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When I first thought about leaving the traditional route of a 9-to-5 career to pursue full-time YouTube, it was terrifying - not many people were doing it. The thought was I have to have money saved up, because this very likely might fail. From the start, I had to give it my all for it to work.

YouTube - holy cow! - I can do my career at my own pace. I didn't have anybody to tell me I wasn't ready, and I learned how to self-market and how to strategize. 'Spontaneous Me' had already been up on iTunes, but besides my mom and grandma, no one bought it. Once it was up on YouTube, it went crazy.

The thing that has made YouTube so successful is that you can relate to the people you're watching to a much higher degree than to the people you see on TV.

I think YouTube used to have a negative connotation, like it was the place where the rejects went and made careers, but I'm proud to be YouTuber. I wanted to be in that first generation of YouTube stars who transitioned into the 'real world.' It was a really good way to build my business.

We started about three years before YouTube existed, so we had to host all the videos on our own servers at a co-location facility. When we got so many hits on our first few videos, and we estimated our bandwidth bill was going to be about $12,000 a month, we knew that we had to establish a business model ASAP.

As content creators, we're benefitting YouTube every day. YouTube couldn't do what they do without us, so do not underestimate your power.

As soon as I starting making YouTube videos, I received so much positive feedback from the online community and a demand for more content. As time went on, my filming schedule became more consistent, and it made sense to hire some help and upgrade my equipment.

A lot of people think YouTube is quite easy, when it just isn't. I've been doing YouTube for six years now, and I'd say the hardest years were definitely the first three or four. You have to constantly put out content that is good just to make people come back to your channel, and I work every single day just to try and expand my brand.

YouTube was really good for building a kind of core, loyal fanbase. I didn't want to be a YouTube artist as such. I mean, there are people who are able to release albums and live off YouTube, but I felt - and not in an arrogant way - that I could be commercial and credible if I really put my mind to it.

Let's make it so the more you invest in YouTube, the better deal YouTube gets for you.