This week saw the launch of  Happy Place Home Studio!   It was a "soft" launch, meaning I built my store in the middle of the desert and did not advertise  it.     But I've already hit double digits on subscribers (lol).

Putting together a channel with the intention of drawing people to it is a very interesting process - at least the little bit of it I'm doing so far.   HPHS is not a business to me and never will be, it's a hobby - but a lot of people certainly make their living with YouTube channels.  Many do EXTREMELY well.     This has never been my forte in business efforts, but it is something I should have paid a lot more attention to.   

I used a site called "Fiverr" to find someone to help me with "SEO", or Search Engine Optimization.   This is the science of using the right "keywords" ("tags") and other means to cajole the search engines to "put you at the top of the list" when someone looks up a particular phrase.   Search engines are everywhere, both on the Web and within web sites such as YouTube.   

What I intended to just be a channel on Youtube quickly became more...a Web site (www.happyplacehomestudio.com), a Twitter account (www.twitter.com/HappyPlaceHome1), a Facebook page ("Happy Place Home Studio") as well as the YouTube channel and email.   A few years ago, this would have been an incredible amount of work if you wanted to create something decent, but now it's all but off the shelf.

A friend very kindly helped me with the Web page and did a wonderful job (Thanks Colleen!).   I figured out how to do some of what needed after a few hours.    The result is an interconnected little SEO empire for the channel.     The results so far are interesting - some of the videos from the channel are actually at or near the top of lists for certain search phrases!   Is that because of SEO, the tags I used, or ??   Hard to tell.

My kids Gary and Haley helped me with an interesting aspect.   Most of my videos just had an automatically generated "thumbnail" picture, which was usually just me looking boring.   The kids had me take pictures of them in my studio in a what they called a "lick-bait" context - mostly them striking "over-the-top" poses or facial expressions.   My studio volunteer Owen and I then took those pictures and make new "thumbnails" of them.  These are the videos you'll see on the channel, and they are the videos that are high-ranking!

It's all very interesting - a learning experience and a great way to pass the time while trapped at home!