The World’s #1 Influencer: How to Make a Viral Video
The world's top internet personality, based on YouTube, has about 317 million subscribers. Each video costs roughly $1 million to produce, and they run a 250-person production team. This appears to be a leak from internal training documents.
Here are a few key reference points:
**Click-through rate (CTR)** is the most important metric. It's calculated as the number of users who click the video thumbnail and title, divided by the number of users who saw it. (The title and thumbnail are extremely critical.)
**Watch time and retention rate** are also essential. The first minute is the most important — viewers drop from 100% quickly down to about 66% by the end of the first minute. From minute 1 to minute 3, drive the narrative forward so viewers don't churn. From minute 3 to minute 6, place the most exciting and engaging content. The goal is to make viewers fall in love with the story, the characters, and the video itself — reducing mid-video drop-off. Less exciting content should appear in the second half, but never signal the end of the video, because doing so would cause viewers to close it, dragging down retention.
**Document:**
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