Hayden Hillier-Smith has edited videos watched over 5 billion times.
He worked with Logan Paul and Mr Beast at the peaks of both their careers. He won a Streamy. He's shaped how millions of people watch video. He's also spent the last several years convinced that the creator industry is measuring the wrong thing.
Views work as a substitute for connection. The chase for more of them is volatile, shallow, and increasingly dangerous. Hayden has watched the algorithm hijack the careers of almost every creator he knows.
In this conversation, Ronit and Hayden get into why retention editing kills story, why your first hundred videos are supposed to be bad, what it means to treat content as a bid for connection, and how grief shaped his entire creative philosophy.
Follow Hayden at @hilliasmith. Subscribe to The Creator Class for more conversations with the creators shaping the industry.
Chapters
00:00 — "We need to stop looking at analytics. You're all doing it wrong"
00:14 — Editing billions of views for the biggest creators on the internet
00:41 — Why fame on the internet is volatile and shallow
01:28 — The video that saved Hayden's life
02:27 — Meeting at the bat mitzvah
03:07 — Hearing Hayden speak at VidSummit
04:26 — The most pivotal moment of his career
05:09 — Retention editing vs storytelling
05:46 — Telling a data conference to stop looking at data
06:28 — Getting hired as Mr Beast's story specialist
06:41 — The isolation video where the engagement ring was the throughline
07:55 — "People don't care about emotions"
09:42 — Being afraid to put himself on camera
09:55 — Watching his mother die at seven years old
10:50 — Logan Paul gave him permission to be big
13:44 — Putting himself in front of the camera for the first time
15:17 — The validation he'd been deprived of his whole life
16:54 — His CPTSD diagnosis
19:01 — Why creators feel isolated
19:29 — The pandemic creator economy boom
20:22 — When a million views stops being enough
21:13 — "It's the same as drug addiction"
22:38 — When shareability was the metric that mattered
23:54 — The best videos are the ones people sit you down to watch
24:33 — Finding your passion as a creator
26:13 — Why most men never figure out what they're passionate about
27:30 — Finding your art outlet
29:38 — Why all creators feel the same emotionally
31:13 — Why your first hundred videos should be bad
32:00 — When the algorithm hijacks your channel
33:35 — Treating the channel as leverage, not the destination
34:52 — Why Hayden's YouTube channel is his editing show reel
35:32 — Ending the editing podcast
38:20 — Forced accountability
39:09 — How to find a mentor
40:33 — Content as a bridge toward future possibility
41:16 — Making content for the specific people you want in your life
43:04 — Why art is the biggest form of connection
44:16 — The video that saved his life
45:07 — How toxic ego led to one of the worst things in internet history
47:04 — The decision not to take his life
49:06 — Being celebrated, then vilified
51:45 — What it means to be a creator today
53:14 — Where to follow Hayden
