Mastering YouTube Shorts: Viral Secrets from 18-Year-Old Creator Jenny Hoyos

In the last few years, YouTube Shorts have emerged as a powerful tool for content creators to reach massive audiences.

Recently, the Creator Science Podcast featured an interview with Jenny Hoyos, an 18-year-old YouTuber who has cracked the code on short-form content.

With over 600 million views in the past year and an average of 10 million views per video, Jenny’s insights are invaluable for aspiring creators.

Today we learn her strategies for crafting viral YouTube shorts ideas.

The Art of Making Anything Go Viral

Jenny believes that with the right approach, any topic can be transformed into viral content. She confidently states:

“I think you can make a video about anything.“

Jenny emphasizes the importance of making content personal and relatable:

“I think my content is very personality-based, I’d say. So for me, making it personal makes them invested.”

She provides an example of how she applies this concept:

“I’ll give you an example. I actually did this in a long form in the video ‘I cooked for strangers to make money.’ Okay, very baseline.

Why should they care? Well, my kitchen is broken, and I want to raise money for it by cooking and making money.

You know, it’s ironic. Like, I’m my kitchen’s broken, so in order to fix it, I have to cook to make money. So I think that’s what makes people invested, having like some sort of personal why or goal.“

Jenny’s key takeaways for making content go viral:

• Make your content personal
• Create a relatable story
• Add an element of irony or unexpected twist
• Give viewers a reason to care about your journey

Crafting the Perfect Short

Jenny shares her insights on what makes good YouTube shorts ideas:

“To me, a good short is one that has a strong hook. The way I like to explain it is if it could be used as a title in thumbnail on a long form and like it will still get clicks, then it’ll work for a short.”

She emphasizes the importance of visual appeal and simplicity:

“The hook needs to be very visual. You need to understand it without even listening to it, and it needs to be so simple, like so simply said. Like you said, explain to a 5-year-old.”

Jenny’s criteria for a good short include:

• A strong, visual hook
• A simple, easy-to-understand concept
• A story that keeps viewers engaged throughout
• Re-watchability factor

The Hook: Where It All Begins

When it comes to creating hooks, Jenny has a unique approach:

“I like to see shorts as if I’m making like a long form. So like, I will sketch like almost as if it’s title and thumbnails.

So like, I have my iPad, and I draw like what would I visually want it to look like, what are different ways if I was to put it together, what would that look like.”

Her process for creating hooks:

1. Sketch visual ideas
2. Imagine different ways to present the concept
3. Focus on making the visual element strong
4. Craft a concise accompanying message

The Importance of Readability

Jenny revealed an interesting aspect of her content creation process – using readability checkers:

“I’ll put it in a readability checker and then make sure that it’s actually like understandable to at least like fifth grade or under.”

She explains the reasoning behind this:

“I have analyzed thousands of shorts as you may know. So I’ve like scraped, you know, the scripts of a bunch of shorts, and I’ve put it in this readability checker.

And I’ve noticed that the most popular shorts, especially Mr. Beast… his is like in first-grade level.”

Key points about readability:

• Aim for a fifth-grade reading level or lower
• Use simple language and avoid complex terms
• Explain concepts in easy-to-understand ways
• Be aware that certain words can significantly change the readability score

Retention and Re-watchability: The Keys to Success

Contrary to popular belief, Jenny found that retention might not be as crucial as many think. Instead, she focuses on two key metrics:

1. Scroll-through rate
2. Re-watchability

Jenny explains:

“The average scroll-through rate, which is basically like on YouTube shorts, you can see what percentage… of people viewed versus swiped away.

And I like to call it scroll-through rate. But the average scroll-through rate is like 70%. You want to get that as high as possible. My personal scroll-through rate is like 85%.”

She adds an interesting insight about retention:

“My average retention is 90-85%. If only 85% of people are watching it, how does the retention subtly get to 95%? It’s because they’re rewatching it.”

Jenny’s benchmarks for success:

• Aim for a 90% retention rate or higher
• Strive for an 85% scroll-through rate
• Encourage re-watches to boost overall retention

Crafting the Perfect First Frame

The first frame of a short is critical for grabbing viewers’ attention. Jenny shared her strategy for creating visually appealing and easily recognizable first frames:

“I have this series where I remake fast food items for a dollar. Instead of like showing my face, I show the location.

show the front of the location because obviously like more people know the fast food location than they know me.”

She describes her visual layout:

“Usually, it’s so funny, I would have the logo in the middle, and then I’ll put the food item here, and then right in the middle, I’ll put like ‘$1 burrito,’ ‘$1 sandwich,’ ‘$1 Burger.’ So then it’s like you perfectly see it, it’s always perfectly aligned, and it really helps for bingability too.”

Key elements of a strong first frame:

• Show recognizable elements (e.g., fast food restaurant logos)
• Display the key concept prominently
• Maintain consistent framing across videos for brand recognition
• Make it visually appealing and easy to understand at a glance

Continuous Improvement Through Analysis

Jenny’s success comes from her dedication to analyzing and improving her content. She regularly studies thousands of shorts from successful creators and analyzes her own performance:

“I did my own little experiment. Like when I knew I wanted to get into shorts, I told myself I was going to upload every day for as long as possible… When I was doing that quantity, I would analyze my retention graph.”

She shares a specific example of how this analysis led to improvement:

“There was one video, after 5 days, I got, I think it was like 50,000 views in 5 days, right? Which I, on average, I usually get like a million.

So I was not happy with the performance. And I pulled up the retention graph, and I noticed on the last second, it was a huge dip.

It was 70%, 1 second later it was 45%, like a 20-25% drop in 1 second. And the retention was 83%.

So what I did was I went to YouTube Studio, I trimmed off that one second… Just by removing that one second at the end, it went from 83% to 88%, and the video went flying.”

Jenny’s approach to content analysis and improvement:

• Regularly analyze retention graphs
• Pay attention to every second of your shorts
• Be willing to make small adjustments for big improvements
• Learn from both successful and underperforming videos

The Path to Viral Success For All YouTube Shorts Ideas

Creating viral content on YouTube Shorts is a combination of creativity, strategy, and persistence. Jenny Hoyos has demonstrated that with the right approach, even young creators can achieve massive success on the platform.

By focusing on compelling stories, strong hooks, simple language, and data-driven improvements, you too can increase your chances of creating successful YouTube Shorts.

Remember Jenny’s words of wisdom:

“Every second counts on a short, like every single second.”

By applying these insights and continuously refining your approach, you’ll be well on your way to mastering the art of YouTube Shorts and potentially reaching millions of viewers with your content.

(Source: Creator Science Podcast with Jay Clouse and Jenny Hoyos)