How to Build a Successful Creative Business on YouTube ft. Beth Ann Williams

Lyric Kinard (00:01.569) Hello friends, welcome to Creatives on Camera and we are here with my friend Bethann Williams. And she has a beautiful story to tell and some really, really excellent recent experience and knowledge that I'm excited to share with you all. So Bethann, why don't you introduce yourself and tell us a little bit about your craft and how you started teaching. Beth Ann Williams (00:28.906) Okay, I started teaching. way back in 1997. And I did not plan on doing it. I was actually working as a, they billed me as an Irish American fiber artist at the time, because I was selling my work in galleries and really specializing on Celtic design. And so that was kind of my niche at the time. And I was getting ready for a gallery show. I was working on a whole bunch of pieces at the same time. I'm a pin baster. I also spray base but big things I like to pin based and I ran out of so safety pins and so my husband heard had heard there was a new quilt shop in the mall near where he worked and he so said well well why don't I just go by and I'll see what they have so he went went there and went straight to the wall where the safety pins were and bought up the whole display. And he got to the register and they just looked at him and and they're like you know what and my husband is like the most wonderful man. He is his warm and caring but he has this resting face that if you don't know him Lyric Kinard (01:32.695) All of them. Beth Ann Williams (01:51.822) If you don't know him, he can look little intimidating sometimes. And he's just thinking, he's not paying any attention, but he can look like he's stern. So they're tiptoeing and they don't know what to think, who is this guy, why is he taking all of our safety pins? And so finally, one of them asked, can I... Beth Ann Williams (02:11.948) Why do you need all these? And so he explained, because he is actually a really nice guy. So he explained, you know, my wife is a a Quilt artist and she needs these pins to finish pin basting. She's getting ready for a show. And they said, well, we're looking for teachers. Would she be interested? And I actually have a degree in organizational communications. I've had teaching experience. So my husband. told me and I'm like maybe that might be fun. So I went in and talked to them and started teaching that month and that was I think March of 1997. And so I've been teaching in one form or another quilting and fiber art techniques ever since and I love it. I love it. Yes. Lyric Kinard (02:58.454) It's amazing how we fall into these things and then they grow. usually I find that you fall into things that you're already prepared for that fit and align with your heart and what it is you're truly meant to be. Things, opportunities, right? Opportunities open up. Exactly. And then you switch to online teaching. Beth Ann Williams (03:13.228) Yes. Beth Ann Williams (03:18.446) And you didn't know. You didn't know you were preparing. Right? Yeah. Lyric Kinard (03:28.47) How and why did you move away from in-person teaching? Beth Ann Williams (03:33.496) Yeah, I was in person teaching for a long time. I started at our local quilt shop and then was traveling and teaching nationally, you know, on the circuit kind of a thing when my books came out and promoting that for health reasons. I needed to stop traveling. I took a job as creative director for a local chain of sewing centers and was there for about 16 years. And I was still teaching as part of everything else there. But then when COVID hit, I was stuck because I've got autoimmune, a bunch of different autoimmune diseases, including multiple sclerosis and I'm on some immunosuppressants and I cannot be out and about the way I used to. I just can't. It's just not safe. It is and I... Lyric Kinard (04:23.873) The risk is too much. Beth Ann Williams (04:28.204) was very sick for a long time because I was actually teaching a class with my with Connor the day before lockdown. So and I was exposed that day we had some sick people in the class and so started out. So anyway all that to say after you know lockdown started and everybody was home I Beth Ann Williams (04:54.286) Talked to the store owner and said well hey, why don't I do some online classes? I said there's other people teaching online Why don't we do some zoom classes for our customers? he's like okay, try it and so I started teaching live on zoom and Enjoyed it. I mean there was definitely a learning curve There was a big learning curve, know trying to figure that out Yes Lyric Kinard (05:15.391) almost definitely all of us floundered through in a big messy way. Beth Ann Williams (05:23.31) But I enjoyed it and it was a way to stay connected. And then after I think like 2022, he's like, we really need you in store. to like run the stuff we need you to run. And I'm like, I can't. just, it's too people-y. And as much as I would love to, I can't. My doctor was like very clear. So that's when, you know, I talked to my husband and like, I gotta make a change. And it was scary to lose a full-time income. You know, a regular budgetable full-time income. that was scary and but we felt like I really didn't have a choice. So I started my own online teaching business to form my own LLC and I had kind of a business in the background, you know, kind of this whole time but it was kind of dormant because I was so busy but I'm like, okay, I'm gonna get serious about this. I'm gonna get serious about having my own business. You had been teaching for a whole bunch of years, but you hadn't registered as a sole proprietor LLC yet? Okay. Beth Ann Williams (06:35.884) I was a sole proprietor. Yeah, I had registered and I did my taxes as a sole proprietor, but I had not formed an LLC until 2022. And so... Lyric Kinard (06:48.951) Alright, going all out. Beth Ann Williams (06:50.926) Yeah, I'm like, if I'm going to do this, I'm going to get serious. And so I started teaching online and loved it. I mean, there was, you know, there's always those heart stopping moments when the tech goes wonky and but, you know, quilters are lovely. You know, they're just really lovely. And, know, everything is OK and everybody understands and we're all learning. And it was wonderful. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (07:19.351) They do, they do. I have found that from the beginning up through now that, it's all creatives. We have this opportunity to come together through this miraculous technology that's phenomenal and amazing. And still, know, stuff happens. I have had huge public thousands of people watching while I have a complete disaster. Beth Ann Williams (07:40.343) It does. Lyric Kinard (07:48.312) Well, I guess hundreds, not multiple thousands all at once live, but people are forgiving, right? Because we all can go through this and you can always figure something out. Beth Ann Williams (07:50.307) Right. They are. They are. Beth Ann Williams (08:02.422) Right? Yep. And I find it as long as you're upfront with people and say, okay, this is the issue that I'm having. This is what I planned. This is what's happening. This is my plan B, you know, and I'm still going to make sure that you get all of the content. You're not going to miss anything. We're just going to have to make some adjustments while I get this figured out or fixed. Yeah, people are great. Lyric Kinard (08:27.155) Zoom tip for all of our listeners, if you're teaching live via Zoom, always have a plan B and C and let people know right ahead of time. And 99 % of the time you don't need it, but you know, you have it in place and your students know it's there and it just gives everybody peace of mind. And you know, we have stuff that goes crazy and we're Lyric Kinard (08:56.385) We're performers, aren't we? We're entertainers in a way, educators, but even if you are panicking on the inside, keep calm and carry on. And your students follow along with you. If you panic, they're gonna panic, right? So you are totally that keep calm and carry on and everything's just going to be fine. We'll work it out together. Beth Ann Williams (09:19.086) Yes, yes. And I found it really helpful when teaching on Zoom to always record. And so my policy with my online classes, and it kind of developed, you I kind of had to figure this out. But what I settled on is I would record the Zoom live. And so the people who could come live, you know, who were in the right time zones that could come live, would join me live. And then the people in different time zones or who were working or for whatever reason, they could watch the recording. And I would give them access to the recording for limited amount of time and that worked out well also because I could tell them okay, you know, there's storms coming through You know this area we're in the middle of a tornado outbreak in Michigan We never used to have them, but you know now all of a sudden we do and so there was one Class this last summer that I'm like, I don't know what's gonna happen. I don't know if we're gonna lose our power I don't know what's gonna happen, but let's go ahead. We'll get started if we're knocked off you know, if I lose power or whatever, as soon as I get power back, I'll finish recording the class, even if it's just me, and I'll send it to you, you'll still get the whole class, and everybody was cool. And as it turned out, the power was fine. Lyric Kinard (10:41.675) Right, let's be clear with this as well. I'm so glad it worked out and that tornadoes passed by. This is an interesting situation because these are classes that you are scheduling and taking payments for yourself. You have not been hired by another group because from the very beginning of when we started teaching classes on Zoom, there's been the question of, should I record Lyric Kinard (11:11.477) my zoom live or not. I think as the creator, as the teacher, that that's up to you. But the majority of people agree that if you're teaching for somebody else, they don't record your intellectual property. Beth Ann Williams (11:30.25) Agreed. Yeah. Yeah, when I'm teaching for a quilt, like a guild lecture, I don't record that. And I don't allow them to record that. That's a live, you know, you're there. You're there, you're not there kind of a situation. There have been times where I was teaching a like six hour workshop for a guild and I did record that and Beth Ann Williams (11:59.054) I forget what, there was something going on for a couple of the people and so I gave them access for a very limited amount of time. But as a general rule, I only record them if I'm offering themselves. I sold the registrations through my online shop and handle it that way. And you know, that worked. Lyric Kinard (12:15.928) I think it's a matter of who record or who controls the recording. You know, if I'm, if I have the recording, I can choose what to do with it. And you know, those, we talked about wonky things happening. was on early, getting ready to give a lecture via Zoom. I was remote. The group was in person. I don't even remember where it was, but their power went out right as. Lyric Kinard (12:44.884) I was getting ready to go on and I had some of their members online with me live. And here's another Zoom tip. Make sure if you are working with a remote group that somebody there is in charge of having your number and you have theirs. So I called and said, Beth Ann Williams (13:03.81) Yes. Yes. Lyric Kinard (13:08.104) I'm going to go ahead with the lecture because those of us online are cool and we're having fun and I will record it and give it to you all for a couple weeks if you want to, or we can try to reschedule. But I'm going to go ahead. So that was me controlling and choosing because of extenuating circumstances to have the recording. Beth Ann Williams (13:30.966) Yeah, but I think what you just said was so important because when you're booking with a guild, you're often dealing with somebody, you know, who you're, they're booking you for an event that might be a year, might be two years, sometimes three years in advance. So by the time the event comes around, it might be a totally different slate of volunteers running the show. And so you don't have that relationship that you had with the person who, you you worked out the contract and everything with. So I tried Beth Ann Williams (14:06.488) to really kind of insist in a very nice way, but you know, it's like I need to contact people. I need people that are going to actually be there and I need cell phone numbers, you know, so that we can text and here's my cell phone number and I will delete it from my phone when we're done. Don't worry. I'm not going to, you know, but we have to have this worked out. Lyric Kinard (14:29.548) it's easy to have this all on a... Yeah, it's easy to have it all on a contract. And it's not pushy, it's just what you do professionally. I also have a spreadsheet of starting from the appearance date, know, one day before, two weeks before, a month before, two months before, six months before, you know, the cut where you check in. Lyric Kinard (14:55.094) because of those when you're working with a volunteer group, volunteers change, right? Beth Ann Williams (15:00.49) And the people are great. I mean, they're doing it because they care. They're doing it because they're serving their guild. They're excited about the content. They want everything to go well. But a lot of times they just haven't had experience, especially when you're bringing in remote, know, bringing in somebody remote. They may or may not be comfortable with the tech themselves. So there might be a third person who's their tech person. So you kind of have to do all that coordinating. But it works. And, you know, I have found Beth Ann Williams (15:32.773) People are, like we said earlier, people generally are just really lovely and it's fine. Yeah. yeah. Lyric Kinard (15:38.616) They really are. Yeah, we have that all in the contract, but that's the one thing when I check in early for a live remote gig that I'm like, okay, whose text do I have? Now, make sure you leave it on. Make sure you look at it. You're the one person in the room who doesn't put your phone on silent. Beth Ann Williams (15:56.246) Right. Right, right. Yeah, so important. Lyric Kinard (16:02.506) Right. So you've successfully created your own business teaching remotely without waiting for other people to hire you. How do you how do you get the word out for the courses? And you're you're all live Zoom, right? You don't do on demand pre recorded courses. Beth Ann Williams (16:22.998) Right. No, I'm just starting to get into that this year. Lyric Kinard (16:27.862) Yeah. So where did you, when you're not, when you don't have a outside group that has hired you to come in and provide all the students for you, where do you find the people who sign up for your courses? How do you make this work? Beth Ann Williams (16:42.454) Right, sure. Initially, when I was teaching for the sewing centers, I was not collecting emails. I I handled their email list because that was part of my job as creative director, but I never copied any of those emails because that was theirs. That would not have been ethical. Right, but as we got into the second year of the pandemic, Lyric Kinard (17:01.356) Right, that's. Exactly. Beth Ann Williams (17:11.918) Started you thinking you know what I probably should start an email list, so I would just say at end of class Okay, this is not the store email list But if you would like to join my personal email list so that I can let you know what's coming up Here's how to sign up and I just you know just a very low key and made it clear this is not For you know for the store. This is just if you want to And a lot of the teachers already did that within the store, just for their own following. I think that's a really good idea. Whether you're teaching live or on Zoom or anywhere, go ahead and have an email list, have a sign up sheet and pass it around so that you are building that email list, even if you don't think you need it right away. Even if you just send out, hey, this is what I'm teaching at this store on this day, this is what I'm teaching at this store on this day. you know, whatever that looks like. It's really valuable to have your own email list and not be reliant on anybody else. I was fortunate. I only had, oh, I only had like 75 emails, I think, at the time when I started my business. I was fortunate though because I had a good following on Instagram. I had a pretty large Instagram and a decent Facebook. Lyric Kinard (18:29.784) Good. Beth Ann Williams (18:36.126) business page. I started my Facebook business page and quite a few people joined. And so for the first couple of years on my own, that was my main way to grow my email list was through people, you doing that link in bio on Instagram and, you know, clicking through links on Facebook. And that worked really well, even though it's really low key. I am not a salesy person. I am like the anti-sales person. I often do everything wrong in terms of not being salesy enough or forgetting to put my name on it or forgetting to, you But what I was good at is showing up regularly and saying, this is what I'm doing. This is the stage I'm at. This is the little technique. You know, this is a little tip. Here's a quick tip. and building a relationship that way so that then people were like, well, that's really interesting. And so then, you know, I might say, I'm doing a class, blah, blah, blah. And the information is in my bio and people would click through because by that time they knew me, they'd seen my work, we had developed a kind of relationship. And I really treated my Instagram and Facebook accounts, particularly Instagram, Beth Ann Williams (19:58.936) a friend, community. You know, I was still locked down. So this was my chance to be social. And so I was looking at everybody else's stuff and, that's so pretty. That's so pretty. Or, I love that. Or I loved how you used value in that and really interacting. And so that was... Yeah. Lyric Kinard (20:17.889) And that's what authentic marketing is anyway. It's not pushy sales. It's making that connection with the people who you have something to offer. You have a gift to offer them. And I notice you're saying past tense with Instagram. mean, I know with my social media, I used to use it for soft marketing all the time, but it has... Lyric Kinard (20:47.761) has changed. The algorithms change. Even in our own use of it, right? Unless we work really hard to curate our feeds, we don't see the people we follow. So what are you doing now? Beth Ann Williams (21:07.126) I did what every good business person does and I pivoted. I think for me, and I've thought a lot about this, is that I think the most important skill, if you want to call it that, or characteristic for a business person. I'm going to say for an artist or creative person as a business person because that's what I know. The most important thing is to be willing to pivot. Be willing to assess what's happening and is it going well? Could it go better? Is there something else you could try? And you don't have to know the answers. You don't have to know the answer. You don't have to know how to fix it as long as you're willing to try something. else and be willing to learn in public. And I think that's the hardest for most of us, you know, because you have to you have to be willing to learn in public. You have to be willing to to embrace good enough because if you wait for things to be perfect, your most people are never going to get anywhere. You have to get to that. And this is hard for me. This is something I have had to deal with. I still deal with probably always will. Lyric Kinard (22:02.416) You were so right. Beth Ann Williams (22:24.56) Because I grew up in a household where if you brought home a ninety a ninety nine out of a hundred The question was well, what did you miss? Okay, that was and that was out of love. My parents are wonderful But that was you know, that was the what did you miss? And so that that voice is still in my head. So Whenever I do anything, I'm always like, you know, I get a little bit stressed. I'm going over all the details. I get a little bit anal Lyric Kinard (22:38.381) Right? Beth Ann Williams (22:52.334) And I have to actively set that aside and I have to actively say, okay We may be at 85 % we may be at 90 % Hopefully we're above 90 but not always and sometimes you have to Go, you have to release it. You have to put it out there and Yep, and you have to move your focus to the next thing Lyric Kinard (23:11.927) Yeah, just put it out there and it's going to be okay. Beth Ann Williams (23:20.352) and not beat yourself up, but move to the next thing. Lyric Kinard (23:21.279) That's one thing, right? Yeah, that's one thing I work really hard with the teachers who are in the Academy Master Class where we want to have something perfect or really good before we put it out there. But that's never going to happen. Lyric Kinard (23:41.718) It's just never going to happen. You're never going to get really good or really perfect. You have to be willing to be bad at something in public, like you say, and or you get good. But releasing the minimum viable product is a viable way to run your business because the students aren't there to look at your polished, perfect video editing skills. What are they there for? They want the skill, they want the knowledge, they want the technique, they want what you're sharing with them, they want the inspiration, they want your heart. And if you can give them your heart and demonstrate that you care about them and you're trying to assist them in their journey, you know, that covers a multitude of glitchy stuff. really, it puts it in perspective. Yeah. No, I'm a big Seth Godin. You know, I like his, Lyric Kinard (24:18.041) That's exactly it. Lyric Kinard (24:31.353) It absolutely does. Beth Ann Williams (24:39.056) approach to marketing, the find your tribe and then also the minimum viable product and all that. That finding, yeah, find your people, get your going. And so for me, part of my pivot was understanding that as much as I loved teaching live and I have relationships with the people that I teach, I mean, some of these people in my classes have been taking classes for me for over 25 years. Lyric Kinard (24:46.049) I just get it going. Beth Ann Williams (25:08.976) You know some of them 20 years some of them 10 years. I know these people they know me they watched my kids grow up, you know and And some of these people are like, you know Obviously local and some of them are around the country from when I was teaching when my books when I was doing books with with Martin Gayle and company and so You know, we have that connection and then you know, I always love having new people too But now I have I don't know. It's still pretty small amylase Lyric Kinard (25:12.345) That's a long time, right? Beth Ann Williams (25:38.936) it's about 2,000 but that's just from just from social media basically you know people clicking through and I very very rarely remember I've gotten better at reminding people hey sign up for my email list if you like but normally it's just it's just the link the invitation is there and I just leave it at that Lyric Kinard (25:47.353) Mm-hmm. Lyric Kinard (25:57.732) Right. Beth Ann Williams (26:05.25) but it worked really well. But then I realized that it takes so much energy. Teaching live is not as scalable as... a of other things that you can do because even if you have a class that's very successful and I have a bunch of classes, I teach a bunch of different things because I'm like insanely curious and so I have to learn everything and then if I learn it I you know I want to teach it, I want to share it. So I have a lot of classes in rotation. And I love that. But I was just getting way too exhausted. I was not able to get... I was getting a decent income for an online teacher, but not replacing the income that I needed to replace. And I was like, okay, I need to rethink this. And my husband is like, yeah, you're killing yourself. You're driving yourself into the ground. Beth Ann Williams (27:04.91) I will help support you while you figure this out." And he's like, okay, he's my biggest investor, know, my biggest supporter. Yeah. And so one of those pieces for me was YouTube. And this shocked me because Lyric Kinard (27:13.879) Love it. Beth Ann Williams (27:23.956) I had never even considered YouTube. I hate seeing myself on camera. I hate listening to myself. I feel like I sound like a little girl. very self-conscious. You know, by nature, I thought, I will hate this. It'll be terrible. I'll hate it. It won't work. And I watched everything I could watch. I researched. I did books. You know, because again, I'm kind of obsessed about this. And then one day I got up and said, I'm going to do it. So I just sat down, started my channel. And for the first month, I kind of flailed because I didn't really know what I was doing. The only thing I had in mind was I need to upload because that's what I was hearing from the YouTube coaches is that Beth Ann Williams (28:15.116) you know, nobody's going to see your first 20, 30, 40, 50 videos. It doesn't matter. Treat it as a learning thing. So I'm like, OK, well, if nobody's going to see it, I'll go ahead. And so I uploaded shorts. I started with shorts because I had done Instagram reels. I thought, that's, you know, kind of the same thing. And people did see it. I was disconcerted at first how many people were seeing it and it started growing And I put a couple of interviews that B had done as part of Quilt and Learn and she sent me the link and so I uploaded those but I didn't Do my first proper video until like a month after I started my channel. So this is Lyric Kinard (29:04.578) Now why did you decide to pivot from social media to YouTube? Did you do this purposely for a reason? Beth Ann Williams (29:14.402) Yeah, I felt that, you know, I did all this research and I felt like that was the most viable path for me that would work with my life. So I thought about, yeah, well, I thought part of it is... Lyric Kinard (29:29.61) what purpose. Beth Ann Williams (29:35.72) I wanted to be able to reach my students, I hate, you know, sometimes I hate even calling them students because there's a lot of folks who take my classes that don't actually need the class. They could, you know, they're my people and they show up. Lyric Kinard (29:50.042) They're just your people. Beth Ann Williams (29:54.03) And I love them and we have great fun together and a lot of them right now are struggling financially because of all the things that are happening in the world and I don't want to go down that sad thing but just to say that it's a real thing and I noticed in the last year particularly that more and more people were saying you know I'd really love to take that class but I just can't afford to right now or I Beth Ann Williams (30:23.984) I've got this going on, or got that I can't do. And I know for my own family, things are tight. They're tight. And classes are one of those things that, it's not like food. So yeah, and I wanted a way to maintain community. Lyric Kinard (30:44.408) Right, it's optional. Beth Ann Williams (30:51.754) And I didn't know if I would be able to do it to the point where I could monetize it. But I thought, let's see, let's try it. Because if I could monetize it, that would help pay for some of the lost teaching income. That could help. And monetization on YouTube, is there's lots of different ways to monetize and I don't want to get into a huge long I don't want to eat up all our time talking about that but some of the main ones okay some of the main ones are you know you can have affiliate links and you can do that right off the bat you know but make sure there are things that you actually believe in you know things that you would pay you know for yourself or you have paid for yourself so that people can trust you you know approach that with a lot of good ethics and clarity. You know, tell people that's what those are. And you can use it as a way to get the word out for your classes, especially if you have on demand. I have used YouTube as a way to promote some of my live classes also. Just said, hey, this is coming up. You know, it's related to what I was doing in the video. You can use it to build your email list and you can also, Beth Ann Williams (32:18.284) you really are serious about it, get towards monetization, which is when YouTube actually pays you for your work on the platform basically. And in order to qualify, there's two different levels, but the main level, the one everybody wants, you have to have at least a thousand subscribers. and have reached 4,000 hours of watch time on a long-form video. Now, not the little shorts, but the horizontal videos. And that, you know... The vast majority of YouTube accounts do not ever reach that. It's a relatively small percentage. And the ones that do, it's often between 18 to 24 months, they say, is kind of realistic. And that's if you're uploading regularly. So I talked to John and he's like, this is going to take a while, but I'd like to try. I'd like to see. And he's like, Beth Ann Williams (33:23.65) Go for it. And there's also brand deals and sponsorships and other stuff as possibility. But that's not stuff you can count on. And the AdSense money, which is what YouTube pays you, it's a percentage of the money that they make from the commercials that play during your videos. Yeah. And we can't choose what plays or when it plays. mean, there are ways to do that. I don't do that. Lyric Kinard (33:41.71) that they put on your thing. Beth Ann Williams (33:52.044) But at least it's coming back to help support the creators that you care about. Lyric Kinard (33:57.605) So how long have you been doing YouTube and where are you at with that goal right now? Beth Ann Williams (34:00.226) Yep. Beth Ann Williams (34:04.032) Okay, I opened my YouTube account on February 28th of this year. yep, and so it's October now. And I uploaded my first original long form video at the end of March. Lyric Kinard (34:12.411) 2025. Beth Ann Williams (34:24.47) and I hit monetization about six months later. Yeah, so I was very excited and shocked and surprised and excited. Yeah, and then in the last month, I've more than doubled my subscribers and watch lists and my first AdSense check comes next month because there's a delay and it's actually going to be a nice check. I'm excited about it. Lyric Kinard (34:29.787) That's amazing! Lyric Kinard (34:33.787) That's a lot of work. Lyric Kinard (34:52.601) Nice! That's awesome! Beth Ann Williams (34:54.224) But yeah, it is it's really been gratifying to the interaction in the comments. You know some videos get a lot of interactions some not as much but It's been exciting to say, okay, you know what? We can really still connect. At first, I wasn't sure if it would be a way to connect because it's more one way. And on Zoom, you can see a lot of your people. And on YouTube, you can't. You're talking to a camera. Beth Ann Williams (35:25.804) I mean, there's live streams, but I am still freaked out about live streams, you know, and I, and I figure, you know, and I figure there is a point, there's a point where you need to push yourself and there's a point where you can respect your own freak outs. Lyric Kinard (35:30.619) Things can happen on live strings. Lyric Kinard (35:39.387) Right. Beth Ann Williams (35:44.734) and say, okay, you know, we're going to push ourselves here. We're going to push and we're going to put on our big girl panties and we're going to do this and we're going to do this and we're going to do this. But you know what? You don't have to do that. And so that's what I did for myself. You don't have to do all the things all the time. And eventually, yeah. Lyric Kinard (35:58.746) You don't have to do all the things that everybody says. That's part of what you were talking about earlier, where you stop and look. think so many of us let our business run us. We're professionals and we kind of go with the flow and do what we think. But we don't... Lyric Kinard (36:25.307) plan and structure and organize ahead of time. And often we don't take the time we need to stop and look back, look at the numbers. mean, kind of get the emotions out of it and really analyze what's working for us in our business and especially what isn't. And that's what you did at this pivot point. I think the analysis part is the key to Lyric Kinard (36:55.567) being able to move forward and actually grow in a successful way. Beth Ann Williams (36:58.786) Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. And I think it's also knowing which metrics to pay attention to. because there's so many, there's so many metrics, there's so many analytics, know, there's your website has analytics and your emails have analytics and YouTube's got analytics and your social media has analytics. And it's really easy to get, you know, sucked down into that. And some people are numbers people and they love that. I am not, I do not like that. I get stressed out. I'm like, wow. Okay. So I, I made a point to say okay. which ones matter to me at the point that I am in the business. And those are the ones that I'm going to pay attention to. This little handful, this is what I'm going to pay attention to. This is what's going to help me make good decisions. And then I'm not going to worry about these over here. And I think in the context of, were you going to say something? I didn't want to knock you, I didn't want to cut you off Lyric. Lyric Kinard (38:04.117) Nope, that's, nope, we're good. Beth Ann Williams (38:07.664) In the context of YouTube in particular, YouTube has wonderful analytics in YouTube Studio. It's got all these, you you can get into the minutia of all kinds of stuff. But I think... Lyric Kinard (38:19.993) right? But they're also easy to find and easy to read compared to so many other platforms. YouTube makes it that's, so let's take just just a minute, just one quick minute to understand why YouTube is different and how it's different than other social media because YouTube is not anything like Instagram. Beth Ann Williams (38:25.506) Yes, much easier. Lyric Kinard (38:47.535) or Facebook. On those platforms, they own the content. It feels very, very random. I mean, you have to have, it feels like you have to have a lot of strategy and put a lot of effort and also things blow up every three weeks for the algorithm in order to get in front of your But YouTube is completely different. YouTube is the largest search engine behind Google. Beth Ann Williams (38:47.744) Right, very different. Beth Ann Williams (39:04.013) Right. Yeah. It's different. Yeah. Lyric Kinard (39:17.355) And it's the place for us makers. Here's, I'll let you take it from here, but it's the place that makers go to what? Beth Ann Williams (39:26.506) Learn how to do stuff. Watch other people do it. Learn how to do stuff. How to, you know, is one of the big things on YouTube. How to do this, how to do that. It is what we do. And I think with YouTube, the algorithm now... Lyric Kinard (39:34.603) Exactly. And that's what we do. Beth Ann Williams (39:46.218) The algorithm gets a lot of hate. Okay, which is unfair because the algorithm is your friend and ally But it does not serve you it does not serve me the algorithm on YouTube serves the viewer It's all about and they and they're very clear about this I watched all the you know the news releases and the the conferences and whatnot where the the big honchos from YouTube the Yeah are very clear and they want you Lyric Kinard (39:53.421) It absolutely is. Lyric Kinard (40:01.401) Exactly. Beth Ann Williams (40:16.182) to succeed and they're very clear that the algorithm is all about putting the right content in front of the right person at the right time. So it's not about punishing us, it's not about hiding us, it wants us to succeed because when we succeed they succeed but it doesn't serve us, it doesn't owe us as the creator anything. So what we have to do is learn how to work with it and fortunately they're also very clear on how to do that and so So it's about understanding the metadata, how to do all the behind the scenes stuff. It's not just thumbnails and titles. know, people, obviously that's really important. They're really important, but there's a lot of other stuff that's important too. And so... Lyric Kinard (40:46.137) Exactly. Lyric Kinard (40:57.499) Those are really important, but... Beth Ann Williams (41:06.338) by understanding all of that stuff. And they don't hide it. I love the fact that yes, you have to work for it. I've worked for it to try to get all this information and trial and error sometimes, figuring out what's gonna work. But you can build your channel. You can put the metadata in in your channel. You can set your defaults. You can set yourself up for success as long as you've defined your niche and you have a really good mental image of your ideal viewer. And this is just like teaching. This is something Lyric talks about in the academy all the time. It's like you've got to have your person. Yes. Yes. Lyric Kinard (41:42.374) This is exactly it. Yeah, this is the core. Yeah, this is the core of everything we do. We are here to serve our people. So you have to know and understand your people. Our time is almost up, but, and we could go on for hours really getting into the weeds with YouTube and all of the data and how it works. And I actually find it really fascinating. Once, you know, it's not, Lyric Kinard (42:12.796) rocket science. know, if you and I could figure this out, anybody can figure this out. One of the things I'm really, really excited for friends is Beth Ann is one of our coaches inside the Academy for Virtual Teaching. And we have been working together behind the scenes. I'm so excited. Early in 2026, we don't have a set date yet, but Beth Ann, tell us what's happening. Beth Ann Williams (42:14.102) Right. Right. Right. Beth Ann Williams (42:34.177) I am too. Beth Ann Williams (42:42.606) We're going to have a YouTube for creatives course Right now the plan is for five weeks. That's four weeks of content and have like an hour of content We're really going to get into the nitty-gritty of how to make it work For you and all that research that I've done how to personalize it for you, and we're going to have question and answer Sessions with each week's lesson so that we can discuss and support you in your journey, if you're building a channel or you're trying to resurrect an old channel, either one, we're going to deal with that and really get into the practical stuff. And I find that a lot of the YouTube advice out there, there's a lot of great advice. There's a lot of advice that does not apply to our niche as creatives. There's just a lot of it that does not translate well for us. Beth Ann Williams (43:42.49) we're going to be approaching it for us. Lyric Kinard (43:42.545) That's why the Academy exists in the first place, right? Because, yeah. Yeah, as creative makers, there are, you know, there's different camera angles. There's different things that we need to understand about the metadata on YouTube. Exactly. Beth Ann Williams (44:01.962) and different psychology, different pacing, different priorities. Lyric Kinard (44:07.13) Yeah, so I'm like, I am going to be so all in participating as a student in this class as well. And I'm super excited. everybody, you know, if if you're interested at all, this is going to be phenomenal. And it will be offered through Beth Ann Williams (44:14.35) Y'all good?Good! Beth Ann Williams (44:30.084) I hope so. Lyric Kinard (44:31.726) academyforvirtualteaching.com. Sign up for our newsletter so you hear about when it comes out. We invite you to join us. It's going to be phenomenal. And, you know, I think we kind of skipped over one of the really big things that YouTube is great for. It is the best place to bring in people into your community that are new. Lyric Kinard (44:55.376) from all over the world. It's the easiest place to find and connect and get with them. And we're going to be talking about that. Bethann, excellent. Yes, exactly. Beth Ann Williams (45:01.644) Yeah, and it builds my email list. It has built my email list and I started a membership as well. So. Lyric Kinard (45:09.308) that's super cool. Bethann, where can we find your membership? Where can we find your website and your YouTube channel? Beth Ann Williams (45:16.802) Yeah, it's really easy. My YouTube channel is Beth Ann Williams Quilts. That's all I have to do. Beth Ann Williams Quilts. That's the channel name, the membership. There's just a join button. And if you click on that, it'll give you the membership details. My main website, where my blog is, and then links to all the other good stuff, including my online shop, is just www.bethannwilliams.com. Lyric Kinard (45:24.348) There you go. Lyric Kinard (45:32.806) Perfect. Beth Ann Williams (45:44.91) And Ann is the plain old variety. There's no E, but it's just Beth Ann Williams. And that'll get you to my site. On Instagram, it's bethann.williams. So it's really easy. Lyric Kinard (45:49.244) haha Lyric Kinard (46:00.412) We'll find and we will put all of these links down in the show notes friends so you can look at them down in the YouTube description or in the show notes wherever you're listening to the podcast. Bethann before we go I would love to ask you the same thing I ask everybody because we're all creatives here. What is the last thing that you made? Beth Ann Williams (46:20.254) Okay, sure. Oh, the last thing that I made was this morning I was worked on a bunch of Tula Pink Fusica animal Christmas ornaments with Connor. So, I did last week, I did a video on Christmas ornaments video tutorial on my channel and I used Christmas fabrics that were left over from another tutorial that I had done. But we, I, Lyric Kinard (46:37.912) have fun! Beth Ann Williams (46:54.992) love Tula pink. I love Tula pink. I love all her little animals. And so, yeah, so we were fussy cutting all these things to make ornaments. You can make coasters. Anyway, just fun. Sometimes just for fun. Lyric Kinard (46:58.054) fun fabrics. Lyric Kinard (47:05.692) Wonderful. Bethann, I truly appreciate your taking time out of your schedule to come and chat with our audience here. You have shared truly useful and truly useful information and your story is inspiring. So many of us aren't able to get out and travel. Beth Ann Williams (47:17.163) Beth Ann Williams (47:24.14) I hope so. Beth Ann Williams (47:29.086) thanks, Cleric. Lyric Kinard (47:34.264) and many of our students are either. And you have found a way to be successful and make this work. Beth Ann Williams (47:36.899) Right. Beth Ann Williams (47:41.058) Yeah, I have students and people in my classes all over the world. So it's really exciting. For all that we complain about technology and gremlins and glitches, I am so grateful for the internet and for the technology that makes all this possible. It's amazing. It's amazing how connected we can still be. Lyric Kinard (47:47.684) Isn't it the best? Lyric Kinard (48:00.752) Me too. It is. It is friends. And let's stay connected. Tune in again next time. If you can, if you have time, leave a review or a comment wherever you're listening or watching this. It really helps get our word out to other people and especially come join us at Academy for Virtual Teaching because it's all about community. We are a community of makers who have teachers' hearts. Beth Ann Williams (48:34.318) Yes. Both. Lyric Kinard (48:34.726) put our, yeah, both, both, right? We're here to serve and we're here to bring that joy and creativity out into the world. And it's not fluff. It's not unimportant. It's vital. So keep creating, keep making, keep sharing my friends and we'll see you next time. Beth Ann Williams (48:46.936) Right. Beth Ann Williams (48:54.882) Thank you Lyric.