Dale Kirkwood

DIY furnace repair and heating-bill advice from a retired heating engineer

Homeowners with furnaces who want to fix or maintain heating themselves and avoid overpriced repair bills (inferred from titles, about text and descriptions).

• Realistic avatar
• A photorealistic older man with grey swept-back hair, a grey beard, glasses pushed up on his head and a dark button-up shirt, shown beside furnaces, filters and thermostats in basement or home settings.

One heating problem per video of about 14 minutes: a winter-night hook, a numbered list of five mistakes or tips, then a pitch for the Home Heating Survival Guide checklist.

• Furnace parts and failures
• Furnace maintenance mistakes
• Winter heating bills
• Spotting upsells from repair companies
• Pre-winter checklists

• The [Dirty $12 Part] That Stops Your Furnace Every Winter
• 5 Furnace Mistakes Repair Companies Count On Every Winter
• Why Your Winter Bill Doubled: 5 Mistakes the Utility Company Won't Correct
• The [X] Most Homeowners Do Backwards

The same older man in close-up pointing at a furnace part, filter, meter or thermostat, with big bold white or yellow caps text (2-3 words) on red or yellow boxes and a red arrow or circle on the key object.

• Six of the seven recent long videos use the same thumbnail layout: pointing persona, caps text and red circle or arrow
• Titles pair a cheap-part or hidden-cost hook with a distrust of repair companies, matching the about text
• An ex-industry insider backstory is repeated in the about text, descriptions and video openings, with seasonal timing for winter
• 7 of 8 descriptions link to a paid guide, giving every video a consistent call to action
• Upload rate is about 2 a week in October, with 7 videos of 13 to 16 minutes in that month