Cork YouTube star Mick O'Donovan: 'My family think I’m loaded, but that’s not the case'
Mick O’Donovan first made an impact with his McDonald’s in Morrowind video on YouTube.
“It’s weird, but the video you think will blow up and do well – it fails horribly. But then the video you spend 14 minutes on at 3am? That’s the one that goes viral.”
Mick O’Donovan is 24 years old and a full-time YouTuber and influencer from Mayfield in Cork. Although his channel is small, it has been growing fast. At the start of 2021 he had just a few hundred subscribers, and now he has over 116,000, and almost 27 million views. Mick’s success is down to his authentic Irish manner, humour and diligent editing – but the video that gave him his ‘break’ was not what he expected.
“I play video games and I'm trying to pick the games that are nostalgic to people,” says O’Donovan, a former pupil of Ashton school. “One of them is called Morrowind, an old-school fantasy game, and I play through challenges in that.”
He saw a tweet from someone about how to put a McDonald’s outlet into the game for fun.
“I thought ‘I have to try that’. Funnily enough, I thought the end result was terrible at first. No one’s going to like this. I can’t put this out.”
But as it turned out, that was the video that caught the mysterious wave of YouTube’s algorithm. Uploaded last March, it received tens of thousands of views and the momentum continued from there. Now, O’Donovan’s uploads get an average of between 50,000-100,000 views per video, with some of his videos achieving over a million views.
O’Donovan puts the success of the McDonald’s Morrowind video down to the unique and weird content. As he puts it, “That’s something I would have clicked on, if I’d seen it”. But more broadly speaking, he says the key to his growth is down to focusing on a niche and managing expectations. He advises people to be patient.
“Your first video is not going to be good. You will not see growth. Don’t get discouraged. Try to make videos you would watch yourself. And try to make them interesting for others. You won’t get away with just playing a game and that’s it. There needs to be a hook. Some kind of challenge or reason for the video. Narrowing down your content, knowing what you want to make. Niche down. So people know what to expect. Then when you grow, you can expand your focus.”
If that sounds like solid business advice in general, then that should come as no surprise. Being a start-up YouTuber is hard work, with many hours of work put into developing the content. O’Donovan spends an average of eight hours making a 20-minute video, from playing and recording the game, to editing the content, finalizing the video file and creating an attractive thumbnail for people to click on. So why did O’Donovan start doing it, especially as success was far from guaranteed?
“I guess I was the kind of person where I was in and out of college, not really sure what I wanted to do. Did I want to do music? To make games? To write? I just didn't know where my life was going for the longest time. I studied video editing and when I finished college I wasn’t able to work at the time. I had a bunch of free time. Like almost too much.”
“I always wanted to like get a good computer, that was the dream. So I saved up for one and after a long time, in September 2020, so during the height of the pandemic, I finally bought one. I’ve watched a lot of YouTube and thought I’d start content creation as a hobby and keep going until I go back to college.”
To keep things manageable, O’Donovan uploads two or three videos a week. He says that it’s important to him that the quality of the work stays consistent and authentic. Mick narrates his playthroughs live and doesn’t script or prepare in advance. He insists he won’t change his personality or style for the audience. This becomes abundantly clear when his viewers (the vast majority of whom are under the age of 40 and from the US) are subjected to references to Brennan’s bread and other Irish mentions.
“I try not to let others steer my content. I keep it personal to myself and it’s the reason why you're coming. And, you know, if I appeal to an audience, it wouldn't be me, you know. On the Irish aspect, I've even had a few comments where people say ‘you're just trying to copy someone else's accent’ – I mean, I don’t even know how to respond to that!” The life of a YouTuber is fraught with over-exposure and mental health issues, including burnout. How has he responded to suddenly having a vibrant community who provide regular comments and feedback? Has it been a good experience?
“Overall, the community has been very positive. Receiving hate, it's not something I worry about. On negative comments, the advice you get is either don't respond, or make the response funny and play it off as a joke.” “I do read all the comments, especially if I'm putting out a new video. I'm in the comments straight away, just in case if there's an issue with the video or something like that. But generally, yes, it's just it's been a very supportive community, which I'm very lucky to have.” The best part of the work, Mick says, are the heartfelt messages he receives from people who love his content.
“I regularly get messages from people who say ‘Look, I've been really struggling with the anxiety or depression and your video was kind of a help in that regard’. Actually, I’ve used YouTube videos in the past like that - you know, when I was struggling, I needed something to focus on and they were kind of there to help. To know that I'm providing that to some people really, really kind of helps me keep going.
“Also, I got a message recently that said ‘Your videos are so good that when I sit down to have dinner, I decided to watch them’. That's like the biggest honour, where you decide on something to watch while eating!”
The biggest question might be – can YouTube support a living? Mick is keeping his expectations in check there and does not expect stardom around the corner. For now, he says YouTube is paying the bills and is a ‘little above minimum wage’ in terms of returns.
“There’s a bit trickling in. You get paid every month – sometimes it’s even longer. In that sense, if it was my job, it would be a bit worrying. But that’s why people branch out into other avenues like Patreon or selling merchandise. There’s also sponsorship – that’s how many people get their revenue, by exposing a developer’s game in a sponsorship stream.
If I keep up the momentum, I can see it being a secure income, at least. That’s what my family are happy to hear – that’s I’m getting an income from it. They only started to take an interest when revenue came in, so they know I’m not just playing games in my room! I won’t be buying cars or houses any time soon. My family think I’m loaded, but that’s not the case. I’m still living in student accommodation. For the moment, it’s kinda livable. I can cover my rent and food with it.” But ultimately, that’s not why Mick is doing this anyway. He started creating content for himself, and that’s what he says will continue.
“I'm very much trying to limit my expectations to an extent where I'm thankful for I have, but I don't want to get too overzealous and expect growth to just keep going - because I predict to some extent, it will level off a bit. I am pretty casual about it, you know. I'm not showing my face, at least as of yet. I'm not too out there. Even if I wasn’t getting the views, I would still do it. I didn’t start it for the money. I started it because I love games.”
