“Ultimately, I want to just continue making content I enjoy.”
2013 feels like a lifetime ago. In reality, it’s only been seven years. (We know, crazy, right?) YouTube was quite different to how it is today: the majority of us were long-obsessed with the Fantastic Foursome, we were all singing along to What Does The Fox Say? and we were only just starting to properly grasp just what this little video website was capable of. It was also the year Charley Coleman launched her channel.
Charley started up her channel when she was only 14 years old, during a time when she says she “loved watching Carrie Hope Fletcher‘s videos”. She thought making her own content for the site could be a fun hobby, so she and her friend, Ellie, came together to film numerous videos for the first few years of the channel.
Charley’s channel currently sits at just over 1,000 subscribers and features a wide range of content, from lifestyle and university-centric videos, to travel and chatty vlogs. This variety has allowed her channel to grow at a steady pace, as has her bubbly and honest personality. Through her videos, Charley has shown her viewers that she’s someone they can relate to, leading to a sense of friendship and sisterhood. As for why her video style is so varied, Charley shares it’s all down to her love of experimenting:
“I do like to experiment a lot with [my] video[s] and how I film them. I think that’s the photography student in me. Although, [while] I consider myself a very introverted person, once you get to know me I can be very chatty, and I think that comes across in my videos. I could talk forever!”
One genre of video Charley likes to film are travel vlogs. She is someone who loves to travel and see the world, something that led her to start watching travel vloggers back in the day, who inspired her to start filming her trips, both to capture the memories and share them with her viewers. “I used to love watching [Louis Cole], Ben Brown and Steve Booker,” she explains. “I loved watching their daily vlogs and seeing all the places they travelled, [and] I realised how cool it would be to be able to watch them back and relive the experience again, so anywhere I went that thought I would want to keep as a memory, I vlogged.”
This influence has led to the release of numerous bite-sized vlogs filmed across Europe and beyond. Visits to France, Turkey, Italy and various locations across the UK have been recorded, preserving memories and inspiring viewers to head out and explore the world themselves. It’s a big accomplishment, especially for someone who says she still struggles with vlogging in public!
Given Charley has been on YouTube for nearly seven years, she’s been able to watch and take inspiration from a variety of creators. “Nowadays, the majority of what I watch is a lot of fashion and lifestyle content,” she says, which includes the likes of Lucy Wood, Lucy Moon and Anna Newton. She’s also a fan of Alice Thorpe‘s design videos and style vlogs; Emily Rose‘s university vlogs; and Shakirah Jelley, whose channel growth and variety of videos have pushed her in her own content.
While Charley shares that she’d love to see her channel continue to grow, one of the things she loves most about her time on YouTube is the connections she’s made with people. As such, she’d love to see her community continue to blossom. “I just love connecting with people, whether that’s other creators or viewers,” she explains.
As for the ultimate goal for her channel?
“Ultimately, I want to just continue making content I enjoy,” she shares. “I do love documenting things I get up to, and I also want to get more creative with my channel again, with some new video styles and ideas. I will definitely continue making content after I graduate, if I can around my job, whatever that may be. We’ll have to see. It is a very scary and daunting time, but I really love my channel and creating videos, so I’m looking forward to seeing how my interests change again over the years, the same way they have since I started my channel. I guess we will just have to see where it goes.”
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Want More?
Jack Edwards recently shared some tips on how to travel more as a student. Alternatively, you could read about Amelia Mandeville‘s relationship with the gym and why she’s excited to begin exercising again.
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