After I posted a video on my Pokémon YouTube channel, Deep Pocket Monster, this happened:

This was one of hundreds of comments, in a matter of hours, that mentioned crying or tearing up. Here’s another one:

Why is this important?

The truth is that this is not about tears. Tears are a byproduct of what really matters and a huge, game-changing lesson I want to teach you about content creation.

It was definitely a game changer for me. When you do it right, this can happen:

Since then this video has become the best performing video I have ever posted on both of my YouTube channels.

325,000 views in less than 24 hours and the third most trending video on ALL of YouTube.

I’ll tell you why this happened. Let’s take off

The history

In early 2020, I caught a series of tweets from my good friend, Ryan Deiss, founder of the Traffic and Conversion Summit. Your company is widely known for its super tactical and data-driven strategies in the digital marketing space. This series of tweets, however, was new to me.

This is the part that caught my attention the most:

He went on to share a simple strategy to entertain and hold people’s attention: make people laugh and make people cry. If you can do that, you’ve connected on a human level, more than any surface-level content ever could.

This spoke volumes to me, so much so that later in 2020 when I decided to start Deep Pocket Monster, entertaining my audience was my number one goal. Even if I am educating them, I still try to entertain in the process.

And it’s working.

In the video I mentioned above (Here’s a link in case you want to check it out) I take viewers on a roller coaster as I try to complete a full set of Pokemon cards in just 48 hours. This set, which has 237 cards, is a well-known set but quite expensive to complete. To make it even more challenging, I’m in a place where I’ve never tried to search for cards before.

To add to the stakes, if I didn’t complete the game on time, I would have to give up the entire folder of cards I collected.

There are ups and downs, there are twists and turns, but my producer and I, Dan Patrick Norton, put together the right story, one that anyone could follow, even if they don’t know anything about Pokémon.

We wanted to connect on a human level, so we also added comedy and drama to the mix…

(Spoilers ahead…)

In the end, we paint a picture of defeat, coming so close to victory. Just when you think it’s all over, it turns out that some characters we met along the way went to the trouble of finding what I needed and sealing victory for the team.

It’s a story anyone can relate to: feeling defeated, only to have someone help you when you’re down, and if you see it, there’s a chance you’ll choke a bit too.

And now, with over a million views and counting, this video continues to introduce new people to the brand, adds more people to the community, and generates more ad revenue too.

Your call to action

In an upcoming content, explore how you can go from the superficial level to the entertainment level.

Don’t be someone you’re not (it’s important to be yourself!), but create a story that has something at stake, something you can potentially lose.

Teaching, yes, but showing the difficulties and funny things that happen along the way.

And finally, study. Study the art of storytelling and entertainment. When you see a video on YouTube, or a TikTok that captures your attention, ask yourself “why?”

Get it right, because as more and more information continues to flood the internet (and our attention), it’s the creators who find their own special way to entertain, who will stand out, win superfans, and survive.

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