in digital media. So they're acutely aware of what it takes to create a video that will drive retention and watch time.

Jay Clouse [00:05:43]:
How big is your team?

Josh Mattingly [00:05:44]:
So we are 11 full time right now and then probably 40ish contractors around the world working on various post production projects. I categorize thumbnails as post production on our team as well, so that all kind of fits on the post side. Thumbnails, long form and short form editing.

Jay Clouse [00:06:01]:
How much do you work?

Josh Mattingly [00:06:03]:
I don't have a start or stop time, Jay. You know, it's so interesting, man. Okay, so a couple things I resonate so hard with creators that are in it all the time and have their blinders on and it's just like it's go time every day, every second of the day. I've had to coach a lot of these creators to say that your team does not have the same incentive that you do. So, like, don't work your team as hard as you're working. You know, they just don't have the same upside. And I think you can very easily burn out a team or at least make them, you know, a little bitter that they're trying to keep up with you on that, on that treadmill. So I try to take my own medicine when I'm managing my team.

Josh Mattingly [00:06:46]:
Everyone's got a pretty, pretty cush, you know, situation. I don't. I'm not like, hey, work the weekend or work until 1am or anything like that. But I certainly do. It's, you know, when you find something that you actually love, as corny as it is, it does not become work. And for me, and maybe you feel this way with what you do, but I wake up in the morning every day excited to go to work. I'm like so pumped to go to the gym and come home and eat breakfast and then sit down at this computer. I spend probably 14 hours a day in this room.

Josh Mattingly [00:07:19]:
I'm in this room more than any other place in the world and I love it. Like every, every second of the day that I get to sit down and help creators solve problems, every day, that I get to build my team, every new client that we get to interact with, every opportunity like this to sit down and talk to someone like you, it's the best. I wouldn't have it any other way. So I'd like average 80 hours a week. Like average.

Jay Clouse [00:07:43]:
Goodness average.

Josh Mattingly [00:07:44]:
Yeah. I mean, there's times where I'm working, you know, Saturday is my, my reset day where I'll take a half day off in the morning, but I still work in the afternoon and I don't mind it. And then Sunday is kind of like just admin day. Catch up, get ahead for the week. Yeah, Saturdays and Sundays aren't like full time days, but you know, I'm doing at least four to six hours a day on Saturdays and Sundays. I also don't have a child or a wife, so I'm just a, a single dude really kind of focused on growing his company.

Jay Clouse [00:08:16]:
Real talk, when you say you work 80 hours a week and you wake up excited every day, how much of that is excitement and how much of that is panic? I feel like as a business owner sometimes there is like sheer panic that may come from like something is on fire. Even just down to like my ego is threatened if this business deal falls apart. And sometimes it's difficult to pick apart these two emotions. What percentage would you ascribe to panic?

Josh Mattingly [00:08:42]:
That's a great question. I don't think I panic a whole lot, but anxiety and stress are through the roof when you build something that other people rely on. Like I said, 11 full time staff, half of them have kids. You know, we have great benefits. So their whole family relies on upright being a successful entity. And that will definitely keep me up sometimes where I'm like, man, if I make a wrong decision here or take the wrong bet, how is that going to impact them when it comes to the creators? I've been so I'm in my 16th year working with content creators, which is crazy. And when I started there were no other platforms, so we were just YouTubers. And you know, watching this industry evolve into what it has become has been so cool.

Josh Mattingly [00:09:39]:
And also I've just been in it for so long that I have dealt with every type of personality, every type of demand, every type of expectation, whether it's realistic or not. You know, you're dealing with a lot of high performers who expect everyone to kind of operate at a certain standard. And so with that there's always a level of all Right. Are we making the right choice here? Are we doing right by our clients? Are they going to be happy? Are we going to be happy? Are we happy with the decisions we're making? Are the graphs going up and to the right? And as long as they are, I think you're in pretty good shape. Even if a graph is going up and to the right marginally. So it's certainly better than going, you know, down. And so when I'm going to bed, I think is the time where I have the most anxiety. It's mostly like going through the mental checklist of, did I do everything I was supposed to do today? Did the team everything that they were supposed to do today? Did we achieve, like, our big three priorities today? You know, any number of those things will run through my head, but I haven't panicked in a while.

Josh Mattingly [00:10:47]:
I'm pretty fortunate about that. But I think it's a testament to the fact that I've actually built a really great team. And so, you know, if ever I'm feeling a level of anxiety, I know that they've done their job. I can very Easily go check Monday.com or a Slack thread and make sure that, like, okay, I can just kind of, like, check in quickly and see that people are moving the ball forward, that we're checking the boxes, that nothing's on. Well, let me. I was going to say nothing's on fire. Everything's always on fire. You know, I mean, you know that.

Josh Mattingly [00:11:18]:
And even if it's on fire a little bit, it's like, let's reframe that as an opportunity. You know, I get to put out this fire. How cool. Rather than like, oh, my God, everything's on fire. Because everything will be on fire. And I think if you just kind of accept that as an absolute truth, it does make the panic go away a little bit. One of my buddies jokes, and he tells me that I'm fueled by cortisol. I hope that's not the case, because I feel like it's going to take some years off of my Life.

Josh Mattingly [00:11:46]:
I'm like 30% anxious right now, but it's because we built a good team.

Jay Clouse [00:11:50]:
Hiring is something I'm really interested in and I value, and I'm excited to get a lot of your perspective on this because you've done it with so many creators and for so many teams and for so many positions. I've for years been at this crossroads where I feel like I can either staff up and hire and fuel the ambition side of me, or I can kind of Stay where I'm at and quell the anxious side of me. And so when you are working with creators who are starting to hire and build teams, do you find that that's coming from a place of ambition and opportunity or. Because content can go so wide so quickly? I imagine sometimes creators get more attention than they can just even handle themselves, and it becomes like a necessity just to deal with the inbound and opportunity coming at them. So I'm curious to hear what that has looked like in your experience.

Josh Mattingly [00:12:49]:
It's interesting. There's a lot of creators that we work with that got to a point that I don't think they even dreamt they would get to. You know, they've set out to create content and they achieve that goal. And then it's like, hey, I'd love to get the silver plaque or a gold plaque. And then it's like, oh my gosh, I have a million subscribers. Oh my gosh, we're doing 20 million long form views a month. Oh my gosh, I got a diamond play button. And you're just like.

Josh Mattingly [00:13:15]:
The fact that they've gotten so far so fast I think is shocking. Now. I think one of two things normally happens when a creator grows that fast. And one is I need to be the biggest, I need to be the best. Like, I see the audience, I see the growth potential. I'm going to take down Mr. Beast, you know, whatever, which I love. Like, every creator who reaches a certain point, that's like their goal.

Josh Mattingly [00:13:38]:
It's just like a common goal. Like, I'm going to beat Jimmy.

Jay Clouse [00:13:40]:
That's crazy. I've never heard anyone say that goal. That sounds like such an insane, impractical goal to have. If you know anything about the way he operates.

Josh Mattingly [00:13:48]:
It's. And I, yes, I tell people all the time, Jimmy is in a different league, in a different game, in a different world, in a different planet, on a different universe. Like, just put him over here, don't worry about him. Be the best you that you can be and hit your goals and be the biggest thing in your niche or whatever fulfillment looks like to you. But I think for anybody to compare themselves to Jimmy or to say that they're going to knock him off number one, it's like, maybe, you know, but I personally don't think that that's a great goal to give to your team, you know, because they're all just like, yeah, okay, really, we're going to beat Mr. Beast. There's like.

Jay Clouse [00:14:27]:
That also puts all the pressure on performance of the content, for sure.

Josh Mattingly [00:14:31]:
For sure. And he's done something in such a very specific way for so long. He's just in a league of his own. Like let him and let him be, it's fine. But I think, you know, people will have that thought or even if it's just let's be the biggest X I can be in my, my category or it's, I just want to keep going. I just need to put my head down and I'm just going to keep doing me. And I think, you know, Ryan Trahan was a really good example of that where he's just so damn good at what he does. Obviously he's changed things recently if people have been watching along with, with Ryan's career journey.

Josh Mattingly [00:15:10]:
But it's never been about having the biggest team or launching 50 channels. You know, he's like, I've got joyride. I've got my thing that I'm doing. I kind of gamified my life and I'm chilling. You know, he's got a huge, huge audience. People are very bought in. I think that's really impactful. I think that's super healthy as well.

Josh Mattingly [00:15:31]:
Michelle Kare is the same category to me. You know, she's just doing her thing. Her show is crushing it. She's now like gunning for an Emmy, which I think is super, super cool. The team's very small and almost like a close knit family sort of unit, which is cool. And she's not out to launch a bunch of different channels and do all these things. She's like just fiercely motivated on doing her thing really, really, really well. And on the flip side of that, the people who want to grow and create the media companies, I think there's nothing wrong with that.

Josh Mattingly [00:16:04]:
I think it's cool. It takes a lot of ambition. It takes a hell of a lot of resilience and, and also a healthy appetite for risk. And you know, we were talking about hiring. When you get to a certain point, I'll use Topper Guild as an example. So Topper is a channel. Last year he was the fifth most subscribed YouTuber in the world. I think he added something like 28 million subscribers in 2025 to his YouTube channel.

Josh Mattingly [00:16:32]:
Insane. And he is 23 and so he's just, he's got the world ahead of him. So much time in front of him and he's looking at this, just massive growth. And so for a guy like him, it's okay. What are the objectives here? Is it to become a media company and launch multiple different channels in different Verticals is it? I just need to make more long form content on the main channel. Should the main channel content increase in scope? You know, that's something I think a lot of creators think that they need to do, which is, oh, I've got the viewership, which means I've got more ad revenue. Maybe let's put that back into the production budget and really start blowing things out. I'm not sure if someone needs to do that because you're building the audience on what you're currently giving them.

Josh Mattingly [00:17:22]:
They're not expecting you to start making $5 million Mr. Beast style videos. They just probably want more of the same kind of comfort food that you're giving to them. And so I think with that it's like, okay, build the team around what you're currently doing really well and continue to do that really well. And when you're at that point, it can be scary because you're saying, okay, now I've got to bring in not am I only spending money on a salary that I didn't previously spend, I'm now having to share space with another human. You know, trust that their thoughts are going to come into the creative process in a positive, productive way. Collaborate with them, understand that they're going to be impacting your culture. My CEO Michael, he made a comment the other day that sticks with me where if we take one person out of our team that's like 10% of our company, which is crazy.

Josh Mattingly [00:18:16]:
And when you think about that from a creator who's building from one or two or three people, every new person is a seismic shift in relativity to like the current size of the team and potentially the process and the system around the content being created. So the risk there is that you just have to be, okay, you have to take, you're going to spend the money and you're going to hire the person and just know that they're going to come in and hopefully make a net positive impact. And that's the point of bringing him on.

Jay Clouse [00:18:45]:
Can you give us some examples of creators who you think have done a really good job of hiring a very effective and efficient team? So I guess I'm kind of leaning on. I wouldn't say they're, they're small by absolute standards. Like, you don't have to say this is a team that only has three people, but relative to the output and impact they have, who strikes you as someone who's really got this balance right?

Josh Mattingly [00:19:10]:
Yeah, my friends James Pumphrey and Jesse Wood, they left Donut to start a company Called Speed. It's Speed with three E's. And they have created a fantastic channel. It kind of feels like a men's magazine. They left the automotive world and they wanted to talk about more things than just automotive. And so when you look at it, it kind feels like a GQ for this generation where they might talk about health hacks, you know, and say they're going to do these things for 30 days and did they see an improvement in their skin or their gut health and, you know, those sorts of things, or they're going to go camping together. James talks about fashion and dressing yourself to your body type. Then they also talk about cars a little bit.

Josh Mattingly [00:19:53]:
But they set out with, like a pretty ambitious goal to create this thing like a digital men's magazine that is on YouTube. It's very cool. And if you look at it, you can kind of tell exactly what they're going for when I say that to you now. When they started their company, it was just Jesse and James going, all right, we know that we want to use the audience that they have to build something new. And James knew in his heart that he would have his fans follow him to this thing. And we're going to create this channel and it's going to be kind of fueled by a very genuine mission. You know, their, their goals and what they're trying to accomplish, or it's just like it's these friends who want to do this thing for them. And they know that at the whole.

Josh Mattingly [00:20:36]:
If you build it, they will follow. If you build it, they will come.

Jay Clouse [00:20:41]:
Yeah. The field of dreams.

Josh Mattingly [00:20:42]:
Yeah, Field of dreams. Thank you. And so, like, they built this thing and it started working, like, pretty quickly. And then it's like, okay, well, they had an editor. I think they might have had somebody as a contractor for a while. And then it was very clear they need to put together the core team of people. And so you have Jesse, you have James. James is talent, creative.

Josh Mattingly [00:21:04]:
Yeah, he's the mouthpiece for the channel. Jesse is the guy behind the scenes. I think he refers to himself as the phone guy, but he's, you know, he's, he's doing all the biz dev stuff. He's constantly making sure that, you know, the. I think their third party partners are up to speed on what they're up to, which is great. So, you know, he is definitely the kind of operator behind it. And then they actually do have a COO now who is doing a lot of the actual operational stuff, the business operations, you know, HR accounting, the back office stuff that People don't really want to do, but you have to do it making sure you're legally compliant, you know, all those good things. And then they have a full time director and full time editor.

Josh Mattingly [00:21:49]:
So that's like a super lean, small team. But they've built the team around their current objectives, which makes a lot of sense. And I think when I'm talking to a content creator about the team that they're going to start forming, you kind of have to have the goal in mind because you can throw people together and you can put really, really good people together without a mission or a focus. And that team will not execute to the highest standard, maybe even to their own standard, because they don't understand where they're supposed to be aiming. And so if you want to put together a team that's going to be hyper effective, you really need know where, where you're going, where the channel's going and what everyone's very specific role is within that ecosystem.

Jay Clouse [00:22:35]:
And do you find that people have those answers when they come to you? Like, I imagine you probably talk to a lot of YouTubers who maybe they've got their silver play button and they're like, I want to do more and I feel like I need to build a team. And that may be as far as they know. Is that what you experience? And do you have to coach them through some of this?

Josh Mattingly [00:22:51]:
Yeah, yeah. And it's not atypical. You know, a lot of this stuff is not second nature. Most people don't think about their positioning statement, for example, or what they want to do next year or three years from now. It's just like, I need to make more content next week, you know, next month I would like to launch my gaming channel or whatever the, the goal might be in their head. And so if we go back to the idea that a creator might just want to be the biggest, that is so broad. It doesn't really tell me anything because I'm like, okay, if you want to be the biggest, do you want to spend the money on your team? Because if so, we could go out and like stack your C suite, but like, will that do anything? Like, will they know what to do if you brought in, I don't know, a head of product and licensing, like, is there even anything for that person to do? And so really needing to understand where they're going is first and foremost. And yeah, I've had so many of those conversations where I kind of gently challenge people in a way that is productive and constructive.

Josh Mattingly [00:23:58]:
You know, I'm never Talking down to anybody, because, look, I'm the biggest dreamer in the world, if you know me. And I think some of the people on my team would corroborate this. I am the guy that has ideas all the time, and most of them are bad. Most of them are things we shouldn't do right now. But I'm still going to throw them out there and my team's going to go, okay, Josh, can we just get back to, like, the task at hand? I'm like, yeah, but this is a good one. So I understand that mindset. And I think that a creator who's never had maybe a coach or a mentor, it's kind of like this chaotic thought, these thought patterns. It's just like, oh, we could do this and we could do this and we could do that.

Josh Mattingly [00:24:36]:
And I like to sit down with everyone and say, okay, great, let's write down all the coulds. Like, we could do all these things and then we kind of do a positioning exercise, which is just to say, how do you want to show up in the world? When I was thinking about upright, it was very important for me that I was able to say what upright was very succinctly, that my teammates could say what upright was very succinctly. So if I went to any of my employees and I said, hey, what is upright media? They should be able to say the same thing that I do. And then if I ask somebody in the industry, they should have the same answer just based on kind of like optics and what we're putting out there. And the positioning ties into everything. It can tie into your marketing strategy, it can tie into your mission vision values, which actually, you should have those first because your positioning should kind of come from those things. And it gives you this really nice filter to put everything through. If you're going to even think about the type of content you should create, you know, you create effectively a filter or like a rubric to say, okay, this doesn't check all the boxes.

Josh Mattingly [00:25:39]:
We shouldn't actually make this type of content. Or if we're going to stand up a new channel, does it tie into our positioning? And that could be, we want to age up our audience, for example. So if I'm talking with a creator who's got a younger audience and maybe they're trying to hit like a college age demo, then they probably shouldn't start that Roblox channel. You know, they should be thinking about what is going to tap into the demo, how they want to be viewed optically in the world. And so I've sat down and had a lot of those conversations with creators, and I think that it does sometimes it can kind of knock them off Cloud nine a little bit because they're dreaming big. But that's okay. You know, it's like, hey, let's not forget where we want to go. Let's keep those really big goals in mind, because that's the exciting stuff, Especially if they're cool and exciting and achievable and they feel like they're in reach.

Josh Mattingly [00:26:23]:
Those are the things that motivate, you know, those are the things that can get your team to walk to the ends of the earth to achieve those things with you, because they get to participate in that success. So let's not forget those things. But right now you need an editor. You know, creator X. You're still editing your own content. You need to get out of the weeds so you can be thinking more about creative ideation, so you can be thinking about the best possible titles and thumbnails and let Steve the editor edit the content.

Jay Clouse [00:26:51]:
What do you think YouTube, the platform is biased towards right now? Like, what does YouTube want? What is the path of least resistance to being successful on YouTube today?

Josh Mattingly [00:27:02]:
You know, I think a lot of us are seeing this fatigue with what has been going on YouTube, and this is like no shade to anybody. Of course, with the utmost love and respect. YouTube has been for years now all about these kind of big spectacles. And I think we're getting to the point where we're kind of tired of that. Not everything needs to be this over the top, gigantic, impossible feat. There needs to be variety. You know, when you look for the longest time, when you look at YouTube, I mean, even the trending page, and maybe that's why they got rid of it, it's kind of like it's the same thing that you're seeing all the time. It's.

Josh Mattingly [00:27:50]:
You're going to see these big spectacles. You're going to see maybe a couple thought pieces from popular YouTubers and people have been around for a long time. And then you'll see music videos. You know, you're going to. You're going to see the latest K pop music video. And that's kind of it. And So I think YouTube is trying to get away from that, it feels like a little bit, and open up more opportunities for people to create more. I don't want to call it genuine is the wrong word because I think spectacle content can be very genuine as well.

Josh Mattingly [00:28:19]:
I mean, look at beast philanthropy. I mean, those are like the Most genuine spectacles. And he's doing things that are changing the world in a really positive way. But it is still like, I would consider a spectacle, but kind of like biasing more toward real connection, you know, storytelling slowing down a little bit. I think we're also at a point now where with AI and just the speed at which things are moving, it feels like, how the hell can I even get in here and make a difference? How do I as a content creator even fit in? Which I would say, three years ago, a creator would go, all right, I need to take out a loan and spend a million dollars on a video, or else I won't be successful. First of all, don't do that.

Jay Clouse [00:29:07]:
Just crazy.

Josh Mattingly [00:29:08]:
That is terrible, terrible advice to yourself. If that is what you're thinking, please don't. But I think now it's. I know people talk about niching down, which I agree. I think if you can go deeper in a niche, and I don't want to call it a niche, it's just like a passion. Like, what do you love? What is something that you're so passionate about and you can speak to better than anybody can, if you can find that and create that channel. I think YouTube is dying for that, and I think audiences are dying for that. And so obviously, YouTube itself is going to bias the algorithm, if you want to call it that, or just the way that videos are being suggested to other people by watch time hours.

Josh Mattingly [00:29:51]:
And if more people are gravitating toward a thing and connecting with your point of view on a specific niche or passion, I think that will definitely help grow a channel.

Jay Clouse [00:30:02]:
After a quick break, Josh and I get a little bit philosophical on the state of content these days. But don't worry, we close the loop on team building and much more. So don't go anywhere. We'll be right back. And now back to my conversation with Josh Mattingly. I find myself thinking about the creator space. It used to be mostly like a kind of a spectrum to me, where on one end I'm seeing education, on the other side, I'm seeing entertainment. Of course, it's a spectrum.

Jay Clouse [00:30:33]:
So there's people that are everywhere within that spectrum. But increasingly I'm seeing kind of a third camp in my mind, which is kind of just companionship. Like, it's not truly entertainment the way I would say, like, this is entertaining, like a movie or something. And it's not educational, but it's just kind of, like, comforting to hang out. Like, I kind of feel like a lot of streaming is this way. I Feel like a lot of get ready with me content is this way. Do you have a different classification system that you guys use or think about internally?

Josh Mattingly [00:31:11]:
No, no, not really. With us and the creators that we're working with, they are kind of all in the most general and broad niches. So we're not working specifically with anybody in. I mean, I love the term companionship. I think that's really cool. I wouldn't say we're working with any creators currently who are doing anything like that. But I'm curious, like, are there people that come to mind for you when you say that? Just so I understand.

Jay Clouse [00:31:38]:
I think it kind of started this way. Like, I think a lot of vlog content was companionship oriented, you know, and I do think a lot of streaming activity where it is gaming, but I think gaming is almost secondary to feeling like I'm here with a friend. Like, I think we genuinely have a lack of connection between people. And so a lot of the parasocial relationships we see are truly like, we spend more time with some of our favorite creators than some of our best friends even, you know, if our favorite creators are uploading once a week or more than once a week, and we're not hanging out with our best friends weekly, we're spending a lot of time with these people. And I think a lot of the value really is feeling this companionship or kinship with people.

Josh Mattingly [00:32:23]:
Yeah, well, I think watching live streamers, live streaming is interesting and I'm not going to claim to be an expert on it whatsoever, but when I see a lot of these streamers that have massive concurrent audiences who are watching them for 24 hours or longer, like 35 days straight of, you know, whatever speed is doing these days, it is so impressive. But I think you're totally right. Imagine like waking up and be like, oh my God, I have to check in with my favorite streamer and see what he's doing right now. Oh, he's sleeping. Like, let me watch this for a little bit. You know, it's like, it is a little. It's interesting. I couldn't imagine being on the creator side of that, where you feel like you constantly have to show up.

Josh Mattingly [00:33:06]:
You know, that's your audience, that those are the people who feel that companionship.

Jay Clouse [00:33:10]:
I think a lot of podcasting is this also, if I'm honest, like, I think especially shows that have co hosts as like standing parts of it, because the rapport you feel when you're watching a co hosted show, it gets passed along to you as the listener. If I were to start a podcast today, I would do it with a co host for sure, because I think it just feels more natural as a medium to hang out in, and people have spent more time together, just have that. And I think it gets passed on to the listener. And it seems like YouTube is increasingly interested in podcasting, as is Netflix, as is, like every streaming platform out there right now. And I think a lot of people are drawn to it just because it feels comfortable, familiar. I don't tune into most of my podcasts today because there's a very specific thing that I think I'm going to learn is because I actually love the way Rich Roll asks questions and the way he thinks about things. So I don't know who this guest is, but I haven't listened to a Rich Roll episode in a while, so I'm gonna do that. I think a lot of it for me is companionship, too.

Josh Mattingly [00:34:15]:
Yeah, that's a good point. I mean, I definitely. It's comfort food for me to listen to a podcast. I look forward to listening to them at certain points in time as well. And I'm bummed if I'm in a car and I don't have something to listen to that I've not already heard or I guess, I mean, yeah, that. That's a good point. I will rewatch or relisten to podcast episodes quite frequently, but I won't do the same thing. Like, I wouldn't go back and rewatch a Mr.

Josh Mattingly [00:34:44]:
Beast episode.

Jay Clouse [00:34:45]:
Right.

Josh Mattingly [00:34:45]:
You know, it's like, I saw the spectacle. That was cool. He crashed the train into the hole. Like, all right, you know, but will I go back and re. Listen to something that was mentally stimulating or motivating? Because I wanted to kind of get another nugget of information from Stephen Bartlett, you know, like, of course, I do that quite often. And yeah, I guess now that I'm saying it out loud, I do. That companionship makes a ton of sense. You know, it's like, oh, this is my buddy.

Josh Mattingly [00:35:08]:
It's my buddy Steven, who's going to keep me company in my car ride.

Jay Clouse [00:35:11]:
I check my Facebook memories a couple times per week, and it's always interesting to see the YouTube videos that I was sharing a decade ago. Oh, and so many of them are still so good. Like, on Valentine's Day, I saw that there was a video I shared from 15 years ago called how to Be Alone. And it was this poet. She wrote a poem, and then she recorded some B roll. And the video is her reciting the poem over top of this B roll. And she even had some like, animations on top of it. And I watched this video from 15 years ago and I just thought this is so much more interesting than anything I'm seeing on YouTube today.

Jay Clouse [00:35:47]:
And she wasn't trying to be a YouTuber, she just wanted to make this video. And I agree with you that I feel like YouTube is starving for that type of content right now.

Josh Mattingly [00:35:58]:
Do you think it's YouTube or do you think it's the audience or both?

Jay Clouse [00:36:02]:
What do you mean that's starving for this content?

Josh Mattingly [00:36:05]:
Yeah, well, because YouTube is going to. You know, I think if I had to guess, if you're working at YouTube and you continue to see people coming into the platform, spending a ton of money, creating some sort of spectacle.

Jay Clouse [00:36:19]:
When I say YouTube, I mean the platform as a whole and not necessarily the agendas of people within the company. Because I kind of feel like a lot of it is emergent behavior based on audience appetite. But I feel like content as a whole, Even outside of YouTube, the pendulum has flung so far in the direction of being almost like processed foods, hyper processed, where it's like optimized for cost or addictive qualities or production value. I feel like when we see something that has some wabi sabi or comes from a place of just love and care without feeling about the performance of this piece, it feels so nourishing in a different way.

Josh Mattingly [00:37:08]:
I totally agree with that. The reason I asked that question is because I think that, I think you're totally right, that YouTube is starved for it. And I think like us as people are starved for it. You know, this is a whole separate tangent conversation, but I found myself doom scrolling a lot lately and I hate it. I hate that I do it. It's something where like, I don't remember what I looked at for 35 minutes. I couldn't tell you one reel that I swiped through on Instagram during that 35 minute period. But the times where I stumble across something that has a genuine purpose or feeling behind it, I'm like hooked up.

Josh Mattingly [00:37:48]:
And that's when I will go to the creator's page or on YouTube, I'll go to the creator's channel and I'm in. And then I want to go, I want to support them, I want to continue to watch and connect. But by and large I just feel like I'm fed this deluge of junk food like you said. And it's interesting too, because when I using the term feed, I read something on LinkedIn. Oh, it was Mike Gaston who actually started the Channel cut. So Mike wrote something on LinkedIn. He said, we used to create things, now we feed things. And I was like, oh, if that's not the truest statement for 2026, I don't know what is, man.

Josh Mattingly [00:38:31]:
Because we're feeding our AI knowledge bases, we're feeding audiences, we're feeding the machine. It's just like, when's the last time somebody really created something that the world stopped and watched and went, oh, my gosh, you have to see this. You know, this is gonna age me. But like an OK Go video, you know, when OK Go would put out any video, like, everyone stopped what they were doing and like, whatever choreography these guys are gonna do this time, you know, it's gonna be incredible. And now we're just kind of like the AI slop machine, like, feed me, you know, so anyway, I, I could tangent on that all day.

Jay Clouse [00:39:11]:
I feel like we, we notice and appreciate the depth and effort and in some ways, like the monotony that, you know, was only tolerated because this person just like, had to get this out. That's what I'm saying. Like, we, we feel that when it wasn't engineered for our consumption, but when it was like this indulgence for the person that just so happened to share it as well. I'm reading this book by Brad Stulberg called the the Way of Excellence. And he calls out excellent. People like to get into a flow state. We like this feeling of, like, we lose track of time and we feel like we're at our, our edges and everything else just falls away. There were some other, I want to say philosophers, and I don't remember their name, but he credits them with the term shitty flow.

Jay Clouse [00:40:01]:
He's like, a lot of our lives today simulates a flow state, but at the end, you don't have any pride over what you've done. You just have, like, shame and loss for time and a lot of short form content, gambling, pornography. Like, these are big problems for young people because it simulates a flow state, but it's shitty flow. And I feel like there's an opportunity for content that is not that. And I'll give one more example here, which is we just had our cat pass away this weekend. Oh, I'm sorry to hear that, man. It's tough. But we went through our phones, our own camera rolls, or looking at photos and videos of the cat.

Jay Clouse [00:40:45]:
And after 20 minutes of watching home videos with our cat, I actually had to tell my wife, like, I can't physically do anymore. It was actually emotionally satiating in A really positive way, but not addictive. You know, I feel like so much of content now is a slot machine of emotions that often shift between emotions. It's like I'm laughing, I'm crying, I'm outraged. And kind of the shifting between them prevents you from being totally satiated. But there was just something about the emotional depth of our own home videos and the feelings we were having that felt satiating in a really positive way. And I just want to. I had the same feeling when I watched that YouTube video I was just talking about of how to be alone.

Jay Clouse [00:41:36]:
I was like, this is emotionally satiating. And I just find myself drawn to wanting to create from that place and consume what was created from that place as well.

Josh Mattingly [00:41:47]:
I mean, well said. I got nothing else. I totally agree. I think that's fantastic. That sort of satiation is what we're doing looking for. Because I find myself in the shitty flow quite often and I'm sick of it. Damn it.

Jay Clouse [00:42:02]:
Yeah. I think we've gotten so good at cliffhangers also. You know where we. We're watching Beast Games. Love Beast Games. Actually having a great time watching it. Every episode ends and it's like the loop is open and I want to close that loop so badly. But before we were thinking in terms of series and watch time, we didn't feel the need to create an open loop.

Jay Clouse [00:42:25]:
We actually wanted to close the loop for you and that was so nice.

Josh Mattingly [00:42:29]:
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Not anymore. You need them coming back, you know.

Jay Clouse [00:42:34]:
Well, we kind of got away from the thread that I wanted to talk about, but we can get back here for a little bit. When people are thinking about hiring and building their teams, I feel like so many media companies now almost feel like by necessity I need to span YouTube. Yes. But now I've probably also gotta be on Instagram, I gotta be on TikTok, I gotta be on all these platforms.

Josh Mattingly [00:42:55]:
Yep.

Jay Clouse [00:42:55]:
Is it practical to try to hire talent that have cross platform expertise or are you seeing that we are moving into a world where you need platform specialists?

Josh Mattingly [00:43:07]:
I think it depends on the size of the company and the amount of bandwidth that you. That you have as a company. You know, if you're just winning on YouTube, I don't necessarily think there's a reason why you need to divert your energy and attention to creating content for another platform. Unless there's a specific reason in mind. If you have a goal, let's say you're working with a brand partnerships team and they say, hey Jay, you're crushing it on YouTube. If you could just start building that TikTok audience. I know I could bring you more revenue. We could start doing TikTok brand deals.

Josh Mattingly [00:43:42]:
Okay, that's a, you know, a reason for me to want to get started on TikTok. But if it is just, hey, I want to be the biggest on YouTube and on TikTok, I wouldn't follow that thread just because, I mean, you know how hard it is to build on one platform. Trying to be a specialist on both, I think is pretty tough. Now if you're a company that started to grow and maybe you have, I don't know, 10, 20 employees, I'd say sure. Maybe it makes sense to bring on platform specialists if you are trying to kind of create that multi platform, multi vertical experience for your audience. Yeah, I could see that being the case. I think these days though, it's almost expected and I don't know if this is a good or bad thing, but it's almost expected that somebody who understands short form content should understand short form content from YouTube Shorts to TikTok to Instagram Reels. Or that if you're going to hire that one person, they are going to be the person who ideates the shorts, films the shorts, edits the shorts.

Josh Mattingly [00:44:46]:
And so the natural inclination is to lean into that person, to be the expert across these different platforms. So I mean, if it were me, I actually do think that's the right move, especially if you're a smaller, leaner team. You know, you got to think too that until you can really get going on these platforms, they're not monetizing. And so you are going to be effectively funneling money into the trash can until, until something pops off or unless you've got, like I said, a brand partnerships, there's something that's already there waiting for you that can de risk that situation, then I think that might be a good move. But if it's me, I'm having that one person start testing on other platforms. And let's test and iterate. If we're not an expert already, give that person a side quest to become an expert. And I would give them one platform at a time.

Josh Mattingly [00:45:42]:
So say, hey, YouTube shorts guy or girl, you're going to do your YouTube shorts every day, every week, whatever the cadence is. And then in your spare time, I'd love you to spend, you know, 10 hours a week just studying how people are winning on TikTok. Maybe study our competitor set on TikTok. What are they doing, what's winning, what's losing, how are they uploading? How are they editing the content? Is it any different than YouTube shorts? If so, please give me details as to how the edits are different. In doing that one research project, you can start building expertise pretty quickly and then like anything, you just gotta test it out and maybe you find that, oh crap, we're crushing on TikTok and Instagram. Does it then make sense to hire a specialist if the content is going to increase in output? Probably at that point, but I wouldn't add anyone to the team until you had like a really strong thesis and you're kind of proving it already just because you know, you're now having to manage another human, you're having to manage their output. You know what happens if you hire somebody full time and TikTok, you know, shits to bed or something and now all of a sudden you have another, another body that you're either going to have to make redundant or find something else for them to do in the organization.

Jay Clouse [00:46:57]:
Is the revenue model of most of the creators you work with in your world ads based?

Josh Mattingly [00:47:02]:
Yes, yes. But a lot of them have like big commercial businesses as well.

Jay Clouse [00:47:08]:
What does that mean?

Josh Mattingly [00:47:09]:
So they've got like a whole partnerships team or like they're working with their agents and managers to do licensing deals. Certain creators we work with have products in that could even just be their own merchandise all the way up to. They've got like a consumables business.

Jay Clouse [00:47:25]:
Yeah, that seems to be sort of a trend. Right. I think advertising and sponsorship is great. When it's great and then sometimes you're like, this is a poor partner, this is a bad experience, this is driving editorial, blah, blah, blah. There's a litany of reasons why partnerships may not work. And so it seems like for channels that have predominantly been ad supported in the past, I see more experiments of trying to have direct to audience monetization or some other form of products company. What else have you seen besides like drinks, candy? It seems like these broad based companies kind of necessitate broad based products. They're starting to kind of look the same to me.

Josh Mattingly [00:48:10]:
Yeah, I mean you're, you're totally right. There was a world where everyone wanted their own prime and it's like, okay, I get it. Kind of the thing I would ask any creator is are you actually passionate about that thing? Are you as passionate about that product as you are making content? And if the answer is no, then I probably wouldn't enter into that as a business only because it takes so much effort to prop anything up that's going to be meaningful. And provide a top tier audience experience or customer experience. And there's the amount of time and effort to R and D a product or even to get in, you know, partner with somebody who already has a product and you're going to, you know, become the face of it and take an equity position in that company that still takes a ton. Like, you still need to be passionate about it. You need to be able to market the hell out of that thing and believe in it and love it and eat it or drink it or wear. Needs to be something that you love so much.

Josh Mattingly [00:49:17]:
Not to keep talking about Jimmy, but when you hear Jimmy talk about Feastables, he is so passionate about the chocolate, about ending child slavery in the chocolate industry. This is clearly something that he, if he wasn't already passionate about it before, he has developed an incredible passion and drive for this thing. You know, he also has a multi billion dollar business now, so it's like pretty cool for him, I would think, to want to build the biggest chocolate company. But when somebody's like, hey, I just want my own, I don't know, my own candy, you know, I just, I kind of, I saw what Ryan did with Joyride. I thought that was kind of cool. I want a candy. You're kind of like, all right, but like, is the audience going to be so excited to buy it and they follow your enthusiasm?

Jay Clouse [00:50:04]:
Like, if you aren't truly enthused about it, if you're not truly passionate about it, it's probably not going to convert that well into audience being like, okay, well, I guess I'll go buy this candy now.

Josh Mattingly [00:50:15]:
Totally. I think if anybody can't answer that question and feel super passionate about selling it and be enthusiastic, then they probably shouldn't do that thing. Or you're doing it for a cash grab and it's going to happen quick and then the company's going to be gone relatively soon. A lot of those companies, you know, they don't necessarily exist anymore or they, they don't exist the way that they did when they first made their initial splash into the market. But aside from the candies and the, you know, the drinks of the world, you know, I know a lot of creators have memberships. You know, I think that is something I'm actually curious about your take on this because you, you have a memberships business. I'm wondering if that, if you feel like that's becoming for the educators of the world, is that becoming kind of what the drinks and the candies are of the spectacle, Content creators, maybe memberships

Jay Clouse [00:51:08]:
are Interesting, because they could take a bunch of different forms. Membership A versus Membership B can be drastically different than Candy A versus Kandy B. Yeah, memberships could be content based, it could be premium gated content where it's the same thing you already expect, but here it's behind a paywall. Memberships could be super high touch peer to peer experiences. Memberships could be super high touch creator to individual experiences. So I think memberships are a big opportunity because they can take a bunch of different forms and fulfill different value propositions. But I think thoughtful membership design is where all the magic happens. And I see a lot of creators who are like, I have audience membership platform exists, let's toss them together.

Jay Clouse [00:51:54]:
People will buy. That's true. But ultimately the power of a membership is renewal. So you have to renew the value you're creating at the same pace that memberships are being renewed. And if you don't think about the design of that and what you're really providing and how you can ensure that it's actually being received, you end up with super high churn. Which can be a big problem, especially if the value proposition is peer to peer. Because if I'm trying to connect with Josh and I met him in this membership, but Josh had a bad time and left, now my experience in the membership is fundamentally worse because Josh is gone. So I do think it's a trend.

Jay Clouse [00:52:37]:
I think part of it is driven by the fact that self paced courses which have been a big thing in the education space are never going to be the same, not the same opportunity that they once were. And so I think a lot of people are running two memberships to try to fix a business model problem. And some people will be successful and others will not because they won't think about that. But I do think it's an opportunity. I think it's an opportunity even for folks in the entertainment space. But the design would have to be way different because you have a supply and demand difference and you also have a price sensitivity difference.

Josh Mattingly [00:53:14]:
Most likely what I heard you say there, and correct me if this is wrong, but this is what I'm taking. I love it. Which is a lot of creators, they see audience and they're trying to extract more value from their audience, you know, more, more revenue and you to, to create a successful memberships business. It's all about adding value. It's a deal. So good you'd be dumb if you said no kind of thing like that's what you're trying to provide.

Jay Clouse [00:53:37]:
Yeah. The weird thing about memberships that I don't hear anybody else talk about is almost every membership subscription will come to an end at some point because it's not like software. It's not like, okay, I send all of my emails from Kit and it would take a lot for me to leave Kit because the utility is clear and obvious and the value is recouped on a very frequent, obvious basis. Most memberships are a little bit more effortful on the part of the member, requiring them to take more action to extract the value you're promising out of it. So the game is, how do I make value extraction on the part of the member as easy as possible? And then, of course, I got to ensure that I'm actually providing value to be extracted. But a lot of people see memberships as a way to capture value from their audience, and that won't last for long. And when somebody churns out of a membership, if I'm thinking about joining this, and I know my friend joined it at one point in time, but they left, probably not going to join it, you know, over time it becomes a harder proposition to get people to join. If you have a mountain of people who have joined and already left.

Josh Mattingly [00:54:54]:
Yeah, that makes a ton of sense.

Jay Clouse [00:54:56]:
Okay, well, to kind of round things out here, I would love to hear any advice, any hiring advice of where you think people go wrong to save people from making an expensive mistake.

Josh Mattingly [00:55:07]:
I love this. Okay, so I actually have these kind of like, I called them innovative hiring techniques or team building tactics. But I think these can be used by anybody, whether or not they have a small team or a large team. But specifically people who are just kind of like, thinking about building a team, thinking about adding their first person or second person to the team. So I think people go wrong by hiring too fast. Oftentimes if you're a solopreneur, you're the content creator who's filming yourself editing your content, doing your own thumbnails, et cetera. And maybe you're drowning. The natural instinct is just like, oh, somebody said yes to this job post.

Josh Mattingly [00:55:52]:
Like, I'm gonna throw them in. They might be the best person in the world for that job. But I would say interview more than you think you should. This is extreme. But I'd say when you think you found the one, interview 10 more people.

Jay Clouse [00:56:06]:
Wow.

Josh Mattingly [00:56:07]:
Because you might find a better person in that 10, or it will just validate that that person was the right person. Either way, that's a positive outcome. So I know it's hard sometimes and painful, but do the due diligence you will not regret it. I think that when people are by themselves, it's sometimes daunting to make a choice because you have to live with a choice. Right? You're like, okay, I'm going to hire this editor. Gosh, it's $75,000 a year and I have never had a full time employee before. Do I know that they're the right person for the team? You can create a hiring committee. Even if you only have yourself as the solopreneur in the company, you can do that by reaching out to peers or friends even.

Josh Mattingly [00:56:56]:
So I've actually, I've created my own hiring committee of people who are just like my, you know, friends and business partners in the industry. But if I ever need a second opinion on somebody, I'll say, hey, will you do me a favor and interview this person? Here's what I ask them about. I'd love for you to gut check them on their technical ability or, hey, you know me better than anyone in the world. Can you just do me a favor and like, gut check for culture? Would we get along, do you think? You know, and so if you can create a hiring committee that's going to help just kind of round out the interview process when, when bringing that person into the fold. So I would always do that.

Jay Clouse [00:57:32]:
Do you compensate those people, the hiring committee? Yeah.

Josh Mattingly [00:57:35]:
No, you could. I mean, you absolutely could. For me, these are people that. Two of them are my business partners, and so they're going to do it just because it's going to be a benefit for Upright anyway. But I just mean, like, anybody who, let's say you just started a podcast, you want to bring on a, I don't know, a technical producer, and you've never done this before, but your dad is your hero and you had that one guy that you knew from your old job who was really good with podcast equipment. I don't know, I'm making this up. Those two people, if you had a good relationship with them, probably would say yes to that. I mean, your dad certainly would, I would think, if he's your hero.

Josh Mattingly [00:58:15]:
And then the other guy I think is maybe just like, hey, man, this would just mean a lot to me. Or maybe I'll buy you lunch and then it's a good opportunity for you to reconnect with that person anyway.

Jay Clouse [00:58:24]:
And also, like, they may be in the same boat and they want you to be on their extended hiring committee. So I understand. My, my gut was like, probably not in cash, but obviously there's just, like, relationship dynamics at play.

Josh Mattingly [00:58:36]:
Yeah. Oh, for sure. There should always be a mutually beneficial exchange, in my opinion. And also it just buys you goodwill, you know, it's like, and maybe offer that ahead of time, like, hey, if you, you can interview Steve, I'd love to do xyz or how can I be helpful for you and your business? Especially if you're working with a cohort of people or you're around a cohort of people who are in the same kind of boat that you are.

Jay Clouse [00:59:02]:
Okay, last hiring question. I sometimes see people hire a generalist first as like their first hire and they kind of learn everything else and then they hire people below them. Other times I see people hire specialists first. What's your take? How would you recommend somebody identify who should be their first hire?

Josh Mattingly [00:59:22]:
Well, my strong belief is that you should always hire generalists first. Unless you have something that is so specific that no one else can do it or understand it. Then I think, yeah, specialist makes a lot of sense, but it's critically important. Not even just in the content world, but as, I mean, I'm speaking as a founder of a startup that people aren't rigid in their day to day. They're not going to go, oh, actually like, I don't, I don't do that if you ask them to do something. Because you hire, if you hire someone to do one thing and then you ask them to do anything else, that could cause friction. And for someone who's a founder who is wearing all the hats and putting out all the fires, you need someone to just kind of be a firefighter sometimes. And so I would always suggest that generalist first.

Josh Mattingly [01:00:13]:
Now to caveat that I'd want to know what that person wants to do and where they want the career to go, what are their aspirations and then create a plan to get them to that point. So to say, hey, you're going to come on and you're going to be my shooter, editor, writer, thumbnail guy, whatever the job entails. But if you tell me that one day you just want to be the executive producer for this channel and when we have a team, we're going to build the team under you, great, Then it's going to be my mission, my promise to you that we're going to get you into that seat once the channel evolves to that point, we've got the revenue to support a team, that will be the goal. That's my promise. Because that way at least the person has that North Star. And then you don't have to get to the point where, well, shit, you need A specialist. Now that guy's sitting there and you have to go, ooh, well, do I need to go find somebody else? Is it you? And now you're kind of having an awkward conversation. You know, I would just kind of try to set those things from the jump.

Josh Mattingly [01:01:16]:
And look, maybe that person doesn't become the ep, maybe for whatever myriad of reasons they get in the way, maybe they're not cut out for the job, maybe they're just not interested in where the channel of the company's going to, but that's okay. But having the North Star and having that, the carrot, so to speak, I think is definitely important. One last thing on that, you can get it all kicked off by putting together a 30, 60, 90 for the person when they first start, which is just to give their first 30 days, 60 days and 90 day goals off the jump so they know what's expected of them in that first quarter. And then I would say you probably need to breadcrumb some of the responsibilities and goals of an ep, if that is where you're trying to aim them, and then probably just check in with them every three, six months.

Jay Clouse [01:02:03]:
You mentioned early in the conversation that no one on your team is going to be as bought in or incentivized to make this business successful as you are. As the founder, as the creator, as the face of it. Is there any go to compensation structure that you found that helps people get close?

Josh Mattingly [01:02:23]:
You know, I probably would have had a different answer for you like five years ago. So I think that if you have a partner, let's say, if you were to treat your channel like a true business, and it is a business by the way. So if you're not treating it as a business, please treat it like a business. And with the business comes everything that comes with the business. So if you have a true partner, you probably need a partnership agreement, which is just a legal document that outlines who owns what percentage of the company. And if you have somebody who's like your day one ride or die and you could not do this without them, then I would just consider literally making them a partner from the jump. Now you're not maybe going to make all the money in the world like any startup, you know, you have to start somewhere, but that person having some sort of meaningful stake in the, the entity, I think is, that's motivating, you know, that's, that's super motivating. You kind of can treat it like a tech startup, almost like, hey, this is our thing, you know, but are you going to exit Most creators don't even have the opportunity to do so.

Josh Mattingly [01:03:34]:
So then you're kind of just, you know, splitting distributions, which is still great, you know. So if you can get to that point where you and your partner are taking distributions on the channel, like that seems pretty cool. I haven't seen that happen that often, but, you know, I think that would be certainly an option for somebody who you could not do this without. I see a lot of people still do profit share. I've seen a lot of people try to incentivize their editors with profit share specifically on the videos that they're editing, which I think is interesting. I just don't. It's tough, man. It's tough to hire somebody on a what if because, you know, Jay, some videos will pop and some videos don't pop.

Josh Mattingly [01:04:15]:
And unless you have a consistently high view threshold where you're doing millions of views per video, those videos aren't making a ton of money. So giving somebody 20% of a couple hundred bucks, I mean, that's not nothing. But I don't think it's going to keep someone around really, truly these days. I think it is just like a good salary and being part of something with a genuine and cool mission. You know, people want to. They have pride, man. People have pride in what they do. They want to show up and know that their contributions have an impact, that they're being treated well, that they've got a great place to work.

Josh Mattingly [01:04:52]:
But personally, I'm a big bonus guy. If you can drive a crazy amount of revenue to anything, you should be bonused on that. That's my personal belief. So if I were to bring in a partnerships person, obviously they're going to get a commission on whatever they do. But if you can bring in a producer who can help you produce some of the biggest content your channel has ever seen, because maybe that's what you want. And they can keep the production costs low and they're really being thoughtful about the production schedule and you know, your batch filming content and you know, really trying to grow a channel. And if they're in the weeds with you and they're pushing and they're growing it, it, I would probably set a bonus target against the revenue of that channel. And so, you know, you just unlock it at certain different milestones.

Josh Mattingly [01:05:41]:
So say, hey, right now we're doing 10 million long form views a month. If we can get to 20 million long form views a month, I'll give you a bonus of X. If we can get to 30 long form views a month, I'll give you a bonus of y and 50 million long form views a month. I'll give you a bonus of Z and then maybe even an end of year bonus if they hit certain other targets. And that's more of a strategic thing because, you know, you can retain an employee if they want to stick around for that full year to get that bonus. And so if you can create something where they're just like grabbing checks from helping you grow your channel, I mean, that's a win win. And I think anybody who's actually motivated by money and growth and wants to be a meaningful contributor, that feels pretty cool.

Jay Clouse [01:06:22]:
I like that model too, because I think the complication, especially for a lot of folks in my audience where YouTube isn't necessarily the main thing, it's kind of a channel for their main thing. Giving somebody on the channel ownership in the company is daunting. It feels like, how do I carve out what the channel means to the company so that I can then subdivide their contribution to the channel within that? So I think the bonus structure feels aligned and much easier to achieve strategically.

Josh Mattingly [01:06:55]:
Totally. I've also, well, I've seen people get tired of the same thing. If you're bringing somebody in and cutting them into the actual company, they need to be as bought in and as excited every day as you are. And that, I think is really hard to find.

Jay Clouse [01:07:20]:
If you enjoyed this episode, I hope you did. Please consider leaving a rating or review on our Apple Podcasts. Come on, I haven't seen one in a couple weeks. I know you have a second. Just take a second right now. Go to Apple Podcasts. Leave a review. I would love that.

Jay Clouse [01:07:32]:
If you're on Spotify and you're saying, hey man, that's not me, that's okay too. Ratings on Spotify go a long way. Comments on Spotify go a long way. I love seeing those. If you wanna learn more about Josh, links to his website and more about Upright Media are in the show notes. Thank you for listening. I'll talk to you next week.

Josh Mattingly [01:07:49]:
Sam.