How Much Do We Trust YouTube Stars?

[noorth]

Maybe it’s experience or maturity but new product hype is a huge turnoff for me. Especially when the product is functionally the same as a product I already have. The real game changers come maybe once a decade. Take a look at your process, what’s changed in the last 20 years? Coatings, maybe clay mitts/sponges.

Everything else has been around with incremental changes. The hype around polishers has been unreal, you’d think before last year you couldn’t polish paint. And everyone seems to ignore the fact that paint is crazy thin now.

If you are a pro, it absolutely makes sense to try new things as you run out of your favorites. But for the hobby detainers it’s a cycle of hope and regret in an attempt to fill some void. People spend all the time on the product search instead of enjoying the actual art of detailing. Sorry for the philosophical rant but it’s just a look back at all the time and money I’ve personally wasted on hype.

Fool me once shame on you, fool me twice shame on me. lol

I really pulled in my spending the last few years personally. Coatings for me are dead, which are very expensive for instance and you don`t need 10 different towels. TRC 365 is one of my favorites and a good drying towel. 365 can do nearly everything besides drying. They are similar to carpro`s 2 face towel IMO which are very expensive. They are better quality however, They hold up longer.

Good point on thin clear coat. For new cars you probably shouldn`t be fooling around with aggressive wool/microfiber pads with heavy compounds anymore, not driveway detailers anyhow like myself.

[Setec Astronomy]

I had a lot of thoughts about what Dan said, and maybe I will express them, but getting back on topic there was a lot of hype around the Stoner odorless iron remover, that got shot down pretty quickly in YouTube land (as far as it not working as well as the smelly iron removers and staining concrete), so it still may be that "the community" sets the record straight on Idrosave, if it winds up being more hype than substance.

[Fishing]

The Junkman 2000 circa 2012 videos is what got me into polishing. His older videos I find to be educational and entertaining at the same time and bring me back to the basics. I find that I do search out others but it is mostly for "How to " type of things when I don`t know how to do something,,,,which is often. I am cautious when it comes to them recommending product brands.

[Setec Astronomy]

You guys have to explain something to me. I don`t watch a lot of YouTube videos, in general. I find a lot of people simply don`t know what they are talking about. Just for a trip down memory lane, remember back when there was no YouTube? I remember when Mike Phillips (back in the Meguiar`s days) first teamed up with Richard Lin, whose day job was videographer, to make the first detailing videos. That was a combination of a high-level corporate detailing product trainer, who teamed with someone with the right equipment and expertise to shoot and edit video.

At the beginning of YouTube, there was a time limit, IIRC it was 7 minutes, so posters had to be succinct, and they had to be able to edit their videos. Today, any yo-yo with a cell phone can put a video on YouTube, and why should he bother to edit it, if you have to watch stuff that should have been edited out, his statistics and income are better.

But here`s the point I`ve been trying to get to--for whatever reason I have been watching a lot more detailing videos in the past couple of weeks, and I have seen more detailers with discount codes (last night I watched a minute of a demo of the new Meg`s ceramic AIO, and this gentleman had 9 different discount codes posted below, some for detailing products, some for energy drinks, and some for...other stuff?). This gentleman, like some others, did not seem shy in saying the quiet part out loud that he made money from you watching his video and also using his discount codes.

Also, everyone seems to have a podcast, and during the podcast, people are GIVING THEM MONEY. This is the world upside down to me, some of you don`t remember a world before cable TV, but back in the "antenna" days, we used to get TV for free. The tradeoff was, we had to watch commercials, because that advertising revenue was how the station paid for the programming. Then came cable, that we had to pay for, and...well, we still had to watch commercials, but that seemed like a fair trade for the better reception from cable. Then came paid cable channels, and for darn sure we weren`t going to pay for commercials on that!

So explain to me the concept of a YouTube detailer with a podcast, that I`m watching interspersed with commercials that I have to click out of, I`m bombarded by sidebar advertising and suggestions, I`m bombarded when I go to my free email by ads related to what I was watching on YouTube, the podcaster is getting paid by YouTube for me being willing to be bombarded by those ads in order to watch his podcast, and on top of all that, PEOPLE ARE GIVING THEM MONEY??? In some cases $20??

I don`t get it; PT Barnum comes to mind. I still have more thoughts on the intersection of social media and forums, and what that means for the future of this site, maybe a separate thread. I`ll note that I have not seen any of these detailers with a discount code for Autopia Car Care or Autogeek.

Ok, I can`t hold it in--this is the same question that was asked years ago about Facebook, when people started to ask "how does Facebook make so much money when it`s a free service??" and the answer became clear that Facebook was able to provide highly effective microtargeting information that advertisers were willing to pay a lot of money for. Kind of like in the old days when companies like Griot`s would buy mailing lists from car magazines to send catalogs for detailing supplies to car magazine subscribers, which was a lot more cost-effective than just sending catalogs out to everyone. Anyway, the question was--would you pay for Facebook in order to use it without ads? The answer was of course, no.

I think this has come up with detailing forums--would you pay to participate in a forum that was not beholden to sponsors, that would allow you to talk about any product, if this forum went away? Would the 3 of you who held up your hands be able to pay enough to do it? Not holding my breath. Maybe my next column (ha ha) will be about the democratization of information that was the promise of the internet, that flopped. I`d say we are more manipulated by advertising and advertisers, and people with lots of money who want to manipulate us, then we have ever been.

If you liked this post please send money to setecastronomy @ areyoufreakingkiddingme .com

[Desertnate]

So explain to me the concept of a YouTube detailer with a podcast, that I`m watching interspersed with commercials that I have to click out of, I`m bombarded by sidebar advertising and suggestions, I`m bombarded when I go to my free email by ads related to what I was watching on YouTube, the podcaster is getting paid by YouTube for me being willing to be bombarded by those ads in order to watch his podcast, and on top of all that, PEOPLE ARE GIVING THEM MONEY??? In some cases $20??

From what I understand the economics of podcasts and Youtube video`s are terrible until you get a massive following.

Very often on the podcasts, unless the podcaster is reading their own content, the adds you`re hearing are inserted by the podcast platform hosting environment and/or production company and none of that revenue goes to the actual person doing the pod cast. The add copy they read themselves is usually for sponsors who pay the person doing the podcast.

Youtube isn`t much different. Under a certain subscription level, Youtube won`t even put adds in the video, so the only way to generate revenue is from sponsorship via discount codes or embedded adds. Once you cross over a threshold high enough to have YouTube insert adds into your videos, the owners of the contents get fractions of pennies for each time their video is played. If the video creator wants to generate any revenue at all, the only way to make it viable to even cover production costs most of the time is via discount codes tied to corporate sponsorship and/or individual sponsorship from viewers/fans via platforms like Patreon.

For people who want to make videos and podcasts their full time income it takes huge amounts of add revenue and sponsorship to make it happen. Even those who have other income, but want to simply cover material/production costs need something on the side because the platform hosts likely going to pay very little, unless your massively popular.

All that to say some people value the content someone is making and are willing to contribute to keep more coming.

[Setec Astronomy]

Well, I was watching the podcasts on YouTube, with commercials. I mean, I get it, I just think it`s a hell of a way to run a railroad. I realize these are people running businesses out of their houses, and they are trying to supplement their income, but it`s like everyone wants to be a media star, rather than a detailer. And if they get to a point, as you say, where they have a "massive following" and are making decent money from YouTube, are they going to tell their listeners "please don`t donate any money to me, I get plenty from YouTube now"? Yeah, I thought not. Maybe this is just the gig economy at work, and I need to adjust my perspective. I`m still railing at the term "financial industry".

[Setec Astronomy]

With all due respect to The Guz, I just watched the first half of his review of Idrosave, and after doing 2 doors on a not-too-dirty coated vehicle, proclaimed it the best polymer rinseless on the market. After 2 doors?

He offered up a different channel`s discount code for the product, which was interesting.

[Nav45]

A lot of the Youtube channels are salesmen who also happen to detail. This means that they have to hype the new products and they also cannot be too harsh on the various companies, especially the ones that offer them discount codes. So it is up to the consumer to realize that the Youtube channel might not be unbiased due to personal gain. And the hyping up of products is how they sustain and grow their channels.

After all, would you be negative towards a product that will help make you money if it sells? Also, would you be negative towards a product knowing that the company might not be willing to work with you due to that negative review?

So you have a lot of detailing companies that work with Youtube channels to promote and market their products. Might this not lead to biased reviews or am I being too harsh?

[Nav45]

With all due respect to The Guz, I just watched the first half of his review of Idrosave, and after doing 2 doors on a not-too-dirty coated vehicle, proclaimed it the best polymer rinseless on the market. After 2 doors?

He offered up a different channel`s discount code for the product, which was interesting.

It`s weird that now we have categories of rinseless that we award prizes to, rather than just rinseless. I guess the Youtube channels don`t want some companies to feel left out. I get it, the latest and greatest get the attention but I am not impressed by Idrosave. And if you check comments on one of the channels, there are people having spotting issues. The other rinseless products don`t have these issues but they are not the latest and greatest anymore.

[Nav45]

The Junkman 2000 circa 2012 videos is what got me into polishing. His older videos I find to be educational and entertaining at the same time and bring me back to the basics. I find that I do search out others but it is mostly for "How to " type of things when I don`t know how to do something,,,,which is often. I am cautious when it comes to them recommending product brands.

I used to love watching Junkman back in the day when he made a lot more detailing content than he makes now. He taught me a lot and was very entertaining. And he wasn`t a salesman, just a good teacher.

[Setec Astronomy]

After all, would you be negative towards a product that will help make you money if it sells? Also, would you be negative towards a product knowing that the company might not be willing to work with you due to that negative review?

So you have a lot of detailing companies that work with Youtube channels to promote and market their products. Might this not lead to biased reviews or am I being too harsh?

No, you`re not being harsh, I think these were the points I was making with this thread. Or in other words, we can trust these YouTubers to give us the straight skinny, just as long as it`s ok with their sponsors or doesn`t cost them any views.

I am not impressed by Idrosave. And if you check comments on one of the channels, there are people having spotting issues. The other rinseless products don`t have these issues but they are not the latest and greatest anymore.

I didn`t have any spotting problems, but I wash and dry section by section. To me this is just best practice for rinseless. I would guess the spotting has something to do with the amount of *secret sauce* that`s in Idrosave, what makes it slick and leaves protection behind, my car was shedding water pretty well today in the rain.

[Setec Astronomy]

Well, DMS put up a video yesterday to "prove" that Idrosave doesn`t spot. He seemed to be trying to debunk some initial impressions about Idrosave spotting, and I guess something about it getting stinky if you leave dirty solution in a closed bucket.

I don`t know about you, I`m pretty cheap, but I pour my dirty rinseless wash solution out after I`m done. I don`t even do multiple cars with the same bucket, I mix a fresh one for each car. So the main thrust of the video seemed to be letting Idrosave dry on a couple of windows, then coming back and spraying the "spots" down and then wiping dry, to prove that you can wipe off the spots. IMO the video was a waste of time and was an odd kind of "does not!" defense of criticisms of "the best polymer rinseless". He who doth protest too much.

But I kind of get the idea that some people try and rinseless wash a whole car before they dry? And then complain about getting spots? If you do a conventional wash you keep flooding the car so nothing dries before you are done and can dry the whole car, so you don`t get water spots. When you do a rinseless, you wash a panel or two at a time, and then you dry those panels, so you don`t get water spots. To me, a better video would have been "best practice" rinseless wash techniques, instead of some questionable defense of Idrosave specifically. Unless these people get so wrapped up in the comments about their videos that their ego demands they defend themselves (vs. defending the product).

[Bill D]

They get too wrapped up in making their videos that their whole lives revolve around them.

[wannafbody]

There is a difference between someone who is testing a product and someone who is being paid to promote a product. Even if a person posts a link they get paid something from someone using the link for a purchase.