I've spent five years as a YouTube Strategist. In that time I've worked as an editor, a Creative Director, a Head of Content, a Ghostwriter, an Ideation Lead, and a Packaging Consultant.
Across all of those roles, roughly 70% of what I do comes back to a single, extremely valuable document.
It's a file on my computer. My master list of 106 YouTube rules. Every rule is something I learned from someone else, or myself... the hard way. On it's own, its a small but mighty reference. But when I pair it with AI, it becomes the most powerful tool in my entire workflow.
Here’s how it works.
I use Claude, specifically its Cowork feature, which lets you connect AI to a folder on your computer. My Master Rulebook lives in that folder. So does everything else: client files, voice clones, research, past scripts.
No matter what I'm doing, the starting point is the same. I tell Claude to read my Master Rulebook first. Before it writes anything, before it generates ideas, before it evaluates someone else's work... the rules go in first.
Then I do the work.
Write a 4,000 word script titled "7 Ways to Be More Productive"
Generate 25 titles for an idea about trying to buy a business
Analyze the transcript of a video my team is editing and flag parts that need refining
Then, when the work is done, I tell Claude to check the output against the Master Rulebook again.
The first pass means the output is already informed by my rules. The second pass catches whatever slipped through. Two passes, every time. That's the system.
A few examples of what this looks like in practice:
Scriptwriting.
I ghostwrite YouTube scripts for Creators. When I take on a new client, the first thing I do is pull transcripts from their existing videos and ask Claude to build a voice clone. That's a detailed document capturing how someone talks: their vocabulary, sentence rhythms, go-to phrases, storytelling patterns, what they sound like and what they absolutely do not sound like.
When it's time to write, I tell Claude to read the Master Rulebook, then the voice clone, then write a script based on whatever topic the client has sent over. After the draft is done, Claude checks the script against the Master Rulebook one more time. Are the intros confirming the click fast enough? Is exposition compressed?
A single script used to take me four to six hours. Now I can finish one in sixty minutes. I've had scripts where the client approved the first draft with zero revisions.
Ideation.
When I'm brainstorming titles and concepts with Claude, feeding it the Master Rulebook first produces noticeably better output. It generates ideas that already account for things like time-to-value, packaging psychology, and audience curiosity gaps. The ideas come out more thoughtful. More specific. Closer to something I'd actually pitch to a client.
Audits and strategy.
When I'm reviewing a channel's content or advising on what to change, the Master Rulebook gives Claude a framework for evaluation. Instead of vague feedback, I get specific notes grounded in principles I trust. "This intro takes 45 seconds to confirm the click. Rule 50 says it should be under 15." It makes my feedback sharper and faster.
Where the rules came from.
I went to film school in Toronto and soon after I landed a role in story production on the reality show, Big Brother. After that I worked on MasterChef and The Bachelor. The job was figuring out how to shape raw footage into narratives that hold attention. Which moments matter. Which ones get cut. How to make someone care about what happens next.
Eventually I found my way into YouTube. I started as a video editor, then a Creative Director, and now a Head of Content.
The whole time, I was writing things down.
Patterns from retention graphs, advice from podcasts, Twitter threads, and conversations with other strategists. I reverse-engineered why certain videos worked and others didn't.
That collection became my Master Rulebook. 106 rules as of today.
You already have rules. (You just haven't written them down.)
Here's what I want you to take from this, even if you never touch YouTube.
You already have expertise like this. It's the things you correct in other people's work. The advice you give every new hire. The shortcuts nobody taught you. The mistakes you watch people make that you know are avoidable.
If you're a photographer, your rules might be '10. Never shoot portraits at noon' and '14. Always send the gallery within 48 hours.' If you're a copywriter, it's '3. Lead with the result, not the process.'
Right now, that knowledge lives in your head. It scales at the speed of you. One project, one conversation, one correction at a time. Put it in a document, give it to your AI, and it scales with every task you hand off.
Here's how to start:
Pick the area you know best and write down 10 rules you already follow, even if they feel obvious. Give each one a name and a one-to-two sentence explanation.
Drop the file in your AI's working folder.
Then use the same two-pass method that I use: rules in, work out, rules check.
You don't need 106 rules to start. You need 10. The other 96 come from doing the work. Every time you learn something new, a mistake you won't make again, a technique that worked, add it to the document. Your AI gets better every time you do. That's the whole point: the document grows with you, and so does your AI.
What this doesn't replace.
The two parts of my job that this document can't replace are operations and taste.
Operations is getting stuff through the pipeline. Coordinating with clients, managing timelines, pushing deliverables across the finish line. AI can help with operations too, but that's a different setup for a different article.
Taste is knowing what's good. It's the thing that tells you which rule to break and when. It's why two strategists can read the same 106 rules and produce completely different work. The Master Rulebook gives you the principles. Taste is what you bring to them.
Want my Rulebook?
Let me be upfront: the Master Rulebook is built for people who work in social media. Strategists, Producers, Writers, Creative Directors. If that's not you, I hope the system above is useful, but the document probably isn't worth your money. I'd rather be honest about that now.
Here's what's actually inside:
Rule 46: Every sentence must advance the story. If you can remove it and nothing is lost, it wasn't earning its spot. Be ruthless with your writing.
Rule 50: Time to value. Count in seconds how long it takes from the start of the video to the first piece of value promised in your title and thumbnail. That number should be as low as possible... ideally under 15.
Rule 102: Make your CTAs contextually connected. Don't leave it up to the viewer to decide what to watch next. Pick the video you know they'd want and draw a direct connection to what they just watched.
106 rules like these. Scripting, retention, storytelling, packaging, intros, audience psychology, and more.
Some of these rules have been in the document for years. Others are more recent. They come from different places but they all passed the same test: I used them on real videos for real clients, and they made the work better.
It comes in two formats:
The PDF is the human version. 106 rules organized by category. Read it, study it, reference it.
The .md file is the machine version. Drop it into Claude, ChatGPT, or any AI's working folder. It's formatted with system instructions so your AI reads the rules before writing, applies them during, and checks against them after. Two passes, built in. No copy-pasting, no prompt engineering. Drag, drop, and go.
This took five years to build. You can have it in five minutes.
YouTube Master Rulebook
106 rules for creating high-performing YouTube videos. Built over five years and hundreds of videos. Comes in two formats: a PDF for you, and a machine-readable .md file you can drop directly into ...
This is me+machine. Every issue: one system you can steal, nothing you need a tech background for.
Your turn: What expertise do you have that you've never written down? Hit reply. I want to hear what your rules would be about.