Sydney Week With Matt D'Avella

Josh: Wait a minute! Frostface! The Daily Talk Show, a conversation sometimes worth recording with Josh Janson and Tommy Jensen. It's The Daily Talk Show episode 245 with special guest the Sydney Opera House, which is behind us.

Matt: Amazing.

Josh: And Matt DiBello.

Matt: Legendary. One of them is legendary. Exactly.

Tommy: It's not me. Yeah, pick the one.

Josh: One's old as fuck and made of steel, and the others also made of steel.

Tommy: Uh, Matty Vella, last time we had you on the podcast was when we were in Los Angeles.

Matt: Yep.

Tommy: West Hollywood.

Matt: Yeah, it was a pretty good one.

Josh: You're a long way from West Hollywood.

Matt: Yeah, no, I feel good. You know what, honestly, I feel burnt right now having been out in the sun all day.

Josh: You were just badmouthing our ozone layer a moment ago.

Matt: It's not the best ozone layer. It might be the worst, actually.

Josh: Well, do we know anything?

Tommy: What do you guys know about the ozone layer?

Matt: I want to say not much. So hopefully somebody else—

Josh: It's got holes in it.

Matt: Yeah.

Josh: That's what I hear.

Matt: And well, I mean, what's interesting actually is that you guys with your private schools, a lot of them— I don't know if this is public school as well, but they all wear the hats. And you have to wear your hat when you're outside. We did not have that.

Tommy: The flap at the back?

Matt: Yeah, to cover up all the skin. And we don't have that.

Josh: Yeah, it's pretty serious, I think, the issues with it. And what it can do to your body.

Tommy: What is the US school system like? We see the Hollywood version, the college, the lockers, the— sorry, not college, you know, the quintessential high school.

Josh: Cafeterias.

Tommy: Cafeterias.

Matt: Yeah, I think you always have a difference between public and private school. And I don't have a lot of experience with private school, having grown up in a public. But yeah, I think it's not the best. You know, I think a lot of the criticisms that people make about it not preparing you for the real world can be true.

Josh: Can you explain where we are, TJ?

Matt: Yeah, maybe we should do that first.

Josh: We're at a place called Opera Bar, which is on the water, on the Sydney Harbour. It's like one of the best spots. So it's like one of the biggest tourist traps as far as a restaurant and a bar, but it's like one of the best views. So we're drinking beers. There's a lot of tourist photos happening.

Tommy: $10 a beer isn't too bad though, or is it?

Matt: Is that what it was? Yeah, it was $20 clean.

Tommy: That's not a tourist trap, I don't think.

Matt: It's a biggish beer.

Josh: And so yeah, it's good beer. So it's a great spot. We're in one of the most quintessential Sydney locations available to us. And so yeah, this is us.

Tommy: Back to the high school thing. On a serious note, Columbine, do you remember? What do you remember of that when you were growing up?

Matt: I was, I think, in 8th grade, which would be middle school. So that's right before you would go away to high school. I remember coming home and my mom having it on the TV. It was really the first school shooting that I recall. There probably could have been one-offs, but this was the first mass shooting in a school, and I think it was scary, and it was like the start of obviously a massive epidemic of repeats and other people doing the same thing, and like us having bomb threats at my own middle school where somebody wrote that they were gonna pipe bomb the cafeteria, and then the entire school gets off for the next 2 days, and then they bring the kid in for interrogation, and it's like a little bit unnerving. But at the same time, as much as it is in the media and all over the news, it's very rare. And it's like getting hit by lightning, you know what I mean? It's very unlikely that it's actually going to happen to you and your school.

Tommy: But it seems like what's happening now is it's like more and more people are getting hit by lightning. There's more and more cases of it happening. Or do you think that we're just hearing about it more?

Matt: Uh, I think that like, I mean, obviously there is more cases of school shootings. That's definitely more and more prominent. But like, like I mean, gun control is such an interesting topic, especially considering Australia versus America. Definitely totally different approaches to it.

Josh: Yeah.

Matt: But I think obviously in terms of gun control— and now this podcast just got very political.

Josh: I'll take it somewhere else after this.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, please. Take yourself home.

Josh: Let's let you go home.

Matt: I think I've gotten into arguments with Australians about this because I'm kind of in the middle and I'm very apolitical. I usually don't really take a political stance and I can actually see both sides. Something that we were talking about earlier today is just this idea of there is, uh, there's probably truth in both, on both fronts. And the one is that like shootings in general and like gun violence is largely people using guns on themselves and it's usually handguns. And it's like even if you got rid of all the automatic assault rifles, you'd still have a lot of problems with gun violence. And it's like, so how do you actually solve that problem? Uh, and getting rid of all the guns, that's what Natalie, my partner who is an Australian, she says, just get rid of all of them. Yeah. I was like, okay, you go around to all these people down south that have guns, stockpiles of guns, and then you go and take their guns away. You're not going to be able to take them away.

Josh: It's not, it's not built into the amendment here in Australia. And one of our, one of our prime ministers just said, yep, we're taking them all back, we're buying them back off you, you can't do anything about it. We're taking most of the really lethal guns off, off the market. So That was a cutting ties moment, which I think Australians just go, why don't you fucking do that? Yeah, in America. Yeah, dude, I like— I even when I was in Texas, like out, out, out in the— I was gonna say out in the outback, but it's not the outback, it's the American version of the outback, middle of nowhere, Middle America. My mate, we were driving and my mate had no top on and tried to go in to pay for our petrol. They said Nah, you can't come in. And then these two dudes in singlets that looked like they basically had no tops on with huge guns on their hips just were allowed to walk in. It's like, you're allowed the gun on your hip, but you're not allowed the shirt. You're not allowed to come in here if you don't have a shirt on. Yeah, it was like, wow. And they were laughing about it too. We'll say it, they're just like, that's so funny.

Matt: Yeah, like a massive hypocrisy. And that's the same thing like you see in schools with like, uh, clothing regulation, and your skirt can only be so high, and yet the cheerleaders walk in and their skirts have to be like super short, which are shorter than regulation. It's like, it's just, I think hypocrisy like that is crazy.

Josh: It's confusing times.

Tommy: What did you wear in high school?

Matt: A skirt. Cheerleading outfit.

Josh: Cheerleader vibes.

Matt: Obviously.

Tommy: Actually, no, dude, I did do cheerleading for a day.

Matt: I did do cheerleading for a day because I guess one school game out of the year, the cheerleaders would pick a guy to cheerlead with them.

Tommy: Yeah.

Matt: And I was like, this is my shot. This is where I'm going to get in with the cheerleaders, which were not very desirable. But yeah, they weren't very— they're not very desirable. No, it wasn't like Bring It On. It wasn't where like the cheerleaders were like, like the coolest girls in the school.

Tommy: What were they like?

Matt: They were like the aspiring dancers. Yeah, they— yeah. And like there was like the flag people that like spun the flags around on poles.

Tommy: Yeah. So what would you actually wear though? I'm curious.

Josh: Are you serious?

Matt: Yeah, I would wear—

Tommy: well, because I feel like when I was a kid, In high school, I used to think, man, if I would have casual dress days where you could wear whatever you want.

Josh: So you're saying— so paint the picture of what you thought school was and then see if Matt can just say—

Tommy: well, I just thought high school was like you could wear whatever you want. Like, you didn't— when I grew up, I had school uniforms. I went to a public school, like, just a sort of a povoh shit school. And so we still had to wear school uniforms. It wasn't blazers or anything. It was just like wearing a polo shirt and pants. But when you look at the US and you see like Nickelodeon.

Josh: So the movies.

Tommy: Yeah, the movies, they're wearing like I Would Be the Hawaiian Shirt guy.

Josh: It's like kids rocking up to school, 16, driving to school by themselves.

Tommy: Was that what was going on?

Matt: Well, I think that if you were to look at me, the only thing that you would see is hair. Because I know, honestly, if you looked at my prom photos, it was crazy. Like legit, like this huge bullet cut with the bucket cut with the hair frayed at the sides all around. Like I had a natural like rim.

Josh: No straightener work?

Matt: I don't know. I don't know. I think it was just too long and I had no idea what to do with it and I was just too afraid to cut it. And it wasn't until like after college really that I finally cut my hair.

Tommy: So what did you wear?

Matt: I wore jeans.

Tommy: Yeah.

Matt: Usually it was casual. Yeah, yeah. A baggier jeans. It wasn't actually— there was no uniform. Baggier clothes, baggier pants, and then usually like a graphic t-shirt. Were you into something witty on it? Like, "Chicks dig me," with little chickens.

Tommy: Were you into it like the music scene? Like with that fringe, were you into like screamo?

Matt: No. I was like into Limp Bizkit, Blink-182, The Offspring. Yeah, The Offspring were good, but that was just like more from knowing. I wasn't like a fan.

Tommy: Green Day?

Matt: Green Day. Yeah, I wasn't actually that big into music, and I think it's because my parents weren't big into music.

Tommy: Okay, sure.

Matt: And I feel like there's You know, like I never listened to the Beatles until I was in college because like, I feel like my parents just didn't let me know that there was music there. It's very sad.

Tommy: Do you remember your first CD?

Matt: I think it was like TLC. I don't know why. I think I bought it for my sister. She sold it to me.

Josh: Did you have that, Josh? TLC?

Tommy: I don't think so.

Josh: That was a big one.

Matt: TLC.

Tommy: Don't Go Chasing Waterfalls.

Josh: There was like Hot Hits CDs that had like the top, top song.

Tommy: Like So Fresh.

Josh: So Fresh.

Tommy: Yeah.

Matt: Yeah. We had a couple of those, like the top 100 tracks of the year or whatever.

Josh: So since we last saw you, bits changed or nothing's changed?

Matt: Yeah, it depends who you ask.

Josh: Yeah, well, I'll ask you, has anything changed?

Matt: I have more subscribers on YouTube.

Josh: A lot more.

Matt: A lot more. I think, yeah, last time we saw each other I was around like 200, and then since then I'm at clean 740. My last cheque this morning. No, but it's been like the growth on my channel has been crazy, which like I guess just on the surface level things have changed. I think it's just like the same thing, but just at a little bit of a larger scale. A little bit more people are watching and paying attention to my videos than were in the past, but generally similar content.

Tommy: And you, you don't have ads?

Matt: No ads, yeah, haven't turned.

Tommy: Have you worked out what sort of cash you'd be making if you had ads?

Matt: I don't know, it's hard to say because it's like, it really depends on who's creating it. But I think since my content is pretty high quality and it's pretty safe, it's not like I'm talking about gun control. I do stay away from those topics in my videos, uh, mainly because I have no idea what I'm talking about.

Tommy: And I think that's like I don't—

Matt: not that I know that much of what I'm talking about when it comes to like self-development stuff, but I feel like I have more of a ground to stand on.

Tommy: Well, it's like your naivety level. Is it like we're just a little bit more naive in regards to like, I know way less about this stuff, so my comfort level of talking about it is super fine, whereas probably because you live in a country where it's actually a thing, it's probably less Unless something you want to talk about.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, right. It's just because it's like so volatile and it's very hard to talk about anything within politics because it's like people get very upset if you don't agree with them 100%, which is the craziest thing. And I think that the most interesting thing about like 2018, 2019 is this idea of identity politics and like people just being like, okay, I'm liberal, so therefore I have all these beliefs that all line up with me. And it's like, eh, I don't think it really should be like that. But in terms of— what was the question?

Josh: The question is, how do you feel? And I think it's— but maybe that is, are you thinking differently about what you're putting into the video based on how many more people are watching now?

Tommy: Do you have to be more vanilla?

Matt: No, not at all. No. And I think that's like— I've lost a lot of subscribers by like not being— I'm not like crazy, but I'm like a curse. And I try to be myself as much as I can in my videos.

Josh: Were these people before? People have signed up and gone, oh, hang on.

Matt: I think it's— you're always getting like a certain amount of people that are leaving. And I think like any time— like when we did our podcast together, I said cunt in it. Yeah.

Josh: And you said it again.

Matt: And I did it again right here. But I probably lost a few people from seeing that. I don't know, like legitimately.

Tommy: I like to think that our dislike rate was only higher because of you dropping the C-bomb and nothing to do with us.

Matt: Was it higher? The ratio?

Tommy: I've got like, what is it called, vidIQ. VidIQ will show you like the tags that people used within videos, all the analytics.

Matt: Well, it's not fair because it is a podcast and the podcasts on my channel don't do as well as the rest of my videos.

Josh: There is so many, I mean, with the more, with higher attention brings more trolls or people willing to just talk shit on your channel. There was one guy that wrote on there and was blowing up about how you're pushing to make money through Patreon or have people donate and support you creating this stuff because it's all ad-free. But then he was going so hard on that in one comment, and then another comment down, he'd watched the whole thing. He got to the end and then was like commenting on the content of the actual podcast, which was like an hour long. Yeah, so it's like he was complaining about how you're pushing for people to support you to create more of these, but then watches the whole fucking thing.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, I actually, I think maybe in the beginning I was a little bit more worried about like trolls or haters or people that would like talk shit on you. But now it doesn't bother me at all. I mean, like, I think there's like an immediate kind of cringe to it when you see it. You're like, oh yeah, because like you're reading— I gotta say, the one thing that is amazing about the comments that I've noticed from my videos is that everybody's super positive and nice, and I'm like, this is amazing. And I'm like reading 20 comments of everybody being super supportive and positive, and then it's just this one shithead. I'm like, ah, you shit.

Tommy: Like, but then spoil it.

Matt: But I actually think it's important to to see that and to be okay with it because people get too caught up in living in their own bubble of like thinking that they're the shit and everything they say is gospel. And I think it's nice to see that. And it also strengthens your arguments because if somebody actually has a good point, even if they're a hater, no matter where it comes from, I'm like, huh, maybe like I didn't do a good enough job articulating my point in this video. And like, I got that in a Black Friday video I made where I think somebody was saying how like 'Oh, this guy's just blaming it all on corporations, that people buy shit.' And I'm like, that's— if you watch the whole video, I clarify that, that I'm like, we need to take responsibility for ourselves. At the same time, I'm willing to look at that argument objectively and be like, well, did— does he have a point? Did I not do a good enough job with my argument? In what ways can I actually improve it? And in that way, I know that there's a lot of people that shy away from criticism or just say, 'Oh, don't even listen to them, haters are haters.' And then I'm like, eh, You know what, I don't know. I like to look at arguments and I like to sharpen my arguments as best I can.

Josh: If in the last week you've been called a fuckwit by 10 different people, chances are you're probably a fuckwit.

Tommy: Yeah, or you're reaching a lot of people.

Josh: Yeah, true.

Matt: That's true. If you do the numbers, if like, yeah, if it's a significant percentage and a lot of people hate your shit, then you're like, maybe I'm just being a troll.

Josh: But I think if you're willing to put yourself out there and build something. I think there is a level of, yeah, like you said, being okay with people saying something or calling you out for something. I think it's a trade-off.

Matt: Yeah, and I think that when you start creating yourself, you are much less likely to hate on other people because you know what it takes. Yeah, you know how hard it is to put yourself out there and how much vulnerability it takes to really like speak what's on your mind. And I think at that same time, that's why we need to be respectful of each other But then again, if there's an idea that somebody's talking about and you disagree with them, I think it's okay to either talk about that in your own content or to have a discussion with them there. But you just have to be mindful that people are a little bit sensitive.

Josh: I think, Josh, with your blog and our podcast, being okay and solidifying thoughts, like putting stuff out constantly allows you to solidify your thinking on something. And then having those rock-solid thoughts or beliefs on something and sharing that, there's a high chance that it's gonna disrupt or annoy somebody. And I looked at— and I— what Josh is gonna blog now since he's quit social media. Oh yeah, which is a whole other discussion.

Tommy: Josh Hansen.com.

Josh: It's good. He's written some stuff.

Matt: Oh, I've got him on RSS.

Josh: He sends it to me and I say fuck off, you're a fuckwit. No, but he sends it to me and I— the ones that I like the most are the ones that sort of cause a little bit of internal conflict. Conflict where I'm like, people are going to think you're a fuckhead for saying that, and they're not even that bad. Or it's like, I even challenge his thought there, but it's not enough where I've like got a rock-solid fact against what he said. But I was like, that's what I actually like about it.

Tommy: But just having an opinion, being able to actually stand for something, I think has way more cut-through than just sort of like adding heaps of disclaimers and making sure that you're not upsetting people.

Matt: And doesn't it take like when you're writing something to be able to think about the other argument. You're like thinking from the perspective of the viewer, of the reader, of the audience, and saying, will they be able to poke holes in this? Yeah, because like you're trying to prove a point. You're like writing a persuasive essay, and it takes understanding how people might perceive it. And I think if you're like ignorant to that, then you're not gonna be as effective.

Tommy: Absolutely. What was your goals a year ago with the YouTube channel?

Matt: It was to make a living out of it. That was my goal from day one of starting my podcast and my YouTube channel, which was like maybe 2 years ago when I started it. And it was transitioning from freelance filmmaking work, working with clients to doing my own thing, making videos, podcasts. And it seemed like the biggest leap. And it, in a lot of ways it was like just the craziest leap to be able to build an audience and to have them support you financially is wild. And I thought it was I don't know if I— you know, I believed in myself because I, I did it and I went for it. But at the same time, you're like, I don't think this is gonna work.

Tommy: What was the actual journey like? Was there a point where you're like, I don't know if this is gonna be— this is gonna work? Like, and then, yeah, what was that sort of—

Matt: so there was like a bit of an in-between where I'm doing freelance client work, I'm working on a couple final projects, which kind of stretched maybe 4 months into my making of original content. And then I had to just say, alright, this is gonna be— I'm gonna have to do a strong stop on all this client work if I'm really trying to build momentum. If I'm really gonna make this work, I need to actually dedicate 2 years. Like, I had, you know, I feel like you have to set a time period of like how long you're actually gonna give this a shot. Yeah, a full-time shot of not really making any money elsewhere. And I did have some money coming in from minimalism my first documentary, which was paying out quarterly, which gave me, you know, a little bit of money here and there, but it wasn't paying my bills. Yeah, but so it was nice to have that, but at the same time, I was like, all right, I've really got 2 years to make this work. I built up some runway. I stopped doing freelance work about 4 or 5 months in, and then—

Tommy: What does runway look like to you? Do you think there's an equation where it's like 3 months of salary is what you should be aiming for?

Matt: It depends how much risk you can stomach. And I'm not really good with risks.

Tommy: So you had 5 years runway.

Matt: I mean, I legit probably had at least a year to 2 years probably.

Tommy: And is that literally like you work out, it costs me X amount to live a month?

Matt: I wasn't that specific with it. But it was like, all right, yeah, generally, maybe $20,000, $25,000 a year I need for basic expenses. Knowing that Natalie has a job too, and I have a little bit of a security and fallback, and she knows that she can help me out if things get really tough. Yeah, but obviously just like spending a lot less money, but it was like my bank account drained quickly, and I couldn't make the same purchases I used to with camera gear. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like, it's very easy to make upgrades when you're making money. You get a good big job, and you're like, great, now I can upgrade my camera. So I had to like really kind of be tight with things for the beginning.

Tommy: Any hard conversations with Nat around it?

Matt: No, no, I didn't. Yeah, we were— she was like fully supportive from the beginning, although she did just tell me, because I had this moment in the beginning when I was like, Nat, like, I don't know if I should do this. And she's like, I believe in you, you gotta do it, you got— you've been talking about it for so long, you just got to take the jump. And then I just talked to her the other day and she's like, I didn't believe you. Like, I really— I didn't think you were going to be able to do it. I was like, there's no way he's going to be, you know, like be able to build an audience and make money doing it.

Josh: But maybe that's just a realistic partner that is also supportive at the same time. Because I don't think it doesn't make—

Tommy: you couldn't believe in yourself if you didn't know if you could do it. How the fuck can you expect her to?

Josh: Yeah, I think it'd be— you wouldn't be together and engaged if she was like, nah, I don't think you do it either.

Matt: Yeah, or she was so delusional she believed in me. I feel like you— she shouldn't believe in me that much because she knows who I am.

Tommy: She knows you don't want to date a fangirl.

Josh: Yeah, except she's probably spewing you haven't got The Rock yet on your podcast. Yeah, yeah, get The Rock on your podcast. Um, the, the model that you've got, I explain, as in the I guess you could call it— do you look at what you're doing as like, my business model is X? Is that— have you got a description for that? Um, because I look at what you're doing with your Patreon subscribers, I guess it's like a modern-day business model, like freemium. But I, I, I tried to talk— I explained to this guy who is a really big author in Australia, and he's got a huge subscription model business and I was saying, oh, you should cheque out Matt D'Avella. He's made some amazing stuff. And he kind of couldn't wrap his head around the Patreon stuff. And how do you explain that model? Because I think it is new. I, I get it, but it's also— it's very interesting to— my parents would be like, what the fuck? And I could imagine your mum and dad are like, you do what?

Matt: Yeah, how does that work?

Josh: So what— how do you explain how you make money through your content?

Matt: Yeah, so I knew from the beginning that, well, I knew from the beginning that advertising wasn't going to be the best way for me to talk about my content because a lot of it is critical of advertising and it's very hard to not be a hypocrite and get ads while also criticising it. And so that was kind of tough. But although at the same time, I'm not against advertising, I don't think advertising is evil, period, full stop. I think that A lot of advertising is manipulative, and I think a lot of people— oh my God, it's just like polluted Instagram with the sponsored posts, and it's just all over the place where you're like, it's very hard to get like an authentic real post without knowing somebody's actual true intentions behind it.

Tommy: Have you ever been paid for an Instagram post?

Matt: Yeah, no, I haven't. I haven't.

Tommy: I've not—

Matt: I haven't been paid. I haven't done any advertising or any sponsorships on Instagram or anything. I might explore that in the future as just a one-off video type experiment to just sell out for a tonne of money for one Instagram post or one YouTube video. Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Josh: Uh, but just, he's selling spray tan.

Tommy: Yeah, I was just doing the squeegee as a test.

Matt: Yeah. Uh, but I do have a couple videos around that that's just like, just to play around with it and, uh, kind of be a bit ironic and cheeky with it. But, uh, the advertising thing, I wasn't— I was thinking about maybe doing like the Tim Ferriss method, which like his works really well is I will only promote products that I've used, tested, that actually add value to my life. And like, that seems to me to be okay, but also at the same time I was like, let me just give it a shot. Let me just try if I can do without advertising.

Tommy: How do you say that? Packed? So you had a deal with— how did that work? A collab with creating a bag?

Matt: Yeah, so there was this bag called the Packed One, which was a physical product. It was a bag, like a travel bag. And I partnered with them. I got like a small stake, like I want to say like 8% or something, to, uh, of like profit of the production of the bag to make all the video content surrounding it. So it's a partnership, and like, this is the only time I think I would ever do work with a brand is if I'm actually a partner in the project. If I— and it has to be something I believe in, something I care about.

Josh: The 2 years that you'd said No more.

Matt: Yes. So that was like an exception in that it wasn't client work because I was a partner. And I would have actually, when it came down to it, I would have gotten paid a lot more if I had done it as a freelance basis.

Tommy: So in future, if someone was to say, hey, we'll pay you $15,000 to do this video, or we'll give you equity, how do you make the call? How can you actually sort of— work out which makes more sense?

Matt: Right now it's a blanket no to all of that. Just because I know that if I do—

Tommy: It's hard to make profit in those things, right?

Matt: Yeah, I think that the percentage deals is tough because you actually end up putting a lot more work and time and energy into it than you would otherwise. Because you are now a partner and you have to get on every partner phone call and you have to, you know, be talking— like you have to figure out the business logistics and you have to read all the contracts and it takes a lot more work than does just executing on some creative concepts, and you don't feel as tied to it. I think that's why it's more valuable. That's why you should potentially get a bigger stake in the project if you can bring a lot of value to it.

Josh: But yeah, so how do you explain to mom and dad how you make money?

Matt: So it's all through Patreon, which is basically— a lot of people see it as just like a donation site, as a way to just donate and contribute to creators that you care about, that you want to be able to help support.

Tommy: I think it's like GoFundMe.

Matt: Yeah, but it's not quite a GoFundMe because generally he hasn't got his illness. Yeah, some people kind of use it as that. I mean, you have the Sam Harris's who— he recently left Patreon, but he was on it and I don't think he gave— he gave it— he did AMAs. Yeah, where he just did like one podcast a month where he's answering people's questions from Patreon, and he was one of the most popular people on there. So I think it's like basically you're giving somebody content Uh, you're giving these groups content and you can do tiers. So I'll do like, I have a tier that's $4 a month, which is people basically paying to just support my ad-free content. And then you have—

Tommy: that's the equivalent of a GoFundMe. That's basically, yeah, you don't have that much coin, but you want to support me in some way.

Matt: Yes.

Tommy: Do that.

Matt: And then you have the $8 a month, which is I do an AMA once a month, just answering Patreon-only questions. And that's like usually a 50 to 60 minute podcast. And then I have the top tier, which is $12, which is really the main tier and what most people do. And it is videos. I make this video. I'm actually shooting the podcast that we're recording right now, and I'm going to release that as a separate little piece of content.

Josh: Wait, 8%?

Matt: Yeah, 8% of all sales.

Tommy: 8% of profit.

Matt: Yeah, yeah, yeah. His expenses are outrageous. Yeah, the trip here.

Tommy: Yeah. Private planes are expensive.

Josh: Yeah, he's actually paid for every one of these boats in the background to drive fast.

Matt: Here, like, you know, a lot of people think minimalism isn't about about buying things, but a private plane is an experience. It's a physical thing, but it's also an experience. Um, but, uh, yeah, so then it's also just edited videos. It's like behind the scenes content. It's like anything that I wouldn't put on my, uh, actual YouTube channel is in the form. It kind of just gives people more of a behind the scenes look at what my life is like and also how I make my videos. So it is— you're getting something for your money, but then also Patreon is meant to be subscription-based. Yeah, so it's really not about one-off donations. It's about people that want to support you for the long run.

Tommy: What sort of drop-off rate do you have?

Matt: It's pretty good right now, but I mean, I'm still learning because I'm about 4 months into it. Yeah, about from originally starting my Patreon account, and I think at the end of the month, I— you get a little drop-off where I might lose 30 to 40, and I have about 1,000 now at this point.

Tommy: Do you feel weird about people knowing roughly how much money you make?

Matt: Um, no, no, I don't feel weird about it. I think that that's like an interesting conversation just about money. And like, I personally— there's a lot of people that share openly how much money they make and do their financial breakdowns. I feel a little bit uncomfortable about that. It's easy to do when you, when you're only making $20,000, $30,000 a year.

Tommy: Yeah.

Matt: But then obviously people always stack and rank and compare themselves to others. And I wouldn't want people to feel that comparison game where like, oh, I need to make as much as Matt's making.

Tommy: But also, there's that comparison thing of people being like, oh, well, I don't make that much money, so I'm not going to support you based on that. Like, people can then start making the call being like, I think Matt should only be making $5,500 a month, so I'm not going to do it.

Matt: The way that I think I get around that is that if the only reason that you're supporting me is because you're trying to help me pay my bills, and like maybe you yourself don't have the money to contribute— and first of all, just don't contribute if you don't have the money for it. Second of all, uh, like, you did threaten me before.

Tommy: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

Josh: Oh, grab my neck.

Matt: Uh, but then at the same time, I'm like, for me, I feel like I'm providing enough quality content that it justifies people paying for it. So like, it's not just to support my, my living and for me to stay alive buying something.

Tommy: They're paying, and that's, and that's why I guess the GoFundMe thing like just treating it like that can be a little bit weird because people do have a point which is like, yeah, you can get it all on YouTube, but I reckon you do the best Patreon stuff. Like, I support probably a dozen people on Patreon and you're the only person that I like consistently watch the extra material. Really?

Josh: Well, why is that?

Tommy: Well, it's because I feel like I'm actually gaining some insights. So, the behind-the-scenes stuff that you did, like the video breakdown was great, the AMAs are really good. I think that most people see, see how many people they're reaching with Patreon and they're like, I'm only ever, I'm only reaching 200 people, so I'm only going to put that amount of effort. And they put all of their effort into their free content, where I think you've got the balance of I'll watch a video and it's like epic production value, and then I'll look and it's like 150 people are only watching it on your thing. You're still giving it the time and the respect because reality is you're making like $10 grand or whatever from—

Josh: Is that your thinking? Like, you— because you could get 200,000+ on your channel. What's the thinking between making it for 150 people?

Matt: Yeah, well, it is— I mean, honestly, like, it's fucking great because those 150 people are the ones that are paying my salary. So I think for me, it feels— feels just as good to put that amount of effort into it. And I'm somebody that's like, I can't just make a throwaway video. I can't. It's very difficult for me to sit down and edit a video and be like, I'm just gonna make this one shitty.

Tommy: Even, you know, I mean, these and shit look nice. They're all shot well. Yeah, I mean, like, you're shooting on like a MacBook Pro webcam.

Matt: Yeah, I mean, it is. I mean, you know this, like, as a filmmaker, it's like you take a lot of pride in what you do, and it doesn't matter how big the audience is. And I think that, I guess, What I could say that I do is I just keep it very simple and like, some people maybe oversimplify it in that they will say, I don't want to put anything behind a paywall.

Tommy: Yeah.

Matt: And I think that kind of thinking is silly because you're like, well, then you're only going to be able to ever make money through advertising. And there's a lot of ways to make premium content for people that people pay for. You put a lot of time and thought and energy into like videos that are a course. And I think that people should have to pay a premium for that stuff.

Tommy: You tried to do the whole course thing, or you're at the early stages of it?

Matt: Yeah, yeah, I did.

Tommy: But you bailed pretty quick on that.

Matt: I did bail. Yeah, for now.

Tommy: What was the thought process on that?

Matt: It was before I started Patreon. I had a habit course that I was developing that I started to write, and then—

Tommy: Couldn't keep the habit up?

Matt: I couldn't keep the habit. Yeah, yeah, I needed to take a habit course in order to figure out how to keep up my habit course.

Tommy: I think actually first it was a filmmaking course.

Matt: I've had a couple, yeah, different ones that I had played with, I think early on.

Josh: Yeah, yeah. So many people just thought, okay, that's a great way, because I think you can logically make sense of it.

Tommy: Yeah, well, if I have this and I sell it for that, and then I think the guy that works at IGA has thought about creating a mobile video course. You know, everyone's like, it seems like a very common thing. Absolutely.

Josh: How to use your iPhone, how to back up your iPhone. I'd fucking use that. Because I got no idea.

Matt: Yeah, no clue how that works.

Tommy: And so what was the— how far did you get into the course? Did you get the curriculum together?

Matt: Yeah, I got the curriculum, basic things structured, and I started to write maybe 3 or 4 of the episodes or videos. And then I just— and like I set a deadline for it, like, hey guys, sign up for my newsletter.

Tommy: Oh really? When was that?

Matt: And then, yeah, sign up for my newsletter. And then I knew that I had maybe 3 months to put this whole course together. And I just realised like this is going to be really difficult to finish in time because not only am I making all this content that is going live to YouTube and a podcast and a video and all this stuff, then all on top of that, basically I would need to make like a video every other day. It's just, I was like, it was a one-off payment too, was it?

Tommy: Or was it going to be subscription?

Matt: Uh, it was going to be a one-off payment, but I think it comes down to too the fact that There are people out there that I know, they're like, yeah, you just make a course in a week, just whip it together. And I'm like, I don't think I can do that. I can't just like put together shit.

Josh: Look at your success. It's preparation and the years and years of slogging away and then committing to that. So it's like, I see these people that see it as an easy thing, even people with audience. Yeah, I've got a friend who has a big audience and I and he's had that same thinking. And it's— What's the thinking? The thinking of, well, if I've already got an audience and now I just create a course, they'll buy it. And I can sell lots of them.

Tommy: And it's, you know, it's not always as easy. I wish it was. Especially because you need all those things.

Josh: And I think he's offering enough. And so it's hard. How do you— What do you think about how you— the success you've had now and how you could apply it to doing something else?

Matt: Well, I think like the first thing is that it's all about reputation. So you would never want to like half-ass something, or you would want to make sure whatever you're putting out there that has that same kind of quality that people would come to expect from you, the same kind of energy and the output that you have created before. Do you mean like creating something completely different from film or doing like a course?

Josh: So using the principles from what you've learned along the way of building subscribers and the effort you've put into making the 2-year runway now that you don't actually make it work, to make it actually work. What were they?

Matt: Yeah.

Josh: And what could you then take that and apply it like? Do you think it's transferable to something else?

Matt: I think the one, one key is consistency.

Josh: Yeah.

Matt: Is like I set out and I said I'm gonna do a video— well, it was originally podcast every Wednesday, and then a video ended up coming out every Monday. And then I kept that consistency up, especially when things were growing. At that point, actually in the first month of growth, I did 2 videos a week because people didn't know who I was. They were subscribing to me and they were seeing me for the first time, so I felt like I wanted them to see more of me.

Tommy: Is there a risk in that? So say you set up a consistency where it's like once a week and then all of a sudden you say, oh, now that I'm going through this hyper growth, I'm going to do 2 a week. Do you then set yourself up for that being the new expectation?

Matt: It was for a little while, and then eventually I had to just be like, I cannot maintain this.

Tommy: Did you lose anything from doing that, from going back to one?

Matt: No. No, my growth didn't change. My growth, I mean, it only got bigger from doing— I think this is maybe my learning lesson is that there's a lot of the daily vloggers, daily bloggers, whatever, just trying to create lots and lots and lots of content, which is good, I think, in the beginning.

Josh: That's a volume game.

Matt: Yeah, because you're getting better though. You're building up skills a lot quicker than somebody who's doing one a week. But then I think that the best game to play right now 'cause there's so much content out there, it doesn't matter if you're creating more, 'cause there's people, there's 3,000 people just like you that are creating just as much, that are creating the same kind of content. So if you slow down and you're like, I'm gonna make one thing a week, but I'm gonna make it fucking amazing, and I'm gonna continue to make one thing a week for the next 2 years, and continue to build it, and like, granted, I had 10 years of filmmaking experience before heading into this, but everybody's got, if they've built up some experience, some skills, or if they're a graphic designer, they have some kind of skill that they've crafted over the, over the years, or something that they can build through freelance and other work that I think they can kind of hinge on as their thing. But it's like consistency was huge. And then also you do have to have like a bit of gut, or like learn from putting stuff out there. Like I can identify what's working well, and it's a lot of it's common sense, but it's like you just see a video performing well, and you're like, okay, that kind of content works well. How can I then recreate this for a different subject?

Tommy: Yeah.

Josh: Can you be too strategic? Are you wrapping up?

Tommy: Yeah, I'm wrapping up.

Matt: Oh, there it is.

Tommy: Tomorrow, Bondi, Christmas Day. Matt D'Avella, are you joining us?

Matt: I would love to.

Tommy: All right, great. It's The Daily Talk Show. Hi@thedailytalkshow.com if you want to send us an email. D'Avella is joining us throughout the week while we're in Sydney.

Josh: Check out his YouTube channel.

Tommy: Yep.

Matt: Nah.

Josh: Yeah.

Tommy: Yeah. Today Talk Show. Have a good one, guys.

Josh: See you guys.