Have you heard of ChatGPT? It’s a new and innovative language model developed by OpenAI that’s capable of generating human-like text in real-time.
But what exactly is ChatGPT and how does it work?
In short, ChatGPT is a variant of the popular GPT-3 language model that’s specifically designed for chat applications. It’s able to understand and respond to natural language input, much like a human would, making it an ideal tool for creating chatbots or virtual assistants.
One of the unique features of ChatGPT is its ability to generate text that’s not just grammatically correct, but also reads like something a human would write. This is thanks to the model’s massive size and advanced training, which allows it to understand the nuances of language and generate more realistic text.
So how can you use ChatGPT? One potential application is in the creation of chatbots for customer service or support. Imagine being able to ask a chatbot questions about a product or service, and getting a helpful and accurate response in real-time.
Another potential use for ChatGPT is in the development of virtual assistants. Instead of having to type out commands or questions, you could simply speak to your virtual assistant and get a response in natural language.
Overall, ChatGPT is a powerful and innovative language model that has the potential to revolutionize the way we interact with chatbots and virtual assistants. If you’re interested in learning more, be sure to check out the OpenAI website for more information.
Here are some pros and cons of ChatGPT:
Pros:
Capable of generating human-like text in real-time: ChatGPT is able to understand and respond to natural language input, making it a powerful tool for creating chatbots and virtual assistants.
Can be used in a variety of applications: ChatGPT has the potential to be used in a variety of applications, such as customer service chatbots, virtual assistants, and more.
Can save time and resources: By automating tasks that would otherwise require human intervention, ChatGPT has the potential to save time and resources.
Cons:
Limited by its training data: Like any machine learning model, ChatGPT is limited by the data it was trained on. This means it may not be able to understand or respond to certain inputs that it has not been trained on.
May not always produce accurate results: While ChatGPT is capable of generating human-like text, it’s not perfect and may produce inaccurate or nonsensical results at times.
Potential ethical concerns: As with any technology that involves automation, there are potential ethical concerns to consider, such as the potential for job displacement.
Overall, ChatGPT is a powerful and innovative language model that has the potential to revolutionize the way we interact with chatbots and virtual assistants. However, it’s important to keep in mind its limitations and potential ethical concerns when considering its use.
I hope this article has given you a better understanding of what ChatGPT is and how it works. If you have any questions or want to share your thoughts, feel free to leave a comment below!
Here are some FAQs about ChatGPT:
Q: What is ChatGPT?
A: ChatGPT is a variant of the popular GPT-3 language model that’s specifically designed for chat applications. It’s able to understand and respond to natural language input, much like a human would, making it an ideal tool for creating chatbots or virtual assistants.
Q: How does ChatGPT work?
A: ChatGPT uses machine learning algorithms to analyze and understand natural language input. It then generates a response based on this input, using its understanding of language to produce text that reads like something a human would write.
Q: Can ChatGPT understand and respond to all natural language input?
A: ChatGPT is a powerful language model, but it’s not perfect. It’s limited by the data it was trained on, so it may not be able to understand or respond to certain inputs that it has not been exposed to.
Q: Can ChatGPT be used to create chatbots or virtual assistants?
A: Yes, ChatGPT has the potential to be used in the creation of chatbots and virtual assistants. Its ability to understand and respond to natural language input makes it an ideal tool for these applications.
Q: Are there any potential ethical concerns to consider when using ChatGPT?
A: As with any technology that involves automation, there are potential ethical concerns to consider when using ChatGPT. For example, there is the potential for job displacement if certain tasks are automated using ChatGPT. It’s important to carefully consider these ethical concerns when deciding whether or not to use ChatGPT.
YouTube is a popular video sharing platform that is used by millions of people around the world. It’s a great way to watch, share, and learn from videos. There are many benefits to using YouTube, including the following:
Access to a wide variety of content – YouTube has a vast library of videos covering almost any topic you can think of. Whether you’re interested in learning about a new hobby, catching up on the news, or watching music videos, there’s likely something on YouTube for you.
Convenience – With YouTube, you can watch videos anytime, anywhere. All you need is an internet connection. This makes it easy to watch videos on the go or at home on your couch.
Opportunities for creators – YouTube is a great platform for creators to share their work with a wider audience. Many creators have built successful careers by creating and sharing videos on YouTube.
However, there are some countries that have decided to ban YouTube for various reasons. Here’s a list of some countries that have banned YouTube:
China – China has a strict internet censorship policy and has banned several websites, including YouTube. In order to access YouTube, people in China need to use a virtual private network (VPN).
Iran – Iran has a history of censoring the internet and has blocked several websites, including YouTube. In order to access YouTube, people in Iran need to use a VPN.
North Korea – North Korea is known for its strict internet censorship policy and has banned several websites, including YouTube. It is difficult for people in North Korea to access the internet at all, let alone YouTube.
Turkmenistan – Turkmenistan has a strict internet censorship policy and has banned several websites, including YouTube. In order to access YouTube, people in Turkmenistan need to use a VPN.
Syria – Syria has a history of censoring the internet and has blocked several websites, including YouTube. In order to access YouTube, people in Syria need to use a VPN.
It’s worth noting that the list of countries that have banned YouTube may change over time. Some countries may lift their ban on YouTube, while others may impose a new ban. It’s also worth noting that while YouTube may be banned in some countries, it is still widely available in most parts of the world.
In conclusion, YouTube is a popular platform that offers many benefits, including access to a wide variety of content, convenience, and opportunities for creators. However, there are some countries that have decided to ban YouTube for various reasons. If you live in one of these countries, you may need to use a VPN in order to access YouTube.
Knowing who has been looking at your social media profiles is one of those things that just about everyone wishes they could do at some point or another.
At least, if they’ve been on social media for a while. Whether you’re checking to see if the ex you’re pretending not to think about has been lurking on your timeline, or, from more of a marketing perspective, you’re just curious who’s been looking at your posts.
This applies to just about all social media platforms, but perhaps more so to Instagram.
Perhaps it’s the nature of the average post (there doesn’t tend to be quite as many bikini pics on Twitter, for example) or maybe it’s just that people on Instagram are more open about wanting to see who’s looking at their feed.
So, can you see who looks at your Instagram? The answer is… it depends. Sorry. Keep reading and we’ll elaborate for you.
Defining Instagram
The problem is “your Instagram” is too vague a premise to accurately answer the question. For the most part, there is no way to see who has been looking at your Instagram, but there are some instances where it is possible. Let’s dive into the differences.
Your Instagram Profile
Probably the most common way in which people want to know if someone has been lurking in their profile itself, by which we mean can you see who has been looking at your main profile page on Instagram. Seeing who has been reading your bio, looking through your pics, watching your reels, etc.
In this case, we can give a resounding “no”. It is not possible (yet) for Instagram users to see who has been looking at their profile. Users could spend all day deep diving into your photo history and you have no way of knowing.
Your Instagram Posts
What about specific posts? Again, the answer is no. Instagram does not currently provide a way for users to look at a list of people who have viewed a particular post.
Your Instagram Stories
Here things get a little more interesting. You can see who has been looking at your Instagram stories… for a limited time. Simply tap the burger menu (the three horizontal lines) in the top right, tap on “Archive”, and scroll to the appropriate story. When you’re on the story, swipe up and you can see who has viewed that story.
As you will no doubt be aware if you use Instagram, stories are not permanent. They sit on your profile for 24 hours and then they are gone. Well, almost. As the person who uploaded the story, you can continue to view it for another 24 hours, along with the information about everyone who has viewed it. After that total of 48 hours from the time of posting, the information is gone.
Your Instagram Direct Messages
DMs are a little more complicated—though not by much. You can see if a person you are in a conversation with has read your direct messages because Instagram will explicitly tell you with a little message in the chat window saying something like “just seen”.
This doesn’t apply if you send a message to someone you haven’t spoken to in DM before, however. Or, rather, it can apply, but the person you are messaging has the option to ignore your message, and you won’t get any notification if they do. Only when they accept your request to chat will Instagram let you know if they have read your messages.
Other Ways to Know
That’s it for the official ways you can tell if someone has been looking at your posts, but there are other ways you can assume or infer that someone has been looking.
Comments
If someone comments on a particular post, it’s safe to say they have been looking at that post. The same goes for liking it. But, on the subject of liking…
Likes
A like on a recent post may tell you that a particular person has viewed that post, but a like on an old post can tell you so much more.
Instagram isn’t big on pushing older content, so when you a like on an old post, it’s usually a good indicator that that person has been doing something of a deep dive on your Instagram profile. This tends to be a little unnerving, as it shows someone is paying a lot of attention to you.
To paraphrase Ed Sheeran; try not to double-tap from way back.
Should You Care?
The next question worth pondering is whether or not you should care if someone is looking at your Instagram profile or content, and the answer is no.
We understand it can cause a bit of a start to suddenly start getting dozens of likes on posts from years ago but, ultimately, you posted that content online for people to look at. You can take posts down or lock your profile, so you are in control of what people can see on your Instagram. As with any social media, you have to accept that a wide range of people will see your content, even people you might not want looking at it.
Your choices in this regard are either to not put the content up in the first place, take it down if you already put it up, or lock your profile so you can control who can and can’t see it. Or, of course, just live with it.
Final Thoughts
While other services like TikTok make it possible to know who has been looking at your profile, Instagram has remained steadfastly in the anonymous (to each other) browsing camp.
Ultimately, it is their platform and their prerogative over how they run it. That being said, if your interests are purely marketing-related, you can always start advertising on Instagram. You won’t be able to see specific names of people who viewed your content, but you will be able to see analytics on the type of people who are looking.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
5. Shutterstock helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the Shutterstock website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
TikTok is a social media platform that lets users easily create, share and discover short-form videos. It’s been around for about 5 years now, and it has over 1 billion users worldwide. TikTok is one of the most popular apps in the world, but most people don’t know how much money you can make by creating content on TikTok.
Can you make money on TikTok? – Yes! Many people make a living on TikTok with the TikTok creator fund and brand deals.
In this article, I’ll explain how much Tiktokers earn from their work on the app and show you some of the top stars who are making big bucks off their TikTok channels.
TikTok is a short-form video-sharing platform.
TikTok is a short-form video sharing platform. It was founded in 2016 by Bytedance, and it currently has over 1 billion users.
TikTok is a free app that you can download for iOS or Android. Once you’ve downloaded the app, you can post original content to your feed or watch other people’s videos and react to them with “hearts” or comments.
When you watch videos on TikTok, though, the app will still show sponsored posts from brands in between them (these are called “ad breaks”).
TikTok launched a Creator Fund in 2019, which pays content creators.
TikTok launched a Creator Fund in 2019, which pays content creators. The goal of the program is to encourage people with large followings to keep producing videos on TikTok and help them grow their audiences.
The Creator Fund gives users who have high view counts and follower counts (based on either their overall following or the number of views they’ve received over the past month) access to paid features like Super Broadcasts and Super Chat.
It’s not a profit sharing program; instead, it pays out when you meet certain thresholds based on how many followers you have. (source)
Top TikTok stars include Addison Rae, Charli D’Amelio, Loren Gray, Zach King and Spencer X.
TikTok is a free app that allows users to make short videos or vlogs. The platform is home to millions of creators who post content daily and share it with their fans.
How much can you make on TikTok? – The best TikTok stars are able to earn hundreds of thousands of dollars per month from their channel, while others make a living by posting sponsored content (i.e., paid advertisements).
Here are some top TikTok stars:
Addison Rae (1M followers)
Charli D’Amelio (2M followers)
Loren Gray (2M followers)
Zach King (11M followers)
Spencer X
TikTok’s most popular users make the bulk of their income from sponsored posts for other brands.
How much can you make from sponsored posts?
TikTok’s most popular users make the bulk of their income from sponsored posts for other brands. These are called brand deals, product placements, and influencer marketing—and it’s an increasingly common way for YouTubers to earn money online.
On TikTok, there are two types of brand deals: ones that require payment up front or in advance (also known as pay-to-play) and those that don’t require any upfront payment but only take a cut based on views (referred to as pay-to-view).
A sponsor may request that their content be shown first in your video or at the end of it in exchange for offering you compensation. If you’re interested in pursuing branded partnerships with brands on TikTok, check out Promoted by TikTok for tips on how to set up your account correctly so you get paid correctly when someone watches a video with their logo in it!
The top stars can earn thousands or even tens of thousands of dollars for a single sponsored post.
In the past, many of the top TikTok creators have made thousands or tens of thousands of dollars per sponsored post. Some have even made millions!
These days, it’s much harder to make this kind of money on TikTok because advertisers are less willing to spend big bucks on influencers. But it’s still possible—if you’re one of the top creators in your category, you might be able to make a few thousand dollars per post.
If you’re just starting out as a creator and haven’t built up an audience yet, expect to earn between $0-$100 per month until then. If your videos catch fire with viewers and build up momentum over time, however, you could eventually earn more than $1k per month for posting content regularly and creating compelling videos that get lots of views (and attract sponsors).
Today, you can only give tips during live broadcasts.
Now, you’re probably wondering how to earn tips on TikTok. The answer is that you can only give tips during live broadcasts. This means you have to be broadcasting an original video or a reaction video at all times in order to collect your rewards.
Tips are not a reliable source of income on any social media platform. They’re not even much of a reward all the time! If someone likes your content and wants to show their appreciation, they will likely follow you instead of tipping you money (which is what coins and hearts are).
The amount of tips that one receives varies depending on several factors: whether they have enough coins/hearts saved up; how many people watch their videos; if the user is popular enough; etcetera…
Josh Richards has been able to negotiate several deals based on his audience size.
Josh Richards is an example of how a TikTok user can make money. His channel, JoshRichardsTV, has over 1 million followers and he’s been able to negotiate several deals based on his audience size.
“It’s pretty common for myself and other creators like me to be approached by companies who want us to do sponsored content,” says Richards. “Sometimes it’s paid upfront, but most often it’s a revenue-share deal where I get paid 50 percent after the video hits certain viewership milestones.”
Tipping as a feature could bring in even more money for creators.
TikTok is a social video platform with over 200 million monthly active users. In 2019, the company launched a Creator Fund to pay content creators. Creators earn money from the ads that run on their videos through the app’s revenue-sharing system, which works similarly to YouTube’s Partner Program.
But could TikTok make even more money if it offered tipping as a feature? Tipping is already used on some apps like Instagram and Reddit (both owned by Facebook).
With enough followers on TikTok, you can earn real money.
You can earn money on TikTok by purchasing ads and sponsored posts. But the best way to make real cash is by creating your own content, which you can then sell through the platform. This is where things get more complicated; TikTok will take a cut of your ad revenue, but it varies depending on how popular your account is. You’ll also have to pay for post production costs like editing software, camera equipment, etc., as well as any other expenses associated with making videos (music rights costs).
So how much can you expect to make? It depends on how many followers you have and how often people watch your videos. On average, users earn about $4 per 1,000 views—which means that if 10 percent of viewers clicked “thumbs up” or purchased an item from one of our sponsored ads (like hot sauce), we’d be looking at approximately $40 in earnings per video!
Conclusion
If you’re looking to make money on TikTok, you need to put in the work. It won’t happen overnight and it won’t be easy. But if you want it badly enough and are willing to put in the time, then there’s no reason why you can’t make some decent cash from your videos.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
5. Shutterstock helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the Shutterstock website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
Like many social media success stories, TikTok seemed to come out of nowhere and just, well, take over. And, like most social media success stories, TikTok has allowed lots of content creators to shoot thanks to their popularity on the platform.
But, while similar platforms like Snapchat and Vine are either dying or are already dead, TikTok doesn’t seem to have found a solution to one of the problems that plagued these other platforms; user monetisation.
Attention spans are not what they were, so we’ll save you some time; yes you can get paid on TikTok from the creator fund, but it’s not as simple as signing up for a partner programme as with YouTube. So, if you’re interested in learning how to get paid on TikTok, keep reading!
What is TikTok, Exactly?
If you’re reading this blog, you almost certainly know about TikTok. That being said, just because you know about it doesn’t mean you know it. Especially if you’re over the age of 30. So, for those of you who have resisted the allure of this Chinese behemoth, here’s a quick rundown of what you get from TikTok.
TikTok is a video-sharing platform that focuses heavily on collaboration. Users can easily “stitch” other users’ content into their own, as well as use the audio from other users’ videos over their own content. Much of the platform is built around this dynamic. For example, clicking the sound link of a video will immediately bring up all the videos that have used that sound, as well as the original video that the sound came from.
Videos are created in a portrait aspect ratio and can be up to 10 minutes in length. In practice, the majority of the videos on the service are a minute long or less. There is also a wide range of filters and special effects, similar to what is found on Snapchat.
What is the Monetisation Situation on TikTok?
So, about the problem we mentioned above. Much like similar platforms such as Vine, Snapchat, Instagram, and even YouTube if you focus exclusively on YouTube Shorts, TikTok does not have a way of directly monetising user content.
What we mean by this is there are no ads being shown against any particular videos. And that’s probably a good thing—these videos are generally very short, and it would likely kill viewership to force people to watch an ad before each video as YouTube does.
The solution is to monetise the platform in a more general sense, inserting ads into the feed every now and again, and then coming up with ways to pass that money onto content creators. In TikTok’s case, its method of choice is through its Creator Fund, more on that in the next section.
How Can I Get Paid on TikTok?
With the way TikTok makes its money established, let’s take a look at how you can make money on the platform.
TikTok Creator Fund
The Creator Fund is how TikTok compensates the creators on its platform. A variety of factors are considered when determining how much a creator is paid, so it’s not as simple as “more views = more money”. TikTok claims that its performance metrics are dynamic, meaning you could receive different payments even though your views and levels of engagement have not changed.
There is no cap on how much you can earn from the Creator Fund, though we know TikTok has committed a fixed amount to the fund ($5.8/£2.3 million over 3 years) and we know their userbase is measured in the billions, so don’t expect to become a millionaire through the Creator Fund alone.
There are some minimum requirements to make money on TikTok, of course. To be considered for a Creator Fund payout, you must be;
At least 18 years old
Be based in the US, UK, France, Germany, Spain, or Italy
Have at least 10,000 followers
Have at least 100,000 video views in the past 30 days
Keep your account in line with TikTok’s community guidelines and terms of service
Brand Partnerships
Brand deals work pretty much the same way on TikTok as they do anywhere else. This method of monetising your content does not involve the platform itself, but rather you enter an agreement with a brand directly (or through a third-party agency), and they pay you to raise awareness of their brand or promote their products on your channel.
There are no hard and fast rules for how brand deals work. Generally speaking, the bigger your audience and engagement, the more options you are likely to have regarding brand deals. That being said, content creators with small audiences can still get brand deals if their niche aligns with a particular brand.
Selling Your Own Products
This one is pretty self-explanatory, but if you have something of your own to sell, you can leverage your success on TikTok to sell it. The product could be music, books, video games, or anything else you create. If you create content on another platform where you make money (such as YouTube), you could attempt to funnel some of your TikTok viewers there.
If you don’t have anything to sell but you have built a large following on TikTok, you can partner with one of the dozens of merch companies to sell your own merchandise, like hats and mugs.
Is TikTok a Valid Source of Income?
TikTok is like any other short-form social media platform. It is possible to make money through the platform, but the number of people who make enough through TikTok alone to call it their “job” is so vanishingly small that nobody should have “TikTok creator” as their goal.
Instead, think of TikTok as another tool in your arsenal. You can make money from it, sure, but use its potential as a promotional tool to bolster your overall revenue. And, in doing so, add a little more diversity to your income streams.
Of course, if you just want to make funny videos or dance to the latest trends, that’s fine too.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
Within 12 months I tripled the size of my channel and very quickly learnt the power of thumbnails, click through rate and proper search optimization. Best of all, they are FREE!
2. Adobe Creative Suite helps me craft amazing looking thumbnails and eye-catching videos
I have been making youtube videos on and off since 2013.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
5. Shutterstock helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the Shutterstock website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
YouTube Shorts monetization is finally coming in 2023. A New York Times leak has hinted that YouTube Shorts will finally be added to the YouTube Partner Programme and creators will get a 45/10/45 split on all revenue with 10% going to musicians and 45% going to the platform.
Starting in early 2023, Shorts-focused creators can apply to YPP by meeting a threshold of 1,000 subscribers and 10M Shorts views over 90 days. These new partners will enjoy all the benefits our program offers, including the various ways to make money like ads on long-form and Fan Funding.
We also want to support creators who are even earlier in their YouTube journey, from gamers showing off their speed runs to trendsetting DIY makeup tutorials. A new level of YPP with lower requirements will offer earlier access to Fan Funding features like Super Thanks, Super Chat, Super Stickers and Channel Memberships. To reward creators across a range of formats, we’ll have paths for long-form, Shorts and Live creators to join this new tier in 2023. Stay tuned for more details.
To be clear, nothing will change with our existing criteria—creators can still apply to YPP when they reach 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours. But these changes reflect the diversity of our growing creator community. Creators can choose the one option that best fits their channel while we maintain the same level of brand safety for advertisers. You can learn more here.
What are YouTube Shorts?
You might be reading this and wondering “what the hell is a YouTube Short?”, but don’t worry, we’re going to fill you in.
YouTube Shorts are essentially YouTube’s answer to Instagram and Facebook Stories. They are short videos—less than 60 seconds to be precise—that are intended for continuous consumption. In essence, YouTube wants viewers to sit and watch several Shorts one after the other, with the ultimate aim being to keep those viewers on the website for longer.
Many of us will happily sit through a 10-15 minute video, and if YouTube can put the right Shorts in front of a viewer, that 10-15 minute window could see them viewing 15-30 Shorts (many Shorts are much less than 60 seconds). These videos are primarily made for mobile viewing, something that is evident when you look at the portrait aspect ratio.
While regular YouTube is the kind of experience you can set up in front of your computer or laptop head off down the rabbit hole, YouTube Shorts is more of a “kill five minutes at the bus stop” kind of experience.
Why make YouTube Shorts?
You have been on the YouTube platform for years and you have always been told to stick to horizontal rather than “ugly looking vertical£ videos – why start making vertical videos now?
YouTube wants to win the new young creator demographic away from TikTok and to do that they are pushing the feature very hard to viewers.
Your videos could show up under the first suggested video on the mobile app giving you a large boost of views. Adopt it early and you could see great results before EVERYONE uses it! Make eye catching relevant videos and you could get featured against established large youtube channels.
Imagine if you could be one of the first people on YouTube all those years ago. Or one of the first people to grow an audience on Twitter and Instagram… this is your chance at a fresh new medium, but this time its supercharged by YouTube!
Even YouTube is exited about the tool
Get discovered: Every month, 2 billion viewers come to YouTube to laugh, learn and connect. Creators have built entire businesses on YouTube, and we want to enable the next generation of mobile creators to also grow a community on YouTube with Shorts.
I have been testing YouTube shorts and seen huge jumps in views even when the channel has only 65 subscribers!
Where Can I See YouTube Shorts?
YouTube shorts are currently curated by YouTube and displayed under videos on the mobile app.
It has its own shelf that you can swap through and the youtube shorts normally match the topic of the main video above – for example if you are watching a tech tips video you might see tech related short stories.
What is YouTube Shorts sizes? ratio?
The standard aspect ratio for YouTube Shorts 9:16. YouTube may add more padding for optimal viewing. The padding is white by default, and dark grey when Dark theme is turned on.
Recommended resolution & aspect ratios for YouTube Shorts.
For 9:16 youtube shorts aspect ratio, encode at these resolutions:
Like most social media platforms, Facebook is increasingly looking for ways to provide you with everything you might need from social media on their website. This isn’t an altruistic goal, of course; Facebook wants people to stay on their site as much as possible because it means more money for them! Still, that doesn’t mean you can’t take advantage of the incentives they are dangling to keep you there.
The answer is, of course, yes. You can make money on Facebook Live, and in this article, we’re going to take a close look at how you can make money on Facebook Live.
What is Facebook Live?
As mentioned above, Facebook Live is Facebook’s in-platform video streaming function. It allows users to start streaming video to their friends, followers, subscribers, and even total strangers on the platform with, in many cases, a single click. Indeed, if you are just streaming yourself in selfie mode, there would be no more setup required than it takes to get ready for a video call, and it’s as simple as that everyday task, as well.
While users have found a myriad of ways to use Facebook Live, it is designed for a personal, almost intimate experience. Consider a person of note—a celebrity or world-leading expert in a particular field, even just a regular person with a lot of friends. The sort of experience Facebook seems to have in mind is a person like that getting on video, live, and casually chatting to their fans, followers, and interested parties, answering questions from the chat, and generally “holding court”.
The video created during a Facebook Live—including the real-time chat—remains visible on that person’s Facebook page (unless they decide to take it down) and is eligible to show up in other people’s feeds when relevant.
Still unsure why you might want to use Facebook Live? Here are some common reasons;
Holding Q&As
One of the most common ways to use Facebook Live for interactive purposes is to hold a questions and answers session with your followers. These live streams typically just consist of the person in the video answering questions from fans. Sometimes they will get those questions directly from the chat in real-time, sometimes they will have polled their followers beforehand. It could even be a mix of the two.
Depending on the type of person doing the stream, the questions could be of a personal nature, such as would be the case for a celebrity whom fans just want to know more about, or they could be more professional, like asking a technology journalist about upcoming stories.
Giving Insight and/or Insider Information
On a related note to the hypothetical journalist above, a professional giving interested viewers an inside look at something they would not normally get to see is another good use for Facebook Live.
Some examples of this include an actor giving their viewers a glimpse behind the scenes of the set they’re working on, or a sound technician showing the chaos backstage at a gig they are setting up. Things like this will nearly always have an audience because there will always be someone interested, and it’s not something they can easily just go off and experience themselves.
Connecting With Your Audience
Facebook Lives don’t have to be offering any specific information to their viewers to have value to them. Personal blogs and vlogs have always been popular for the right people for a reason, and the same applies here. If you are popular enough that people want to know about you, they will welcome any insight into your life.
What makes this different from a Q&A Facebook Live is you don’t necessarily have to be interacting with the audience (though you certainly can). You could just be giving a bit of an update on your life, having a rant, or dropping stream-of-consciousness chatter on your viewers.
It’s worth noting that just turning the camera on with no plan and no real substance to offer is something that only really works for people with an existing fanbase. And we stress fanbase here because fans are not necessarily the same as followers. Fans will be happy to get a glimpse into your life, but people who follow you because you share industry-specific news aren’t likely to care what you’re having for dinner.
Sharing Industry-Related News
If you are a journalist (or something similar like a YouTuber who covers industry news), or a business, you could also use Facebook Live to break news, give updates, talk about new developments, and generally anything related to your field of expertise.
One example of this might be a sci-fi YouTuber going live from Comic-Con, giving a glimpse of proceedings to the thousands of people who wanted to go but couldn’t make it for whatever reason.
Making Money With Facebook Live
Now that we know what Facebook Live is and what you might use it for, how do we make money from it? Fortunately, Facebook has systems in place to help you do that very thing. And, as we’ll touch on shortly, there are always other ways to monetise your content, even if it means not using the official Facebook channels for monetisation.
In-Stream Ads
Perhaps the most familiar form of monetising video content, Facebook’s in-stream ads allows streamers to run ads during their video content, earning money based on the number of views and interactions those ads get.
Facebook gives you a good degree of control (if you want it) over how these ads are displayed. For example, you can run pre-roll ads that show an ad between 5 and 15 seconds long before showing the stream. You can also opt for mid-roll ads, which temporarily take over the main feed but keeps your live stream playing in a floating window. It is also possible to choose banner ads, which show up below your video (on mobile) and above chat.
In each case, Facebook aims to serve ads with as little disruption to the viewing experience as possible.
Stars
Facebook offers a way for viewers to tip live streamers using “Stars”, which are comparable to “bits” on Twitch. Viewers buy stars and can then send them to the live streamer. As the streamer, you earn one cent for every star you receive. Viewers can send a custom amount of stars, but they are encouraged to choose from a preset selection including 50, 100, 200, all the way up to 2,000.
Stars allow Facebook to make money also, in a very similar way to how currency exchange companies make money. While live streamers will earn one cent per star received, it costs viewers more than that to buy the stars, and that is where Facebook’s profit margin comes from.
Promotional Content
Making money through Facebook Live does not necessarily mean you have to use Facebook’s built-in systems. If you have things to promote—products, courses, live appearances (such as concerts)—you can use Facebook Live as a way to build interest, drive traffic, and generally raise awareness.
Granted, this is a much less direct way of making money with Facebook Live, and one that can be hard to track the success of, but it’s certainly an effective use of the service.
Brand Deals and Sponsorship
Another method of making money with Facebook Live that doesn’t involve Facebook itself is by striking up deals with brands. Essentially, you will get paid directly from a person or company to include certain content in your live streams. This content could be a straight-up ad, a review of a product, a how-to session, or anything really that raises awareness of the thing you’re being paid to talk about.
Of course, you will need to get into a position to make these kinds of deals before being able to take advantage of them. Having a large audience is usually enough, but content creators with smaller audiences can still get brand deals if they have a focused niche with an engaged audience.
Final Thoughts
These days, it’s possible to make money using just about any content creation platform on the Internet, regardless of whether that platform has any systems in place to make it easier for you. As it turns out, Facebook Live does have systems in place that allow you to make money.
But, like anything else, you need to get into a position to take advantage of these systems (or any other method of generating revenue) before you can benefit. You will need to grow an audience, build a reputation, and become someone who people are willing to watch when they go live. What that means for you specifically will depend on what your business is, but it will almost certainly require a bit of patience.
It wasn’t that long ago that making YouTube videos were created just for fun. But now, it’s one of the highest-paying jobs on the planet. Content creators are making a living out of ad revenue, sponsorships, and using their influence to branch out to other business ventures. The competition is high, but here are the 20 of the richest YouTubers dominating the video-sharing platform right now.
Top 20 Wealthiest YouTubers of 2022:
1. Jeffree Star – $200 Million
The makeup artist and former musician is on the top of the list as he is a master of promoting his own brand, Jeffree Star Cosmetics, using his YouTube channel. He makes beauty content and shares his opinion on confidence, self-image, and fame.
Jeffree made money before YouTube by doing various makeup and modeling gigs. He also joined Myspace and gained a large following. He later started a YouTube channel to endorse his music. But when it didn’t work, he launched his own business.
With 16.1 million subscribers, he is far from being the most-subscribed YouTuber, but it’s enough to make him the wealthiest. His company alone makes him over $100 million yearly. Combine that with his other income sources, and Jeffree gets a $200 million estimated net worth.
2. PewDiePie – $40 Million
Felix Kjellberg, also known as PewDiePie, is dubbed by many as the king of YouTube. He has been on YouTube for a long time, popularizing commentary and reaction videos relating to video games and other pop culture topics.
PewDiePie was always passionate about gaming in his youth, so he recorded himself playing his favorite games. It wasn’t easy at first as YouTube didn’t have the monetization feature yet. He supported his lifestyle by selling artwork, working in the harbor, and running a hot dog stand.
He had the biggest YouTube channel for a long time until T-Series dethroned him after their rivalry. Still, he remains the most popular individual user on the site with 111 million subscribers and a net worth of approximately $40 million.
3. Markiplier – $35 Million
Markiplier is a YouTuber who makes comedic sketches and gameplay videos. Like PewDiePie, Mark has a long history on YouTube. He is a pioneer of the sketch style of playing every character involved.
He has created multiple YouTube channels throughout the years because of different reasons. The first time was when his Adsense account was banned. So, he made MarkiplierGAME. He is also a part of the now-deleted Unus Annus channel.
Now, his self-titled main channel has a subscriber count of 32.3 million. Mark has also found success in other ventures, such as podcasting and voice acting. He has a net worth of around $35 million as a result of his endeavors.
4. DanTDM – $35 Million
Originally referred to as TheDiamondMInecraft, DanTDM is another content creator who got most of his fame and fortune by playing video games. He primarily plays Minecraft, but he also tries other games, like Counter-Strike: Global Offensive and Pokemon.
In the category of dedicated Minecraft YouTube channel, he set a Guinness World Record for the most views. Dan also broke the record for the most goals scored by a Rocket League squad of two or three players in a single game.
Dan has acquired a total of 26 million subscribers. With this following, he wrote the book titled Trayaurus and the Enchanted Crystal in 2016. He did a book tour and starred in a YouTube Red series the following year. He has a net worth of nearly $35 million.
5. Ryan’s World – $32 Million
Ryan’s World is one of the most recognized YouTube accounts for children. In this channel, a child named Ryan Kaji reviews toy products, performs DIY science experiments, and completes numerous tasks.
It was previously known as Ryan ToysReview, but it was later renamed to its current moniker as Ryan tried new things. The 10-year-old’s mother had given up her full-time career to work with her son for this channel.
They currently have nine total channels, but they garnered 32 million subscribers on their main account. There’s a Spanish and Japanese version of Ryan’s World. They also sell merch, which is mainly toys and clothing. This gives Ryan a $32 million net worth at a young age.
6. Dude Perfect – $30 Million
Cody Jones, Tyler Toney, Garrett Hilbert, and twins Cory and Coby Cotton make up Dude Perfect. They gained popularity by making trick shot videos. Now, they are also doing other wild challenges and fun video series.
The five members were all roommates in college at Texas A&M University. They started by recording trick shots at Tyler’s ranch. When their videos became viral, ESPN called them and asked to feature them.
Dude Perfect has amassed 57.3 million subscribers. Players from several professional sports leagues have collaborated with them. They also created a mobile game with the same name as their channel. Now, the group has a total of $30 million in net worth.
7. MrBeast – $25 Million
This may come as a surprise to some, but MrBeast is not the wealthiest YouTuber alive. He just likes to make philanthropy and challenge videos in which he gives away thousands, and sometimes millions, of dollars to random people and organizations.
Jimmy began posting on YouTube as MrBeast6000 when he was 13 years old. He started getting mainstream attention in 2017 when he made unique vlogs and rigorous challenges.
MrBeast is now close to getting the Red Diamond Play Button as he racked up 91.8 million subscribers. This fame also helped him launch other ventures such as Finger on the App, MrBeast Burger, Feastables. That’s why it’s not surprising that he has over $25 million in net worth.
8. VanossGaming – $25 Million
Evan Fong, popularly known as VanossGaming, is a Canadian online figure, creative director, gaming commentator, and disc jockey. He showcases most of his talents on his YouTube channel.
He created his YouTube channel around the same time he went to college to study economics. When he began to devote more time to content creation, his parents became concerned. But everything worked out in the end for Fong.
He is regarded as a key character in the expanding video game commentary subculture. This is how he got 25.6 million people to subscribe to his channel. He also makes money as a DJ called Rynx. It eventually gave him an estimated net worth of $25 million.
9. Ninja – $25 Million
Ninja, whose real name is Richard Tyler Blevins, is a professional gamer known for streaming Halo 3, Fortnite, PUBG, and more. Team Liquid, Cloud9, Renegades, and Luminosity Gaming were among the teams he played for.
He never went to a university and started streaming in 2011. He was slowly getting viewers at first. His mainstream media debut came in March 2018, when he streamed Fortnite with Travis Scott, Drake, and JuJu Smith-Schuster.
At the time of writing, Ninja’s subscriber count is hidden, but it’s known that he reached 23.9 million in the past. Apart from YouTube, he has many fans on Twitch, even becoming the most-followed channel on the platform in late 2021. He now has a net worth close to $25 million.
10. Rhett and Link – $24 Million
Rhett James McLaughlin and Charles Lincoln “Link” Neal III are a comedic pair that dubs themselves as the “Internetainers”. They have made several comedy projects together, but perhaps their most successful one is the web series Good Mythical Morning.
The duo met in first grade at a North Carolina elementary school. They went on to share a dorm room at North Carolina State University. They both worked in their respective fields for a period while also creating skits.
Their Rhett and Link channel has 4.99 million subscribers, while Good Mythical Morning has 17.5 million. They run five channels in total. They are also the current owners of another comedy group called Smosh. With this, the two have a combined net worth of $24 million.
11. James Charles – $22 Million
As a creator who thrives in the beauty genre, James Charles Dickinson is known for his makeup tutorials. He has stated that cosmetics is a creative expression and an art form for him.
He got into beauty by assisting a colleague with her makeup for a school dance. He eventually taught himself how to do it alone and began doing it professionally for others. James started his channel while working as a small makeup artist in New York.
James has about 24.2 million subscribers currently. After a tweet displaying his makeup made headlines, he was named CoverGirl’s first male brand ambassador. He’s over $22 million after releasing his own makeup line.
12. Jake Paul – $22 Million
Jake Paul is a vlogger who has turned his focus to celebrity boxing. His YouTube channel is known for its pranks, controversy, and music. He is a part of Team 10, who dropped the song, It’s Everyday Bro, which received mixed reactions from listeners.
He first became known on Vine and then for his role as Dirk Mann on the Disney Channel show Bizaardvark, which he played for two seasons. Paul has been the target of numerous controversies during his career as a result of his actions.
Even with the disputes, Paul has gained 20.4 million subscribers. As of his professional boxing career, he has a 5-0 record. Content creation and boxing made him one of the most prosperous YouTubers today, worth $22 million.
13. KSI – $21 Million
JJ Olatunji, alias KSI, is known for posting hilarious reactions and gaming commentary videos on his YouTube channel. He is also involved in celebrity boxing, and he releases his own music. He is also a member of the British influence group Sidemen.
In 2008, he began publishing gaming videos on YouTube, and most of them were about FIFA. He drew a large number of viewers and quickly increased his material coverage.
The JJ Olatunji channel, where he uploads his vlogs, has 14.8 million subscribers while his music account, KSI, has 23.7. JJ was the first rival of Jake Paul in their amateur boxing career. It ended with a draw, and both turned pro later on. This contributed to KSI’s current net worth of $21 million.
14. Preston Arsement – $20 Million
With multiple gaming channels, Preston Arsement is one of the leading content creators in his category. He mainly plays Minecraft, and he’s a part of The Pack, a Minecraft community he started with his friends. He also makes videos from the Minecraft server he runs.
Like many gaming creators, Preston has been a video game lover since childhood. He eventually decided to skip college and create the TBNRfrags channel with two of his friends, TBNRKenWorth and ChocoTheChocobo.
TBNRfrags has reached 7.53 million subscribers. But later on in Preston’s career, he decided to make a channel of his own. It now has 19.3 million subscribers. Arsement’s online pursuits have earned him a net worth of over $20 million.
15. Like Nastya – $20 Million
Like Nastya is the second children’s channel to make it on this list. The channel stars a little Russian girl named Anastasia Radzinskaya, who often does toy unboxing, reviews, and travel vlogs.
At birth, Anastasia was diagnosed with cerebral palsy. Her parents both worked and owned businesses that they eventually sold. They devoted all of their time to caring for their daughter, eventually making a YouTube channel dedicated to her.
Fortunately, the girl is doing well now, and their efforts have earned them 89.2 million subscribers. They translated their videos into different languages. It helped Anastasia gain a net worth of approximately $20 million at eight years old.
16. David Dobrik – $20 Million
As a long-running social media personality, it’s not a shock to many that David Dobrik is one of the most affluent content creators on the planet. His YouTube channel featured individuals with whom he had previously collaborated on other platforms.
David started out on Vine. Before Vine was shut down, he had over a million followers. Because of this, he was able to shift to YouTube faster than most other influencers.
The Slovakian personality continues to grow with his 18.3 million subscribers. He made a second channel, David Dobrik Too. He uploads challenge videos and blooper clips there. David also has a podcast with Jason Nash. All of this amounts to a net worth of around $20 million.
17. Lilly Singh – $20 Million
Formerly called Superwoman, Lilly Singh is an accomplished comedian and actress. Her YouTube channel is full of skits and crossovers with well-known celebrities.
Singh had planned to obtain a degree as her parents had wanted but instead chose to make YouTube videos. She decided that if her YouTube career did not take off, she would return to grad school. But her YouTube channel exceeded her expectations.
She now has 14.7 million subscribers and has been involved in projects outside of YouTube to improve her wealth. She got the chance to make music, host a talk show, and tour the world. Though she still studied for a degree, she also has a net worth close to $20 million.
18. Logan Paul – $19 Million
Logan is the big brother of Jake Paul. The siblings have a similar career and content, consisting of pranks, challenges, and vlogs. Both of them have been involved in several controversies and have dived into the world of professional boxing.
At ten years old, Logan was already making videos. In 2015, he was the most famous Vine creator. He moved on to act in some television programs and even write a screenplay.
He now has 23.4 million subscribers. Aside from his typical content, he’s a frequent guest at boxing, mixed martial arts, wrestling events. He also hosts a podcast titled Impaulsive that adds a lot to Paul’s $19 million net worth.
19. Blippi – $16 Million
Blippi, also referred to as Stevin John, is a popular children’s entertainer who can be seen on a handful of streaming platforms. He depicts a lively and curious character in his informative videos so that kids can relate to him.
Stevin didn’t start out as Blippi. In fact, he was far from child-friendly in his early days of playing characters. He portrayed Steezy Grossman, a child born as feces.
Switching to a different look is perhaps the best decision he’s made now that he has 15.1 million subscribers on YouTube. He also makes foreign language videos and releases them to various platforms. That’s why Blippi is worth $16 million.
20. Roman Atwood – $14.5 Million
Roman Bernard Atwood was known initially for his prank videos. However, he ultimately transitioned to another content style. He made vlogs, in which he chronicles his daily activities.
While still in high school, Roman Atwood began filming and making videos. He even made The Nerd Herd DVD series. In Columbus, Ohio, he’s also worked on a number of films and commercial gigs.
His original prank channel earned 10.3 million subscribers until he stopped posting there in 2016. Now, he is active on his second channel. Overtook the first one with 15.5 million subscribers, giving Roman Atwood a 14.5 million net worth.
Social media platform Pinterest (PINS) makes money from advertising. Shares started trading on the New York Stock Exchange on April 18 under the symbol “PINS.”
Founded in 2010, Pinterest went public on on April 18, 2019. Its initial public offering (IPO) price was at $19 per share and it raised $1.4 billion, giving it a valuation of roughly $12.7 billion including restricted stock and options. As of Dec. 3, 2021, the company had a market capitalization of $23.3 billion. Roughly 431 million users, or “pinners,” use the bulletin board-like platform every month to browse and share images and other content in the form of “pins.”
Key Takeaways
Pinterest makes its money via advertising, specifically, promoted pins. These promoted pins are ads that look similar to user-generated pins (posts).
The company has integrated a “buy it” button which permits users to buy pinned products directly from Pinterest, rather than visiting a separate merchant site.
In 2021, the company generated $2.57 billion in revenue but posted a net loss of $316 million.
Opportunities for increasing revenue that Pinterest plans to pursue include greater international expansion, focusing on video and increasing ad capabilities, as well as pursuing its own e-commerce efforts.
Pinterest History
The company, which grew out of an app called Tote that dated from 2008, received $100 million in financing when it was valued at $1.5 billion in 2012. The funding firms included Rakuten, Goldman Sachs (GS), and Andreessen Horowitz. It was valued at $12.3 billion during its last round of funding in 2017. The company has a dual-class structure.
When it was founded, Pinterest seemed to follow the model of social network sites like Meta Inc. (FB), formerly Facebook—meaning that it aimed to develop a massive network of users first and then to install means of generating revenue later on. Pinterest $756 million in revenue in 2018, a jump of 60% from the previous year. The company generated $261 million in revenue during the second quarter of 2019, a 62% year-over-year increase.
“Our advertising products help businesses reach Pinners across their decision-making journey,” said the company, which cited a Talk Shoppe survey that said 68% of weekly active users discovered a new brand or product on Pinterest.
“We address various advertiser objectives through our Promoted Pin ad format, which contains either a single image, a carousel of images or video. Our ability to develop new and improve existing advertising products will be an important driver of our future growth.”
So just how has Pinterest come to be one of the most-hyped social media companies among investors and what is a promoted pin?
Monetizing Pins on Pinterest
Before looking at more traditional means of generating revenue, it’s worth looking at how Pinterest has utilized its unique pin system to create opportunities for monetization. The company has integrated a “buy it” button which permits users to buy pinned products directly from Pinterest, rather than visiting a separate merchant site.
Merchants participating in BigCommerce, Shopify, or Salesforce Commerce Cloud are allowed the opportunity to partner with Pinterest; it’s unclear whether Pinterest charges any commissions from these partners.
Promoted Pinterest Pins
Pinterest’s primary source of revenue is what it calls “promoted pins.” These special pins are effectively advertisements, paid for by identified sponsors. As with Facebook’s timeline feature, promoted pins look very similar to (but not exactly the same as) standard pins. Pinterest utilizes user data to target advertisements based on user interests and searches, as well as other demographics. Given that users pin items that they are interested in already, this process is relatively straightforward for the company.
Pinterest’s revenue is driven by interest and use of its platform, which is increasingly popular among fashion and beauty brands. Given that the users of Pinterest are overwhelmingly female and have above-average incomes, using its platform as an e-commerce gateway is more than ideal.
Next Steps
Pinterest’s user base has grown over the years, where it’s carved out a niche that allows it to not directly compete with the likes of Facebook. Pinterest’s leadership has adopted a much less aggressive approach to growth than its competitors. Revenue has grown since the company has gone public, but so has its net loss, as the company has ramped up spending on sales and marketing and research and development.
One big future opportunity is being able to tap the international markets, where Pinterest currently has little reach. Beyond that, Pinterest is interested in building out its e-commerce efforts (what exactly that looks like remains to be seen), as well as continuing to develop advertising tools— including video capabilities—for advertisers.
Whether you are just heavily interested in a particular subject and would like to find like-minded individuals to socialise with, or you are looking to build a community for promotional reasons, Facebook groups are an excellent tool in your arsenal. Still, as useful as Facebook groups can be, they have to have members—often lots of them—to achieve that potential.
There are several ways to grow a Facebook group, and, fortunately, the majority of those ways have nothing to do with spending any money. In this post, we’re going to take a deeper dive into what Facebook groups are, why they might be useful to you, and what you can do to ensure the success of your group or a group you are part of.
What is a Facebook Group?
A Facebook group is essentially a place for people with a common interest to get together and discuss that interest, much like any other internet forum. The interest in question can be anything that doesn’t break Facebook’s rules and guidelines, and anyone can set up a group.
The reason Facebook groups are so popular is, ultimately, down to the popularity of Facebook. With billions of people already on the platform and familiar with how it works, it is often far easier to set up a new Facebook group and get new members interested in joining than it is to build a community on places like Reddit, even as popular as Reddit is.
Group admins have the ability to set the rules of their Facebook group, removing members if they don’t follow them. They can also have the group be public, private, visible to all but only members are allowed to participate, invite-only, and more.
All standard Facebook rules apply within groups, so doing or saying anything that breaks Facebook’s terms of service can still get you in trouble, even if the admins of a group allow it.
Are Facebook Groups Worth It?
The natural question you should be having at this stage is; are “Facebook groups worth the effort?” The answer very much depends on what you are trying to achieve, but we’re going to hazard a guess that, yes, they are worth it if you are reading this page.
Firstly, if you are just looking for a community to talk about something you are interested in, Facebook groups will certainly be able to give you that. That being said, there is a strong chance that a group already exists, and you might want to consider joining one rather than making one. We’ll get into whether you should start a group a little later on.
If you are looking to Facebook groups as a tool for promotion, it is certainly worth it, but you will have to put the time and effort in to make things work. Like most things in life and online promotion, there’s no quick fix to reaching your goals.
Things to Consider Before Starting a Facebook Group
It’s all well and good concluding that a Facebook group can get you what you’re looking for, but that doesn’t automatically mean you should make one. Running a successful Facebook group is not without effort, and even if you’re willing and able to put in the effort, there’s still no guarantee of success.
Before we look at how to grow your Facebook group, let’s take a moment to ponder whether you should be starting or running a group at all. And, remember, this is independent of whether a Facebook group could be good for you in terms of goals. A Facebook group might be an amazing tool for promotion, but if you don’t have the time and willingness needed to make it work, it won’t help you.
Do I Have a Good Subject Matter for a Facebook Group?
This is especially important if you are planning to use your Facebook group as a promotional tool. If you just want to create a community to talk about something you’re interested in, it doesn’t matter what that interest is, because your only goal is to find people to talk to about it. If you are promoting something, however, your subject matter needs to be relevant but still interesting enough to foster genuine discussion.
For example, if you are promoting a YouTube channel about technology, such as new gadgets, that subject may be too broad to create a successful Facebook group around. Remember, the beauty of these groups is the ability to find people with the same specific interests as you, not general interests. But, if you zero in too far and create your group around, say, a specific type of technology, like mobile phones, you run the risk of people in the group not being interested in your general technology YouTube channel.
Do I Have the Time to Run a Facebook Group?
Running a successful Facebook group, whether for personal or promotional reasons, takes time. This is especially true in the early days of the group, where you will need to get out and about to garner interest and draw attention to the group. As things progress, the group will need less and less of your time to keep ticking over, but you will need to be actively working to get to that stage.
And, if promotion is your goal, this applies even more to you. If you just want to talk, you can always get the group started and then dip in and out as you please. If you want to promote things, you’ll need to keep your hand in constantly, or the members of the group will stop seeing you as someone of interest.
What Rules Should My Facebook Group Have?
There are two types of rules to consider; Facebook enforceable rules, and arbitrary rules. Facebook enforceable rules are things that Facebook provides a mechanism for, such as having the group be private and invite-only. Arbitrary rules can be literally anything you want, but you have to enforce them yourself, such as by kicking people from the group.
The best rules will vary from group to group. The only advice we can really give here is to be as unrestrictive as you can within the scope of your group. For example, it wouldn’t be wise to allow misogynist language in a group for survivors of domestic abuse. On the other hand, it would be unwise to ban adult language in a group about alternative comedy.
How to Grow Facebook Group
So, you’ve decided you want to start a group and you have the time and willingness to do so. How do you make it grow?
Have Compelling Reason to Join
The first thing you need to do is make sure your potential members have a compelling reason to join your group. The most effective way of achieving this is by offering something they can’t find elsewhere.
Of course, if you have a topic that there is no other group for, that would be the ideal situation… but it’s an unlikely one. There are a lot of groups on Facebook. If you haven’t got a unique subject matter, have a good look at the competition, and see if there is anything you can offer that they can’t. This could be more relaxed (or stricter) rules, or even just your expertise if the subject matter is something you are particularly knowledgeable about.
Leverage Your Existing Audience (if you have one)
If you already have an audience—perhaps you run a YouTube channel or blog—be sure to promote your Facebook group to them. This may seem counter-intuitive if the main reason for creating the group is to promote the thing your audience knows you for, but having a larger number of members gives your group more legitimacy in the eyes of newcomers.
We’re not suggesting paying for fake members, of course. That rarely works. Bought users will not engage, and a large group with no activity often looks less appealing than a small group with no activity.
Branch Out to New Audiences
Obviously, you will want to stay within the subject matter, but when letting people know about your group, don’t limit yourself to things like your own audience from other places. Reach out to other communities and try to find new people.
Always be sure to be respectful when you do this, however. Just barging into a subreddit or a YouTuber’s comment section and spamming about your group is unlikely to win anyone over.
Encourage Members to Promote the Group
Once you have members, encourage them to let others know about the group. Don’t just tell them to go get more members, of course, they’re not your employees. Just politely mention it from time to time, and be sure to emphasise the fact that everyone benefits from more members, as there will be more discussion.
Final Thoughts
Whether you want to talk about your favourite series of novels or promote your YouTube channel about miniature castle building, Facebook groups are a powerful tool to achieve your goals. And, what’s more, it’s free! All it takes is a little time and effort on your part to build an active community.
When getting started on YouTube—or even when you’re established—it can sometimes be tempting to engage the services of one of those “10,000 views for $10!!!” offers you find on places like Fiverr. And, if you seek the advice of any knowledgeable YouTuber, you will likely be told to stay well clear of those bought views for a variety of reasons.
Ultimately, however, the damage done by fake views is mostly one of disappointment. You pay for thousands of views only to find that your revenue doesn’t change because none of the fake viewers are legitimately engaged with your content. Where things get a little dicier is when it comes to YouTube terms of service, since breaking those can get you kicked off of the platform. Of course, for YouTube to penalise someone for fake views, they first have to be able to detect those fake views. So, can YouTube detect fake views?
Yes. To a certain extent, YouTube can detect fake views and will take action to nullify those views, as well as potentially take action against any YouTubers who are suspected of wrongdoing.
What do We Mean by “Fake Views”?
As with many things in the English language, the wording can get confusing when dealing with fake views. One of the main points of confusion is the use of “fake views” interchangeably with “buying viewers”, which may be true to some extent, but it is perfectly possible to buy viewers in a manner that YouTube deems acceptable.
We are, of course, referring to advertising. At the end of the day, paying advertising and other forms of promotion in which you pay money to promote your channel are forms of “buying views”, but YouTube does not have a problem with this. Not least because they hope you will use their advertising platform to promote your work
No, when we say “fake views” or “bought views”, we are referring to views that have been bought by the amount. Paying money for a guaranteed number of views will almost always fall afoul of YouTube terms of service, which takes a hard line against anything that artificially increases the number of views, likes, comments, or any other metrics you might care to pad out.
The use of the word “artificial” in that sentence is important. You see, if you just went out and paid 10,000 people to watch your video, like or dislike as they deemed fit, and drop a comment based on their actual thoughts about the video, YouTube probably wouldn’t have a problem. Those users would be engaging with the content and the fact that you paid them to do it wouldn’t be an issue.
The reality of fake views is not that, however.
Fake views are nearly always either bots or a captive audience, such as users who are being paid pennies to watch thirty seconds of video. These views are not worth anything to YouTube since they are not going to click on ads or dive further into the site where they can accumulate value for the platform.
This is not just bad in the sense that the fake view isn’t earning YouTube any money, but it’s also bad in the sense that it skews their advertising performance metrics. The more views that don’t result in clicks through to advertisers, the less appealing YouTube becomes for said advertisers.
Needless to say, it’s in YouTube’s best interests to crack down on fake views.
Can YouTube Detect Fake Views
So, with all of that in mind, can YouTube detect fake views? We said in a somewhat cagey fashion that they can, but what does “to a certain extent” mean?
Simply put, YouTube can make educated guesses about views based on a variety of factors. Things like IP addresses and their watching habits, how long views last, the views per hour ratio of a video or channel, and where the traffic sources for these views are.
All of these things and more are considered and allow YouTube’s systems to paint a picture of the user viewing a video. If there is a high probability that a view is fake, YouTube will treat it as such.
Will I Get Banned for Buying Fake Views?
You may get lucky. YouTube has been known to erase fake views without taking any action against the YouTuber whose videos were viewed. It is likely YouTube factors in the magnitude of fake views and whether a channel has a history of getting fake views. If you buy a few thousand fake views once, you will probably be safe from the ban hammer. If you buy tens of thousands every week, you’re going to get caught.
That being said, always remember that YouTube’s terms don’t specify an amount. Fake views are fake views, and you could have your channel erased if you buy them.
Do Fake YouTube Views Work?
The golden question then becomes; is there any benefit to fake views. And is that benefit worth the risk? Unfortunately, we have to come down on the side of no, there is no worthwhile advantage to fake views.
As mentioned, these views do not engage with your content, meaning they don’t earn you ad revenue or click your affiliate links or sign up to your Patreon. Worse still, they negatively affect your channel. Having a high volume of views with a poor engagement rate reflects badly on your content in the eyes of YouTube, and this could lead to your videos getting recommended less!
Final Thoughts
There are many shady things that can be done to increase your chances of success online, including on YouTube. But when the negative impact of buying fake views is weighed along with the risk of getting caught and suspended from the platform, it’s hard to make a case for buying fake views.
Building your audience organically will ensure that your viewers are engaged, there for the long haul, and, above all, you will be safe from being caught out by YouTube!
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube
I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.
I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.
That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.
5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
Facebook Marketplace has been something of a revelation for many people, combining the convenience of sites like eBay and Gumtree with a distinctly more localised approach. Many people prefer to sell one-off items on Facebook because of how easy it is to find buyers nearby. And the same goes for buying things—it’s often more appealing to look in your local area for something you could perhaps walk to pick up, rather than something that might have to be shipped across the country. But what about something a little larger in scale?
In other words, can you make money on Facebook marketplace? Like, real money. Not just a bit of extra change for some old items you don’t need anymore.
The answer, of course, is yes. As long as you have something to sell, you can certainly make money on Facebook Marketplace. As for getting items to sell, we’ll leave that for another post, as it can be quite an in-depth topic in its own right. But, whether you buy items in bulk, import from China, or even make the thing you’re selling yourself, we have a slew of tips to help you ensure that product gets sold.
And, if you are just selling one or two items you don’t need anymore and have no intention of making this a regular thing, read on! These tips should still be useful for you.
What You Should Know About Facebook Marketplace
Before we get started, let’s cover a few basics about Facebook Marketplace for anyone who is new to it, or wants a little refresher course. The Marketplace is open to anyone who has a Facebook account and is not in trouble for breaking any of Facebook’s rules.
For the most part, there are no restrictions on the types of things you can sell. The exceptions to this include anything that is illegal, weapons or explosives (even if they are legal where you are), and anything that would require the buyer to be a legal adult, such as alcohol. Oh, and animals. You can’t sell animals.
Finally, you can’t sell services. That means you’re not allowed to offer something like car washing, dog grooming, house painting, or anything else that doesn’t involve money being exchanged for an item.
Tips for Making Money on Facebook Marketplace
Now, onto the tips. We’ve put together six tips we feel will give you the best chance of a successful sale on Facebook Marketplace.
Presentation is Everything
Often the first mistake people make when selling things on Facebook Marketplace is being too casual with their listing. This can seem a little paradoxical because one of the reasons Facebook Marketplace is so popular is the decidedly local feel it gives. It’s a lot more like selling something to a neighbour at a garage or car boot sale than it is taking your items to auction.
Still, even with that in mind, it pays (literally), to put a little effort into the presentation of your item when you make your listing. Potential buyers may know that they are buying a second-hand item from a neighbour, but given two identical items for the same price, they will nearly always go for the one with the nicer photos. Here are some sub-tips for making sure your photos are up to scratch.
Clean Your Item
Firstly, give whatever it is you are trying to sell a bit of a sprucing up. If it can be cleaned, clean it. We’re not saying you should turn it into a full restoration project, but a bit of wipe or dust down will usually go a long way.
Of course, it’s important not to damage the item, so be careful about what you clean it with, as many cleaning products will have some materials they are not meant to be used on. And, if the item is somewhat fragile, such as an antique of some kind, it might be best to leave it well enough alone.
Stage Your Photo
Making sure the thing you’re selling is presentable is only half the battle, if the pictures you take don’t show the item off in all its glory, it can the same effect as not sprucing it up a bit before taking the pictures.
Always make sure you have good lighting when you take your photos. You don’t need to buy a professional lighting rig for this—everyday sunlight will do just fine. The placement of the lighting is important, too. If you have a lot of light behind the item, it will make it hard to see. Also, try and get the item in front of as plain a background as possible. If the background of the image is too busy, that also makes it harder to see the item.
Take Multiple Photos
So you’ve cleaned your item up and you’ve staged the photo perfectly… now what? Well, you certainly shouldn’t just sit back and admire your handiwork. Get the camera back out and snap a few more pictures from different angles.
Not only will having more pictures increase the likelihood of someone purchasing your item, but it could also save you time in responding to questions from potential buyers. If there are any points of interest on the item, try to include them in a picture. For example, if you are selling something electronic, try to include a picture that shows any stickers or stamps regarding voltage or classification information.
Make Your Description Useful
It can be easy to skimp on the descriptions when selling on Facebook Marketplace. After all, you’re not writing a product description for a professional store, are you?
Leaving aside the fact that a lack of information—or badly written information—is a turn off to some, this is another situation where you should put a little extra effort in to save yourself some time in the long run. If the listing does not answer the obvious questions about the item you are selling, either through the pictures or through your description, you will almost certainly get interested parties messaging you to ask.
Use Keywords
Keywords may not be the kind of thing you’d associate with what is essentially a classified listing, but they shouldn’t be overlooked. Facebook does its best to make sure any bargain hunters on the marketplace find what they’re looking for, but there’s no sense in making it harder than it needs to be.
Make sure your listing contains any important words. For example, if you are selling a used video game for the PS4 console, your description should, at the very least, include the words “PS4”, “game”, “console”, and “used”. Also, while we’re not sure how much of a difference it makes to Facebook’s search algorithm whether the description is well-written or not, you should try to write the description clearly anyway for the sake of the potential buyers who are going to be reading it.
Be Honest About Your Item
Being honest about what you are selling is important for several reasons. Firstly, it’s just morally wrong to lie about what you’re selling. If that’s not enough, however, there’s also the fact that it could lose you sales. You might fool someone, but someone who knows the item might be able to spot the lie. And, finally, lying would be a shortsighted way to make a sale, as you would then have a reputation for it, which would make it harder to sell items in the future.
List Items Individually
Don’t group several items together for convenience, because it makes them harder to sell. Now, we’re not suggesting you sell an Xbox gaming console and its power supply separately, but if you had a dozen Xbox games to sell, grouping them may make it harder to get a sale, as the buyer will have to be willing to purchase all of the game rather than just one of them.
Price Your Item High (But Not Too High)
Don’t go crazy, but pricing your item a little higher than you’re willing to sell it for will give you a little barter room. Many buyers on Facebook Marketplace like to haggle the price down and are more likely to buy if they can get a bit of money knocked off. Adding a little on allows you to get the price you’re after while letting the buyer feel like they’ve got themselves a better deal. Of course, if you price it too high, most buyers will just keep on browsing straight by your item.
Final Thoughts
Facebook Marketplace is certainly more of a tool for selling things you no longer have a use for but could still be useful to someone else, like electronics you have upgraded from, or old furniture. That being said, it is still a viable business tool, as you can sell almost anything on there, and that includes products you stock.
As with any marketplace, presentation is most of the battle. Make sure your descriptions are accurate and give the buyer all the information they need, and make sure your pictures are clear and show all parts of the item that might need to be seen.
Privacy on the Internet is one of our bigger concerns in today’s interconnected world, and YouTube is not exempt from those concerns. Given the sheer volume of YouTube videos that are watched at any given time, and especially by any individual person, there is a wealth of information that can be gleaned from knowing someone’s YouTube viewing history.
Unfortunately, the answer to “can YouTube history be tracked?” is a resounding yes, it most certainly can… assuming you are using YouTube as a logged-in user. YouTube will still track your usage when you are not logged in, of course, but there this data will be anonymised. This is not to say it’s not tracking you in a way, but more on that shortly.
YouTube Viewing History
The first thing to be aware of when considering YouTube’s tracking abilities is that it is baked into the platform. YouTube makes its money through advertising, and the biggest selling point for online advertisers is the fact that ads can be targeted to very specific demographics because of all the information YouTube has. YouTube knows your age, gender, geographical region, interests, and more, allowing advertisers to make sure their ads are being shown to people who are likely to be interested. Naturally, that system doesn’t work if YouTube doesn’t collect information about you.
Your viewing history is the most obvious thing, of course. You yourself can view your viewing history if you wish, a particularly useful tool for finding videos you’ve enjoyed in the past but can’t find now. Of course, in order for this feature to be available, YouTube needs to keep a record of what you have watched.
Your YouTube viewing history is private, and cannot be viewed by anyone else. If you don’t want certain videos logged to your viewing history, you can always log out of YouTube before viewing them. There are some limitations to this method, however. For example, YouTube will not allow you to watch videos it has deemed inappropriate for younger viewers unless you are logged in. This is mostly to prevent children from getting around content restrictions by using YouTube logged out.
You can also clear your viewing history if you’re worried about someone using your computer and stumbling across your obsession with videos of capybara playing with dogs, but that will only affect the viewing history you see—the data that YouTube uses to decide what to recommend to you will still be there.
Non-YouTube Tracking
It is possible for your YouTube history to be tracked by non-YouTube parties, but in the vast majority of cases, this would require you to have either agreed to something or been hacked by someone.
For example, if you are using YouTube through a device that has been opted into something like Nielson tracking, all of your online activity will be tracked, including your YouTube use, but this is something you will have actively sought out and agreed to beforehand.
It is also possible for your device to become infected with malicious software that will monitor your YouTube usage, but you should be able to avoid this with common sense security measures, such as having up to date anti-virus software and not clicking on untrustworthy links.
There are also perfectly legitimate (in the legal sense, not necessarily the moral one) ways to track your usage, such as Facebook’s “Off-Facebook Activity” settings. These can be disabled by you, but if they are not, Facebook can track a number of things you might be getting up to online.
Your Online “Fingerprint”
We often worry about our identity being out there because all of the scariest sounding forms of hacking and online fraud involve stealing our identities for something. It is possible to track you without your identity, however.
When you use the Internet, including websites like YouTube, there is a wealth of information that those remote servers have access to. These include things like the operating system your device is using, the browser, what screen resolution you have, even what fonts are installed.
While none of these things inherently give away your identity, there are sufficient variables to reliably identify a returning anonymous user. In this manner, a remote server can build up a tracking history for a user, even if that user never logs in or gives their name or any other personally identifiable information. Essentially, they can create a “digital fingerprint” corresponds to you and you alone, even if they don’t know who you are.
Now, if YouTube uses this method, nobody is being particularly open about it. However, we do know that they use browser cookies to keep track of what you’ve been watching.
Browser Cookies
Browser cookies are essentially little packets of information that are stored on your hard drive. The next time you visit YouTube anonymously, YouTube can check these cookies and see what you were looking at the last time you were there.
If you’re not comfortable with this, there are two options. You can either regularly clear your cookies so that there is no record, or you can browse YouTube in incognito/privacy mode. With cookies being stored on your computer, you are in complete control of whether they stay or go, as long as you know how to do it.
Final Thoughts
Your YouTube history can certainly be tracked, but, for the most part, the entity doing the tracking is YouTube. It is possible for nefarious parties to get into a position to track your viewing history, but in most cases, if they are in that position, your viewing history will be the least of your worries.
It should also be noted that, from a privacy standpoint, YouTube is a very different platform for children. COPPA regulations mean that YouTube cannot track nearly as much data on underage viewers as they can with adults.
For the most part, however, protecting your privacy and identity on YouTube requires the same common-sense approach that should be used whenever you are browsing the Internet or using connected apps.
Top 5 Tools To Get You Started on YouTube
Very quickly before you go here are 5 amazing tools I have used every day to grow my YouTube channel from 0 to 30K subscribers in the last 12 months that I could not live without.
1. VidIQ helps boost my views and get found in search
I almost exclusively switched to VidIQ from a rival in 2020.
When I first started I threw things together in Window Movie Maker, cringed at how it looked but thought “that’s the best I can do so it’ll have to do”.
Big mistake!
I soon realized the move time you put into your editing and the more engaging your thumbnails are the more views you will get and the more people will trust you enough to subscribe.
That is why I took the plunge and invested in my editing and design process with Adobe Creative Suite. They offer a WIDE range of tools to help make amazing videos, simple to use tools for overlays, graphics, one click tools to fix your audio and the very powerful Photoshop graphics program to make eye-catching thumbnails.
Best of all you can get a free trial for 30 days on their website, a discount if you are a student and if you are a regular human being it starts from as little as £9 per month if you want to commit to a plan.
3. Rev.com helps people read my videos
You can’t always listen to a video.
Maybe you’re on a bus, a train or sat in a living room with a 5 year old singing baby shark on loop… for HOURS. Or, you are trying to make as little noise as possible while your new born is FINALLY sleeping.
This is where Rev can help you or your audience consume your content on the go, in silence or in a language not native to the video.
A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.
4. PlaceIT can help you STAND OUT on YouTube
I SUCK at making anything flashy or arty.
I have every intention in the world to make something that looks cool but im about as artistic as a dropped ice-cream cone on the web windy day.
That is why I could not live on YouTube without someone like PlaceIT. They offer custom YouTube Banners, Avatars, YouTube Video Intros and YouTube End Screen Templates that are easy to edit with simple click, upload wizard to help you make amazing professional graphics in minutes.
5. StoryBlocks helps me add amazing video b-roll cutaways
I mainly make tutorials and talking head videos.
And in this modern world this can be a little boring if you don’t see something funky every once in a while.
I try with overlays, jump cuts and being funny but my secret weapon is b-roll overlay content.
I can talk about skydiving, food, money, kids, cats – ANYTHING I WANT – with a quick search on the StoryBlocks website I can find a great looking clip to overlay on my videos, keeping them entertained and watching for longer.
Facebook pages can easily be seen as Facebook’s attempt to break out of the personal headspace that Facebook occupied for so long, and, if that was Facebook’s goal, it’s been quite effective. Pages have become an almost essential part of any online presence, be it an individual, company, or brand. But, like any too for promoting something, Facebook pages are only effective if they are used correctly.
Simply creating a page and calling it a day might be the kind of thing someone with millions of followers on other platforms can get away with, but if you are trying to build up a following from, shall we say, more modest numbers, you’re going to have to work a little harder than that.
This brings us to the purpose of this post. We’re going to look at a number of methods to grow Facebook page followings, but before we do, we’ve got a little crash course on Facebook pages for you.
What Are Facebook Pages?
The easiest way to think of a Facebook Page is as a public-facing profile alternative. Now, if you are a public figure and make no attempt to keep your Facebook profile private, this may seem a little strange to you, but you should try to remember that Facebook is mostly used as a platform for keeping in touch with friends and family.
The vast majority of Facebook users have a friend list full of people they know in real life, such as colleagues, friends, and family members. They don’t necessarily want their posts and comments to be visible to the wider world. Especially if they have any kind of notability. This is why a large number of Facebook users make their profiles and content only visible to people they are friends with.
Facebook pages allow those users to maintain that separation between the wider world and their private lives, but still have a public presence on Facebook—the largest social media platform in the world.
Do I Need a Facebook Page?
If you’re a reader of this blog, there’s a good chance you need a Facebook page. If you’ve stumbled here from a search engine looking for information on Facebook pages and are not looking to promote anything or boost your online presence, you probably don’t need a page.
For the people who are promoting things—perhaps a YouTube channel, or a podcast—we would recommend having a Facebook page even if you don’t feel the need to separate your private life from the public eye. You may feel that way now, but things can change. And there’s nothing stopping you from sharing anything you would have put on your Facebook wall onto your page as well.
That’s the key element here. You will be making a conscious choice to share something publicly, and that should protect you from unintentionally sharing anything that you wouldn’t want public, such as personal matters, or controversial opinions.
10 Tips to Grow Facebook Page Followings
And now to the meat of the article. Please note that our tips are in no particular order. Let’s go!
1. Post Regularly
One of the biggest tips we can offer for growing a Facebook page’s following—or any following on a social media platform—is to post regularly. This is especially true for smaller pages.
There are two main reasons that regular and consistent posting helps grow your Facebook page. The first is that it will mean anytime a new person arrives at your page, they are going to be seeing relatively recent content. If they get to your page and the last thing you posted was eight months ago, they might understandably conclude that the page is inactive and move on.
The other reason is that every post you make on your page increases the chances of someone new discovering your page. Whether it’s through your content being shared or through Facebook organically showing it to users, the more posts you have, the more things there are for people to stumble across.
Just be careful not to let your drive to post regularly affect the quality of what you’re posting.
2. Share Inherently Useful Content
Continuing on nicely from that last sentence, it’s not enough to just post anything on a regular basis, you also need to make that content worthwhile for your potential followers. For most of us, that rules out just posting links to your latest show/video/song/book/etc.
Of course, if you are already an established personality or brand with a huge following, just having a Facebook page that posts updates like that is useful and will get plenty of engagement. If you’re trying to grow a brand, however, you need to give those users a reason to come to your page other than… well, you.
An example of this might be an author who writes books on interior design. They could post tips on interior design, giving people a reason to follow your page for that content. Then, that author has a new book out, they’ll not only have a following but one that is primed for that product.
3. Focus on a Niche
Once again following on nicely from the end of the last point, we have your niche. While this may not be possible for everybody—it’s hard to stick to a niche if you’re a pop musician, for example—if you have an area that your content or services revolve around, make sure the posts on your page stick to that niche.
Being more focused with your content will undoubtedly lower the number of potential users coming to your page, but it will ensure that the users who are interested in what you’re posting are more likely to find it. It will also make those users far more likely to stick around, and increase the chance of them engaging with your posts because they are truly interested in the subject matter.
The trick is finding a balance between narrowing you’re niche so far that the audience is minuscule, and broadening it so far that your page has too much competition to make an impact.
4. Invite People to Like Your Page
We often don’t like to bother people, but inviting people to like your Facebook page is something that not only yields good results but can be done with the click of a button thanks to Facebook’s “Invite People to Like This Page” button. The like invite will show up in their notifications, and they will be free to ignore it if they don’t want to.
5. Promote Your Page Outside of Facebook
Facebook is big. It can be easy to forget there’s a whole Internet out there, and it’s important that you don’t neglect to use that Internet when you’re trying to grow your Facebook page.
Obviously, we’re not suggesting you start spamming comment sections or tweet threads, but promote responsibly wherever you can. Sometimes simply letting followers know you have a Facebook page is enough.
6. Use Facebook Live
If you have it in you to make video content, Facebook Live is an excellent tool for garnering more interest in your Facebook page. These videos not only get put into various feeds when they are live, but they also remain up (if you allow it) after the fact, acting as lasting content for your page.
As per our above tip about niches, try to keep this content in line with the subject matter (or matters) that your page represents. There’s no sense attracting people who won’t be interested in what you do.
7. Run Giveaways and Other Promotions
There are no hidden tricks here, this is exactly what it sounds like. If you are in a position to run competitions or promotions… or just give stuff away, it’s an effective way to generate interest for your page. Just be careful not to violate any local or international laws with any contests you run. Always check the law.
8. Join Relevant Facebook Groups
We’ve talked about getting off of Facebook to promote your page, but what about on Facebook? Finding relevant groups and participating can be a great way to generate interest. Like with anywhere else, be sure not to spam, and adhere to the rules of any group you join.
9. Utilise Calls to Action
If you’re writing blog posts, recording podcasts, posting videos, or generally making content elsewhere on the web, don’t be afraid to use a call to action. It could just be a line at the end of your article, a polite nudge at the end of a video, or really any mention. You’d be surprised how much of a difference it makes.
10. Advertise
You can advertise away from Facebook, but we’d suggest using Facebook’s own advertising platform if you want to advertise a Facebook page. It is more likely to land in front of a user who will be interested, as the very fact that they are seeing it means they are a Facebook user, whereas a Google AdSense ad could easily wind up in front of a person who is not on Facebook and has no intention of joining.
Facebook remains something of an untapped resource for many when it comes to making money from your video content. YouTube is obviously the most well-known option for regular video content, Twitch might be your go-to if you’re a streamer, and there’s a myriad of other places to check out, like Vimeo, Instagram, and more. But Facebook has an understandable reputation as a platform for keeping in touch with your friends and family.
And Facebook is great for that. But there’s a lot more you can do with it.
Facebook has been making serious inroads into the video content space and a natural part of becoming a platform for releasing video content is giving content creators a reason to put content out on their platform. The main incentive, of course, is the ability to generate revenue from your content.
Can You Make Money on Facebook Videos? – Facebook has a monetization system that will run adverts on videos and offer branded content on pages. There are multiple levels and various requirements to qualify.
Let’s dive in.
Video Content on Facebook
There are a few ways to get video content on Facebook, and each one has very different use-cases. There is, of course, the standard method of posting a video to your wall or page. Facebook supports video files up to 10 GB in size with a maximum length of 240 minutes, so it should be sufficient for the vast majority of content creators. Video resolutions are limited to 1080p at the time of writing, however, so if you are looking to put 4K content out, you will need to look at other platforms. In most cases, however, even 4K content producers will be able to put a 1080p version of their videos on Facebook without it negatively affecting things.
Another way to get video content on Facebook is by using Facebook Live. This is Facebook’s live broadcasting solution and allows users to instantly start streaming to their followers (and other Facebook users) with hardly any setup needed. Facebook Live is heavily geared towards people switching on their phone camera and holding what could be termed as intimate live streams with their followers, but it is certainly suitable for more traditional live streams. Facebook is even taking steps to make this side of things more accessible for a wider range of live streamers, such as their Facebook Gaming push.
There are also Facebook Stories, which are Facebook’s answer to Snapchat—short videos that only exist for a brief period before disappearing off into the ether.
Monetising Video Content on Facebook
There are many ways to monetise your Facebook video content, and we’re going to start with Facebook’s own mechanisms. As with any platform, Facebook’s monetisation has certain criteria that you will need to meet, but don’t worry, we’ll give you all the information you need.
In-Stream Ads
In-stream ads are probably the most recognisable way to monetise video content, so it makes sense that Facebook would offer this on their platform. These ads can show up in a number of ways, including before the video (pre-roll), and during the video (mid-roll).
For the most part, these ads will work exactly how you’d expect them to, though mid-roll ads work slightly differently for Facebook Live videos. As Facebook want to cause as little disruption to the live viewing experience as possible (but, obviously, still show the ads) these ads will take over the main video window, but the live stream will continue playing in a smaller floating window, so the viewers don’t miss any of the action.
As per Facebook, these types of ads are suitable for longer content and content that is “suitable for advertisers”, meaning you’ll probably miss out on that ad revenue if you are making content about controversial topics. Facebook will automatically look for natural breaks in the content to insert ads, and your pay is determined by things like how many views the video gets, and who is advertising on it.
Fan Subscriptions
If you are familiar with services like Patreon, or features like YouTube Membership, you will understand Facebook Fan Subscriptions. This feature allows Facebook users to support you by contributing recurring monthly payments. In exchange for these payments, as well as supporting content they like, these users will get a special badge, as well as other perks and discounts.
This option is not limited to video content, of course, as anyone on Facebook with a big enough following can enable fan subscriptions, but if you are producing video content on Facebook, this is certainly a way to monetise that content, as well as any other content you happen to produce.
Branded Content (Brand Deals)
Branded content is Facebook’s version of what you might call a brand deal in other places. Essentially, you, the content creator, strikes a deal with a brand where they will pay you to promote them. These are different from sponsored videos in that they will typically cover a period of time, or set a number of videos.
Facebook facilitates these deals for eligible channels, aiming to bring suitable brands and content creators together… and taking their cut of the deal, of course. That being said, there is nothing to stop you from striking up brand deals yourself. This can be a little trickier, as you will need to be able to market yourself to the brand, and any legalities will have to be taken care of, but for those that can do it, it will often mean more money than going through Facebook.
Subscription Groups
Subscription groups are essentially a group version of fan subscriptions, and allow fans to join smaller, more exclusive groups with the creators they want to support. Like fans subscriptions, subscriber group members will get special perks.
Selling Merchandise
Moving away from Facebook specifically, there will always be ways to monetise your content if there is a big enough following, whether that content is on Facebook, YouTube, your personal website, or anywhere else. One such method is selling merchandise.
Granted, this doesn’t work for every type of content creator, as not every niche lends itself well to merchandise. If you are a content creator in a niche that does lend itself well to merchandising, however, you can certainly monetise your content this way.
Third-Party Subscriptions
Facebook may offer fan subscriptions, but you are in no way obligated to use them if you want to offer this kind of option to your viewers. Indeed, with Facebook’s eligibility criteria (more on that below), many content creators don’t even have the choice in the first place.
Services like Patreon do not have any eligibility criteria regarding the number of views you get, how much watch time you have over a given period, or how long you have been on the platform.
Now, we’re not saying that signing up for a Patreon account will automatically lead to the money rolling in. You still need to have a decent following to take advantage of this kind of service, and in most cases, people who don’t meet Facebook’s eligibility criteria probably aren’t missing out on much in the way of revenue. But there are always exceptions, and if you are such an exception, don’t feel like Facebook’s monetisation solutions are your only options.
Promoting a Product or Service
In this day and age, many content creators have other things on the go. This might be the aforementioned merchandise line, some kind of product or endorsement, an online course, or even public appearances, such as professional speaking, stand up comedy, or music gigs.
If this applies to you, try not to see your video content as a single entity that has to be worth your time in its own right. Consider how many of your viewers might become customers or fans of your other ventures as a result of your videos, and don’t discount that value.
Of course, you will need to take steps to make sure your viewers know about your other ventures.
Facebook Eligibility
Eligibility for the various Facebook monetisation options we have mentioned varies a little depending on the specific type of monetisation you are going for, but, for the most part, you should expect to have to meet the following criteria if you want to take advantage of Facebook’s native monetisation;
Adhere to Facebook rules, standards, and guidelines
Have at least 600,000 watch-minutes over the previous 60 days
Have at least five active videos
Have at least 10,000 page followers
Reside in an eligible country
Other criteria include at least 60,000 of the 600,000 watch minutes being live video minutes if you want to monetise live videos.
Final Thoughts
Facebook seems committed to making it as easy as possible for content creators to monetise their video content on the platform. And it makes sense—the more money you make, the more they make. That being said, you should never feel as though Facebook’s monetisation solutions are your only option. As long as you have an engaged following for your videos, there will always be ways of monetising that content.
YouTube and blogging are two powerful ways to earn a fairly passive income online. YouTube is a visual platform that relies on video content while blogging gives you a little more licence to deep dive into ideas with writing, images and videos blended into a comprehensive article.
But how can you monetize your youtube channel and blogs, and what one is more profitable?
Lets look into making money online in the first place. You can make your site a profitable business by monetizing it in the following ways:
Affiliate Marketing
It’s one of the most popular ways that bloggers use to make money. with this type of marketing, you need to promote certain products that belong to other businesses. So, every time a person buys the product through your affiliate link, you earn a commission.
Some of the most popular affiliate programs include:
Amazon associates
Commission junction
ShareASale
Publish Sponsored Blog Posts
You can get paid to write and publish a blog post on your site. This is simply sponsored content, and it offers one of the best ways to improve your blog monetization strategy. A business organization, company, or individual can pay to create content about their products. In some instances, they might prepare the content themselves and then give you for publication. Some of the best blogger networks that can provide you with such opportunities include:
BlogDash
ValuedVoice
Sell Ad Space
If you have ad space on your site, you can sell it at a set price to an interested buyer. This sounds better than getting a small amount of money every time someone clicks on your ad, and you simply charge a flat rate.
Write Product Review
Once you have built your site and become a reputable writer, you can get paid to write reviews. You can try out a sponsored product, write a product review about it, and get paid to do that job. But it’s important to find a niche that you understand and products relevant to your audience. For instance, if your blog is about health and fitness, it will make sense to review supplements, smartwatches, wellness applications, and fitness apparel.
Get AdSense
When you start writing and publishing content for income, advertising is usually at the back of your mind since you want to profit from your work. The easiest way to monetize your blog is by using Google AdSense, i.e., an Ad Network run by Google. AdSense usually displays adverts on websites, and when a visitor clicks on it, you make money.
YouTube.
Just like blogging, there are several ways you can use to monetize your YouTube channel. If you are in the YouTube Partner Program, then you can earn money through:
Ads
If you meet YouTube’s advertiser-friendly content guidelines, then you can turn on ads. You can check your eligibility by checking out the self-certification examples and guidance found on this platform.
But understand that choosing to turn on adverts doesn’t mean they will automatically appear on your video. Your content must go through the standard ads process that includes human and automated reviews to determine if it meets the guidelines. Besides that, you need to have all the rights to the audio and visual elements in the video. YouTube has two types of ads options; hence you can turn on ads for:
Individual videos
Multiple videos
Merch
YouTube has a merchandise shelf that allows interested creators to sell their branded merchandise on this platform. Note that this feature usually appears on certain video pages that are eligible channels.
Memberships
Allow viewers to join your channels via monthly payments. However, you should be ready to give them members-only perks such as emojis, badges, and other types of goods. YouTube has policies and guidelines to help eligible account holders.
Chat and Super Stickers
You can turn on this feature and connect with your fans during live chat. Making super stickers and chat content can earn you up to$500. Viewers can purchase the super chats option to highlight your message in the live chat.
Premium Revenue
YouTube premium revenue will automatically turn itself on. If a viewer is subscribed to YouTube Premium, then every time they watch what you publish, you will earn part of the fee they pay for their premium account.
In this blog vs YouTube earnings overview, it’s clear that both platforms offer multiple channels of earning money. However, more people prefer to watch videos rather than read blogs, and this is because they have a better chance to view content in a “live” way.
Q: When to get AdSense
If you are a blogger, you can apply for AdSense once your site starts receiving at least 100 unique visitors daily. Blogging rules have changed, and it may be quite difficult to get accepted, especially if your site doesn’t generate a reasonable amount of traffic every day. Besides that, you need to have a Google account, e.g., Gmail, to use AdSense. With YouTube, you need to have at least 1000 subscribers with a total of 4,000 watch hours.
Q: Does AdSense Pay Per Bloggers Per View?
Blog: No. AdSense doesn’t pay bloggers based on ad views. Instead, people get paid using cost-per-click (CPC). This is an established payment system that allows you to receive a portion of your payment when a person from your target audience clicks on the targeted ads by Google AdSense. So, if one of your users clicks on your ad, you should receive 68% of the payment as the publisher.
Q: How Much Does AdSense Pay Per Click/View?
Blog: Your commission is 68% of the total click amount, but this can go down to 51% in AdSense for search. Generally, the amount you get in terms of the commission depends on the existing competition on the Google Search engine platform and the CPC in that niche. The commission per click usually ranges between $0.20 and $15.
YouTube: according to various sources, you can earn between $0.01 and $0.03 per view with YouTube AdSense, but this amount usually averages out at around $0.18 per view. Like blogging, Google will pay you 68% of the generated AdSense revenue, and so for every $100 that the advertiser pays, you get $68 as the publisher.
Q: How Can You Improve Your AdSense Earnings?
For bloggers, AdSense earnings matter. To maximize your AdSense revenue after monetizing your website, here’s what you need to do:
Craft High-Quality Content
Your content is what will make you stand out. Valuable content will always get more clicks, which will organically raise your revenue. This is because it will generate more traffic and leads. By doing so, your chances of getting more clicks will increase, making your site attractive for product or service advertisers.
When crafting content for a specific niche, look at what your competitors are doing first, including their writing styles. This way, you will know what’s expected of you and how you can uniquely craft your content for your audience.
Use the Right Keywords
A combination of engaging, high-quality content with the right keywords will be highly effective in revenue generation. Look for those keywords that people commonly use when searching for specific content. Optimize your keywords so that search engines can easily crawl on your site and rank your content on top of search results.
Of course, more traffic will lead to more clicks, and the result will be more earnings from Google AdSense.
Consider Best Ad Placement Best Practices
Ad placement is important in maximizing your earning. On your homepage, you can increase the click-through rate (CTR) by:
Using 728 x 90 leaderboard ad image unit just right above your homepage’s fold and below the main bar navigation.
Consider testing different ad units, i.e., 300 x 250 medium rectangle or 160 x 600- a wide skyscraper in your sidebar.
On your main blog page, use:
A 336 x 280 large rectangle image for your ad unit right on top of your article.
Consider using a similar type of ad unit before the comments section at the end of your post.
Ad size and style all matter in boosting a blogger’s AdSense earnings. This gives your visitors several chances to notice and then click on your ads. When considering ad style, understand that the goal is to make them more visible while simultaneously reducing ad blindness.
That’s why google usually recommends that you consider using different colors for your links and ad text to make them stand out.
There are three main ad styles that have been proven to be technically effective, and they include:
Color contrast: use ads with colors that easily stand out against your website’s background.
Blend: ensure that your ad units are the same color as your site’s borders.
Complement: use colors that preferably already exist on your website even though they don’t exactly match with the borders or background but easily blend.
Use a Plugin for Ad Management
Ads that generate good revenue must be managed. This makes it possible to group ads depending on the content and where they can be inserted. Some of the useful features of an ad plugin include:
Ad rotation: you can opt to use a timed or on-page rotation for your site’s ad group
Adblocker: it checks if the browser has an ad-block software and then issues notification for it to be disabled.
Expiry date: you can set an expiry date for your ads.
For YouTubers, you can only make money with your YouTube partner account to get AdSense Revenue. The best way to increase your YouTube earnings include:
Publish Quality Videos
In content creation, quality will always sell. There is more to creating videos, which means creating content that can easily captivate the viewer. There are already several other creators in your niche; hence, you should create videos that people can watch. But how can you effectively do this?
Create videos that meet YouTube guidelines
Create a schedule for your video posts- it is important to upload videos to create a schedule that your audience will be in-tune with. Do you want to upload videos twice weekly, 5x monthly, etc.? You can learn more about scheduling here
Create your Thumbnails. Even though YouTube offers you the thumbnail option, it’s great to create your own since you can customize it to meet specific user preferences. You can use a graphic editing app to do this.
Briefly describe what happens in the video in the description area. Note that the summary of the information you provide here should be accurate, and you can even add blogs or websites that you are affiliated with.
Ensure that you sparsely use the relevant keywords to fill out all the details outlined in the title, tags, and description. SEO is also relevant in YouTube.
Create a quick but captivating intro that highlights what the viewer should expect.
Manage your Channel
Only a great channel with a reliable number of viewers will earn you a good income. YouTube success doesn’t come easily, so you must build and manage your channel. Ensure your channel’s description, including colors and logos, matches your niche and user profile. Besides that:
Fill in all your profile information
Customize your site’s color scheme and background
Use a captivating cover photo
Use a captivating cover photo
Channel management also requires you to vary the presentation of your videos. There are those subscribers that love short videos while others love longer versions. Analyze the performance of different videos based on the length and use that information to create relevant content. This way, you can:
Publish video content of varying lengths to cater to the different needs of your target audience
Create your playlist featuring a series of various videos
Lastly, consider your community in content management. There isn’t any successful YouTuber who doesn’t have a community. How can you build your community?
Directly interact with your fans by replying to comments
Ask them to give you their opinions
Make them feel like they are part of your content creation journey
Improve your AdSense Ads
Use your YouTube partnership account to improve your AdSense. Do keyword research to drive more traffic and result in better showing ads. The more traffic you get and the better the quality of the ads, then the more money you will earn.
In this case, consider the type of tags you use. Tags should be ideally used to connect videos with similar characteristics. So, the more connections you get, the better your chances of getting more views.
Market Your Channel
It would be nice for your channel to get more exposure on YouTube and other platforms. A high level of exposure guarantees you more leads and traffic, which leads to more views that generate revenue.
Q: How Many Views Does a Blogger/Youtuber Need to Get Paid?
Blog: There isn’t a specific fixed number you need to get paid. You can get paid with as little as 100 visitors. However, you should understand that every page view generates $0.01 and $0.25. That means that you would earn $1 -$25 monthly.
If you want to make money from blogging, you need to get around 10, 000 views unique visitors monthly. This way, you can monetize your blog easily and use it nicely for a revenue stream. However, the biggest challenge for most people is getting these numbers. For a YouTuber, the views you need can be equated to 4,000 hours of watch time.
Q: What Kind of Blogs/Channels Make More Money?
You can flourish in any niche and earn a modest income if you put in the work. However, there are niches that if you invest in, you are guaranteed more revenue. This is because such niches are popular, and their content is highly demanded.
We “interact” with money almost every day. Whether it’s buying food, transport, paying for accommodation, or even accessing the internet, so, money is an important factor for the sustenance of our livelihoods, and that’s why starting a finance blog will put you a step ahead in ensuring you earn more.
People are always looking for effective ways to handle money, and finance blogs are the best in providing actionable insights that the user might need. Whether it’s a busy professional, a retiree, or a young college student, finance content will never go out of style as it appeals to most people. Some of the aspects of finance you can focus on. Include:
• Passive income – blogging is one of the best ways to earn a passive income or use it as a side hustle.
It is currently one of the best niches to focus on since most people are actively looking for ways to make passive or active income through marketing.
With your marketing blog, you can help your target audience learn how they can master e-commerce skills before starting a business. Some of the areas that seem to be attracting big numbers include:
• SEO
• blogging
• Email marketing
• E-commerce marketing
Travel Blog
Travel blogs have become a necessity in this era, with more people keen on exploring their locals, regions, or even international areas.
Travel blogs are quite popular, and you can always make good money, regardless of the zone you decide to focus on. You can make money through affiliate links, accommodation reviews, etc. Additionally, you sell travel apparel on your blog.
Food Blog
If you are a foodie, this is a new area for you to flourish. Food blogs are popular currently, and you can make yours the online recipe book. Teach your target audience how to prepare different tasty dishes, and you can even use some nice photos from your kitchen.
Besides that, you can prepare specific meal recipes that target a certain group of people e.g.
• New moms
• Those struggling with weight loss or weight gain
• Diet time limits
• Fitness enthusiasts
Some of the other areas you can focus on include:
• Restaurant reviews
• DIY meals
• Food and traveling
• Affordable outdoor dining
Fashion Blog
You don’t need your clothing line to write a fashion blog. You can still express your unique sense of style on your blog through product reviews. There are new fashion trends almost every month, and this means that people are always trying to keep up to date with what’s happening in the fashion world. The best thing about being a fashion blogger is that you can link your site to your social media page, become a social media influencer as well, and add affiliate links.
Not all YouTube videos are the same, and there are certain types of videos that tend to perform better than the others, regardless of the publisher. These videos generate more income, and they include:
How-to videos
They are quite popular since people are always looking for popular solutions to fix and do things. How-to videos top the charts since they are better off than instructional manuals. You can cover a wide range of topics ranging from education, travel, and photography.
Product Reviews
These are videos that involve a YouTuber testing out a product then giving the target audience a review, including the downsides and pros, based on their personal experience. According to Google, product reviews have generated more than 50,000 years of YouTube watch time in the last couple of years only.
Vlogs
These are videos that cover a wide range of niches depending on the creator. You can vlog about basically anything but lifestyle topics, including music, comedy, and entertainment
You can learn more about YouTube side hustles here
Q: What’s Easy Monetize, YouTube Channel or a Blog?
It depends on your content and the effort you put in. it takes about six months to start earning from your blog. With YouTube, your channel needs to have t least 1,000 subscribers and a total of 4,000 watch time hours within the last 12 months.
It will take you roughly a year to get to 4,000 watch hours, i.e., 240,000 minutes, if you maintain an average watch time of 20,000 minutes per month. But YouTube divides watch time across the whole channel, and so you can achieve the watch hours in less than a year if you produce a few high-quality videos.
To get quickly monetize your channel and get up to 4,000 hours of watch time, here’s what you can do:
Create fresh content
To be discovered on YouTube can be easy if you upload fresh content that appears on top of YouTube’s search results. Your goal should be to publish videos that remain relevant all year round, and this means that you can continue to earn revenue from the same video for months to come.
The best way to make evergreen content include:
• Interacting with your viewers and asking them about which content they prefer
• Answering their questions as much as you can
• Consider trending topics and offer valuable information regarding them
• Create videos that offer solutions or give deeper insights
Do Livestreams
Of course, your community of fans wants to know and interact with you on a one-to-one basis. The best way to boost viewership and improve your target audience’s confidence is by hosting live stream sessions. Understand that the numbers might be small at first, but the more you do, the better your chances of growing your channel and earning more revenue.
consistently Upload Your Videos
More hours mean that you need to have more videos under your belt. Create viral videos that will quickly give your channel the needed boost to attain those 4,000 hours. Don’t forget to be consistent. There’s a lot that goes in during video creation. Hence you must be ready to put in the work.
Go for Quality
The length of your YouTube video matters in attracting and retaining your target audience. But sometimes, to hit those high numbers, you need more quality content than quantity. A popular video with your audience will generate more traffic, and your channel will quickly hit those hours.
Q: Blog vs YouTube Earnings: Which One Should You Consider?
It all depends on what you have in your hands at your interests. There is a whole blog vs YouTube earnings debate that never seems to go out of style. But here are a few tips to help you consider the right type of platform that suits you:
Rate of earning income
A blog will quickly earn you a reasonable income, especially if you can monetize your ads and work with affiliate links. While YouTube has a better-earning potential, it’s more volatile and only seems more profitable for people who have fully established themselves with short- to medium-term goals. Overall, getting your foot in the blogging field seems easier, and you can get the job done within 3-4 months.
SEO Benefits for Growth
You stand a better chance to grow exponentially if you start with blogging. Blogging can help your YouTube channel to grow. Some of the benefits of starting a blog before a channel include:
• Understanding keyword research and its benefits in content creation
• Improving click-through rates
• Content length and what appeals to your audience
• How to describe photos and videos
With this information, you can create SEO-friendly videos that increase watch-time and more audience retention, leading to more revenue generation. Besides that, you will learn the importance of creating longer videos because they give you more watch time, a better chance of retaining viewers, and provide your target audience with more values. Lastly, you can use your blogging skills to caption and describe your videos using the right keywords. You can learn more about YouTube captions here
Startup Costs
Before you start blogging or vlogging, you need to invest a sustainable amount of money. While there are cheap ways to do this, it remains a fact that you need to put some money aside for content creation.
Blog costs
You will mainly invest in services. Here is a brief overview of blogging costs:
• Hosting: you need a host for your website. Expect to pay at least $60 annually, but this depends on the host you choose.
• Domain name: your blog needs a unique identifier in the form of a domain name. a basic domain name will cost you around $13.00. remember that you should choose a unique domain name that complements your site’s profile.
• Paid theme: while this isn’t a requirement, remember that you want to use your blog to generate revenue. Some bloggers may avoid this and opt to use free themes with limitations. To be on the safe side, ensure that you get a paid theme, and this can cost you around $30.00
YouTube Costs
You need a camera and a good microphone to start a YouTube channel. However, some may argue that you can use your smartphone. However, your success with a smartphone is quite limited based on the 720p to 1080p standard. You will be disadvantaged if you don’t produce high-quality content because your competitors are, and that’s why they are earning more revenue. On average, here’s what you need:
You can find more information regarding the tools from alanspicer.com
Starting a blog is cheaper, and you can leverage that to create a good YouTube profile. You will probably have better deals initially as a blogger, and the whole setup process is cheaper.
Selling Your Work
If you need a platform with a good exit strategy, you should probably consider blogging. People sell their websites all the time, which can generate up to 50x of the platform’s monthly average profit. Overall, it’s easy and quite profitable to sell a blog.
Meanwhile, how many times have you heard a person sell their blog? This is because it’s highly unlikely for that to happen. In fact, if you do so, then you will be going against the terms and services of YouTube/Google.
This doesn’t mean that people don’t sell their YouTube channels, but the whole process is complex and involves many backdoor deals.
In conclusion, if you want to grow your target audience quickly with a moderate income, then you should consider starting a blog. But if you are patient, want to build a community, and earn a significant amount of money in the long run, then YouTube should be your go-to solution. To learn more about starting a YouTube channel, here’s what Alan Spicer, a certified YouTube Expert, offers.
Facebook Groups are rapidly emerging as a powerful tool for promotion, revenue generation, and social interaction, of course. Still, while that last point may be obvious, and most people will be able to see the promotional potential of Facebook Groups, monetisation is a little less intuitive.
Can you monetize facebook groups? Yes! In fact there are so many little tricks to monetize a facebook page we’ve made a list!
That’s why we’ve put together this post to illustrate the many ways you can monetise your Facebook Group, as well as a few ways to ensure your group succeeds.
Let’s dive in.
10 Ways to Monetise Facebook Groups
It should be noted that some of these suggestions will only work if you are an admin of a group. Now, in no particular order;
Promote Products
If you’re a member of a popular group (and, of course, if you are the admin of one), you could use it to promote any products you sell. Of course, you will need to make sure the group in question allows promotion, and if it does, there will probably be guidelines you will have to adhere to.
Remember to participate in the group beyond just promoting things. People tend to react poorly to someone who only ever contributes to a community for selfish reasons, and you will likely find you get better results if you participate.
Build a Reputation
If you have an area of expertise that you plan to turn into a career of some sort, you can start laying the groundwork for that future in a Facebook group! Let’s say for argument’s sake that your area of expertise is something technical like machine learning. You could find an appropriate group and start helping others with their problems, gaining a reputation as an authority in the subject matter. Then, when you decide to try your hand at something a little more professional, such as freelance work, or even a YouTube channel, you will already have a group of people who know you are the real deal.
Remember, the Internet has made it possible for more people than ever to try their hands at things that would normally have needed a formal education. But there will always be a place for people who know what they are talking about and are willing to offer a helping comment.
Charge Membership or Subscription Fees
If you are running a Facebook that is particularly useful to its members, you could start charging membership or subscription fees to join. Bear in mind that your group will have to be something special, offering things that your prospective members wouldn’t be able to get elsewhere.
In order to do this, you will have to set your group to private and invite only, and then set up your own way of handling payments, as Facebook does not currently offer this option.
Earn Advertising Revenue
On a similar note to the previous suggestion, a popular group will likely be of interest to advertisers. Those advertisers could go through Facebook’s own advertising platform, of course, but that platform does not currently offer a way for advertisers to target specific groups. As the admin of a group, you can provide that option for your group.
Again, you will have to deal with the mechanics of this one by yourself, as Facebook does not provide the tools to do it.
Collaborate With Brands
One-off advertisements are fine, but striking up a deal for ongoing collaboration with a brand or company offers much more stability in your revenue stream. Once again, this is something you’ll have to arrange yourself. You will need to be able to show any potential brand that your group is worth collaborating with. It can also be useful to have some ideas to present to said brand for how the collaboration could go, such as running competitions.
Dabble in Affiliate Marketing
Affiliate marketing allows you to make money from product or service promotion in much the same way that advertising does but in a less intrusive manner. Affiliate links and promotions will typically fit into the general flow of the content in a group, offering the members something of value. An example of this might be providing an Amazon Affiliate link to a product that’s been discussed in the group. The members will not have to pay anything extra (indeed, many affiliate programs offer special deals for affiliates), and you will make a little extra case from each sale.
Accept Donations
It may not be the most reliable way to monetise your Facebook group, but if you have enough members and they are engaged and active enough, you could consider accepting donations.
Of course, this suggestion assumes you are an active participant in the group and that the members can see the value you bring. If you just started the group but don’t really do much from day to day, you may struggle to find anyone willing to donate.
Offer Consultancy Services
If you establish yourself as an authoritative figure on a particular subject, you could parlay that reputation into a career in consultancy work. With today’s fast-paced world of development and creation, people and companies are often branching out into areas they aren’t necessarily familiar with. In these cases, they might not want to hire an expert, but that doesn’t mean they won’t benefit from an informed opinion.
Network
Whatever your intended career going forward, you can probably benefit from a little networking. Whether it’s just people in the same niche as you or people in positions of influence who can be of direct help to your career, getting involved in communities like this can present opportunities that you wouldn’t otherwise have had.
Sell Your Group
Now, this is explicitly against Facebook’s rules, so we have to say that we do not recommend you do this, but selling popular groups is a thing that happens, and it can be very lucrative. Especially if you develop a knack for building popular groups and can do this on a regular basis.
Again, this is against Facebook’s rules, so you take a risk by doing this. That being said, there’s no way for Facebook to catch you unless you make a big deal out of it.
5 Tips for Helping Your Group Succeed
We won’t dwell on this section too long because advice for making your Facebook group succeed deserves a post of its own, but here are some tips for making sure your Facebook group thrives.
Keep Engagement High
Engagement is the lifeblood of a successful Facebook group. Regardless of what your ultimate goal for the group is, you’re going to want active members who are commenting and replying and reacting to the content.
One way to ensure engagement stays high is to post engaging content yourself, as well as draw attention to popular posts by other members.
Promote The Group
If you want the group to succeed, you need to get the word out. You could advertise if you’re prepared to throw some money at the problem, but if not, you’ll need to do the leg work and get out there yourself.
Other groups are a great place to promote (as long as the group in question allows that kind of thing), but you can also take it off Facebook and get the word out that way. Just remember not to spam, as that will almost always have the opposite of the desired effect.
Foster a Welcoming Atmosphere
If you want people to join and participate in your group, you need to foster the kind of atmosphere that encourages it. What kind of atmosphere that is will heavily depend on the type of group you are running. You can enforce the atmosphere you want with things like rules, temporary (and permanent) bans, and, of course, comments.
Be an Active Participant
We’ve already touched on this in the “keep engagement high” section, but it’s important enough that it deserves its own section. You should be active in the group, encouraging conversation, drawing attention to good posts, and generally keeping everything going.
Encourage Members to Invite Others
Promoting a Facebook group doesn’t have to be a one-person operation. Once you start to build a membership base of engaged users, you can gently encourage them to do a spot of promoting themselves.
We’re not suggesting you demand they go on a full advertising campaign, of course, but things like sharing the link with friends they think will be interested and other low-effort activities.
Final Thoughts
Facebook Groups are not the most obvious thing that springs to mind when you think about options for generating revenue online, but they are certainly an option.
That being said, we have to admit that the biggest monetisation potential for Facebook Groups involves them being used in conjunction with other things. For example, using your Facebook group to drive traffic to affiliate links or services you offer elsewhere or promoting products or services within the group. The options for monetising a group using official Facebook channels is extremely limited, but there is every chance that will change as the platform evolves.
Whether you are considering starting a YouTube channel for business or pleasure, the allure of that big red play button can be hard to resist. YouTube is proven to be a great medium for expanding a brand, bringing attention to your business, or just connecting with an audience over something you are passionate about. And it is for these reasons that so many people want to start a new YouTube channel, even now when there are so many channels out there.
In this post, we’re going to look at some of the mechanical aspects of starting a channel, as well as some tips for how to go about getting those first views, but we wanted to start off by reaffirming your desire to start a channel (we’re assuming you do want to if you’re reading this!)
Is It Worth Starting a YouTube Channel?
One of the main roadblocks to a successful YouTube channel is a reluctance to pull the trigger on that “create channel” button. This can happen because of a variety of reasons—most of which we’ll cover in more detail in a moment—but the important thing to remember is that new channels are being created all the time, and plenty of YouTubers who are successful today started out recently or were shy to begin with or thought their chosen topic wouldn’t get much interest.
Ultimately, the majority of YouTube channels do not achieve the kind of success their creator hopes for, we can’t deny that. Whether they want to achieve financial independence through their content, become an internet megastar, or just find a small audience that is interested in what they are interested in, most don’t make it. But the one thing you can be certain of is that if you don’t start a channel at all, you definitely won’t succeed.
With that in mind, let’s take a look at some of the biggest reasons why people don’t start YouTube channels at all. And then tell you why you shouldn’t let those reasons stop you!
“I’m Too Shy”
Many would-be YouTubers love the idea of starting a channel, but when faced with the prospect of sitting in front of a camera and speaking to strangers on the Internet, they soon find themselves wilting away from the idea.
We’re not going to tell you that the shyness just goes away—though it does get less severe if you stick at it—but we can tell you that you don’t necessarily have to fight that shyness to run a YouTube channel.
There is more than one way to make a YouTube channel, and not all of them involve showing your face. In fact, it’s entirely possible to run a successful YouTube channel without showing your face or speaking! Granted, the style would have to work with your content, but many popular channels are clips shows, use virtual characters in place of on-camera appearances, and make use of text-to-speech technology.
“My Interests Are Too Niche”
Okay, we won’t lie and say there is no such thing as a “too niche” topic when it comes to an entire channel. You can certainly limit your potential audience to the point that you’re never going to hit those YouTube Partner Programme goals if you choose something extremely obscure.
That being said, assuming your interest is not so niche that you could start a support group for it and get everyone in a single room, being niche is actually a good thing!
Having a niche subject matter makes it easier to get noticed and build an audience when you are first starting out. It’s generally better to be laser-focused at the start of your YouTube career, build a small audience, and then gradually expand your niche to broaden the potential audience. So your niche interest could actually be the thing that makes your channel succeed.
“I’m Too Late to the Game!”
YouTube is easily the most popular platform for user-generated video content at the moment, and that popularity can make it a little intimidating to dive in yourself. With so many people already on the platform publishing videos, how can you hope to make a splash of your own?
It’s true that it can be hard to make an impact on YouTube when you’re just starting out, but it is far from impossible. In reality, the vast majority of successful YouTube channels got started under these circumstances. Whether there are two million or twenty million other channels, you’re still going to be trying to make your mark in a very crowded room.
Ultimately, if you release good content on a regular basis, you stand a good chance of succeeding on YouTube, regardless of how many channels are already taking up space on YouTube’s recommendations page.
How to Start a YouTube Channel
So, hopefully, we’ve convinced you that the excuses you’ve been making to yourself for why you shouldn’t start a YouTube channel aren’t valid, now let’s get to how you actually go about it.
Create a Channel
We said we’d cover the basic mechanics of starting a YouTube channel and we weren’t kidding. The first thing you need to do is create a YouTube account if you don’t already have one. There are no stringent requirements for creating an account; as long as you have an email address, you should be good to go. After that simply follow these steps;
Sign in to your YouTube account and click on the user icon at the top right-hand corner of the page.
Click the gear icon to open up your YouTube account’s settings page.
Click “create new channel”.
Choose “Use a business or other name”, enter the name of your channel and away you go!
Choosing Your Channel’s Name
The last part of that list—entering the name of your channel—obviously requires you to know what name you’re going to use. It’s worth putting a good deal of thought into this part of the process before getting started, as changing your channel’s name after it is established can be a bit of a headache.
Now, we want to stress that, while this decision is important, it should not be a decision that keeps you from starting a channel. There is a fine line between giving something due consideration and using that consideration as an excuse to not get started at all.
If you are starting a channel as part of a business or an existing brand, that should make naming a little easier. If you are starting a channel as an individual, it’s important to consider what you want for the channel’s future. For example, if you have plans to one day grow your channel to the point of having a team working on it, perhaps bringing other content creators on board, you will want to steer clear of using your own name, as that links the channel to you specifically, making it a little weird when other people are on there.
Alternatively, if your plans don’t involve anyone but you being in front of the camera, you should consider using your name in the channel name, as it will make it easier for you to parlay any YouTube success into success in other areas.
Set Up Your Channel
With your channel made, you need to spend some time setting up your channel. This means adding things like profile and header images and filling out your about section. You can also arrange how your channel page looks, but don’t worry too much about this until you have a few videos uploaded.
In your about section, make sure you explain what your channel is about, but try to keep it as clear and concise as possible. Many viewers won’t even click to expand the about section, so try to get the basic premise of your channel into the first sentence, but in a way that grabs the reader’s attention.
If you are tying your YouTube channel to something larger—such as a business, brand, or other personal projects—be sure to put links in your information. These should show up in the top right-hand corner of your channel pages, just below the header image.
Start Making Videos
The most important part of being a YouTube is, of course, being a YouTuber! Simply picking out a good name and creating a channel isn’t much use if you don’t then create content for it, regularly.
There is a veritable cornucopia of excuses to not make videos, and we’re not saying they’re all bad reasons. But, as with the channel name choosing, you should not let this become a crutch that you use to stop yourself from doing the deed. Remember, the quality of your video can always improve. The quality of you can always improve. But there’s no reason you can’t be improving while you make content, and there is no better practice than doing.
Just make the best content you can, and always strive to improve.
Keep Going
Once you’ve gotten over that initial hurdle that so many people fall at, you just need to worry about sticking with it. This is one area where bloody-minded persistence isn’t necessarily the best road to take. You should be persistent, yes, but in a smart way.
By ensuring that your channel grows, you will find it much easier to stay motivated and keep putting out new videos. Here are some tips for ensuring that happens.
Work Your Niche
We touched on this before, but a good way to get started as a YouTuber is to really drill down into a niche, finding an audience through the simple act of providing them something that not many others are. And if it’s something nobody else is providing, all the better!
The problem with such a tight niche is that it can severely limit your growth potential. To give an extreme example, if you start a channel based around talking local news for a small town with a population of 700 people, you’re going to struggle to find millions—or even thousands—of viewers who are interested in your content.
As you grow, try to expand your niche slowly and organically to widen your potential audience.
Take Advantage of Search Engine Optimisation
You don’t have to become an SEO expert (though it will certainly help if you do), but you should familiarise yourself with the basics of optimising your videos for being found in YouTube search and even other search engines like Google or Bing.
We’re not going to tell you that you need to upload new videos every day or week to be successful—many popular YouTube channels have upload schedules that involve months between videos—but you do need to be consistent.
If you start off uploading weekly videos and then abruptly don’t put out another video for a few months without warning, it will be a turn off for your viewers, and it will cause YouTube’s algorithm to question whether you are a reliable content creator.
Build a Community
Playing an active role in the community that arises around your channel will ensure you have some degree of influence over how that community develops. It will also give your viewers a strong sense of connection with your content.
You can do this in a number of ways, such as regularly replying to comments, or setting up and actively participating in a Discord server or subreddit.
Monetise Your Channel
When you reach a stage where monetisation is an option (whatever form that comes in), you should strongly consider doing it. YouTube doesn’t need to be about the money, of course, but it is hard work, and it’s much easier to motivate yourself to make time for it if you’re getting something tangible back.
Final Thoughts
YouTube continues to be the premier video platform for user-generated content, and there is still plenty of opportunity there for those willing to put the effort in.
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