Reviewing Faceless YouTube Channels: 8 Lessons From Viewer Channels

I reviewed a batch of faceless YouTube channels that people in my free Facebook group and on Twitter sent me, and the same problems kept coming up. Creators were uploading too slowly, making videos too short to earn much ad revenue, switching niches on the same channel, and ignoring the one or two videos that were carrying the whole channel. On one channel, about 95% of 345,000 total views came from two videos. The fix in almost every case was the same: figure out what is already working, make more of exactly that, and make it long enough to get paid.

How I review a channel

These channels came from two places: a post in my free Facebook group (we were at almost 2,500 members when I recorded this) and a tweet asking people to send me their channels.

When I do channel reviews, I don't usually look at the content too much. I'm more focused on the outside looking in: the titles, the thumbnails, the upload pattern, the view counts.

A few of the channels had Shorts on them, so I'll say where I stood on those. When I recorded this, I hadn't formed an opinion on Shorts with the new setup they had. I think they're good for branding, and I've seen some channels do them pretty successfully. I really don't know how they affect the algorithm. I didn't have a formula, so I wasn't going to say go do Shorts or don't do Shorts. Go try it and feel it out.

I've kept the creators anonymous here. The lessons are what matter.

Lesson 1: Three videos in seven months is too slow

The first channel had 80 subscribers. I liked what this creator had going on. The long videos were about 30 minutes each, on the rise of well known internet business figures, and that's awesome.

The problem was output. It had taken seven months to get three long videos out.

I did the math. Seven months for three videos is about two months and ten days per video. I'd bet that around video 10, 15 or 20 this creator starts to get really good. But if you need another 20 videos to get where you need to be, at that rate it's going to take about four years.

My recommendation was to either make more content or put more time into it. Try to get a video out once a month, maybe even once every few weeks. And quit worrying about the Shorts. It seemed like this creator knew what they were doing. They just needed to make more content.

Lesson 2: Show clips that match what's being said

The same channel did something well that I look for. The clips were very contextual. The video showed what was being talked about. It showed the data, the information, the real stuff.

Some channels don't do this. They show far off clips that have nothing to do with the content, just Storyblocks type footage.

Two notes I gave on top of that:

• With 30 minute videos, the main thing is really hooking the viewer and keeping them engaged. Longer videos need a lot of moments that break the pattern.
• From the outside looking in, the thumbnails could be a little bit better.

If retention is where you're stuck, read YouTube retention secrets.

Lesson 3: Two minute videos don't pay

The next channel was in men's haircuts and grooming. At first I thought it was weird. Then I found the bigger channel it was based on, and it made sense. It's a new angle on the self improvement content for guys that was already out there, and I liked it.

The creator was clearly trying to model that channel, and the results looked pretty solid. My advice was to watch that channel's top videos, understand why they do so well, and model those.

What I didn't like is how short the videos were. Two minutes, three minutes, five minutes.

For the monthly row, I pulled up the stats in vidIQ for a channel in this niche. It showed about seven million views in the last month. A good amount of that was Shorts, and I couldn't see the exact split, so I said let's say four million came from the long videos. With videos that short, that's probably $5,000 to $8,000 a month. With longer videos, that channel could totally make $15,000 to $20,000 a month.

So figure out how to make the video 10 minutes long. You're not going to make very much in ad revenue on a two minute video.

I also noticed a few weeks with no uploads. Whatever the production issue was, being consistent matters here too.

Lesson 4: Model closely, or pick one style and stick with it

On that same channel, the thumbnails were bouncing around. Yellow fonts on one, a different look on the next. There were about five different styles.

You have two options:

1. Model the channel you're basing this on as close to the T as you can, thumbnails and titles included.
2. Create your own style, and then do it on a repeat basis.

What doesn't work is five formats at once. My full approach to this is in the faceless YouTube thumbnail guide.

Lesson 5: New niche, new channel

The next channel had started with space videos and then gone over to fitness and health on the same channel.

Go upload that content on a new channel.

The worst thing that could happen is one of those old space videos blows up. YouTube is then going to try to recommend your new content to that audience, and it won't know how to work with it.

The other issue was the topics. They were very oversaturated, and it looked like throwing things at the wall and seeing what sticks. You want to go in with an actual content strategy that you feel good about moving forward. I have students in the health niche, so I know this niche works. You just need to be more intentional.

More on this in how niche your YouTube channel should be.

Lesson 6: Find the two videos carrying the channel

This one I wanted to pin down for everybody.

The channel covered celebrities, and it wasn't monetized yet. One video had 130,000 views. Another had 176,000. The channel had a total of about 345,000 views, which means something like 95% of the views came from two videos.

Basically, two videos got all the results on the channel, and all the other ones were a waste of time and money.

Both of the winners were life stories of famous actresses. The rest of the channel went from actresses to queens to a fashion brand to a tennis player.

So what you do is stop doing whatever else you're doing on the channel, and go find other people like the ones in those two videos. This creator had started to do that a little, and I liked it. The next step is to really figure out why those two did well. I didn't go through a full synopsis in the review, because it's pretty obvious if you just watch those videos against the other ones.

Lesson 7: Some niches work better with a face

One channel was a faceless channel about making money online. It wasn't monetized, and there hadn't been an upload in 10 months.

I see one of these every so often. It was a bigger thing people did about a year before I recorded this. My issue with the niche is simple: why would you take advice on how to make money from a random channel with nobody behind it?

I know there are some channels getting results with it, and maybe you get some decent affiliate commissions. But these channels usually work better as a personal brand, with your face on camera. If you want to stay faceless, make some other type of channel.

Lesson 8: Three years of uploads can't replace a content strategy

The last real review was a basketball channel that had been uploading for about three years. That's impressive to me, because of the persistence.

But the most viewed video had 13,000 views (it was a news video), and I estimated the channel was probably making about $40 a month.

Here's the crazy thing. You can make one video, maybe it takes you a month to make, and it does more views than everything you've posted in the last three years, at a fraction of what all of that cost.

I've had a lot of people come to me in similar situations, and I get it. You believe in this stuff and you're persistent. But after this long, uploading is a habit you've built. You need to reevaluate, ask yourself if this makes sense, and focus on your content strategy. When people work with me, usually within 10 videos they should be getting more views than this.

There was one more channel on my list where the videos were getting about three views each. My advice there was to go watch some YouTube, and then ask yourself if your channel looks like the ones you watch.

A couple of the channels in this batch had some decent potential. If you keep posting and the views aren't coming, read why you're not getting views on YouTube.

Video Chapters

• 0:00How the channel reviews work
• 1:03Where I stand on Shorts
• 1:34Channel 1: good long videos, three uploads in seven months
• 2:35Contextual clips and keeping viewers engaged
• 3:37The math on uploading too slowly
• 4:40Channel 2: a modeled channel with very short videos
• 6:36Why two minute videos don't pay
• 7:38Estimating monthly revenue with vidIQ
• 8:40Pick one thumbnail style
• 9:12Channel 3: switching niches on the same channel
• 10:46Channel 4: two videos carrying the whole channel
• 12:17Channel 5: a niche that works better with a face
• 13:49Channel 6: three years without a breakout video
• 15:56The last channel and wrap up

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