Audience before Advertising
Steve from The Young Turks explains how creators could approach monetization, advertising, and audience-building on YouTube.
Audience before income
The key ingredients for a profitable YouTube channel are a loyal, engaged community and a steady stream of great videos. Most creators find that before you can earn money with your channel, you first need to grow your audience and make consistent videos that you enjoy and your viewers love to watch. Then, think about monetizing.
LET’S TALK ABOUT MONEY
PewDiePie tells it from the heart. Making money hasn’t changed his passion for making videos — “It’s just something that I love to do” — or his attitude and approach toward making money primarily as a creator.
SETTING REALISTIC EXPECTATIONS WHEN YOU MONETIZE
CTNtechnologynews explains, in his own words, his experience with tips for earning money on YouTube.
Set up your channel to earn money
Whether your goal is to earn back some of what you spent making your videos or to become a sustainable business, YouTube’s platform lets you make money with successful videos.
Get your channel ready to earn:
- Step 1: Enable your channel for monetization.
- Step 2: Connect your YouTube channel to an AdSense account in order to earh money and get paid for your monetized videos.
- Step 3: Take a minute to get to know the kinds of videos you can monetize and the different ad formats.
- Step 4: Select “monetize with ads” for your videos and choose which ad formats and videos you want from Creator Studio app and in video manager.
- Step 5: Keep making great videos that your community loves to watch!
Note: Monetization is only available in certain countries, and copyright or community guidelines violations can affect your eligibility to earn money.
TIPS
- You can maximize opportunities if you automatically monetize all future uploads.
- If you want to monetize only a few existing videos, choose popular videos with high watch times.
- Learn more about copyright and community guidelines.
- Check that your account is in good standing.
YOUTUBE POLICIES AND COMMUNITY GUIDELINES CAN HELP YOU STAY IN GOOD STANDING AND KEEP YOUR VIDEOS MONETIZABLE ON YOUTUBE.
Learn why it’s key to respect the community, create advertiser-friendly content, and report violations. (Video in English)
Ways to earn money with your channel
There are different ways you can earn money with your channel. Start with ads and then look into other ways you can make money.
Ads
Now that you’ve enabled monetization (and hopefully enabled all formats to maximize revenue!), ads can run on your videos. Keep in mind:
- YouTube connects your channel to paying advertisers so you can focus on what you do best: creating. In most cases, you get paid when viewers watch ads. We’re constantly improving our ad systems so they work better for viewers and pay out to more creators.
- You can also earn money from YouTube Red subscriptions. YouTube Red members pay a recurring fee for special benefits like watching YouTube videos without ads. The amount you earn from YouTube Red is calculated based on how much time members spend watching your content compared to other content.
Other ways of making money on YouTube
If you’re already making money with ads on your videos and have an established audience you could look into:
- Working with brands: Brands and ad agencies are always looking for ways to promote their products and services. Brands can be eager to work with creators when the target audience for their product is similar to a creator’s channel audience. No need to be shy if you’ve got a few thousand subs, take charge and prepare a pitch to a brand or advertiser — think of it like a collab! Learn more.
- Merchandising: Having merchandise made — stickers, clothing, or other branded products — can strengthen your brand and help you spread the word. Try using merch cards or annotations in your videos to help your fans find your stuff.
- Crowdfunding: Crowdfunding is when a community of fans contribute money to your project. You can raise funds to help support your channel by launching an external crowdfunded campaign.
- Events: Build an even stronger community by going to see them! Schedule live appearances in places where your audiences are most vibrant and engaged. In addition to meeting your fans in person, you’ll likely gain opportunities to sell merchandise or tickets to your event.
- Tip: Use interactive cards to funnel viewers to your merchandise page, crowdfunding sites, or get a little extra with Fan Funding.
You now have more ways to potentially earn money with your videos, your community, and advertisers or brands. Think about where you are in your YouTube journey and create a blueprint for earning money that best fits you and your audience. You’ll find a solution that works best for you and your community with a little trial and error.
Note: Not all of these revenue streams are available in all countries. If you are being paid or compensated to create content, make sure you understand your disclosure requirements.