If you have had your head stuck in the sand for the last 5 to 10 years then I fully expect you to know what Youtube is and how massive it is. Sadly despite it being the 2nd largest search engine in the world (Google being 1st) there are so many channels that get created and simple fail to take off. Now this can be for a variety of reasons but by far the most common is the expectation that you can create a video, throw it up on Youtube and expect instant success.
Don't get me wrong on occassion you will hit the jackpot and your video is shared hundreds or thousands of times over and you can build a substantial channel around just a handfull of sucessfull videos. More often that not though your efforts fall on deaf ears (or non seeing eyes) and you need help.
Enter Alex Genadinik and his Udemy course 'Youtube Success tips: How I got 900,000 views'.
First a little about Alex Genadinik. He is based in New York and is a 3 time Amazon best selling author with a deep expertise in software development, mobile development, entrepreneurship and growth marketing. Alex has over 50,000 students on Udemy along spread across 70+ courses. This was the first time I had heard of Alex but thats not uncommon in Internet Marketing because the internet is so vast.
None of that really interested me and I am put off by the 70+ course thing because this can sometimes mean content and expertise is diluted but I liked the premise of the course so checked it out. The part that did interest me was his Youtube stats which were not too hard to find. You can see his Youtube channel here.
A quick check of this one channel and I could see that his claims in the title of the Udemy course were infact correct. Youtube Success tips: How I got 900,000 views. This is a bold claim to make but is one that in comparrison to others quite meagre. That aside he does have at the time of writing this review 11,162 subscribers and 953,923 views across 826 videos so he is telling the truth. Thats the first hurdle cleared!
So I took the plunge and purchased the course when it was on offer at $10 (about £8 in the UK).
The course comprises of 18 lectures which equate to about 2 hours worth of content, which is delivered in bite sized chunks averaging about 4 minutes in size. Lectures 1 to 3 are the course introduction and set the scene well to introduce your tutor Alex and the success he has seen.
Section 2 covers lectures 4 through to 14 and Alex's teaching style is nice throughout these. Instead of telling you what you need to do he elects to show you what he actually did to achieve the results he has today. This includes some video of the backend of his Youtube account which evidences the views he gets on a monthly basis and then during the lifetime of the channel. His Youtube earnings are in view for a short time and whilst they are small in comparisson to some big Youtubers they are not to be grumbled at, add on to these his affiliate commissions from nearly 1 million views and he is doing well. I would suggest well enough to live.
The section moves on to show you how to keyword research, how videos can get ranked for competative keywords, strategies for new channels, achieve higher rankings using embeds and a few more bits.
Section 3 covers 2 lectures, 15 and 16 and these are some simple strategies to increase views and sales doing a bit of SEO and using your email signature. This isnt rocket science but still valid information.
Section 4 is the usual wrap up, plea for a review and discounts on future courses.
VERDICT: Youtube Success tips: How I got 900,000 views
The course is short and to the point but at the £8 or $10 that I paid I don't really have an issue with this. Alex is an english speaker and whilst he does have an accent its not too strong. I found a couple of gems in the course which I will be taking forwards to all of my Youtube Chanels and in these alone the investment paid off.
I also love the fact that Alex's own Youtube account is evidenced well at the start of the course. This built my trust with his straight away and kept me interested until the end of the course. Sadly the course does lack detail and whilst I like the way he teaches the subject which is one of 'do what I did' and not 'do this and that..'. This works well for me as I can see what worked and what didn't. I believe the price at £80 is too high for the content which can be found for free elsewhere but the course on offer is worth the time saving you get by not looking for this content. I am also surprised to see that Alex has over 840 videos on Youtube which means he averages 1.2k views per video. I would have expected more from a channel as big as this.
Overall its a good course and the content delivered. Alex provides solid evidence of his efforts and clearly knows what he is doing. I give it 3.7 out of 5.
You can check out Alex's course by clicking one of the links below. Alternative courses are shown further down the page and remember to let me know your feelings or thoughts on this course in the comments below.
