The Doctor Mike Interview: YouTube's Favorite Doctor

You said no to $20 million. Oh, way more than that. There's sums of money that are in the hundreds of millions. They were like, you sure you want to turn this down? You're in debt for med school. I said, it'll come if we stay true to the science.

You're one of the most powerful doctors. Dr. Mike reacts to lunch leave. I trust his opinion a lot. We love Dr. Mike. I think the next big trend on YouTube is the Dr. Mike-ification on YouTube. Every industry is going to have a creator that's going to appeal to the masses. Making content.

online. It's all about creating a wave or riding a wave. I gotta ask about the boxing. Another hypocritical thing that I do, like brain damage, I probably shouldn't be doing that. I think so many YouTubers can get views, but they can't get fame. You've been on every big show. How do you pitch? You should factor in as two things. I don't say this often, but... You're very good at what you do.

Before we start, make sure you subscribe and ring the bell because we have so many more interviews, studio tours, breakdowns coming up with the world's biggest YouTubers. I mean, I can't believe some of the stuff we filmed and I can't wait to show it to you. So hit that button so you don't miss it. And now back to the video. Dr. Mike, thanks for coming on the show, man.

Excited to be here and chat my favorite thing in the world, YouTube. Let's do it, man. Well, I have to ask. I mean, you spent over half a million dollars, 10 years of your life, you know, studying in medicine, and now you're on a YouTube channel full time. Yeah. Not expected trajectory for me as an immigrant coming to the United States and then being a medical student.

Never thought I'd end up here, but okay. So I'm a year overdue for my checkup. Okay. So I called your office and I'm like, um, can I get an appointment with Dr. Mike? And I was like,

Oh, my God, he still practices. Yeah. And you still had availabilities. So I have a lot of questions about how you balance that. But what does your day look like in terms of how many days a week do you spend on YouTube and then practicing? And I have a lot of questions about the YouTube side that I think you don't often.

talk about in interviews yeah so normally I structure my week in a way that I have three days in the week to do YouTube stuff TV stuff speaking engagements and then three days of the week

I think even if you're not a doctor, even if you're not in the medical field, there's so many things that you could learn about the way you run your channel, the way you've grown to tens of millions of followers across all socials. So I want to start off by just showing some of the formats.

after analyzing 30 or 40 videos on your channel, and just asked you to talk about these different formats, which seem to be the most popular, as well as maybe other ones. And then I have some follow-ups in terms of how you think about it, because it was just so well-structured when I went to your channel. Yeah. So when we first started the channel, I had no idea what I was doing like everyone else. And I didn't know what I'd be passionate about. In fact, when we first turned on the camera.

the videographer I was working with at the time, who now is sort of a partner with me in the channel, said, okay, Mike, just say to camera what you do for a living. To get that like two sentences out was the most painful experience of my life. I could not talk to camera. It wasn't natural to me. And it felt forced for the first 30, 40 videos. And we just said, let's be creative. Let's talk about the issues that my patients have in the office.

Let's have it reach a wider audience. And as time went on, we started finding new avenues of making that message work. Because at the end of the day, what happens with most creators in the healthcare media space, they start off with a good message. But then they run out of content and they start corrupting the medical information. So they start promising you miracle solutions, supplements. Here's the one thing you don't know. Or like the last season of the Dr. Oz show was.

how your zodiac sign impacts your heart health, right? Because they got to create buzz. They got their version of click worthiness. So I wanted to make it my stance that I would never do that. And I would constantly try and re-innovate and find ways to make the audience excited about the content. But at the end of the day, I'm still talking about the same few things that I was talking about last year, the year before, but it just packaged in a way that is so...

entertaining and watchable so take me through some of these formats yeah so obviously react format has always been big on youtube uh initially i had a lot of pushback to doing a react format i remember People in the comments were like, hey, you should watch Grey's Anatomy. And because I was someone who never watched Grey's Anatomy, it always made me mad. So why would I watch that? It's inaccurate. I'd be fueling more misinformation. And then I had a med student rotating with me.

who basically spent the month learning what it's like to make content online for healthcare. And he said, you got to do this. You got to do this. So I said, okay, in one of my videos, let's create a call to action that if this video gets a set number of likes. I'll do a reaction video. And lo and behold, it got way over the amount needed. And I did my first Grey's Anatomy video and it exploded. Like absolutely exploded. The channel completely changed trajectories. Actually.

Like a month before that, I got fired by my MCN because they viewed me as a failure. Yeah. In launching your multi-channel network. Yeah. Where your YouTube channel is housed under. Exactly. They fired you. Wow. They fired me. They said, you know, you're not, well, I turned down a few sponsors that they thought they could make money from, but.

For me as a doctor, I'm not going to peddle BS. And if I don't stand by something, like they offered me some clothing company that I would never wear. And I'm not going to push that to my audience unless I believed in it. So they were unhappy on that end. I wasn't getting multi-million views as they hoped I would. a year in. And they said, we want to part ways. A month later, we do the Grey's Anatomy video.

everything changes. So then right away, we're like, all right, we got to respond. Let's put out another react video. So we did another show and then another show. And we were just trending those months, number one, number two, number three, for such a long period of time. Ultimately, that went away because people like...

kind of grow old of the content and the novelty fades. So we said, okay, now we have to move into a different type of reaction. And we knew memes were popular. And I would always send my friends in the hospital medical memes. So I said, let's do the meme reactions. Then we graduated.

to TikTok reactions. And we're constantly trying to innovate ways that we can use known formats, the things that's relatable to the non-relatable, which is the dense science info. So we try and package those two together.

And as we go down this list, people love buying products, but a lot of the products lie. So we have a product review series, which do really well with thumbnailing. So a lot of times when we're thinking about a concept, it's not just the value of the subject, how much it needs to be talked about. It also is how well can we title and thumbnail this? How much does the audience want to watch a full length video on it?

Some subjects are only 60 seconds worth, which is great now for shorts. And then we went into this new truth or scare model where we can move into more scripting, where we can do things ahead of time. bulk film taking some of the pressure off me because i've been largely coming up with the medical side of the content on my own for entire time. So 90 plus percent of the videos are in my medical mind of how I want the audience to understand it.

And that takes up a lot of time. So with these truth or scare ideas, basically we can get a really good quality researcher come in, give me the facts, allow me to now repackage the script into a way that's relatable to the audience. And from there, we're getting some good info out, but being able to bulk film a couple of episodes back to back to back. And maybe Mike, can I call you Mike or is it Dr. Mike? No, no, no, please, Mike. Mike, when you're doing...

like truth or scare an episode. So we have context for the audience was the one where you're like, are AirPods bad? Right. So we'll always start a truth or scare episode in the same way where there's a claim being made in that episode. And the claim for the AirPod episode was, are AirPods dangerous to your health?

The claim is actually that AirPods are dangerous to your health and they can increase rates of all sorts of diseases. And then we go through the episode, present the data both ways. And at the end, I give my final takeaway on the truth or scare meter, where it falls. And, you know, for each episode, you get a lot of really good info in a really short period of time because these are buzzy topics that people are searching for.

So you get great search traffic. You also get great seasonal traffic. If something takes off, people are searching AirPods. People are searching sunblock in the summer. You kind of get the seasonality out of it. But at the same time. Evergreen concepts as well. So really like that series coming together. It's new. We're still developing it, but really cool stuff. And it's really inspiring to hear that even someone with as much expertise as you like.

seek out other experts. Oh, for sure. To put information together, like research, so you could... increase your content while not decreasing your quality yeah i mean it's just at the end of the day you can only do so much as one person you need to expand the team you need to be able to delegate to have a successful channel that continues to grow it's

Totally feasible for a year, two, three, maybe to grow completely doing things on your own. But after a while, whether it's burnout, mental health anguish, full on productivity dumps or. writer's block that it becomes really hard to come up with content. But if you could take certain things off your plate, whether it's editing, filming, thumbnail generation.

That takes a lot of the weight off and allows you to be your most creative self. So look, can I sit and spend five hours researching the science behind AirPods? Sure. But I could also hire an MD, PhD to do the same. Present me that information. I'll still.

fact check it and make sure it's accurate. But I'll at least have all the sources there ready to go. And I know I'm putting out accurate content. What's the most amount of episodes you've ever filmed in a day? Maybe three or four. Three or four. That's pretty impressive with how.

dense the information. Sure. I mean, it makes it easier when some of them are react content, but even react content, I'm watching the content genuinely for the first time. Oh, you are. Yeah. Yeah. So I know there's a lot of expert react channels where they. plan what they're going to say. Sometimes it's even scripted. But for me, I want it to be as genuine as possible. Now...

given the fact that a lot of the episodes have some weird conditions, sometimes I'll get, oh, there's three topics here that you should be aware of that will pop up. So I'll do some preliminary research about those topics. But in general, it's my first time watching the episode.

giving my answers right there on screen. So it feels like you're watching along with me because that's the reality. And I have to ask about that because again, react format is such a big thing across YouTube. And I think if you're listening or watching this and you're like, I'm not in the medical field, but.

I want to try React for my field. What are some of the things that you tell your team like, hey, Look for these kind of clips before you bring it to me or you would tell other youtubers like if you're trying to react format Here's some of the things to look out for them make for a good clip you need obviously the shows or episode or whatever you're reacting to to be valuable to the audience. It needs to already be something that people search for.

Like doing the first episode of Grey's Anatomy was a no-brainer rather than doing some random episode on season two. So we take something that is already well-known and we pair it with the unknown. And I happen to be the unknown in that example.

So when you're thinking about making content, take something that is really well known that you're reacting to and then pair it with yourself, which is usually the unknown. When you get big enough to be known, then you could actually take things that are unknown and pair it with your content. and break news. So whenever I'm discussing making content online or news, it's all about creating a wave or riding a wave.

So for example, Grey's Anatomy, no one knows who I am. Everyone knows what Grey's Anatomy is. In that situation, I'm riding a wave. I'm riding a wave of Grey's Anatomy and I'm adding my value to it from my perspective as a practicing doctor. But then...

If there's a bad doctor that I'm seeing that's doing some damage, I'm like, all right, now I'm going to create the wave. I'm going to take an op-ed perspective and actually introduce my audience to this topic and explain to them what's going on. But that could only be done.

when you already have somewhat of a following. It's so well said because I feel like so many people start out and try to create a wave. Yeah. But you got to get there. I mean, to me, now the algorithm is set in such a way where you can... experiment at your own will. If you do creating a wave really well on the right topic at the right time, the algorithm will find you, whether you have one sub or one million subs.

So that's something truly special about it. And now with some of the new features like hype coming out, you're going to have even better support in trying to make things blow up. And I'm excited to see how all that shapes out and plays out.

For sure. Is there a way if you're riding the wave to measure how big it is? Like sometimes I use Google Trends and be like, if I'm going to react to something or if there's somebody that, you know, I would love to have on the show and make sure it's like a good fit.

checking out their views or like other things that you look at or is it just an instinctual thing? I think when I first started, we were doing things like looking at Ranker or looking at Google Trends and looking at these objective data sources. To be honest, as time has gone on, I found that to be less useful and more so leaning towards instinct and just...

general sense of things. Like if you say this topic to someone, what will they say? Well, they know what it is. If you ask a person, this person's name, will they know who they are? And I use that kind of as my barometer more so than an objective source. Makes sense. Last few years on YouTube, there's been this huge trend of the Mr. Beastification of YouTube. People are trying to do more spectacle, challenge formats. But I'm not kidding you. I've gone on podcasts and I've said...

I think the next big trend on YouTube is the Dr. Micification on YouTube. Okay. And what I mean by that is I think every industry is going to have a creator that's going to be talking about the field in a way that's going to appeal to the masses. If you look at dentistry, you have Dental Digest.

look at law, you have legal eagle. If you look at chemistry, you have now red. I'm wondering, what do you think about that? And do you believe that every industry is going to have somebody who's going to be a creator and is going to break out no matter how unsexy that industry is? Yeah, I think that's absolutely true. And I think that's the big talking point I actually tell kids these days. When they're polled, they say their number one dream job is to be a YouTuber. And I have to redirect them.

in that hope and say, hey, learn something, bring some value to YouTube. Otherwise... You probably won't get popular, number one, because you won't have anything really interesting to talk about. But even worse, you might get popular. And they're like, wait, why is it worse if I get popular? Well, then you'll get popular.

You're probably going to be popular for a short period of time. And at some point it'll fall off. And then you're going to feel terrible about yourself. And you won't have a career not to necessarily fall back on, but to say, well, I've learned this. This is where my value is. They'll say.

A negative comment will come in and say, you have no value and they say something really mean. But then if you look inside and you say, well, what is my value? What am I bringing to the table? That's going to be a demon that you're really going to struggle with. Yeah. I think you need two things. You need experience.

And then entertainment value. Sure. And it's easier to make experience or like knowledge entertaining than just to be a pure entertainer. Yeah. And even to be entertainer, like do the rounds. Like, you want to be a funny comedian? Do stand-up comedy. Do the legwork. Be... performing at shows, bomb a lot. Learn what that's like. You could tell the difference from someone who's had those reps versus someone who hasn't when they step away from that camera. Have you tried doing that?

Well, with the live show, doing a full improv, that was the hardest thing I've ever done, more so than boxing. Because on improv, if you don't come up with anything, you're just frozen. And in medical school, you get no training of thinking on the spot. You're kind of instead just always reverting back to what you know, the knowledge, knowledge, knowledge. you're accepting the reality as it is and just keep building on it, keep building on it. And that was.

one of the best tools that i think made me better as a podcast host as a doctor and in fact i think medical school should incorporate improv training into their education why because i think when you're sitting one-on-one with somebody part of

understanding who they are is accepting the information they're giving you. And a lot of times as doctors, we're quick to write people off or just skim over whatever story they're telling. But with improv, you have to be in the moment. You have to be locked in. You have to say yes and.

And when a patient's telling me something that might not even be factually accurate, I have to say, yes, and I want to help you the best that I can. Yes, and I want to help your child the best way that I can. And when we start creating commonalities, we can then...

Talk about things we disagree in a friendly way as opposed to an argumentative antagonistic way. Yeah. When was that oh shit moment for you where you were practicing and then you're like, OK, maybe I'm going to dial back like how much like.

I practice in the field. I'm going to do more YouTube or like, there must've been a moment I imagine where it's like, okay, this YouTube thing is taking off as a business. Uh, let me try to invest there versus the traditional path that you studied for. Yeah. My passion for being a doctor. will never go away. It's just the thing that I enjoy doing most.

And YouTube's awesome because there's so much value there, forgetting the financial side of things, the value of helping so many people health-wise also. You know, I do a lot of education as a primary care doctor. in my office, but imagine doing it at such a larger scale on YouTube. There's so much benefit to be had. But the moment where I realized that that was as valuable as it is to me was when I finished my residency.

I already had my YouTube channel up and running. And there was a period of time that I was going to work in New York and I got my license to practice in New York. And suddenly my hospital where I did my residency training said, what about continuing to work here? We'd love to hire you. And I had to apply for a New Jersey license, which took three, four months. And there was that gap where I didn't practice, but I made YouTube videos. Boy, did it feel unauthentic and not genuine.

I lost connection to the field in that three months. And I said, no, I can't give up practicing clinical medicine because it makes me understand better the problems people have. It allows me to relate better to people. use better language where I can actually see one-on-one if they're understanding what I'm saying. And it just makes you just more valuable, but also happier. Even when the channels...

not performing as well as you hope, going to the office and having someone tell you your notes are late or your patient mad that you're five minutes late to their appointment, that's valuable. And people will always belittle it. So valuable being able to see the exact outcome of your work right there in the moment. So, so valuable. Wow. Yeah, I think there's something to be said about keeping your razor sharp.

I interviewed Hayden Hillier-Smith, who's one of the best editors on YouTube. He still edits while he makes YouTube content. Of course. So you're practicing the craft. Was there a moment where, like, I have so much respect for doctors because, like, you invest so much of your time as well as your finances into it that you're like, wait, the finances of YouTube are taking off more than being a doctor. Yeah, and I don't say this often, but I've...

Because of the YouTube success, I now volunteer as a doctor. Oh, wow. So that's just like, by law, I have to get paid. So I donate the money back to my hospital, which is a nonprofit. And I work at a community health center. Taking a different line than most media doctors who use the moment to build up a business of clientele of celebrities or private pay, I said, well, let's...

do really well in the YouTube space and use that to fund being an awesome doctor for people who are really needing it. And that value, I can't. understate or overstate how valuable it is it's just it's so powerful to help someone who has a true problem

versus the value I would get from having someone who says, I'm strong, but I want to be 100X strong, give me the best supplement formula, what have you. So helping people who are in need is just... intrinsic to me i even remember in 2015 when i had my little viral moment of popularity for the superficial stuff yeah yeah i right away my first

thought was okay how do i do something meaningful with this and i did like a date for charity yeah and this was for everyone who's i wasn't gonna bring up but the context is like you were named sexiest doctor alive yeah yeah i i was like that was a more superficial story that i want to get but yeah you've you've

But that's how it started. And you know, it's funny. People still like lean on it. And I'm like, that was 10 years ago. It's funny. I'm like, I've aged out of it. So that's not me. But it's a funny tagline that even I'll save someone's life on an airplane. That happened.

flying over the Atlantic Ocean and there was no EpiPen on board. So I MacGyvered one and we saved this young gentleman's life. And it was an epic story. And coming back from it, I'm like, oh, New York Times is going to want to write about planes not having EpiPens on board.

And it was New York Post who was like, Instagram sexiest doctor alive saves life on plane. I'm like, all right. So clearly they're just about the clicks and not the value. Wow. Was there a moment when you were like taking off that you're...

colleagues and peers looked at you differently because i also the number one thing i also hear is when people are in a profession they're starting to create content they start getting looks yeah it's like wait what like you have a day job like why are you creating content like

Were you feeling that? What advice do you have for people who may be going through something like that, but want to do the content thing in addition to the professional thing? We'll get right back to the video. But first, I want to tell you about a creator tool that I love using, and that's Opus Clip, who sponsored this video. You've probably heard of their AI.

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Advice, I don't necessarily have perfect advice because I feel like everyone's going to have an individual journey here. What I experienced was the first couple of years of my residency when I really got to know the staff I was working with, the nurses, the CMAs, the other doctors. they knew me for me. They didn't know that I had social media at the time because it wasn't popular. And then when it exploded,

Everyone got really nervous, especially the higher up executives of, oh, what is this going to mean for us? We're not a huge hospital system that can handle this type of risk and all this stuff. So they were very worried. But I reassured them that I'm only doing this to get good medical info out there. And if someone invites me on a talk show as the sexiest doctor, I'll allow that and I'll go and go along with it.

but I'm really going to move the conversation to something valuable because that was always my passion and why I never wanted to stray away. And because I've stayed in the same hospital system, actually it's my 10 year anniversary with them this summer. Thank you. So they know me. They know me from before the popularity and I've grown with them and they've seen how it changed and they've seen the struggles that I've had.

when you can do that with a family just absolutely amazing it's rare these days because most people are moving around and shifting within their careers i've been blessed to be part of this uh overlook family medicine family and it's just been a

Awesome experience. Actually, one of my last podcast guests this year was a nurse that I worked with for my full 10 years that... just retired after like 50 years of service to the hospital system. And the conclusion to her career was she had... debilitating pain. And she was going to these surgeons and they were scheduling her for surgery. And I asked her to see me. And it was awkward for her to come see me as the young doctor that she almost raised. She always considered herself my work mom.

and then she came in to see me finally because she was having this debilitating pain at that moment she wasn't walking for like six months already And upon examining her and actually doing the work that most doctors these days are skipping over, I found out it wasn't her back that was the problem. It was her hip.

And I didn't do anything magical. I just found that the problem was coming from a different source. And I just saw her the other day and we talked about it on the podcast. Her pain is completely gone. She avoided surgery. She was getting... like a spinal cord stimulator placed and we canceled that surgery because of that physical exam. And to be able to give that back to someone who basically raised you in the healthcare field was just super special and cool to do on YouTube. That's incredible.

Have you gotten ideas for videos to educate the masses on your YouTube channel from the clients that you see on a day to day basis? For sure. I think it's a. symbiotic relationship that is unexpected most people say well like being a doctor and doing social media how can those possibly go hand in hand well when i'm making a youtube video on a topic that's obscure or that I'm not well-versed in, I have to do a lot of research. Well, that helps me with my patients because I become a better doctor.

But then when I go and I talk to my patients, I understand what questions I need to answer. I need to know what words I need to use to answer that question. Then I could bring that to YouTube makes me a better YouTuber. So I think living in these two distinct worlds actually creates a really healthy value.

that I can bring to the general audience. Yeah. I mean, that's why I'm such a big believer in this Dr. Mike-ification of YouTube. I'm going to keep going with this because honestly, it's like you... are doing the work you're you've educated yourself for it and then you're almost like having a daily like focus group to get ideas to be like okay i'm gonna sharpen this i'm gonna you know while giving the value and then if you make a video about it it's been field tested

And then the stories that you get from your day-to-day experiences, whether it's prescribing a medicine and it's not covered and the insurance company's problematic. And now you have a toolbox to reach. lawmakers. Like when the EpiPen situation happened, I made a YouTube video about it. And Chuck Schumer's office calls, who's the Senate majority leader now, and says, would you like to stand with the senator and call for EpiPens on planes?

Yeah, let's do it. That would never happen if there was a bullhorn of YouTube at my disposal. Or immediately after that, I said, well, there's not enough primary care doctors. Now Chuck Schumer's most watched Instagram reel on his social media is ours talking about the need for more doctors and how we included it in the latest bill that he passed. So there's so much value to having a social media platform.

as a professional, not just creating content, another form of monetization, but impacting your field, impacting the people who use your field. the public service of it all is so valuable. Yeah. I mean, I think there's argument to me, like you're using so much of your power for good, but you're one of the most powerful doctors like in the world with this platform that you have and you built and the way you're using it is so inspiring.

I'm hoping that someone can look at my story and say, oh, I could do this 10 times better. And they do it way better. Because what I've seen, especially with social media these days, is Young Doctor gets a little bit of popularity. and right away starts doing advertisements for some Miracle Cure All product, or they come up with their own Miracle Cure All product. And if they just waited a little bit longer, and they held out, and they stayed true...

there would be so much more success, so much more value. I'm not even talking about financial. Financial will be there too. We do really great on the YouTube channel. But... The value that you could bring to the community as a whole is just so undervalued. And I feel like people think short term so often. And I really encourage them. Push it.

wait for that marshmallow test of delayed gratification. And that's exactly what I want to ask about. Those early days, you're having your moments of fame. What are some of those brand deals or sponsors that came to you that you're like, no way? We turn down 99% of sponsors that come our way because they see doctor, popular, they don't really understand what I talk about.

Let's create a formula line for you. We'll give you $20 million up front to invest in it. These are real sums of money that people are offering you. You said no to $20 million. Oh, way more than that. I mean, there's sums of money that are in the hundreds. millions over five to ten years or whatever the length of the brand deal is.

It's just that's not why we started this. And I'd rather earn less. When I say less, it's still great money. Like I grew up broke on welfare. So this is all a net win. And even it goes into the TV side of things. I was offered to take over hosting for a nationwide television show syndicated across the whole nation.

And I was ready. I was going to be the sole host of the health program. So excited. All the meetings were done. The schedule was cleared with my hospital for filming. Like it was ready to go. A week before filming, they send me the contract and there's one word in the contract that said, instead of having like full review of sponsors, I get reasonable review.

And what the lawyer essentially explained to me was that given the fact that there was two execs and me, I could be overruled. Whereas before, we all had to unanimously agree. And I said, well, I'm not comfortable with that. Let's change it. They said, no, we won't change it. I said, well, give me some examples of sponsors you imagined for the program. And they said some...

vitamin or supplement is like one of the sponsors. And I said, you want me to say this, that everyone needs this? Most people don't need this. And I realized like, there's no way I could do this show, even though it was a seven figure sum for multiple years. And nationwide attention and your show, they said you could run it as is.

They even backtracked and said, you don't have to read the ads for the product. We'll bring in a new doctor to just read the ads. I'm like, but it's my show. So you have to just stand on the truth and say what you stand for. Because otherwise. Even if you succeed, you won't be happy with your success. And all that really matters is what happens when your head hits the pillow. Were there any other opportunities that...

you considered and you're like, cause it's tempting. Like, I mean, especially when you're trying to make it like you're balancing so much, you're working hard. Like, was there anything that you're like, I'll give you one from two weeks ago. Um, I hope I don't exactly call them out. So it's a, combination product of a toothbrush plus another product within it. So maybe that'll hide it as well.

And I said, oh, this sounds like a great concept. I'm like totally in. So our teams are working together to do it. And I said, well, send me the product. I want to use it before we finalize. So I used it for two weeks and I realized. It was a pretty mediocre toothbrush and a pretty mediocre secondary feature. So it didn't do anything well, and I didn't feel comfortable recommending it to my audience.

It was a huge deal, huge financial deal. And technically, it's not a bad product. It wouldn't cause any harm. But I just don't want my audience buying junk. I want that. We've done sponsorship deals for a hairdryer. I use that hairdryer still to come on this show. I love those products. And if I'm recommending them, it's because I truly use them. So I have no fear in turning those down.

not because I'm successful. I had that lack of fear. Even when we first started, like with my agency, they were initially like, you sure you want to turn this down? You're in debt for med school and this will change your life. I said, it'll come. And I was just dead set that this would change if we stay true to the science. And I think we've proven that to be the case. And I hope young doctors listen and young experts listen that you don't have to sell out to be financially successful.

I mean, to have that conviction that early, because when you were in debt, like YouTube was... Probably hard-headed more than anything. When did you make your first hire as a creator? When I was doing... Instagram, I knew I wanted to transition to YouTube because I was being held out from television by the gatekeepers of Hollywood. So when I first got my little viral moment of fame, I had a really rough realization of what 15 minutes of fame was. Everyone called when my story broke on BuzzFeed.

Ellen DeGeneres, Steve Harvey, everyone's calling. And they're like, we need to have you on our show. But you can't do anyone else's show. And at that time, Ellen DeGeneres was the biggest show. And I said, OK, I'll do that one. They want the exclusive. They want the exclusive. So we do the.

pre-interviews, all the stuff. And it was actually filming in New York. It was a rare opportunity on Labor Day. And day before the show, they call and they say, bad news. Hillary Clinton is announcing her run for presidency and she's doing our talk show as the only talk show.

So the other guests are like pink and Jimmy Kimmel. So you're beat. And I'm like, Oh, no worries. I'll call Steve Harvey back. So I call Steve Harvey back. They're like your old news. That was two weeks ago. We don't care. And then I realized that it's going to be hard to maintain.

that audience. And I still got some invitations to do shows and they were great, but it was always under the notion of sexy doctor, even though I wanted to talk about prevention and myth busting and all these things. So as time went on. I realized I need a new platform because these invitations were becoming more and more sparse. And I said, I got to do it on YouTube. And I recorded my very first YouTube video on my webcam and it was terrible.

It was the worst thing ever. I actually played it on Phil DeFranco's podcast for him because I had a clip of it on my computer. It was just so bad. I was talking about a research study about exercise, and it was terrible. And at that moment, I realized I needed to make a hire. So I said, as soon as I find someone who's good quality with video and editing, I'm going to hire them. And someone reached out, a guy named Dan Owens, who is now a partner in the channel, and said, hey, I do stuff.

for YouTube, and I think you'd benefit from having video content. We met, we clicked, we started working on a part-time basis. That extended to now, you know, seven years later, he's partnered in the channel. We continue to grow.

Wife is a member of the YouTube channel now as well. So we're always trying to take care of our own and make sure that when I succeed or the channel succeeds, everyone succeeds. That's so interesting to hear because I think a lot of people who are creators are looking for partners.

operator. But it's hard to incentivize them given how hard it is to work. What does partner mean in the channel? Because also channels, creators, we don't often have exits or liquidity events. There's a few like the MapHats of the world.

Again, I was starting this as a broke medical student, not really knowing what I was doing. But essentially, my goal was to say, everyone should have a really good salary working here because we do really well but then on top of it not only should there be a bonus structure but after a certain period of time that bonus structure should reflect on how well the channel is doing so

We created performance incentives that if the channel's doing something, your salary is going to reflect that. And not just thinking about salaries, because that's one part of it. The health insurance every employee has is the best health insurance. Food that everyone eats is always top tier food. So travel. If I'm traveling somewhere and I'm traveling first class, everyone in the crew is flying first class. Most people are not doing that. But I was like.

We're all a team and we're all doing this together. So we all should celebrate in the wins. What's some of those bonus structures for creators thinking about incentivizing their... Either percentages of total revenue or specific parts of the revenue because we have...

different revenue streams, whether it's AdSense, brand deals, speaking engagements. Now we have the course that we're selling. And because we have these different avenues, there's different incentives depending on which team you're on. What does the pie chart of income look like now, like rough percentages? I would say it's the heavy portion of it. Let's say 90% is split between brand deals and AdSense revenue. and they'll teeter-totter depending on the year.

And then speaking engagements is the next big percentage point. And then the course is probably the smallest because it's the newest and probably where I put less focus on. But I just wanted to have a product out there to encourage people.

who want to be experts and tackle media, not just social media. What's monthly overhead to run your channel? That's a good question. If I had to factor everything. It's probably $100,000, $200,000. A month? Yeah. Oh, wow. What's like revenue? Revenue is climbing into the eight-figure sphere. Eight figures? Yeah.

Oh, my God. Wow. And that's, again, turning down 99%. Of course. Wow. I mean, you deserve it, man. All the stuff you said no to and the long-term thinking and the good you're doing. Do you have an estimate of what the Dr. Mike brand is worth today? I don't think it's worth anything because you can't really sell it. Right. Like I'm the brand kind of. So if I'm not in the videos, it's not worth anything. And, uh, you know, I've discussed.

And I've seen how influencers create products and they do really well. And some of them are just no brainers. Like if you're a channel that talks about nail polish, you got to launch a nail polish product. If you're a channel that does. food reviews or cooking, you got to create a food product, right? Like that just makes absolute sense. It's where your passion is. Health, it's not as easy to do that. Unless I'm a genius, I can truly create some innovative miracle product.

I'm probably going to be white labeling some BS supplement. And I don't want to do that. And I've stayed away from that from a brand deal perspective, much in the same way I would stay away from me creating one. How big is the team today in terms of people? We probably have four or five full-time folks and probably the same. independent contractors whether it's animators editors now we're trying to enter this world of dubbing which is so complicated oh man especially medically because

It's not just a joke that I want translated well. It has to be medically accurate and culturally sensitive. So that's really tough. And you have to find medical experts. who speak the language, who get YouTube, who get this concept and then get a voice and multiple voices, especially for the reaction videos. Cause now you're translating multiple soundtracks. Right. Right. Yeah. So very tricky. Yeah.

Yeah, dubbing is, I feel like it's one of those areas we're trying to focus on. But AI definitely helps. Yeah, I'm hoping AI can solve this. You know, I've actually been really disappointed in AI. Really? scratch that i've been very disappointed with how people talk about ai versus what the reality is tell me more you have people who are very excited about ai and

probably use it to some degree in their everyday lives in a cool way that I'm unaware of. But in healthcare, we always say AI is taking over. The most AI feature I have available to me is I can search the word colonoscopy in the chart and it'll find the colonoscopy report for me. That's as cool as AI as I have. So maybe...

There's some AI in radiology where it's helping read scans or something like that. But it's very far and few between right now. And in the same way that people are saying, oh, it's going to take over the world, it's going to be exponential. I actually had that argument with Dr. Mike Isretel, PhD, about AI because he's a firm believer that AI is going to solve all our problems in healthcare. It's going to make medications that will never feel sad or depressed.

in any way. And it'll just make us more optimal, more optimal. And I am less optimistic that it will do that. Or I guess I'm more realistic that it probably won't do that.

Yeah, I think it's going to be fascinating to see how it plays out. I mean, you've been on every big show on TV. How do you pitch TV producers? Well, initially when I was doing it, I was... focusing on creating the relationships with the network producers that have hired me in the past, and then creating pitches in the same way that I create titles and thumbnails for YouTube videos.

When you're creating a title and thumbnail and a concept, you're trying to create it for what the audience that you think on YouTube wants and what that producer wants for their show. Will probably not be the same that your YouTube audience wants just like how if you're creating content for YouTube That content one-to-one probably won't work on snapchat or on Facebook not without some tweaking at the very least

So I started thinking about ways to incorporate, if I'm doing a video, can I write an op-ed at the same time and submit that for publication? Like during COVID, we did this quite frequently where I wrote an op-ed for the daily news about the vaccine, did a vaccine video on YouTube. did some press appearances surrounding my op-ed and the vaccine video.

And it sort of created a 360 environment where I'm hitting all aspects of media as opposed to just YouTube or social media. How do you find the contact information of the TV producer? LinkedIn. LinkedIn is a powerful source. For me, I was lucky that initially I had some opportunities and I already had some existing contacts and then I leaned on those. But there's always networking opportunities with people in your field. I met some of my best friends in the space.

going to medical media events and just talking to folks and seeing what's available. Whenever a reporter writes an article, they leave their email at the bottom, email them, talk to them, pitch an idea, and then... TV show producers are constantly scouring the web for articles. And if your name pops up frequently, they're just going to reach out to you. So it's not only about...

reaching out, but also having a healthy inbound as well. Yeah. Cause I think so many YouTubers can get views, but they can't get fame. And I feel like finding that and like those things, or maybe fame isn't the right word. It's like things that could. like strengthen their brand yeah like influence influence in more of a way um to double click on that like let's say you find the producer's contact information on linkedin or you get it at an event what are you sending in that email

I would right away send the pitch of an idea that you think works well, and then they just become familiar with the fact that you're sending pitches. And once you send enough pitches and they see you... like it becomes a level of familiarity where they're seeing your name constantly pop up with really good ideas.

They just might act like they know you. I've had that happen where I've sent pitches to a specific producer. And then when we meet, oh, yeah, we met. I'm like, no, no, we've never met. I've just pitched you a bunch. And I guess like you watch my content as a result. So even if you don't get.

picked up your opportunity and being in the back of a producer's mind is valuable and are you like hey dear so-and-so like hope all as well here's a idea for a segment okay hope all as well cut to the chase um uh like you wanted to preview of the email, a body of the email to right away be in the first line, like the idea. The idea of the segment. So it's very clear. Yeah. Like if you're doing back to school lunches, being unhealthy.

Back to school lunches. Again, creating a title and thumbnail. So you want to hook the producer just like you're hooking the YouTube viewer. And maybe you're even putting in the subject line. For sure. You're definitely putting in the subject line. And then you're giving a few bullets of explanation. Exactly. And you say if you want to learn more. Reach back out. Yeah, let's have a convo about it. Wow. And because of that, I was...

a recurring guest on Live with Kelly and Ryan, Good Morning America, Rachel Ray, like all the big talk shows when I was doing it frequently. Now the YouTube channel rivals a lot of those shows viewerships.

I have to do that less. But also explaining to folks that people are like, oh, I'm going to hire a PR company. And they think they're going to become famous because they have a PR company. Explain to them what a PR company actually does. Do they need it? Should they be spending the money and what they can expect? I wish I had that playbook when I first started. I spent so much money on things that I didn't need.

where I realized if someone just gave me some guidance, I could save $50,000 right off the bat just by knowing where I should invest and where I shouldn't. Wow. Do you do all your own publicity in-house? Yeah. No PR firm. No. I mean, initially when I first started, I did and I spent money that shouldn't have been spent. Well, I didn't know. Right. So like you're coming up as a young resident and becoming a young doctor and you're like TV.

Like media, like it's some imaginary thing. So you think, oh, there's no, like, how do I reach them? So you think, oh, I'll hire someone. I'll pay them X number of thousands of dollars a month and they will tell them about me and they'll want me. And a lot of times.

If you didn't have a project, if you didn't have a product, a book, something to pitch, the producers weren't interested. Like I said, oh, we hit a million views, a million subs on YouTube. They'll surely want to interview us for that.

They didn't care. That's their competition. They don't want to promote your YouTube stuff. They want to promote their own show. So they want exclusives. So I would say, oh, I have a really good YouTube video coming out. They say, well, it's too late because your YouTube video is going to come out. People are going to see it. They're not going to come watch our show. So then I realized I had to change timing around.

You could only learn this if you had that experience. And that's what I try and teach in my course, all the things that I wish I would have done when I first started. How do you change the timing around now? Let's say you're working on a YouTube video and like the way you talk about having a 360 approach is fascinating. as much juice out of it it depends what we're talking about so maybe an example of like a recent one that you did a 360 approach

Honestly, COVID was the best examples of that. When I'm putting out a video that I know is going to get traction because so many people are asking questions about vaccinations, I will preliminary pitch producers about a topic. Give them the time when the video is coming out. Say, I will tease my video coming out on your show. Still get like.

some kind of value before mine comes out and then i'll also get an extra added value to my show and that led to opportunities like standing on the white house lawn reporting to Fox News and arguing with them about whether or not Fauci is doing the right thing. I had no idea that I would have an opportunity to do that. But last second, their producer was like, oh, we like your pitch. Where are you?

And I happened to be interviewing the Surgeon General that day at the White House. I said, I can't do it. I'm at the White House. They said, oh, we have cameras at the White House. Just go to the lawn. I'm like, I don't have a press credential. They're like, don't worry. We already paid security. They're expecting you. So I walk out. on the front lawn and here I am doing an interview and you know something I again I never expected to have happened but it was only made possible by YouTube

And also thinking about, okay, the video takes so much work, but that script can be a written piece. Exactly. Or you, knowing your talking points, that could be you appearing somewhere else. Also, maybe a speaking event. And newsletters. I'm trying to lean into that. now in the coming months, if I'm being honest, because it takes time.

That has been largely underutilized. There's been so many things that have been underutilized with the amount of work that we've done where we could have repackaged things 10 different ways and put it in a more 360 approach that I wish I did. But because I was learning and just trying to...

deal with the demand of everything going on because I'm still practicing. I'm still fielding calls for my patients that you can do everything and you have to be okay with that. Did you have any thoughts about the newsletter as you approach that? Well, figuring out a way that...

people would actually get value. Again, the advice that I'm giving isn't usually revolutionary. So I'm not the type of doctor that's going to say something like the correct... ice bath protocol is three minutes and 13 seconds and you need to do it like this, this many times a day in order to get the best benefit. That will get clicks because people are going back, what is the best protocol?

I don't talk that way. That's not how I communicate. So it's harder to create a buzzy newsletter that will get good openings. So we're trying to figure out a good sequence of how often they should come out where we'll definitely have value.

but still not have to corrupt the medical information in the process. Yeah. And also like, I find repurposing is so tricky because we just launched our newsletter a few months ago and we're like, okay, like we don't want, just want to put the interviews in there. We're going to have a thumbnail roundup.

of the best thumbnails on YouTube. Yep. So there's some kind of value. Yeah. Always about added value. Always. And how do you think about like the creative wrapper, like the packaging of it? Because I thought... This is really genius what you did. I pulled up a short. And I feel like I learned a ton of medical information from this. This is a video that came out after Mark Rober was on Hot Ones. OK. Yeah.

No, no, no, no. No, no, no. Never do this. Literally never do what Mark Rober is doing in this clip. This is throat numbing spray. Like, if you have a sore throat. He was recently on Hot Ones, and in order to avoid tasting the spiciness, he used a throat numbing spray over and over. I feel bad that Mark Rober had to be the target of this because he's an awesome guy and obviously shares the best information on the web when it comes to science and tech.

Mark Rober went on Hot Ones. He used a throat numbing spray in order to try and trick his body from feeling the spiciness. Which, by the way, a lot of us use when we're sick. Yeah, exactly. You know, when we have a sore throat. So immediately I was like relatable. It's a commonly used, yeah, over-the-counter product. Yeah, yeah. And he definitely overused the product.

And any medication, whether it's over the counter or prescription, if you overuse it and you don't use it as it's intended, like for example, this one you're supposed to spit out and it looked like he was swallowing it throughout the episode.

And that's setting a bad standard for everyone else. Because if you're watching this as, I mean, yeah, as a 10-year-old, if you're watching this, you could easily get tricked into it. But even as an adult, you could be like, oh, next time I eat spicy things, I'm going to do this. It's a true health risk to do this. So I reached out to Hot Ones to try and get them too.

adjusted somehow but obviously it was probably too late or whatever it was i didn't get an answer so i was like all right i guess i just have to put out like a psa about it and explain that this isn't the right way to use the medication just so that we didn't start this trend of

oh, everyone's copying this popular YouTube show and then everyone loses because then YouTube looks like it's spreading bad information, hot ones, Mark Rober. So I thought this was like the middle ground approach of doing it. Yeah. How do you think about like once you...

have the idea, okay, this happened on Hot Ones, to make the hook as interesting or like thinking about like the first few frames of a short yeah you know in order to get people to stop scrolling you have to do something and i've played around different avenues uh in this regard of like here i'm yelling don't don't don't do never do this And sometimes I find it a little cheesy, to be honest. I wish I didn't have to do that.

But look, clearly, I think this has like 50 million views or something. So it works sometimes and you need to use it as appropriate. So I've definitely overused it. I've underused it. And you're just trying to straddle this very thin line that's hard to follow. sometimes. Yeah. I got another clip. Can I show you? Yep. Okay. So this is when Mr. Beast put himself, like he buried himself for seven days. And I thought you had a really interesting take on the medical side of it.

Mr. Beast was buried alive this weekend for 50 hours. So let's talk about his movement, air, psychology, and most notably, poop. When blood becomes stagnant in our bodies, it can create a whole host of problems leading to blood clots or even pressure ulcers where the skin...

actually begins to break down. Despite his own ventilation system, my one concern came when they launched fireworks leading to smoke entering his coffin. This could have led to carbon monoxide poisoning, which could be fatal. Claustrophobia is listed on the DSM-5 as a specific phobia yeah so like in a situation like this people know what you're going to talk about so you have to create content that is something that they won't expect and that they want to wait for so the

The reason why we went one, two, and three, the reason why we teased the poop angle is just to keep that retention so that people get the full amount of information. And look, when you're doing prank videos or something, maybe someone will say, oh, you're just trying to get people to watch longer and you're hooking them onto this thing. I'm trying to do it so they get the maximal amount of medical information. So that's how I think about it myself.

And it's tricky. It's hard to get people to watch in this day and age with the competition that exists. But it is definitely doable. And it just takes a lot of experimentation. And again, pairing the known with the unknown. The unknown is the medical information. The known is this.

very viral mr beast video of him being buried alive yeah so so thinking almost like a preview statement of like we're about to get into this and like maybe having a punchline like and poop like well like some of the best speakers always say like in the beginning of a speech you should tell people what they're gonna hear Tell them,

And then tell them again what they heard. So you have to really reiterate things multiple times so that when people leave a presentation, a speech, a video, they have at least two takeaways that they can remember. Because if you just... put in a whole lot of info or you make it too dense. I feel like that becomes problematic. Although now, nowadays some podcasters are doing it the other way where they take like really simple concepts and they make it very complicated.

like andrew huberman's a prime example of that on his podcast where sometimes i take a complex subject and i try and simplify it he'll take a simple subject and he'll make it so complicated teaching you vocabulary words about the brain and all this I never expected that content to work, but here we are and it's exploding. Can you talk to me about the other formats? Yeah.

Bad doctors. These days, there's plenty of them, especially on social media. Some of these are actually in real life. Like this, here's what happens when a doctor lies. That was a vice-style conversation with an individual who had really bad... care at a medical facility and i thought it was important to highlight what to do in situations like that so again you're getting all of this inherent corruption and interest and

you could just listen to the story on its own, but now I'm pairing it with the known, which is my advice on how to handle it. So we're even adding value to a ready compelling story. I thought that was pretty cool. Things bad doctors say is me trying my hand at improv. I work with Sam Bowers here, who has a really strong improv background as my producer, and we played off each other in showing different styles of bad doctors. Because in training doctors, I see a lot of bad habits.

I found there's specific subtypes of doctors. Like we named one the keyboard warrior, where they never look at you and they're just constantly typing away at the keyboard. Or the doctor that's always trying to sell you some miracle supplement. And we found several subtypes of that and we thought...

hey, this is great. We can show a comedic version of it. But again, added value in addition to the comedic value is the educational value after each bit. So we always try and elevate the content to some degree and we think what's the impact. And responding to comments, I mean, that's your ultimate connection to your community because people constantly submit questions.

That's difficult to navigate in the health space because you can't answer individual questions. So if someone says, hey, I have this condition, what do you think I should do? Can't answer that question. And not just can't answer it from a legal perspective.

There's no way I can accurately answer the question because I would need to know so much more information that's not in that comment section, like what other medications they're on, what other conditions, what are their family history like, what's their physical exam. And obviously I'm not doing that through a comment section. So...

Great way to talk about general advice. So if someone says, hey, what medicine should I take for my diabetes? I'm not going to tell them, but I'll talk about the most commonly prescribed ones as well as their side effects. So find a way to still do education with that.

type of question any other formats or things you're seeing on youtube that you're experimenting with that are working or things you tried before that you're kind of well now we're leaning heavily into the podcast space especially given the fact that youtube is leaning into the podcast space i'm actually sad that YouTube is not part of podcast rankings in terms of judging which podcast is successful because Apple...

has charts, Spotify has charts, but then YouTube, that's interestingly missing. And I feel like they're having some growing pains with it. Like if you click podcasts on the left sidebar. A lot of those things aren't podcasts. People are just labeling it podcasts to get the extra little exposure. So that's interesting. I really like podcasting. And I never thought it would be a format I would find.

comfortable to speak freely for two, three hours at a time. But it's been incredibly valuable. And I also didn't think the audience would stick around as often because we always talk about shortening attention spans. No, people like we put out a three hour episode with minutiae inside baseball stuff. People are zoned in for hour, hour and a half on average. It's incredible. Yeah, I'm glad you brought up the podcast because that's another area where I think.

People who aren't even in medicine can learn a ton from what you're doing. I was looking at your shorts and just finding out how you clip your podcast. And I thought this was fascinating. In your recent interview on your podcast with Lindsey Stirling.

You had five clips from that interview on TikTok. You only had three clips from that interview on YouTube. And then I'm like, oh, OK, there's some overlap. No, no, there's only one overlap between the two. So I'm like, wait, what's going on here? And then I looked at the other podcast interviews. I'm like, there must be some strategy here between how you clip it or maybe the questions you're asking the podcast that I think could help anyone.

who's trying to get their podcast on the ground, even if they don't have an existing audience. I agree. One last thing. I want to give you my free YouTube playbooks, which include the best tips and visuals for my interviews from Casey Neistat to Mr. Beast. Just go to created.news.com. playbook. These playbooks are no fluff, no BS, just proven tactics from the best creators. And trust me,

It's better than most paid courses out there. It's all part of our created newsletter where every week you'll get a breakdown of the latest news for creators, weekly roundups of the best videos and thumbnails and more. So you're always a step ahead. That link again is created.news slash playbook to get it free.

in your inbox or just see the link in the description. All right, back to the video. A lot of it right now is experimentation. That's why it's not consistent episode to episode. There are certain podcasts that I've seen successfully put out

all of their clips onto let's say tick tock first and allow that algorithm to show you what's successful and then only post the better ones onto youtube shorts um so we tried that for a bit sometimes that works sometimes it doesn't like it would be cool when like I have one episode with Dr. Gundry who makes claims that eating grapes are bad for you. That eating grapes is bad for you. And I clip that and...

Every platform no matter where I post it even if I repost it it gets millions of views So I don't know if people are really into defending grapes, but that that one does well across But some of them will take off on one platform won't do well on another Being that we make medical content, we oftentimes say words that trigger algorithms.

to decrease the viewership. So we say words of medical conditions, mental health conditions, things that maybe algorithms don't like or are maybe down regulating. So we run into a lot of trouble with that. Perfect example I can give. I feel like Tommy and it's going to hate me for doing this on a podcast, but I did it last week in public and he didn't seem to mind it too badly.

He came on my podcast and he talked about health condition he had and he needed testicular surgery. So on the clip that we clipped, it was Tommy and it had testicular surgery. And it did terrible for 70 days. I'm talking about like 300,000 views, which is low for us in a shorts format. And then on day 70. I just looked at it. I said, let me change this to he woke up in pain and removed the word testicular. 14 million views in two weeks. Wow. And that's a 70-day-old short.

So it makes it clear to me, at least anecdotally from that one example, that removing one medical word that could be flagging something can completely change the trajectory of a video. which is good and bad. Good in the sense of now I know to be careful in the future, but also bad because...

You're constantly just looking at your old catalog and be like, what can I change that will change the trajectory of my channel this month? Because getting 14 million off one short, imagine I have hundreds of shorts. If I could change three of them like that.

that could completely change how well your channel does. And it's essentially free advertising in that way. So it makes you sit there way too long playing with titles for sure. Yeah. But I also think it speaks to language in your videos. Because I think...

Every creator that I interview that is in a more sophisticated field, they have to distill their words without dumbing it down. When I was interviewing Marques Brownlee, he's talking about some of the... most technical of topics when it comes to these products. But looking at the grade level of his speaking and writing, it's about fifth or sixth grade. How do you think about distilling what you're saying so it appeals to a more mainstream audience? It's funny because...

In saying this, I almost feel that it's offensive to the audience to say it this way. And then I came to the realization that it's not for one reason. The reason I distill it so well and make it simple and easy to understand is because... That's my understanding.

Like in order for me to understand how the body works and how white blood cells work, I have to really simplify it for myself because I'm not one of these Harvard, MIT geniuses. So I have to make it super simple for me to understand. And when I do that.

I can then translate it really easy to almost everyone in the population. How do you think about titles and thumbnails when it comes to taking dense information and making it much simpler? Because I think you have a higher bar in that. You can't click bait. in the way that maybe other YouTube channels can because there's...

a medical standard that you have to adhere to. So I pulled a few thumbnails and titles. Just wanted to hear your take on it and how you go through it. Yeah. So not only do we have the medical standards, but we also don't want people to have false expectations going into a video. As an example of this, if I make a clip off a podcast that's longer than 60 seconds, so it can't fit into a short, I've thought about making a really fun thumbnail for it.

of me in an environment doing something that's about the topic discussed in the podcast clip. And then I feel like that just sets up the viewer into thinking that this is an engaging video of me in an environment, but it's not. It's an interview. So you have to really straddle this line of making it really interesting, really valuable.

but still real to what the concept is and what they're about to see. Because what I found is if you stray too far in the opposite direction, even if in the short term it works, long term it sets an expectation for the person to say, ah, I'm not going to.

click on that creator's video because they don't always give me what they promise that makes sense yeah any of these other like titles i i find like it's like the way you keep it concise like though like any other tips or things uh because i find Early on, like some of your other titles and thumbnails, I don't want to embarrass you. They're really bad. I pulled some of your earlier ones to compare to. I think one of these I made in...

in like paint or something on my own. So it was really bad. And we were experimenting, obviously, especially here. Like at this point, I knew very little about YouTube in 2017 when we first made these videos. And they have a lot of views now, but that's not how they started. started for the first year or so. A lot of struggle here. But obviously, they simplified drastically. Faces became clearer so that it's recognizable that it's my face.

Fonts became more consistent to what the brand font is. Colors became more consistent. We hired a great motion graphics editor to work on our content on thumbnails as well as. within the videos. So if we're ever popping up a definition, we have preset graphics that are now brand custom so that people know, oh, if it pops up with this sound, that's the definition coming. If we get a sidebar, it has our logos in the back.

elevate the production value without doing too much and bogging the process down and is there anything on the podcast side like with your pre-production or your questions that you think about that you think has helped the discovery of that show i think

We sit in a very unique place where we can talk about a whole range of things, whether it's talking to an expert and debating them. That's hard to do when you're having the world-leading experts coming on and you're posing them questions, challenging them. You have to be very comfortable doing that. That's cool.

Then you can have athletes come on. I have some athletic background. I did the whole influencer boxing sphere. Yeah, I want to ask about that. So I can talk about the athletic side of things. And then with a celebrity, I'm pretty plugged into the culture as much as I can be as a practicing physician. So we could also chat about stuff like that. And that opens things up and double-edged sword in that regard because you have...

A lot of different topics to talk about. So you have a lot of different audiences that pick and choose what they want to watch, which leads to less consistency. And as a result, sometimes it makes it difficult to make content because you never really know who your audience is. Like even as a prime example, we did a live show last year, the year before.

And it's an improv show, variety show, where we bring in audience members, play fun medical games where there's fun but a takeaway. And when we're doing the show, we're like, should this be for adults? Should this be for kids? Should this be for YouTube insiders? But there's an audience member that doesn't fit into those buckets at every show. There's someone who doesn't know you that's...

coming with a friend. There's adults that won't get the pee-whoop references or the silly references. And then there's kids who don't get the healthcare costs in America monologue I want to do in every show. It's very difficult to narrow down and cover one topic because the audience is so diverse.

I think you've done it really well, especially on episodes where there may be a subject matter, which is not your expertise. You bring on a co-host. Yeah, for sure. Like I think it was that episode with Dr. Sundry Gundry. You brought in another specialist. Dr. Danielle Bilardo. Yeah, because what happened. If I'm a little bit out of my sphere from the research side of things, I think it's important if we're going to be having a debate to have someone there who knows the research cold. Yeah.

While I can talk about the practical implications as a clinician of what I see in my patients, what the guidelines say, and then the rationale as to why we should or shouldn't follow them is cool. I can't talk about the research of the little micro molecules, what the recent study has found. I just, I can't keep up with all of it. So it's great to have someone when you're doing those types of deep dives. Yeah. Scientifically.

what's the best way for creators to limit burnout? I think the simplest step that works for everybody is really hammering home on what your priorities are. And when I say hammering home, I mean actually putting pen to paper or fingers to keyboard and writing down what matters to you. Because if you're going to invest time into being a creator, know that you're going to lose something in the process. You have to sacrifice to be a creator.

People used to think, oh, I could just do this on the side. If you want to do this successfully, this is not a sidekick. This is something you have to truly invest into. And that's both financial and time-wise and emotional-wise. For me, I used to watch sports growing up, huge sports fan. The amount of sports I watch since doing YouTube has drastically fallen. Like it's embarrassingly low how little I watch sports.

I used to do fantasy football and do the calculations and see who's a good pick for me. Now, instead of doing those calculations, I'm doing YouTube analytics. So I just transferred for where my priority was at the time to what it is now. And sometimes that means cutting out fantasy football. Sometimes it means moving on from a partner. So it truly depends on his...

Case by case. But starting with that set of priorities is going to set you up for the best chance for success. How do you define burnout as a doctor? Because I feel like people have different definitions. Sometimes it's hard to grasp what it is until. Yeah, I feel like burnout. is almost similar to a medical condition that we call dysthymia in healthcare, where major depressive disorder is for a set number of months.

You have these symptoms that are in line with major depressive disorder versus dysthymia is this longstanding low level of not necessarily depression, but sadness. And when you have that for a long period of time and you're starting to lose joy in what you once enjoyed doing, you...

once enjoyed doing videos, now you really despise the process. But you're not in a place where you're having major dysfunction like you would in major depressive disorder, where you can't keep friendships alive, you can't perform at work. It's not that to that degree. It's a lower level. but it's for a longer period of time, that chronicity of it, that's what I think leads to burnout. And burnout means that you're just not capable of gathering the amount of value from...

the content you were making or the creative process. And I think when that goes on for a long period of time, you really need to reevaluate why that's happening. And I do that all the time because I burn out in those ways all the time. Yeah, I was going to ask if you've experienced that because you manage so much. Every time I see your videos, it's like you're so upbeat. Well, you've got to be upbeat to keep people's attention, to keep folks happy in general.

And that doesn't mean I'm always upbeat. I'm definitely sad. I'm definitely mad. In fact, I remember when I was a... resident, we would interview future residents that were med students. And they would oftentimes ask me, how can I do better in interviews? What can I do better to prepare? And the advice is always like, be normal. And to me, what be normal meant was...

experience all the emotions. If someone says something offensive, it's appropriate to get angry. If someone, you have experienced a loss in your family and you're sad.

be sad don't pathologize sadness as a form of mental illness there's times where you're supposed to be sad and when you're happy be happy when you want to be helpful be helpful and just like experience the range of emotions and there's times where during burnout you get stuck in one part of that emotional, I guess, pie chart, if you will.

And when that happens, you have to take a look and figure out and work backwards and see how you got there. What's happening? Where are you spending too much time? Where are you not spending enough time? And for me... I have this built-in safety net in that I'm always doing something different. So you're never getting bored. But at the same time, there's a major cost to the constant switching of gears.

You know, one second I'm filming a video, then a patient calls in the middle of it. Your brain has to shift gears. Then I'm going back to making the video. One of my dogs starts acting up and is a distraction. My gears are shifting again. You could only shift gears so often before you need to say, okay, I need to take a break because my gears are overheating.

It's probably a terrible analogy, but that's how I think about it and why my situation is a little different where some people can get bored with the process. I'm never bored. I'm more so worn out with the process. I mean, the context switching must be draining.

block off time? Or can you? Because you have patients reaching out. I talk to creators who are like, yeah, I'm going to have manager versus maker days. Maker days I'm going to film. The other days I'm going to manage and work with it. I don't have that. And that's my biggest weakness in all of this.

Doctors are oftentimes the biggest hypocrites. So we'll give good health advice, but it doesn't mean we always follow it. And in this situation, my balance is completely off. I should be taking more time away from certain scenarios.

But I'm one of those people that when I see an opportunity, I just can't turn it down. I want to keep pressing that pedal and going forward, especially because I see so much value from this, not just for me, but for the greater good that I'm like, you have to keep going. You have to keep going. And this will never. be around as often as it is. But the reality is if it's taking such a toll where you're becoming less effective in your abilities.

taking a break can actually yield better outcomes. And I oftentimes have to remind myself of that. And that could mean taking a day for just doing something fun. It could mean taking the evening to playing video games and not answering emails. There's a wide variety of coping strategies people are going to have there. Do you have systems in place to help with that too? Because when you...

Said earlier that you sometimes film three to four episodes a day. I'm like, oh, that gives you runway to then have that footage with your team being edited. Like, do you have other things in place where it's like the content? No, it's a disaster. I mean, the fact where we are now is already better. were filmed up a week or two in advance. For so long, for probably three or four years, we were shooting on Monday, publishing on Wednesday. Wow. And we've been publishing Wednesday and Sunday.

in addition to like shorts every now and then an additional video every now and then for the last seven years without missing dates. So I've been really consistent with that and saying like we need to publish two videos a week. And we were under the gun a lot.

And if I was to give advice to new creators, the advice I would give is if you're looking to make content and you're trying to figure out how often you should be posting, what you should factor in is two things. You should post as often as you can. that your mental health and your quality allows so if you're rushing to put out a video but sacrificing the quality you should wait to publish it it doesn't matter about the time that you're posting it

If your mental health is suffering for a long period of time, shortly your body can adjust. But long, long term. That's just so toxic to your system, to your creativity, to your health that it's not worth and it won't be sustainable. So it's the quality and the mental health should be your rate limiting steps as to how often you publish. Yeah, that's such a good checklist that every creator should ask themselves.

I got to ask about the boxing. Okay. Because another hypocritical thing that I do, like... Brain damage, I probably shouldn't be doing that. That's why I asked, because I watched this video where you're reacting to WWE injuries. Obviously, you didn't do WWE, but you're taking some... Well, WWE, you're probably having less impact on your brain than you are when you're actually...

Yeah, yeah. Well, I mean, I was watching your fights and you were taking some hits. You were delivering some too. Yeah, yeah. Why did you decide to do that? And how did you even manage that with your workload? Yeah, that was... That was really tough scheduling-wise because for a period of a year and a half, two years, I basically woke up, boxed in the morning for 90 minutes, worked all day, and then either ran or strength trained six days a week.

So two days, six days a week for almost two years. And that's a lot with everything else going on. I remember my team would come in in the morning at 9 a.m. ready to film. And I've already worked out. I'm already exhausted. I have a black eye or something else going on from sparring. So that was really hard.

My whole thing with health is it's not about trying to live to a perfect standard or to the healthiest standard, to the most optimal. Yeah, we'd like that. But for me, health care is about... Making sure people understand and are consciously making choices.

that they have enough information to go off on. So if I'm recommending a test, if I'm recommending a treatment, I want the patient to know why it is that they're doing it. And for me, I'm acutely aware of the risks of boxing, and I've accepted those risks, and I want to...

continue boxing let's say so someone might want to jump out of a plane with a parachute they are aware of the risks and as long as they're aware of the risks i guess you could judge them as a person but i'll never judge them as a doctor So that's been my philosophy from day one. And I've had a unique journey with boxing in that when I was in med school, I unfortunately lost my mom to cancer. And that's been a big part of my journey. It's actually right here on one of the thumbnails.

And something that got me out of like the four month funk where I just wasn't taking good care of my health was taking a Groupon boxing class. And I fell in love with boxing then. I said, oh, this is like really good for my health. It took me out of my comfort zone, challenged myself in a fun way. And I always loved the sport as a result.

When influencers started doing it, I'm like, oh, I got to do this. I got it. And again, me thinking is always like, what's the added value? Well, I'll do this. I'll get a paycheck and we'll just give it to charity. So the last fight that I had on Showtime pay-per-view, which I mean, talk about a fantasy camp dream for a kid. Like I'm not on the level of the Jake Pauls or Logan Pauls. So to be able to fight on Showtime.

pay-per-view like I remember the week before I fought or two weeks before I fought there was another pay-per-view match and in the middle of it they go coming up next week and it's my freaking face there and like this doesn't make sense like this should not be allowed

But I said, I'm going to make the most of that opportunity. So I trained really hard and were able to give the entire paycheck over $100,000 to the Boys and Girls Club here in Harlem in New York City. So it was totally awesome to be able to do that. Wow. Were you going into that and be like, hey, I'm going to...

like make a medical video about this or like, or like, you're like, there was definitely content around it. There was definitely valuable content. And like I said to the kids that are starting up, that want to be YouTubers, I had an experience to share, you know, I'm a doctor. who treats athletes, but sometimes couldn't relate to them as well, right? When they would be injured and they would want to push on.

now i could now i could say here's the experimental thing that i tried on my elbow here's how it went wrong and we created a lot of great content as a result and it was a fun journey and i don't think it's over yet i think it's just hard to sometimes find

matches when you're six foot three 200 plus pounds but yeah i also think it's really interesting as you think about like educators versus entertainers when it comes to creators you don't always have to go to school to have an educational experience sure you could be the guinea pig and put yourself into something of course

like you did with boxing, life experience, and then reflect on that and then break it down. Um, any final like studies, like, like things that creators should like keep in mind, like diet, like tip, like anything that I find. Being a creator, you throw so many things by the wayside when you go into it. I know I personally have. Any other thoughts or scientific studies you feel like you should pay more attention to? I think the pendulum has taken a few swings.

I think initially it started off with this hardcore rise and grind culture, 3 a.m. club, put out as much content as you can until you no longer can. And that was unhealthy. And now it swung to the... Let me not challenge myself as much. Let me protect my mental health.

And that was good because it was unhealthy to begin with. And we need to be cognizant of our mental health. But now it's going into a little bit of that safety zone. And we need to be cognizant that we don't get too safety. And we continue to experiment. We continue to take risks.

Number one way a child learns, and I specifically say child because it's the time in our lives where our brain is most adept at learning. It's most excited to learn, ready to learn. The most that a child learns is from taking risk. from doing something bad, being corrected, from taking a jump and falling, from tasting a food and not liking it. So the more we get into this culture of too much safety,

The less we're willing to experiment, the less we'll push our boundaries, the less we'll be successful. So we have to constantly be aware of that pendulum of not getting into the toxic chronic space, but also into that fearful, we need to not take risks as well. Well, it's been amazing seeing you take risks. And man, it's just so inspiring to sit down with you. Thanks for taking that time. Thank you. I appreciate it. Thank you for the opportunity because...

It's nice to be able to talk about YouTube for once. I feel like that's always looked by the wayside when folks bring me on a show. They say, let's talk about medicine. And I love talking about medicine, but YouTube is where I started. So much of my passion is there. I'm really grateful for the app. Of course, man. I'm grateful you came on. Thank you.