Can You Be a ‘Creator-CEO’?: Learning from Codie Sanchez’s Video Strategy
Here’s a secret: this article is not about Codie Sanchez. It’s about you.
Our friend Codie is an incredible example of a thriving creator CEO, and someone who has worked hard on nailing her video recipes over time.
From some ANT-nalysis (get it? ANTEATER analysis?), we’ve curated out six core recipes she cooks up at varying levels of complexity. These form the foundation of her channel, and help her to produce consistent content across all her channels.
Today, we’re going to dive into those recipes, along with a few examples from Codie Sanchez’s short videos that illustrate those recipes she’s worked so hard to define.
We respect your time, so here’s everything we’ll say, short, sweet, and upfront:
We’ll introduce you to Codie Sanchez, including who she is, what she does, and who she does it for.
We’ll touch on the six video recipes she uses to build her pipeline.
We’ll give you the next best thing you can do to bolster your video strategy (we’re talking right now, today).
There’s more to the story, so read on if you’re interested in doing more with video as a founder or CEO. (And hey, if you feel like someone else could benefit from this knowledge, feel free to send this their way).
Let’s begin!
First, Who is Codie Sanchez?
Who isn’t Codie Sanchez? She’s an investor, small business owner, writer, and tinkerer bringing financial fluency to as many people as possible. A big piece of that equation is ‘Contrarian Thinking’, her newsletter in which she decodes the language of money, which reaches over 550 thousand people every week.
For Codie, the idea that we aren’t all taught about investing and revenue building in high school is a tragedy, and she’s doing everything she can to set it to rights. After building an investment firm in Latin America, a venture fund focused on small businesses, a media business, and a small business holding company, she undeniably has the chops to educate the everyday person on how to create wealth.
In her own words, Codie’s committed to “questioning everything”. It’s this sharp, outside-the-box way of thinking that’s driven her unique style of content creation across LinkedIn, YouTube, Instagram, and more.
Her content serves two purposes:
One, educating her audience of small business owners and budding investors on her brand of Contrarian Thinking.
Two, building a pipeline of interested viewers to sign up to her newsletter (where she provides even more awesomeness directly to their inboxes).
Codie Sanchez and Short-Form Video
A major pillar of Codie’s hard-won content pipeline is video. Long-form and short-form videos both make regular appearances on her YouTube channel, while the short-form videos make it to other platforms as well. She started posting regularly in March of 2022, and here are some quick stats:
414 videos posted in just over 2 years (103 long-form videos, and 312 shorts).
1.28 million subscribers amassed in two years.
Roughly 201.9 million views over that time.
All of those numbers look really huge and intimidating, and they’re a sign of some pretty major success over some hard yards done in content creation.
But here’s the number that simplifies everything above… 6.
Codie has six video recipes she utilizes for her short-form video. In fact, they’re the same six video recipes we see a lot of successful creator CEOs building into their content. Which, hint, hint, means they are recipes that can work for you too. Let’s break those recipes down.
The Six Video Recipes Codie Uses to Build Her Pipeline
Man On the Street: Also called ‘interview’ segments, these videos rely on picking someone else’s brain to help you make your point (or learn something new!).
Podcast Clip: Clipping a podcast interview – or making it appear like you’ve been on a podcast – can create immediate authority and interest with viewers.
Show & Tell: Don’t just talk about a concept, show it off! Walking through a particular spot, showing off a relevant prop, or telling a story in the spot it happened… these are all show and tell videos.
Talking Head: The classic video format, where you break down a single concept while speaking directly to the camera.
Walk and Talk: One of the easiest ways to make a simple piece of content more interesting is to walk while you talk. This makes the short feel more like a conversation you’re having with a friend on the street.
Whiteboard: Nothing breaks a concept down for people better than visuals, and whiteboarding allows you to make your own. Step into lecturer mode and talk as you write.
So, what does this mean for you?
Here's the interesting part: each of these six video recipes can be used by anyone, to talk about anything. They’re amazing frameworks to create interest and structure information.
The key is to think of them as recipes, formats, and frameworks rather than existing videos.
It’s tough to look at the amazing stuff that Codie produces and not want to be at that level immediately. In fact, we see so many founders and new creators leap right into that top-level of content creation, because they think it’s the only way they’ll see success. That’s completely understandable!
But more often than not, what we see is that this approach actually causes creators to burn out early due to the high demand or limited ability to experiment.
We really don’t want that for you! It’s why we do things differently with our founder clients here at ANTEATER.If you’re taking on content creation solo, it’s almost always best to start with the simplest method and scale up as you learn more about what you want to put out there (and what your ideal customers respond to).
The real win for Codie? She has 400x the engagement on YouTube that she has on LinkedIn, but she STILL puts in the time with her LinkedIn audience because they bring her business. It’s worth her time to put in that effort, which means it’s absolutely worth your time, too.
Your next best step.
Whether you’re kicking off a new phase in your video journey or you’re brand new to this and standing on the starting line, your next best step is undeniable: brainstorm.
As a creator CEO with skin in the game and years in the business, you have a ton of two things: knowledge, and experience. These two things will give you a unique point of view that you can use to transform these video recipes into unique, targeted, genuinely useful videos that your community can engage with.
So, we’ve got a little homework for you (don’t worry, it’s fun, we promise). Head over to our guide to the 5 Levels of Video Creation and kick off your video strategy at Level One. Remember, think approachable, affordable, and doable. You’re the star of the show, so as long as your knowledge and personality are in the spotlight, you don’t need to do anything fancy for now.
And hey, if you need a little bit of extra help getting there, we understand. We’ve got a 4-day email course here that will take you from idea-less to filming and posting your first 10x-ed short video in four days flat. Feel free to check it out (no pressure)!
As a final sign-off, props and many thanks to Codie Sanchez for demonstrating that grit, creativity, and consistency are the hallmarks of a successful creator CEO. We’ll see you in the next one!
