The Story Behind the $10,000 Piece of Video Content

I know, I know. This headline kinda sounds like clickbait. To get past that right now- yes, I made over $10,000 that was directly correlated with a single piece of video content. And here’s the whole story.

To set the stage a bit, it was 2017, and I just moved into my own apartment, all by myself. I had also quit my 9-5 job a few months prior to moving into my new apartment. So not only were my expenses higher, but my average income was significantly lower. My wedding video side business, which at this point became my main business, needed to pick up… Big time.

I was getting inquiries and leads from a wedding lead service, along with few facebook ads here and there, but converting them into customers was the struggle. My wedding films were beautiful! But yet people didn’t book. And with my bills lurking in the corner, ready to pounce at me at the first of the month, I was getting frustrated.

The idea of making video content didn’t just hit me one day. It was an idea that lingered around in my head for a while. So one day, I decided to step in front of the camera. It wasn’t magical, exciting, or inspiring. In fact, I kinda cringed at myself. But I knew there was a reason to be on the other end of that lens. I didn’t know what was to unfold at the time, but all I can say is that I wish I stepped in front of the camera sooner. Here the story of my first piece of video content, that made me over $10,000 in one day.

So in this post I’ll be breaking down 3 key topics of my story- why I decided to make a piece of video content in the first place, the basics of how I actually made the video, and the results that brought me in a very nice chunk of change!

Why I Decided to Make a Video of Myself

As mentioned above, I was really in a bind. My work, the service of creating videos for other people, was fantastic. The quality was well above average, but my pricing was well below average. So naturally I raised my prices to match the quality of work. And for some reason, I wasn’t booking clients. Obviously I knew that I wouldn’t book as many clients because of the higher prices, but I was booking a solid zero clients in the first month or two. The inquiries were there, but the conversation was majorly lacking. 

But in those inquiry emails, I would get questions like “Do you have a drone?” or “do we get the raw footage?” which I always hated answering. The drone was an easy answer- “Yes, but if it’s bad weather, I can’t fly” which everyone seemed to understand. Raw footage however, was very difficult to explain via email, and usually required paragraphs and paragraphs. 

While that was all happening over a few months, I was also watching and listening to Gary Vaynerchuk, who is a very vocal businessman and influencer. He preached how video was the key to marketing! Not 30 second TV ads (which was the 9-5 job I just quit), but social media videos that could be more easily shared and consumed.

So one day after the 798th inquiry asked me about raw footage, I decided there had to be a better way to answer this. And that’s when I decided it was time to step in front of the camera.

How I Actually Made the Video

The key things I focused on when making the video was that I wanted the message to be clear, direct, and understandable. There was to be no room for interpretation! But at the same time I didn’t want to read from a script, because I wanted the video to sound more casual and conversational, rather than a tutorial. 

So step 1 was to sketch out my talking points. I knew I wanted to talk about what raw footage was. So I sketched out some talking points, and planned to overlay screenshots and photos to really nail down my point. Another point that I needed to explain was why there was a charge for raw footage. Everyone and their mother (literally) expected raw footage to be free, so when they found out there was a charge for it, they freaked out. I knew I needed to debunk the mystery of this in the video as well. And then my final point was to actually put raw footage into perspective for my potential clients- did they actually need it? 

After I sketched out all of my talking points, I proceeded to step 2- actually filming myself… Yuck. I may have been over exaggerating a bit, but I 100% felt awkward on camera. Luckily I knew that I was editing this video, so I would just cut out all of the mess ups. So I had my outline to read from in between takes along with a cup of coffee to keep my energy up, and I went to it!

Side note- Remember how the camera adds 10 pounds? I think that’s bullshit nowadays. It used to be a thing with older cameras and lenses, but now it’s not really a thing. But what the camera does do is takes away 10% of your energy. So I always give a little extra “umph” in my delivery on camera to make sure I don’t come across as boring or unenthusiastic.

Over 45 minutes later, I finished filming my 5 minute video. From there it was time to load it onto my computer to edit, which was probably even more difficult than filming. The footage looked great, but watching back 45 minutes of me mostly messing up was so mentally difficult. I had to cut through all of the awkward pauses and stumbles just to find the snippets of good information. But finally after an eternity of editing (realistically 1 hour), I had a 5 minute video of really solid information, while also being mildly entertaining. 

Now all I have to do is post my first video to the world. Oh boy… 

The Results (CHA-CHING!)

First things first, I uploaded the video to YouTube. I personally love YouTube as the home of my videos, because they are so easily accessible and shareable to everyone. 

At this point, I actually had three leads lined up for meetings that week. All three of them had questions about raw footage, so instead of me writing out a huge email to each of them explaining what it was, I sent them the video instead. I believe one of them responded with a “thanks, I’ll check it out.” and the others didn’t respond at all. Not exactly encouraging.

But that week, I met with all 3 potential clients, we discussed details about their weddings, and then I asked the big question. “Did you get a chance to check out that video I sent you on raw footage?” 

“Oh my gosh that was super helpful!!” was the response from each bride, more or less.

But one bride went on even further. She said to me, while visibly glowing, “your video was super helpful, it convinced me to not get the raw footage, and I felt so much better about meeting you in person, because you seemed so easy to talk to on your video. I knew you weren’t some creep haha!” 

She also went on to say that she already knew that she was booking me before our meeting because she already liked me and trusted me from the video. 

At this point I’m really trying to keep my cool while I’m in the meeting with her, but in my head I’m like “HOLY SHIT THIS WORKS I NEED TO KEEP MAKING MORE OF THESE VIDEOS!!”

And as the next week progressed, I saw signed contract after signed contract come in, and checks to soon follow. HOT DAMN that was a good week. And it was all from a single piece of video content that answered the burning question of “do I need raw wedding footage?”

Wrap Up

So after breaking down why I decided to make my first video, how I actually made the video, and of course reaping the benefits of said video, I can confidently say that this style of video content is the future. Even in 2021, making videos like these is going to catapult your business further than you can even imagine. I know I certainly wasn’t expecting making over $10,000 in one week. And since then, I have continued answering those burning questions in my videos, adding to the library of genuinely helpful video content- resulting in becoming the leading expert in my industry. 

Have you started answering your people’s burning questions using video content? If so, tag me on social media @kristiangolick via Instagram, LinkedIn, Twitter, or Facebook. And if you want to learn more about how to use video to amp up your business, then make sure you check out and subscribe to my YouTube channel!