Welcome Underdog Fantasy!
My name is Christian Roper, and I have over a decade of experience in many forms of content creation. Among them include touring the country with a large band as their in-house photographer, documenting tornadoes, hurricanes, and climate disasters for outlets like NPR and Inside Climate News, being a television personality on a History Channel treasure hunting series, and even producing original documentaries for outlets like Amazon and Apple TV. I’ve been able to adapt to all content genres and audiences. I have a degree in Marketing from The University of Texas at Austin, and have been an avid fan and follower of sports since birth (Colt McCoy is the reason I went to Texas).
For the past 5 years, I have served as the head of Roper Media LLC, a Texas-based production company that develops and distributes documentary content for major streaming outlets.
In doing so, I worked quite a bit in graphic design with the intent on converting artwork views to clicks on streaming platforms. Here are some examples of film posters I created for my original film content.
Though I didn’t have any experience creating YouTube thumbnails for sports and fantasy outlets, it was something I was able to study and produce pretty quickly. I studied up on current media trends as well as your current usage of thumbnails and was able to create a few hypothetical that align well.
Thumbnails are an overlooked part of production and the most important marketing tool for gaining organic views.
Thumbnail for a hypothetical video where fantasy insiders discuss which players famously un-retired and had massive fantasy seasons.
Thumbnail for a hypothetical video where fantasy insiders compare and contrast rookie wide receivers, giving the ultimate guide on which newcomers will help you and which will hurt you.
Thumbnail for a hypothetical long-form draft guide style video where fantasy insiders give the ultimate insight into how your fantasy team can make the playoffs. This type of video does exceptionally well when paired with a thumbnail that highlights something wildly controversial, like trading Patrick Mahomes.
Thumbnail for a hypothetical video where fantasy insiders speculate on which late round fantasy picks might win your fantasy league. A great alternate thumbnail for a video of this type would be to focus on a single player. For example, if a show host speculates on a dark horse rookie WR, a graphic focused on him with the text “The Next Puka???” would generate plenty of organic attention.
Thumbnail for a hypothetical video where fantasy insiders discuss the big play upside of rookie Xavier Worthy and the likelihood he will be the league’s next top target. Pairing a popping graphic with a controversial question like “The next Tyreek?” is a great way to pique curiosity.
A simple and conservative thumbnail for a video where fantasy insiders discuss the NFL’s new kickoff rule, how it will affect offensive player production, and whether or not return specialists are worth a roster spot.
Each thumbnail would be specific to the content discussed and designed to pair well with a well-crafter video title. The thumbnail is the first thing that hooks a potential viewer and the title then provides further context that convinces them the video contains some information that they need in that moment.
I would also highly recommend utilizing YouTube’s built-in A/B testing feature to compare how different thumbnail variations compare for converting clicks, and using those statistics to drive creative decisions in future art. My background is in camera work, so I have a great understanding of color theory and framing. I also base all my artwork decision off of current trends and what I know is successful within the genre (ex: using brief text that asks a question, highlighting a controversial take, or using a host’s reaction to overemphasize a point in a video).