![[Fully Managed] Auret Esselen from Essetino Media Ep. 73](https://penji.co/wp-content/uploads/2025/04/BLOG-IMAGE-Auret-Esselen.jpg)
Introduction
Daniela: Hello everybody. Welcome to the First 100 Podcast. This is the podcast where we discuss and explore the journey of entrepreneurs, business and agency leaders as they share their strategies, challenges, and triumphs that led them to secure their first 100 customers or followers. I’m your host, Daniela, and I’m Penji’s partnership coordinator. Today I’m joined here with a very special guest, Aurett Esselen. Hi, Aurett, how are you?
Aurett Esselen (AE): Hello. I’m doing great. How about you?
D: Great. Excited to have you on the podcast today. For anybody watching that doesn’t know you, what you do, who you are—can you tell us a little bit about yourself?
Starting Essetino Media
AE: Yeah, sounds good. I’m co-founder of Essetino Media. It’s a business I started with my best friend from high school. We help many different people, but particularly experts, thought leaders, coaches, and consultants—people in the education space. We help them get more visibility online through YouTube strategy and marketing. We manage a handful of YouTube channels. We also do design—websites, course creation and implementation.
We officially started the business in 2010 and started taking our own YouTube channel seriously around 2015. YouTube has been our main marketing source. It’s been so successful that it allowed me to quit my job and spend more time on my other interests. I’m also a music artist. I sing. I’m a multi-passionate creative. YouTube has really allowed us the freedom to grow our business and do what we love. That’s a message we constantly share in our videos and presentations.
D: First of all, congrats on being able to hold a friendship that long. That’s already a feat in itself. I honestly don’t talk to many people I went to high school with. Most of it felt surface-level.
From Scripted Paths to Entrepreneurship
AE: Yeah, and the reason we came together to start this business is because we connected on the fact that we had what I call scripted paths laid out for us. I was on the path to becoming a doctor. My friend—she’s Filipino—was expected to be a nurse. We realized that neither of us were excited about these paths. We were just following motions. So we reconnected after high school and became even closer. We decided to just try building a business, even though we didn’t go to business school. We were self-taught and just committed to figuring it out.
D: That’s incredible. I think it really shows the power of human connection—how much a relationship can evolve and where it can take you.
Helping Business Owners Use YouTube
D: So your focus is more on helping business owners use social media—especially YouTube—for marketing, not necessarily to become influencers, right?
AE: Correct. A lot of our clients want to use social media for marketing but don’t know where to start. Many of them aren’t active on social media personally, which makes it hard. Being familiar with these platforms helps, but if you’re not, it can be intimidating—especially YouTube.
Where to Start as a Beginner
D: What would you suggest as a starting point for someone who’s truly starting from zero? Someone not active on social media, especially YouTube.
AE: First, full transparency—I’m not great at posting on other platforms myself. We’re just now focusing more on Instagram and LinkedIn because we have the resources. We went all in on YouTube. And that’s my first piece of advice: don’t try to be on every platform at once. It’s overwhelming. If you don’t have a team or the time, you’ll spread yourself too thin and get little results while feeling burnt out.
When we started, we tried to be on everything—Facebook, Instagram, Twitter—and ended up being nowhere. It wasn’t until we noticed traction on YouTube—people thanking us in comments, engaging with our tutorials—that we said, “Let’s focus just on this.” That changed everything.
Also consider what type of content creation comes easiest to you. Do you prefer writing posts, taking photos, or being on video? For me, video came more naturally. It took me hours to film my first video, but I saw it as a way to improve communication. And I wanted to share my voice more. Now I can hit record and just be myself. You don’t need to play a character. There’s an audience for everyone—whether you’re high-energy or very chill. Someone out there will relate to how you speak and explain things.
Turning Views into Clients
D: So let’s say someone builds traction on YouTube or Instagram—how do they convert that into actual clients or customers?
AE: That’s a huge myth—“get more views and you’ll make more money.” Not true. What matters is who’s watching. The right views generate clients, not just any views.
We teach a YouTube strategy framework with three A’s:
- Align – Does the video align with your business goal? Know whether your goal is to grow an email list, sell a specific offer, or something else.
- Attract – Does the video attract your target audience? If you’re chasing trends that don’t align with your audience, those views won’t convert.
- Action – Does your video include a clear call to action?
For example, we create tutorials for LearnWorlds, a platform for course creators. That attracts coaches and educators—our target audience. We include an affiliate link and also invite viewers to contact us directly if they need help. No hard sell, just helpful content and a soft CTA.
Each video becomes an asset that builds trust and moves people closer to working with us.
Figuring Out Your Audience
D: Once someone understands the strategy, it becomes easier—but getting to that point is hard. A million views don’t matter if none of them are from the right people. Sometimes you’re targeting Florida and all your followers are in Australia. How do you fix that?
AE: That’s an optimization issue. If you want local leads, your content has to reflect that. For example, if you’re a baking business in Sydney, your video title should include “Sydney.” Even better—include your specific city or neighborhood. We worked with a security company and used video titles like “Security Systems Installation in Vancouver.” That made them more discoverable to the right people.
D: And how do people niche down? What advice do you give for reaching the right audience?
AE: When we started our channel, we didn’t plan to focus only on YouTube education. We have many interests, but it wouldn’t make sense to mix them all. For instance, I wouldn’t post my singing videos on our business channel.
So think about who you’re trying to reach and what they care about. Our umbrella topic is “creating profitable content,” which allows us to talk about YouTube, social media, lead magnets, design—it all connects back to content marketing and solving the problem of “how do I market if I hate marketing?”
If you’re torn between two topics, ask: would my ideal client be interested in both? If so, you might be able to bring them together. You can start narrow, then expand. Just make sure the shift makes sense for your audience. If you go too far off-topic, you risk confusing or losing them.
Also, YouTube is a long game. You have to be consistent. And if you get bored of a topic, you’ll burn out. That’s why I talk about YouTube but also include design, content, and other interests under the same umbrella.
Broad vs. Specific Content
D: Some topics only go so far. People don’t want to talk about SEO or graphic design forever. How do you keep things fresh?
AE: You can go broad or super specific. We make general videos like “10 Ways to Create Profitable Content” and detailed ones like “How to Create a Lead Magnet in PowerPoint.” Each one attracts a different viewer, and both are helpful.
D: And it’s all under your larger theme—so it still works.
AE: Exactly.
Wrap-Up and Where to Find Aurett
D: Aurett—sorry, I mean Aurett, not Aurett. You told me and now it’s just stuck in my brain.
AE: That’s okay. Maybe next time I’ll add another “E” to help you out.
D: Thank you so much for doing this today. It’s been really great learning from you. For anyone who wants to follow you, work with you, or learn more—where can they find you?
AE: You can hang out with us on YouTube at Essetino Media—that’s youtube.com/@EssetinoMedia. In our videos, you’ll find links to connect with us. You can also visit essetinomedia.com. We offer YouTube strategy calls, channel management, and other services to help grow your business and build a powerful online presence so you can earn revenue doing what you love.
D: I’ll add all those links in the video description. Thanks so much again, Aurett.
AE: Perfect. Thanks so much, Daniela.
D: And thank you everyone for listening. I’ll see you on the next episode. Bye for now.
