How to be a Perfect Person Online
What if you were perfect? 😇
Your jokes would always land. Your advice would never be wrong. And your white t-shirt would never have a stain. (Maybe don’t wear that on pizza day.)
That’s what life is like for Miles Bonsignore, host of Perfect Person and cast member of 2nd Try. But getting there wasn’t a stroke of luck. It required a move across the country, a little bit of scheming, and a lot of hard work.
So, if you want the inside scoop on being a full-time creator, scroll on.
The BuzzFeed Staff to YouTuber Pipeline
If you were online in the 2010s, you remember the chokehold that BuzzFeed had on the internet. Today, the outlet is best known for interviewing celebrities while they play with puppies, but back then it had a lot more to offer — especially in video content.
Series like Ladylike, Worth It, Unsolved, and yes, The Try Guys, started going viral. Videos like “Women Wax Each Other’s Mustaches” racked up millions of views, and the talent behind them began to make a name for themselves.
This had to be great for BuzzFeed and for the creators, right?
It was…for a minute. But it wasn’t long before the talent started to crave creative independence. They were facing both high production demands and a lack of control over their content. So, many of them left the company and moved over to YouTube, including Safiya Nygaard, Devin Lytle, Ryan Bergara, and Shane Madej.
Before these people decided to strike out on their own, BuzzFeed operated like an old-school TV network, pouring resources into media with mass appeal. When they left, they took ownership of their audience and their content, helping usher in the democratization of content creation.
On that note, let’s talk about The Try Guys — err, at least who The Try Guys were at this point in the story.
The Try Guys are a great example of how today’s content economy came to be. They left BuzzFeed in 2018 to create their own independent production company.
At first, they hosted all of their videos on YouTube and monetized through merch, events, and ad deals. Then, in 2024, they launched their own streaming platform and video app (2nd Try TV), enabling them to charge subscription fees for access to all their series.
But never mind that. It’s time to discuss: The TryPod.
The TryPod Era
When The Try Guys left BuzzFeed, they launched a podcast: The TryPod. Of course, they needed a producer to help make it happen, which brings us to Miles Bonsignore.
Miles wasn’t at BuzzFeed for long. “When I was there, I was always looking for an avenue to be able to make my own thing, but I had no idea how to do that.”
So, when the opportunity to join The Try Guys came up, he jumped on it. He started as a production assistant and was later promoted to podcast producer and camera operator.
“With podcasting, I was like…Well, I can make The TryPod, and then I'll be on it. The goal, especially when I pitched it, was to produce it, but also to be on camera.”
It worked — he quickly became a key part of the dynamic, introducing many of the show’s most beloved segments, like Spooky or Kooky.
But you can’t talk about Miles or The TryPod without bringing up Advice That’ll Go For Miles. At the end of every episode of The TryPod, Miles offers up a (typically unhinged) piece of advice, intro’ed by the segment’s pop-punk theme song. Here are some of my faves:
Every problem can be solved by eating pasta.
Make pasta. Preferably, too much. Panic can’t survive carbs.
If there's a mouse in your house, become its landlord.
Give it a little room. Let it pay rent in crumbs.
If you’re late for something, run…
but like, suspiciously.
No doubt about it, Advice That’ll Go For Miles was the linchpin that made it possible for Miles to step away and build his own content empire.
“I always had the goal of doing my own thing. I didn't know what that would look like or how that would exist. But I was like, I have to garner an audience first, and then eventually spin it off, and hopefully that works.”
Enter: Perfect Person.
What it’s Like to be a Perfect Person (And How You Can Be One Too)
Perfect Person is a call-in advice show hosted by Miles and a range of guests (many of whom are regularly returning fan favorites). It’s Advice That’ll Go for Miles in its final form. And as someone who pays for the platinum version on Patreon, I can confidently say it’s a banger.
There’s a lesson in there, folks: Don’t quit your day job — at least not at first. For Miles, there was added pressure: His wife was pregnant. And what creative living in LA with a baby on the way would quit a full-time, salaried position without proof of concept?
“I did Perfect Person and worked as head of the podcast department at Try Guys for over a year. After my son was born, my Patreon started to get into full swing, and my ad sales on the show started doing well, so I was like…I think it's time to have the conversation.”
At first, he proposed going part-time, but the team knew that wouldn’t work. So, he left.
…but not really, because he stayed on as a part of The TryPod and became a cast member of 2nd Try.
Advice (for Creators) That’ll Go For Miles
If you want to be a perfect person on the internet, there’s no one better to learn how to do that from than Miles. He’s held all the roles: editor, producer, and talent.
How to get started
We’ve already covered this one: Don’t quit your day job.
“The best way to do your own thing is to do it while you have a steady income. Honestly, you should work on the weekend to do your own thing.”
It might be hard to hear, but it’s really good advice. The reality of trying to make it as a creator is that you’re going to be exhausted sometimes. But to Miles’ point: “The alternative is quitting your job to start something, which I think is really dangerous.”
Start building while you have job security. And when it feels hard, lean into the reason why you started in the first place, whether it was to have a creative outlet, build your own income stream, or something else.
“One of the things I would tell myself is: How lucky am I that I'm so tired and it's late and I'm editing my show where I get to do silly things? That is a gift. I know what it feels like to work totally shitty service jobs. This is so much better than the alternative.”
Beyond that, you just need to get comfortable making stuff and learning along the way — even if it means incurring some cringe.
“If you’re worried you’re going to make something and someone you went to high school with is going to think it’s cringy, that’s fine. Release yourself from the trappings of worrying about that.”
Some of your posts are going to flop. Some of them are going to be a huge success. But guess what? 99% of people will only remember the good stuff.
How to deal with burnout
Burnout happens, especially creator burnout. Fewer than one in 10 content creators describe their mental health as excellent — and that share continues to drop the longer they’ve been a content creator.
So, how do you deal? The instinct may be to step away and stop posting. And that might be the right move for some creators, but it’s definitely not for Miles.
“There are a lot of people in LA that are so burnt out, and they have huge audiences, and they don't fucking post anything. I feel like that's a total disservice to their followers.”
Not all creators feel this way. Some have stepped away (Mark Rober comes to mind) to varying levels of success. But it’s important to note that Miles doesn’t think you should sacrifice your mental health to push content out and keep your socials active — more so, he believes it’s important to find a sense of gratitude to the people who are responsible for your success. That’s how you fight burnout.
“In some way, you owe your career to your audience, since those are the people watching every week. I feel like I should work hard to give content to the people who have supported me.”
How to connect with your audience
Miles has an intimate relationship with his audience. He talks to them online, on the phone, and in person. His fans are a part of the show when he tours, and in some cases, he’s driven across the city to meet them.
You don’t need to go to these lengths, but you should find a platform where you can engage with your people and build a community. For Miles, that place is Patreon.
“Our Patreon is all me. I'm responding to everybody. But I think that's kind of the fun of it — that's the relationship that I want to garner with my audience.”
Patreon, Discord, Reddit, Instagram, YouTube: You can do this wherever you want. Ideally, it’s somewhere you already have an audience, though. And once you know where you’re hosting your community, the only thing you need to do is show up and be yourself: chit chat, ask questions, troll, etc.
“When people distance themselves from their audience too much, they start to treat them like they’re not a real person. Their audience starts to get meaner. They will comment stuff like ‘I hated this video,’ or ‘Your old shit was better.’”
The internet is a mean place, but when you keep it real and offer up your whole human self (awkwardness and all), most people can’t help but treat you like one.
How to stay consistent and experiment
We all know that consistency is a must if you want to grow a loyal audience. But how the hell are you supposed to come up with fresh content ideas every week?
With the help of his producer, Ashley Lawless, Miles figured out a realistic approach for his YouTube channel. “We think about this all the time. If on Fridays, that's our video day, we need to come up with two types of concepts.”
He broke these types of concepts into two tiers:
- Tier 1: Stylized content that takes several days to shoot and edit
- Tier 2: Simple content you can shoot and edit in one day
This breakdown makes sense: One easy-to-execute video, and one that requires more production effort. Your exact mix will be different — perhaps you just find one, highly repeatable content format you commit to executing weekly. Or maybe you post a low-effort clip every day; whatever’s doable for you.
Finding consistency doesn’t mean you can’t experiment, though. You can use trial reels or create a “throwaway” channel to get weird. For example, Miles has Millyslop, a YouTube channel where he posts videos that don’t “fit” into his usual content style, like this one that introduced me to my new (old) favorite song:
(BTW, he also has a video on this channel, Unsoliticed Advice for Content Creators, that’s worth checking out.)
How to monetize
Pushing content live doesn’t pay the bills (unless you’re putting it behind a subscription paywall). You need to monetize, but luckily, there are a lot of ways you can go about doing this:
Paid content
Like Miles, you can offer subscriptions for bonus content. Miles uses Patreon for this, but there are plenty of other options, like YouTube, Substack, and TikTok Series. You can also make one-off digital content and sell that — like Miles’ tour documentary, I’m Not a Perfect Person.
Merch/products
If your audience has the appetite for it, you can sell merch. This is easy to do if you work with a company like Printful, Redbubble, Teespring, Bonfire, or Merch by Amazon. You can also sell products you develop that are related to your “brand” as a creator. For instance, Miles worked as a barista in New York for years — something his fans know about him. This year, he launched Perfect Person coffee: His very own roasted beans.
Events
Can you take your show on the road? Or even just down the road? Hosting a live event is a great way to monetize and connect on a deeper level. Miles has toured twice: the Dial Tone Tour and the Perfect Person Self-Help Tour.
Speed Round
Ding ding! Let’s wrap up with a Perfect Person speed round, a segment included in every episode of the podcast.
