- The Attention Letter
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- i just fired my 5M subscriber team (so should you)
i just fired my 5M subscriber team (so should you)
Your editor is ruining your videos.
Not because they're bad people. Because they're asking the wrong question.
After investigating MrBeast's $500M operation,
I found their leaked training documents.
Here's how they actually work:
They maintain databases of successful past-video’s retention graphs.
Every cut that works gets catalogued. Every sound effect. Every visual trigger.
They run this through their video’s transcript to predict drops before they happen.
90% of viewer drop-offs occur at transition points, silence gaps, or repetitive visuals.
They add sound effects 2 seconds BEFORE predicted drops.
Not after people leave.
Where to find them:
Don't look for "video editors."
Look for YouTube analytics nerds.
Data visualization geeks who want to learn.
The training process:
Hire technical editors from communities and especially, courses.
$100-$150 per video.
Put them through "Retention Bootcamp."
Two weeks analyzing nothing but retention graphs.
Until they can predict drops before they happen.
Three creators I tracked did this:
Creator #1: 2:14 average watch time → 4:32 average watch time
Creator #2: $3K monthly revenue → $21K monthly revenue
Creator #3: 180K views per video → 1.8M views per video
All in 60 days.
The algorithm rewards retention above everything else.
Every extra second of watch time = 3-5% more revenue.
Stop hiring editors who make pretty videos.
Start hiring Retention Architects who make addictive videos.
Daniel Faraday