Category: TIPS & TRICKS

5 Content Marketing Channels You Can’t Ignore

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 22 February 2021
1 Comment on 5 Content Marketing Channels You Can’t Ignore

Content marketing, by its most simplistic explanation, boils down to two activities:

Content creation.
Content distribution.

For many content marketers, it’s easy to start at step 1 and stay there, just continuing to produce content. That’s fine and well, but if you aren’t sharing your content with your audience, I guarantee you’re not getting the results you want.

While step 1 should be a nice combination of creativity and analysis, step 2 is made almost entirely of data-backed strategy. Determining the most lucrative content marketing channels will help you reach your target audiences in meaningful and impactful ways.

So, what channels should you be focusing on this year? That depends on your industry, goals, audiences and more.

But the following 5 are all excellent channels to consider incorporating into your content distribution strategy:

YouTube

Video marketing has risen in popularity every year, and now it’s more important than ever for businesses. In 2020, it was one of the fastest growing types of visual content marketing used, and about one-quarter of marketers said it helped them reach their marketing goals in 2019.

Video became the champion of communication—business or personal—and entertainment during the pandemic as more consumers utilize these technologies and tune into this captivating content format. Of the 24% of marketers who said they used video for the first time in 2020, nearly half said doing so was a necessity because of the pandemic.

But this section is titled “YouTube” – not video. I have a reason for this, and it’s only partly because the next section is “live video.”

YouTube can act as several different things for your brand. It’s:

A place to host your videos.
A search engine where people look for and find information.
Google’s daughter company that feeds directly into SERPs, giving you a second opportunity to be discovered organically.

In short, YouTube is a powerfully multifaceted distribution channel because the videos you upload to it are both shareable (it’s simple to embed them into your landing pages and blog posts and to link to them in social media posts and emails) and searchable, whether your audience is searching on YouTube itself or on Google.

As more people look to video to learn and communicate, brands that want to keep up will strive to provide more content in this format.

Those that want their videos to be easily found will most likely compile them on their YouTube channel.

Live video

Video is one thing; live video is something else entirely … OK, perhaps that’s an exaggeration, but live video really is important enough to deserve its own mention on this list.

Close to half of marketers (45%) use live video to connect with their audience in a highly personal, real-time format, according to Social Media Examiner.

A number of industry reports indicate that this medium is increasingly important for marketers, and not just because of the pandemic. Live video use was already on the rise, especially in B2B marketing:

29% of B2B marketers used livestream content in 2020, making it one of the fastest growing content types of Content Marketing Institute’s survey.
63% of B2B marketing representatives were willing to exchange their contact information for access to a webinar, according to Demand Gen Report’s 2019 Content Preferences Survey Report.
64% also noted they’d take 20-60 minutes to watch a webinar when researching a B2B purchase.

Facebook Live is likely to be the most popular channel, with 64% of marketers voting it as their most important in Social Media Examiner’s report, followed by Instagram Live with 19%.

But before you choose your streaming platform, consider where your audience finds video content. LinkedIn supports live video, and with only 5% of marketers saying this is their most important live video channel, you may stand out from the pre-recorded crowd.

Live video can be lucrative for B2C brands as well, and with consumers seeking out this format more often, you may find your audience quickly. A HubSpot survey found that 79% of respondents watch live video at least once weekly; YouTube Live is their favorite channel.

Email

Email is a low-cost, high-value content marketing channel, and should therefore be a key component of your digital marketing efforts. Plus, it’s a strong communication method in any circumstance: A Brafton survey found that following the pandemic, email was the No. 1 way brands communicated important updates to their customers.

For most marketers, email is already among their top channels; 87% of B2B marketers told CMI that email is the top way they distribute content, second only to social media. With a return on investment of 42:1 on average, it’s easy to see why.

However, you only stand a chance to see this level of ROI if you know how to leverage this channel strategically and in a way that makes sense for your brand, goals and audience. For many brands, this means creating a diverse email marketing strategy that includes aspects like:

Regular newsletters.
Sales emails.
Helpful notifications about company updates.
Cart abandonment emails.
And more.

Email is a key communication channel for just about … everyone. For that reason, brands that put the time and effort into getting their email strategy right have the opportunity to open up meaningful conversations.

Podcasts

Audio content is steadily becoming a cornerstone in content marketing as more consumers seek out information and entertainment in podcasts. And while some might assume that podcasts are primarily for individuals seeking entertainment, they’re actually a strong B2B marketing device.

Demand Gen Report found that half of B2B buyers would be willing to spend up to a half-hour listening to a podcast when researching a purchase decision. And among B2B marketers surveyed by CMI, just 26% said they were already including this audio-first format in their marketing mix.

Here’s what this tells us: Buyers will listen to a podcast. But not many B2B brands have entered that market yet. When you launch your podcast, you’ll be among the few.

Of course, like all of these channels, this isn’t just a B2B trend. Consumers are listening to more audio content, especially as more people spend time at home. Nielsen’s August 2020 Total Audiences Report found that 53% of respondents listen to spoken-word audio content either weekly or daily.

Podcasts can do a number of positive things for your marketing efforts, like increase brand recognition and trust, and drive traffic and backlinks to your site (from the platform you use, e.g. Apple Podcasts).

In the future, more people will tune into podcasts to learn something new or disconnect from their day to day for a few minutes. You have the opportunity to be the person who speaks directly to them when they do.

Your blog

Last but not least, I can’t leave this list without mentioning the most important content marketing channel of them all: Your blog.

I’m not calling this the most important channel because it’ll be the most lucrative of your efforts, or the one that captures the most attention. I’m also not mentioning it because I think you’ll forget about it. That’s just crazy, and besides, 93% of B2B marketers already use blog posts in their content marketing strategies.

Rather, your blog is an essential addition to this list because:

It’s the home base of all your content marketing efforts. Most of the content you create should, in some form, live on your blog.
It’s easy to forget how much value you can truly glean from your blog when you know how to creatively leverage it.

Any type of asset that you create for the above channels can be repurposed for your blog, giving the content new life and your website another opportunity to capture attention from organic search.

Every video you create should have a search-optimized page to live on, and your blog is the perfect place to expand on the video’s topic.

Your email strategy can easily be centered around your editorial calendar. When you publish a great new article, share it with your email subscribers.

And so on.

Choose your channels wisely!

A new year always presents new possibilities for marketers. This year, move your company’s marketing efforts in a positive direction to reach the right audiences and provide meaningful interactions for them.

Whether you choose to explore the opportunities that await your brand in video, email, audio, blog content or something else entirely, make sure you’re doing so with the needs of your target audience in mind. This is truly the best way to connect with them.

Tags blog, content promotion, facebook, social media, social media marketing, social media marketing strategy 2019

BUSINESS TIPS DEEP DIVE ARTICLE MARKETING NEWS TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

YouTube Is Quietly Boosting Short Videos As It Preps Its TikTok Rival For US Release — And Some Creators Are Seeing Big Audience Growth

YouTube is testing a new TikTok-like feature that allows creators to upload short vertical videos, called Shorts.
Ahead of its full release, some creators say they are seeing huge audience growth by posting short videos.
But for now, videos that appear in YouTube’s Shorts section don’t earn creators any money.

TikTok is top of mind for all the major social-media platforms.

Following TikTok competitors from Instagram (Reels) and Snapchat (Spotlight), YouTube is slowly rolling out its own rival in the US called “Shorts.” And in preparation for the launch, creators say YouTube is quietly promoting short videos, spiking engagement and reach for some channels.

While the full Shorts feature hasn’t launched in the US yet, creators are still able to upload short vertical videos that mimic TikToks.

Similar to TikTok videos, Shorts are vertical videos that can be up to 60 seconds long. YouTube announced the feature in September, and has been testing it officially in India, where it has added a short-form video creation tool and camera to the YouTube app.

Beyond India, some elements have been implemented as a beta test to the YouTube app, like a carousel (“shelf”) of short videos that appears in a section on the homepage and under videos.

YouTube is currently experimenting with different ways to help users find and watch short videos, and the company is testing adding a Shorts entry point on the Explore tab, the company said.

As YouTube prepares for a full Shorts launch, creators said a key to getting short-form videos into the special section is to add “#Shorts” in the title or description, though sometimes videos are added even if they don’t have the tag. YouTube confirmed that creators don’t need to use the hashtag but that adding it would increase the chance that a video would be shown on the Shorts shelf.

Some creators whose videos have been picked up by the Shorts shelf have seen runaway success in viewership,. I have even made a deep dive blog post to explain every fine detail and FAQs about YouTube shorts.

Daniel LaBelle, a comedy creator with 1.6 million YouTube subscribers, launched his channel in April to repost the TikToks he was making after his wedding photography business dipped due to the coronavirus pandemic.

“I posted for probably five or six months, built up 30,000 subscribers and then out of nowhere in November things exploded,” LaBelle said, adding that his channel went from 30,000 subscribers to over half a million within a month. “I think it was because of the Shorts, but I still don’t know for sure.”

Some of the short vertical YouTube videos LaBelle posted on a whim in the beginning of 2020 were being picked up by YouTube in November and added to the new Shorts feature, he said. LaBelle then noticed the view counts on those older videos begin to soar (his most viewed short has 23 million views).

“You can get a lot of attention on your channel by doing these short-form videos,” said Alex Sibila, a part-time YouTube creator with 4,800 subscribers. “Some of my Shorts are now my most viewed videos.”

Sibila is an electrical engineer and makes videos about electric vehicles and owning a Tesla. He uses the vertical video feature to share 30-second teasers that direct back to some of his full-length videos. His Shorts range from 20,000 to 50,000 views, which is more than the 1,000 to 5,000 average views his longer uploads attract.

“They are still shown on your channel as regular videos,” Sibila said of his short videos. “Then if you are on mobile they have the Short shelf, and that is where you get a lot of views. If videos are pushed out to the Short shelf then they are getting shown to a lot of people and that’s what is going to make them viral.”

As the battle for short-form video heats up, YouTube will compete against TikTok, Instagram, and Snapchat to be seen as a platform where creators can make money, reach new audiences, and build a sustainable business. Snapchat’s Spotlight and TikTok have each set up programs dedicated to paying creators on an ongoing basis.

Read more: Snapchat is minting overnight millionaires with its TikTok competitor but creators worry the gold rush will end soon

The biggest question YouTube creators have about the Shorts feature is whether it will earn them significant amounts of money.

Creators generally earn money on YouTube from the ads placed in their videos through YouTube’s Partner Program. How much money a creator earns from AdSense depends on the video’s watch time, length, video type, and viewer demographics, among other factors. YouTube also keeps 45% of the ad revenue, with the creator keeping the rest.

LaBelle’s short-form videos earn money when they are viewed in the subscriptions section of YouTube, where ads will play before the video. But if the videos are viewed in the Shorts section of the YouTube app, they don’t earn money because videos on the Shorts shelf don’t get ads or generate subscription revenue right now, the company confirmed.

Still, LaBelle said he is making more money off his short videos on YouTube than he is on TikTok, where he has 14 million followers.

“I am at a point where I am trying to prioritize YouTube as much as I can,” he said. “It’s been a fantastic income source as well, just being on YouTube and working with the AdSense program.”

But creators don’t know how Shorts will change when YouTube officially rolls out the feature in the US.

“YouTube just kind of threw this onto us without any warning or introduction,” said Rob Wilson, a content strategist at the YouTube analytics and growth platform vidIQ. “It still feels to me like a beta test that could change radically.”

But for now, creators are figuring out their own strategies and trying to get the most out of the feature, and the extra boost provided by the platform.

Sibila plans to post two under-60-second videos a week to share on Instagram Reels, TikTok, and YouTube.

“Trying to get people to click on those longer videos and check out my channel is tough sometimes, especially as a smaller creator,” Sibila said. “Now that I’ve started posting more Shorts, I’ve found that they can be incredibly viral and they are very shareable.”

“It’s super exciting,” said Kevin Parry, a stop-motion animator and visual effects artist. “The struggle for me has always been to make one piece of content and have it work on every platform. With most platforms now pushing shorter formats, I can make one piece of animation, or one behind-the-scenes clip and post it everywhere now.”

Tags reels, short form content, shorts, tiktok, vertical video, what are youtube shorts, youtube shorts, youtube vs tiktok, youtuve vs tiktok

HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE MARKETING TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Do YouTubers Have Managers?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 17 February 2021

While many YouTubers are happy to make videos on things like how much they earn (because it is almost guaranteed to be a highly viewed video) there is much about the life of your average YouTuber that remains off-camera.

Not necessarily because there is some desire to keep it secret, but because it’s not all that interesting and people rarely think to ask.

“Do YouTubers have managers” is one of these unglamorous questions that you don’t see often answered, but it can be useful information for aspiring YouTubers who are looking to map out their road to success on the platform – Most small YouTubers under 100K subscribers do not have managers. When starting YouTubers try to manage all of the day to day tasks themselves. However, as a channel grows to around 100K subscribers is might be wise to seek additional help with organization and marketing decisions.

In this post we’re going to look at the different types of “manager” that this question could refer to (yes, there are a few) as well as what type of YouTuber might need them, and whether this might apply to you.

Let’s dig in.

What is a Manager?

There are a few different roles that the title “manager” could refer to in this context, and understanding what they are will go a long way to helping you understand if you need one.

In this section we’re going to give each type of manager a different label to distinguish them, but in reality they would probably all just be referred to as a “manager”.

Show Manager

In a more traditional television setting, this role would likely be referred to as a “Show Runner”.

A manager in this context would be responsible for taking care of the logistics of making YouTube channel content. For example, if the boys over at How Ridiculous want to drop a sail boat from the top of a tower onto an industrial-strength trampoline, someone needs to make those arrangements.

It can also cover things like handling travel arrangements if the channel is going abroad, or securing guests for the show.

This type of manager is typically only necessary for larger channels with more extravagant content.

Money Managers

This type of manager is actually often referred to as a “money manager”, largely because it is a pretty self-explanatory name.

Money managers exist in all walks of life, not just YouTube, and are responsible for managing their clients money. This can cover a lot of things from, from advising their clients on whether a particular purchase or investment is a good idea, to actively investing their client’s money for them.

Obviously, for a channel that has a few thousand subscribers and makes less than a hundred dollars a month, a money manager is wholly unnecessary.

For larger channels that are making lots of money, however, and especially when that money comes from several different sources, a money manager can be an invaluable way of freeing up time and giving you peace of mind that your money is being taken care of.

Content Network Managers

For YouTubers that become part of a larger content network, they may have a manager responsible for taking care of them within the network.

The manager would be responsible for advising them, making sure they don’t break any of the content network’s rules, and generally acting as a point of contact between the YouTuber and their network. Obviously, this type of manager only applies to YouTubers who are part of a content network.

General Managers

When people think about the idea of a YouTube manager, this is usually the type manager they are thinking of.

A general manager (not like in a business sense) takes care of a range of things, some of which may include things we have mentioned above.

They will often be responsible for handling enquiries, such as bookings and collaboration suggestions. They will probably also be handling a good deal of the more administrative tasks involved in running a YouTube channel, such as updating websites, handling descriptions, and some of the more in-depth promotion.

In this regard, most YouTubers act as their own manager, but many of the more successful YouTubers generally reach a point where they find outsourcing some of the less creative aspects of their job can free up a lot of time, which one of the most constraining parts of being a YouTuber.

This tends to be the first step towards deciding that getting a manager would be a good call.

Talent Managers

Talent managers are a bit “odd man out” in this context, as they are not really related to YouTube specifically.

Talent managers will often have several people and acts on their books, and concern themselves with looking after their clients best interests, ensuring they get good deals and only take on work that is good for them.

Talent managers (or agents) are usually more found with YouTubers who have a marketable skill outside of YouTube, such as being a musician, comedian, or actor.

Business Managers

We saved the best for last. Business managers are by far the most important of the manager types we have listed. You can think of a business manager as similar to a money manager, but the scope of their work is much broader.

If your YouTube venture begins to grow beyond the confines of yourself and your home studio, you should definitely consider getting a business manager. There comes a point in many successful YouTube channel’s life where, no matter how much it still feels like a cool creative project, it is technically a business. It is technically a business from the moment it makes its first dollar, but it is unavoidably a business when it is making thousands.

There are a lot of things to wrap your mind around when running a business, and the consequences for failing to fill out certain forms or apply for certain licenses can be quite strict. For someone starting a business, you would expect them to know everything they need to know, but for a YouTuber who just wants to make content, it is reasonable to expect that they would not know everything they need to know to run a business.

Business managers will look after the business side of a channel, leaving the YouTuber to concentrate on what they do best; making content.

Do I Need a Manager?

Much of the decision as to whether you need a manager (or any help, for that matter) will come down to your ultimate goals for the channel.

If you are looking to grow to be a large operation, perhaps extending into a brand beyond your channel, and you can comfortably afford to hire a manager, then you could probably justify it.

If, however, you have no intention of making your channel more than just you and a camera, it would be very difficult to justify a bringing a manager onboard, even if you can afford to.

YouTube Partner Managers

Currently, YouTube has a program in place called YouTube Partner Managers, and is an initiative by YouTube Creators to help YouTubers get the most from their channel.

The program involves one to one tuition, personalised plans for your channel, and invitations to workshops and other exclusive events.

Unfortunately, it is only open to channels that meet certain criteria, and it is invitation only.

Can I Do It All Myself?

In theory, there is nothing stopping you from taking care of everything yourself. There are no laws that say you have to hire a money manager once you start making a certain amount of money. There are also no laws that say you have to partner with a business manager before turning your channel into a business.

Like many things in life, however, the question is less about whether you can and more about whether you should.

The different types of manager we have mentioned above cover a very broad selection of skills and expertise. To effectively do the job that they can do, you would need to learn these skills and gain that expertise; something that is very time-consuming.

The smaller your channel, the less you need to know and the less work would be involved, but if you have ambitions of growing into a YouTube behemoth, you will probably need to consider hiring a manager at some point, if only to save your own sanity. After all, there are only so many hours in the day!

Final Thoughts

Of all the types of manager we have mentioned, only the money, business, and network managers are particularly common in the world of YouTube, and the rest sometimes go under different labels (talent agent, for example).

The first two of these—money and business—are especially important for YouTubers that need them because the consequences of getting that side of things wrong can be severe. If you manage your money poorly you can end up broke, or worse; in debt. If you don’t handle the business side of things well, you can get hit with fines, even sued.

This is especially true if you begin hiring people, who will have many rights as an employee that you must respect as their boss.

Of course, if you stick to just making videos from your home studio by yourself and declare all the money you make, you’ll be fine. Not every YouTuber dreams of being a content network.

Tags branding manager, marketing manager, youtube channel management, youtube channel manager, youtube management, youtube manager, youtube money

HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Do YouTubers Get Paid if You Have YouTube Premium?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 16 February 2021
4 Comments on Do YouTubers Get Paid if You Have YouTube Premium?

Given the many and varied ways there are for a YouTuber to earn revenue from their channel, and the increasingly volatile ways in which YouTube decides who can earn revenue through their platform, it can be a little confusing trying to work out when YouTubers get paid and when they don’t.

Whether you are looking at this from the perspective of a YouTuber wanting to know if they can get paid, or an interested viewer who is just curious how it all works, you might be looking for a little clarity.

In this post, we’re going to provide some of that clarity as it pertains to YouTube Premium. Do YouTubers get paid if you have YouTube Premium? – YouTube Premium is an additional revenue stream for creators to replace YouTube ads for ad free video viewing. YouTube Premium membership fees are split between the creators a member watches based a percentage of their total watch history and behavior that month.

What is YouTube Premium

Let’s start with the basics; what is YouTube Premium?

YouTube, as we all know, is a free service. For those of us old enough to remember the early days of the platform, you might recall that YouTube’s ability to make a profit was one of its main criticisms, and the fact that it was free was a big part of it. These days, of course, YouTube displays advertisements on their content (sometimes excessively so) to make money, but that isn’t their only source of revenue.

YouTube Premium is YouTube’s subscription service, giving a subscriber a range of benefits like access to exclusive YouTube content… and ad-free viewing. It is this last one that is the reason why there is any confusion about whether YouTubers get paid—if there are no ads being shown, there is no ad revenue to split with the YouTuber.

Do YouTubers Get Paid if You Have YouTube Premium?

The short answer is yes.

YouTube Premium users do not get shown ads on content they watch—regardless of who made that content—but the content creator receives a share of the YouTube Premium revenue in place of that ad revenue.

This share is proportionate to the amount of watch time you receive. So, to pull some completely unrealistic numbers out of thin air for an example, if the total YouTube Premium earnings for one month was $1,000, and your content accounted for 0.1% of all YouTube Premium watch time, you would earn $1 of YouTube Premium revenue.

There are other factors you could take into account, such as YouTube Premium exclusive content.

A mixture of more traditional television and network style TV show creators and regular YouTubers have found themselves making content for YouTube Premium in much the same way that Netflix Originals are made. In this case, though, the deal regarding what the YouTuber is paid and when would be agreed beforehand.

There are also rumours (though nothing official at the time of writing this post) that there will soon be an option for YouTube Premium members to donate to a channel of their choice as part of their membership.

Much like how Amazon Prime members get one free Twitch sub as part of their subscription.

Why Does YouTube Want a Subscription Model?

You might be asking why YouTube would want to offer a model like this, rather than stick exclusively to advertisements. After all, a YouTube Premium subscription is a fixed amount per month, regardless of how much content a user watches, whereas a user could watch a ridiculous number of ads in that same period, easily overtaking the value of a Premium subscription.

There are a few reasons why this model is appealing to YouTube, and the fact that it is a fixed amount per month is one of the bigger ones.

Advertisement revenue is erratic by its very nature. Trends in marketing, the economy, regulatory changes, and more can all have a profound and immediate impact on the revenue of an ad-based business.

For example, COPPA regulations surrounding how the personal data of underage users is treated forced YouTube to make changes that effectively stopped advertisements from being shown on a substantial number of YouTube videos. This naturally affected a lot of YouTubers, but it affects YouTube as well. If there are no ads being shown at all, there’s no revenue for anyone. While Premium subscriptions can still fluctuate (user’s can cancel any time) it is a far more reliable source of revenue than advertising.

It is also an easier source of revenue. Advertising online is a game of information; the more information you can collect about a user, the more relevant ads you can show them.

This is increasingly becoming a problem as more people become hostile to the idea of big tech companies collecting their data, and actively resist with ad blockers and VPNs (virtual private networks). And, of course, regulations like the aforementioned COPPA situation.

With a Premium membership, YouTube does not need to collect any information about its users to make the revenue from those subscriptions, making that particular revenue stream impervious to ad blockers and regulations around data protection. In fact, we might expect, going forward, that privacy could become one of the selling points of services like YouTube Premium. “Want to protect your data? Go Premium!”

Should YouTubers Do Anything Differently?

A natural follow-up question for a YouTuber here is whether they should be changing their approach because of YouTube Premium, and the short answer is no. Not yet, at least.

Stats from 2020 show that there were around twenty million YouTube Premium subscribers. Given that there are several individual YouTube channels with more than twenty million subscribers, it is safe to say that the majority of YouTube viewers aren’t on a Premium subscription.

Going forward, however, it would be reasonable to believe that YouTube would prefer more Premium users than not, and if they achieve this goal, it opens up an interesting new paradigm for YouTube content creators.

Since Premium revenue is paid based on watch time, and since there are no restrictions on Premium revenue (other than being eligible to monetise your content, of course), there really would be no other onus on a YouTuber than to make quality content.

Sure, you would still need to think about discoverability, but the need to think about advertising niches and advertiser-friendly content would be gone. You could make content for anyone and about anything (within YouTube community guidelines) and not have to worry about your revenue being hit.

Of course, this is an unlikely situation any time in the near future, but it is an interesting one to think about.

Does YouTube Premium Affect Other Revenue Sources?

The only revenue source that is affected by YouTube Premium is advertising revenue, since the fact that you are earning any Premium money means that somebody definitely was not watching ads on your content.

Everything else, however, is unaffected.

You can still earn revenue from things like Super Chat, Memberships, merchandise, and, of course, any external revenue sources like brand deals and Patreon are completely unaffected by YouTube Premium.

Should I Focus on Watch Time?

While Premium users make up a small number of the overall viewership of YouTube, we would still argue that focusing on watch time as long as it doesn’t harm the quality of your content is a good strategy.

This is because it should result in more revenue regardless of whether a viewer is a YouTube Premium subscriber or a regular user. The more watch time you have, the more of a share of the YouTube Premium earnings you get, but also the more opportunity there is for YouTube to display ads.

It should be stressed, however, that this is only the case if people are actually watching your whole videos. If you make your videos longer, but most viewers switch off after the first few minutes, you will not benefit from the additional length of the video. In other words, making your content longer does not guarantee more watch time.

What Do You Get With YouTube Premium?

In addition to ad-free viewing and exclusive content, there are other benefits to YouTube Premium. These include;

YouTube Music Premium
Background Play
Video Download

As the name suggests, background play lets you play videos without actually having the video onscreen, which is good for content that is primarily audio-based, such as podcasts or long music tracks.

It should be noted for the content creators who make those kinds of content that background plays still count as far as revenue share goes, so don’t worry if people are putting your content on in the background; you’ll still get paid. Watch time from downloaded videos is also counted.

Final Thoughts

While YouTube Premium is not a particularly significant thing that YouTubers should be changing their strategy for—especially since there is not much strategy changing that would be necessary—it does represent a possible future for YouTube that is more creator-friendly.

Right now, YouTube is essentially beholden to advertisers as their main source of revenue, so if advertisers want something, YouTube generally has to give it to them.

If Premium were to become a substantial part of the YouTube system, it would mean that YouTube could be more consistent—and more fair—with their creators, both in revenue sharing and policy changes.

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.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

A GREAT way to find an audience and keep them hooked no matter where they are watching your content.

4. Learn new skills for FREE with Skillshare

I SUCK reading books to learn, but I LOVE online video courses.

Every month I learn something new. Editing, writing, video skills, how to cook, how to run a business – even how to meditate to calm a busy mind.

I find all of these for FREE with Skillshare – Sign up, pick all the courses you want and cancel anytime you need.

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.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Tags do youtubers get paid for youtube premium, how to youtubers get paid, money, youtube money, youtube premium, youtube red, youtubers and youtube premium

SOCIAL MEDIA TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Do YouTubers Use Teleprompters?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 16 February 2021

Asking “do YouTubers use teleprompters” is a bit like asking whether people wear hats. “Some of them do, some of them don’t”, will invariably be the answer.

Unlike television, where we can confidently say that most onscreen personalities are using a teleprompter (or a cue card or something similar), YouTube has no common standard.

It is entirely up to each individual YouTuber how they run their channel, and while there are certain things that work and things that don’t work in most cases, there is technically no right or wrong way to go about it.

Do YouTubers Use Teleprompters? – When surveying my own audience if they use a teleprompter, full script, notes only or prefer to just wing it – 60% of creators prefer to wing it with 9% of them using a teleprompter to keep them on topic.

Of course, this would be a rather short and pointless post if we left it there, so we’re going to take a more in-depth look at the role of teleprompters in YouTubing—what are they, how you can get a teleprompter set up, and which situations are best for using a teleprompter versus situations it is best not to.

What is a Teleprompter?

In the strictest terms of what is used in broadcast television, a teleprompter (also known as an autocue) is a device for projecting a script onto a transparent surface in front of the camera. This is done in such a way that the person in front of the camera can see the words, but they are invisible to the camera itself, with the advantage here being that the presenter or host can read the words while looking directly at the camera.

This is obviously a very useful tool in situations where the on-camera personality has a script to stick to, or needs prompting on what they have to say, but it is not necessarily what is meant when used in the context of YouTube.

There are several options for a teleprompter like setup for YouTubers, including the simplest option of having the text on the screen of your laptop or computer, with the camera above it.

That being said, there are some very affordable options available these days that replicate the full functionality of a traditional teleprompter, often using a phone or tablet as the source of the text.

These can be bought for around £50, which is a considerably more attractive option than the thousands that it would have cost to buy the kind of teleprompter that has been used in broadcast television studios for decades.

Makeshift Teleprompters

Not everyone can afford even relatively inexpensive gear like a £50 teleprompter—especially when it is possible to make do with what you have. You can fashion a teleprompter-like setup out of the electronic gadgets you have in most cases.

There are plenty of free apps that will handle the scrolling text part of the equation, and the physical side of things just requires you to be able to see the screen that your text is being displayed on. If you have a stand or clip, you can put it near the camera, but even propping it up against a vertical surface will work if you have no other options.

The trick is to get the screen as close to your camera as you possibly can. The closer the text is to the camera, the more it will look as though you are looking directly at the camera when you speak. If you can’t get your text near the camera, consider moving yourself back. The further you are from the camera, the less obvious it is that you are not quite looking directly at it.

When to Use a Teleprompter

As accessible as teleprompters are—and as easy as it is to set one up—there is still a time and a place for them.

Not every type of YouTube video warrants a teleprompter, and there are plenty of types of video that would actually be worse for the use of one.

There are some situations where it isn’t that important, such as voice over videos where the speaker is not on screen. In these cases, editing can take care of any issues without the viewer being any wiser.

That being said, having a teleprompter—or at least a script—could at the very least improve your workflow, and give you less work to do on the editing side of things.

For YouTubers whose ability to talk in a free form kind of way is one of the more appealing aspects of the channel, forcing yourself to read a teleprompter can often make the content feel stilted and awkward compared to the usual fare. And, of course, any kind of interview or other dynamic content cannot be scripted, so an autocue is entirely useless.

Where teleprompters shine, however, is with monologue-like content. When the YouTuber has scripted a section (or an entire video) and will be essentially talking to the camera, a teleprompter can allow you to get your speech off clearly and in much fewer takes than trying to remember your lines, and will take less preparation than memorising those lines.

Using a Teleprompter

Given that the basic premise of a teleprompter is reading some text from a screen, there is not much in the way of learning to do when first using it.

That being said, while teleprompters are simple to understand, they can take a little practice to get good at.

Of course, some people will be naturally good at this which may seem unfair to those that aren’t. Unfortunately, the universe is rarely fair, and we just have to do the best we can.

For those of us that have to work a little harder at this, the main thing is practising what you are going to be doing. In other words, reading silently won’t cut it. You need to be reading text out loud, and working on your delivery.

The goal is for your speech to seem natural, rather than the awkward stilted speech of someone who is reading something aloud and is not comfortable about it. Consider reading aloud the next time you pick up a book, for example, or when you next read an article.

Why Not Just Memorise?

An obvious question might be, “if I have to spend so much time practising reading out loud, why not just spend that time rehearsing the actual words I will be saying?”

Of course, that is an option. There is a relevant idiom that goes something like, “give a man a fish, and you feed him for a day; teach a man to fish, and you feed him for a lifetime.” If you decide to put this time into rehearsing, rather than practising, you are effectively condemning yourself to rehearsing for every video you make.

If you can get good at reading from an autocue, you can just turn it on and go.

Sure, it will be slow-going in the beginning as you get to grips with the skill, but it will get easier, whereas rehearsing each video never changes; you will always have something new to rehearse.

That being said, there is no right or wrong way to YouTube. If you try using a teleprompter and find it’s not for you, don’t feel as though you are doing something wrong. If an alternative method works for you, that is the right method.

Don’t be Stubborn About Edits

There can be a temptation to believe that teleprompters are pointless if you have to edit or retake parts of your video.

This can lead to YouTubers either scrapping the teleprompter when they make mistakes, or blindly refusing to acknowledge those mistakes.

It is important to remember that we are only human, and even professional television hosts sometimes mess up when reading from a teleprompter.

The important factor is not whether the teleprompter completely eliminates errors and the need for editing from your videos, but whether it reduces those errors and edits. You should always be striving to make your content better, both for your viewers to watch and for you to make.

If a teleprompter don’t make your content worse but does improve things by a noticeable amount, it is worth keeping around.

Eye Contact Matters

One thing that can be a problem for YouTubers—especially those who record in cramped spaces or use makeshift teleprompter setups—is appearing to look at the camera while you speak.

When a YouTuber is constantly looking at something other than the camera, it can get distracting for the viewer, so it is worth adjusting your setup as much as possible so that you appear to be looking directly at the camera when you are, in fact, reading your script from the teleprompter.

Weirdly, this is one of those situations where a little is often worse than a lot. Looking just to the side of the camera is often more distracting than looking in a completely different direction. If your circumstances make looking at the camera impossible, this may be a handy piece of information to have.

Of course, we are not advising you to stare madly into the camera like a glassy-eyed crazy person, not blinking, face straining from the effort of not looking away.

Above all, you want to appear natural when reading from your teleprompter.

Tags teleprompter, youtube, youtube script

HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

A Zero-waste YouTuber With About 125,000 Subscribers Explains How Much Money He Earned Each Month In 2020

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 8 February 2021

Levi Hildebrand is a YouTube creator who films videos on how to help preserve the planet, be a minimalist, and follow a zero-waste lifestyle.
He started his YouTube channel in 2017 and now has about 125,000 subscribers.
By monetizing his videos with ads and brand deals, he turned his YouTube channel into a full-time job.
Hildebrand spoke with website blog Insider about how much money he makes on YouTube, and why he only works with brands that align with his message.

Levi Hildebrand wants to help preserve the planet and he has turned this mission into a full-time career by sharing his message on YouTube.

Hildebrand launched his YouTube channel in 2017 and now he has 125,000 subscribers. On his YouTube channel, Hildebrand has videos about urban farms, compostable phone cases, and how to follow a zero-waste lifestyle.

His channel’s slogan is: “You don’t need to be a hero to save the planet.”

To make a career out of posting content on social media, Hildebrand has developed several revenue streams, including brand sponsorships, affiliate links, Patreon, and money earned from ads placed in his videos through YouTube’s Partner Program.

Read more: A 5-step guide to making the most money possible from YouTube video ads, with advice from top creators

To be accepted into YouTube’s Partner Program, creators must have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours, and once they are in, their videos are monetized with ads filtered by Google. How much money a creator earns (called AdSense) depends on the video’s watch time, length, video type, and viewer demographics, among other factors. YouTube also keeps 45% of the ad revenue, with the creator keeping the rest.

Hildebrand’s YouTube channel is a One Percent for the Planet member – an organization where members contribute at least one percent of their annual earnings to help save the environment. And for 2021, Hildebrand said he will be donating all of the money his channel makes this year from YouTube AdSense to the organization.

But how much money does a YouTube channel about sustainability and minimalism earn?

Hildebrand broke down how much money he’s earned on YouTube by month in 2020.

January: $756
February: $967
March: $682
April: $1,008
May: $995
June: $1,181
July: $1,167
August: $1,199
September: $1,722
October: $1,444
November: $1,549
December: $1,156

YouTube ad rates fluctuate month to month, and at the start of the coronavirus pandemic, some YouTube creators saw a decline in their March earnings as advertisers pulled campaigns and lowered budgets. You can see that reflected in Hildebrand’s earnings.

A post shared by Levi Hildebrand (@levi_hildebrand)

Since Hildebrand follows a sustainable, zero-waste lifestyle, he only supports brands and companies that have similar values.

For instance, some of the brands and products that Hildebrand has promoted on his channel include the shoe brand Allbirds, a phone case company that makes compostable products, and a sunglasses brand that uses sustainable materials.

Only working with eco-friendly brands can be tricky and he rarely says yes to working with new companies, Hildebrand said.

“I never agree to a product review or a collaboration of any kind until I’ve actually held and used the product for a significant chunk of time,” Hildebrand added. “Because if your product sucks it doesn’t matter if you have the best branding and you save 1,000 whales for every purchase. I will take a better produced high-quality product over an overtly sustainable product in the same niche.”

To help him decide whether a brand is worth promoting, he created a checklist of must-haves:

The product must be high quality.
The company has to have good branding.
The brand must have some focus on sustainability or giving back to the planet.

Hildebrand’s message to the YouTube community is that he hopes to see more creators sharing tips on how to care for the environment.

“Big creators like MrBeast and Mark Rober have a voice and when they do things like the TeamTrees challenge and other things like that, they are normalizing environmental actions,” he said about the 2019 movement started by two YouTubers where for every dollar donated one tree would be planted somewhere around the world (to-date TeamTrees has raised over $22 million).

“If we see creators of any size using a reusable bottle and mentioning the fact that you shouldn’t use disposable, or creating a lifestyle that is sustainable that they are representing to their audiences, that can make a huge difference,” he said.

Tags Levi Hildebrand, money, youtube money

TIPS & TRICKS

How Much Do YouTubers Make an Hour?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 30 January 2021
1 Comment on How Much Do YouTubers Make an Hour?

Let’s kick things off by potentially ruining your appetite for this post; we’re not going to be able to give you a definite answer to the question of how much do YouTubers make an hour. There are simply too many variables that are completely different from YouTuber to YouTuber, including how we decide to slice up the time YouTubers spend plying their craft.

Before you click away, however, here’s what we can tell you.

In this post we are going to look at how YouTubers make their money, and how those methods can translate to a kind of hourly rate. One thing that will become apparent is that YouTubing revenue does not lend itself well to being easily quantified.

Why is it Hard to Calculate an Hourly Rate for YouTubers?

Hourly rates are easy to calculate when you have a regular job. You know how much you get paid, you how many hours you work, you divide one by the other, and you have your hourly rate.

YouTubers may know how much money they are getting paid (though even that can be a little complicated) but knowing how many hours they are working is much more difficult.

Take your average new YouTuber who gets started around a full time job, school, or other commitments. They will have to make time around those commitments to work on their channel, and this often leads to things like doing a little in the morning, perhaps an hour after work, getting some editing in once the kids are asleep.

This already makes things difficult to measure, but then take into account the fact that not everybody sets aside blocks of time for dedicated YouTube work. We often get distracted from time to time, perhaps checking email, or watching a quick video.

When is it YouTube Work?

Further complicating matters is the range of things that can be considered to be part of running a YouTube channel.

We can unambiguously say that writing, filming, and editing a video is YouTube work, but what about participating in social media? Sure, directly promoting your latest videos on social media is part of your YouTube work, but just being active in a related community will also help your channel… is it work if you do it for fun?

After all, many of us start YouTube channels about things we like, it makes sense that you would be active in communities about those things as well.

Another example of blurred lines in this regard is a YouTube musician. If your channel is based around you playing guitar, for example, then technically speaking, any time you spend practising that guitar is beneficial for your channel. As you can see, keeping “YouTube work” separate from other things isn’t always easy.

Revenue Sources

Determining which revenue sources are a result of YouTube is not quite as difficult as separating out the time you spend working on your channel, but the erratic nature of that revenue can make it hard to put a consistent number on.

Let’s start with YouTube Partner Programme earnings. This is simple enough; any revenue you earn through ads on your channel is definitely YouTube revenue. But even this can be inconsistent, as any YouTuber who has been on the wrong side of an adpocalypse will tell you.

Then there are other sources of revenue, such as merchandise sales, affiliate links, and brand deals. None of these are consistent, which means you have to factor in long periods to get an accurate hourly rate because it can change quite dramatically from week to week and month to month.

Revenue Differences Between YouTubers

From the perspective of an outsider looking in—that is, someone trying to get an idea of how much YouTubers earn—another factor complicating things is the substantial differences from YouTuber to YouTuber.

For one thing, most YouTubers don’t make anything from their channel, which makes their hourly rate quite simple to calculate. On the other end of the scale, there are YouTubers who earn money through the YouTube Partner Programme, get brand deals, sell merch, have membership subscriptions, and more.

YouTubers like that will have a much more impressive looking hourly rate than a YouTuber who just relies on the YouTube Partner Programme.

But even YouTubers with similar viewing figures who only make their money through the Partner Programme can have vastly different hourly rates, as the type of content—and, as a result, the type of ads—can make a huge difference to how much a view is worth.

Improving the Hourly Rate

There are two ways to improve the amount of money you make per hour; make more money, or take less time. The amount of money you make is tied to the success of your channel, and a topic worth a dedicated post of its own.

Reducing the amount of time you spend working on your channel, however, is not one of the more talked about aspects of YouTubing, though it can be just as invaluable.

are some tips for reducing the amount of time you need to spend on your channel.

Get Better!

The more you improve at your craft, the easier it will be and the less time you will have to spend on things like additional takes, reshoots, and excessive editing.

An accomplished YouTuber can often make more polished, entertaining content in considerably less time than an inexperienced YouTuber.

As the old saying goes; practice makes perfect. The idea of “practice” is often misunderstood, however. It is not enough to simply do a thing, you have to be striving to improve at that thing. If you just go through the same motions each time, you won’t get any better overall. Actively try to learn more about the software you use, including tips and tricks for making your workflow more efficient.

It is often the case that just learning keyboard shortcuts for your editing software can cut the time spent editing down by as much as half!

Have a System

If you go into every video winging it from start to finish, you will invariably find yourself doing a lot more editing and reshooting. For those of you who like to turn the camera on and talk, we’re not saying you should start scripting your videos; keep that improvised format if it works for you.

When we say have a system, we mean develop ways to make your life easier. One example of this would be an audio or visual cue for an edit point. This could be a whistle or clap that will be clearly visible in the waveform of your audio in your editor, and will save you having to hunt around for spots you know will need cutting out.

Other examples include things like having templates for your videos and thumbnails, and having your recording setup either permanent or any settings written down, so you don’t have to spend time getting everything set up each time your record.

Anything you can do to streamline your recording and editing process without sacrificing the quality of your content will effectively improve your hourly rate as a YouTuber.

Focus

It can be very easy to develop scatterbrain when running a YouTube channel. Most YouTubers are creative by nature, and with a world of tools and resources at your disposal, the temptation to drift into other niches and video types can be tempting. Now, we’re not saying you should never do this—in fact, in the long term it is advisable to do this as it will help keep your channel fresh—but while you are finding your feet as a YouTuber, it is better to keep focussed and concentrate on doing one thing really well, rather than a doing a dozen things just okay.

Don’t Get Hung Up On Numbers

While things like how much money you are making and how many views you are getting are a good indicator of whether you are going in the right direction as a YouTuber, it is important not to live or die by those numbers.

A huge range of things can affect your numbers, like seasonal changes (fewer people watching YouTube while the sun is out, for example) and trends. Even a highly successful channel will see what looks like flat spots in their growth at one time or another, but if you panic when this happens, you risk making bad decisions that can lead to actual stalling or backsliding.

Final Thoughts

So, calculating the hourly rate of your average YouTuber: not so simple. Even calculating your own hourly rate as a YouTuber is difficult enough!

If you are attempting to work out if YouTube is a viable career move, or if you are currently successful enough on YouTube to go full time, it is important to take a large sample of revenue numbers into account.

You don’t want to quit your day job after a couple of really profitable months on YouTube, only to find they were just a spike and your revenue takes a nose dive the following month.

Tags income, make money online, money, youtube income, youtube money, youtuber money

TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE YOUTUBE TUTORIALS

Embed a YouTube Video Without Suggested Videos

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 19 January 2021

One of the great things about YouTube is the ability to embed videos on other sites.

Not only does it open up a whole new realm of possibilities for viewer retention if you choose to allow your videos to be embedded, but it will enable you to incorporate useful videos into your blogs and other content.

To do this, all you need to do is add “?rel=0” to the end of the URL in your embed code. As an example, here is the embed code that YouTube outputs for which we have added the argument and highlighted it so you can see where it needs to go;

<iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/PO9rEOcWo6M?rel=0” frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture” allowfullscreen></iframe>

In the past, YouTube has been very relaxed about how their content is shown, making for an excellent resource for those who need video content but can’t host it themselves.

Unfortunately, things are a little less relaxed these days.

One symptom of that is a change in YouTube’s attitude to displaying recommended videos on embedded videos.

Specifically; you used to be able to opt-out of having recommendations show up on embedded content, but that option has gone.

It used to be the case that you could click a checkbox when getting your embed link to let YouTube know you didn’t want recommendations popping up at the end, or, if you were pressed for time and knew your stuff, simply add a “rel=0” argument to the URL.

We’re sorry to say there is not presently a way around this change in YouTube’s thinking. But, as with many YouTube limitations, there are alternative approaches to consider, and information to unpack.

We can’t tell you how to embed a YouTube video without suggested videos popping up at the end, but we can help you understand why this is the case now, and how to make the most of a bad situation.

Why Would You Want to Remove Recommended Videos From Embedded Content?

The primary reason you might want to prevent recommended videos from showing up on embedded videos is if you are making video content specifically as a companion to something external to YouTube.

This could be an accompanying video for a written tutorial, or a short clip from your phone of an event you have written about in your blog.

In cases like these, you might not want things popping up that could lead your viewers away from your site. Suppose you go to the trouble of creating a companion video for your blog post.

In that case, you almost certainly don’t want people clicking on an unrelated recommended video at the end and falling down the YouTube rabbit hole, losing interest in your content.

Retention is one of the most significant factors of success when making online content of any medium. A small number of people who view a lot of your content can be worth considerably more than a large number of people who only look at one thing and never come back.

Turning recommended videos off didn’t guarantee that your blog or site would retain viewers after the video was finished, but it at least removed the possibility of them being lured away by a keyboard playing cat!

Why Did YouTube Make This Change?

Though we’re confident we can accurately guess why YouTube decided to force recommended videos on embedded content, it’s worth mentioning that we are guessing. YouTube has its moments when it comes to transparency, but they don’t explain every action they take.

Ironically, the most likely reason they made the change to force recommended videos into embedded content is the very same reason we mentioned above for why someone might want to remove them; retention.

There are many metrics that YouTube consider important when judging the success of a video or channel, but retention is up there among the big ones. In other words, if a viewer arrives on YouTube, watches the first minute of a video, and leave the site never to return, YouTube probably isn’t going to recommend that video much in future.

YouTube wants people to stay on their platform because the longer people are on YouTube or watching YouTube videos, the more opportunity YouTube has to serve them ads and make money. If they allow you to disable recommended videos on embedded content, whether or not a viewer continues watching YouTube content is entirely out of YouTube’s hands, and they don’t like that. Sure, filling their screen with recommended videos doesn’t guarantee the viewer will stick around, but it does increase the chances. And at least YouTube got to try.

Not Fair?

The first reaction to learning YouTube has made this change is often that it isn’t fair for them to force you to show recommended content on your site in this way.

It’s worth remembering that YouTube is essentially providing a very expensive service for free. Very few free services come without compromise. For example, to watch a YouTube video, you have to accept that there will be ads. However, if you decide to pay for YouTube Premium, you will no longer receive ads, because YouTube is using your subscription fee instead of the ad revenue you might have generated.

It may not seem fair at first glance, but the unavoidable reality is that YouTube has to pay its bills like every other company, and this is just another way they ensure they can keep doing that without having to charge you to use their service.

It is also worth noting that, if YouTube were a subscription-only service, they would not need to do things like this. Granted they probably wouldn’t allow embedded videos at all, but they wouldn’t need to take steps to keep people on their platform for as long as possible. Consider Netflix, who are entirely subscription-based. They are getting paid whether you are on their service for five minutes of fifty hours. In fact, in that business model, it actually becomes beneficial to have users spend less time on their platform since they get paid the same subscription fee regardless but more watch time means more costs in bandwidth.

Silver Lining?

So, you can’t disable recommended videos in your embedded content, but you might not be forced to accept that YouTube is going to serve up other YouTuber’s content on your website.

We mentioned above that the way you would have removed recommended videos in the past was to either check the option when you get your embed link or add an argument to the URL. Well, that argument still has a purpose. Now, if a video has the “rel=0” argument, the recommendations shown will only be from the same channel as the video that is being embedded. It may not be perfect, but at least your viewers will be getting lured away by more of your content.

To do this, all you need to do is add “?rel=0” to the end of the URL in your embed code. As an example, here is the embed code that YouTube outputs for which we have added the argument and highlighted it so you can see where it needs to go;

<iframe width=”560″ height=”315″ src=”https://www.youtube.com/embed/PO9rEOcWo6M?rel=0” frameborder=”0″ allow=”accelerometer; autoplay; encrypted-media; gyroscope; picture-in-picture” allowfullscreen></iframe>

There is no option for this in the settings you are presented with when you click to embed the video, so you will have to add the code manually. You will also need to be sharing a video from a channel with at least one other video for this to work—YouTube can’t recommend other videos from the same channel if there aren’t any!

It’s also worth noting that the above method only applies to situations where you are inputting the full embed code. If you are using a platform like WordPress, the embed code that is part of the platform may not recognise arguments or may overwrite your arguments with its own.

Are There Alternatives?

Unfortunately, not if you want to use YouTube to embed your videos. You could use other platforms, such as Vimeo, or DailyMotion, but those platforms have their own foibles to deal with, and this is a YouTube blog, so we’ll leave that to someone else. You could always host the videos yourself, but this can be a very costly road to go down, especially if you expect to get a lot of traffic.

Video hosting requires a lot of bandwidth, not to mention storage, hence why YouTube is so keen to squeeze the most revenue from each viewer. If you are dealing with a one or two videos on a low traffic site, you might be able to get away with hosting the videos yourself. If you have plenty of traffic on your site, however, hosting your own videos could very quickly land you with a huge bill from going over the bandwidth allowance that your web host provides.

The best option, in our opinion, is to use the method outlined above to ensure any recommended content is from your channel, and make the most engaging content you can. If everything goes to plan, your viewers won’t disappear off into YouTube Land because your content will have held their attention. And if they do, they’ll be disappearing off to another of your videos.

One final thought on alternatives; consider how important it is that your post exists outside of YouTube. If it is relatively short, consider putting it in the video description rather than an external post. This eliminates the problem of rogue YouTube suggestions at the end of the video, and it could help with the SEO of your video!

When are Embedded YouTube Videos Useful?

If you’re sitting there wondering why anyone might want embedded videos on their site, first off; kudos for reading this far into the post! There are plenty of situations where embedded videos are useful, and we’re going to give you a few examples. Before we do that, we’ll say that the reason for embedded videos is nearly always the same; companion content.

It may be that the page you are embedding the video on is the companion, rather than the video itself (example below), but this is nearly always the fundamental reason you would do this.

Video Alternatives

The first and most obvious situation where an embedded video would be used is when the video and the written content on the page it is being embedded are the same content in different mediums.

The video would usually come with a caption informing the reader that there is a video version of the post if they prefer, with a similar note about the written version in the description of the video on YouTube.

Additional Content

Videos can also be used to provide additional detail or context to an article. For example, if you were writing a post about camping in the woods, you might embed a video on how to build a campfire, rather than write a whole section about it in the post itself.

This is particularly useful for reducing the amount of text your post needs to get your information across while not reducing the amount of information you are conveying.

Video Breakdowns

Though the video is being embedded in your post, there is no rule that states that the video has to be secondary content. The text could be supplementary to the video, such as expanding on things said in the video. It could even be a breakdown of the video, such as a deep dive on a newly released movie trailer.

Demonstrations

Typically more common on business websites than blogs, demonstration videos can help to show a reader what the text on the page is talking about. For example, a business that sells high-tech computer-controlled heavy machinery might embed a video showing that machinery in action.

Final Thoughts

We don’t like not being able to answer the question being posed at the top of the post. Unfortunately, when it comes to how to embed a YouTube video without suggested videos rearing their head at the end, there is no solution to get around it, only alternatives and compromises.

As with all immovable obstacles in life, this should be seen as an opportunity to grow and improve in other areas. Make your content more engaging so that people are less likely to click off to another video at the end. Make more content for your channel so you can at least take advantage of the ability to limit the suggested videos to your own content.

Any excuse to improve your content should be seen as a good thing.

Tags embed, embed video, embed youtube video

DEEP DIVE ARTICLE LISTS SOCIAL MEDIA TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

14 Virtual YouTubers That Will Blow Your Mind

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 18 January 2021
4 Comments on 14 Virtual YouTubers That Will Blow Your Mind

The growing trend of virtual YouTubers, or VTubers, is one that isn’t showing any signs of slowing down!

A natural result of this growth, there is much interest in virtual YouTubing as a potential inroad to becoming a YouTuber, not to mention an alternative path for experienced YouTubers.

If you want to know what virtual YouTubers are, you can check out this post, but one of the best ways to learn about a thing is to observe that thing.

To that end, we’ve put together a list some of the most notable virtual YouTubers on the platform today, complete with a bit of information about what kind of content they make and. For your convenience, we’ve split our picks into different sections so you can easily zero in on what you’re interested in.

So, without further preamble, let’s get into our virtual YouTuber list!

Anime Virtual YouTubers

Given that the virtual YouTuber phenomenon started in Japan with anime characters, and given that anime characters still make up the overwhelming majority of active virtual YouTubers, it feels only right to start here.

Kizuna AI

What better virtual YouTuber to kick things off with than the one that started it all. Kizuna is widely regarded as the first virtual YouTuber. She has two channels and covers a variety of topics in a vlog-like format, as well as Let’s Play-style videos, despite being known for having particularly poor gaming skills.

Kizuna is more or less the blueprint for a character virtual YouTuber, remaining in character all of the time and running the channel as though Kizuna herself is the YouTuber. Kizuna’s success has led to her getting millions of subscribers, many of which find her mannerisms and quirks adorable. She’s not necessarily a child-friendly account due to the fact that she will occasionally curse in her frustrations at failing in some video game or another, but that’s all part of the charm.

Mirai Akari

Within her first year of being on YouTube, Mirai had attracted over three hundred and fifty thousand subscribers to her account; a phenomenal effort any type of YouTuber. And, at the time of writing this post, she has more than doubled that figure. Like Kizuna, Mirai does a lot of streaming video games, though you will find that this is a common theme among virtual YouTubers, especially of the Japanese anime variety.

Her initial “backstory” was that she was an amnesiac-suffering time traveller, come back to 2018 to find human connection through her YouTube channel. Whether or not the interesting gimmick is a draw or not, her content seems to keep people coming back for more.

Nekomiya Hinata

Like Mirai and Kizuna, Nekomiya is another game streamer, though we can further refine her audience a little because she has a keen interest in first-person shooter games, so don’t expect much in the way of Animal Crossing here. She’s not a fan of horror games, but that makes it all the entertaining when she plays them.

In the nearly two years since she started her YouTube channel, Nekomiya has amassed an impressive following of over half a million subscribers. She has a distinctive look with her bright pink hair, extremely long pigtails, and cat ears. That is actual cat ears, not a quirky headband with pretend cat ears. This is one of the more significant draws of virtual YouTubing; you can be whatever you want.

Luna Kaguya

If you thought Mirai Akari getting three hundred and fifty thousand subscribers in under a year, wait until you see Luna’s record. This impressive VTuber managed to hit a million views per video in her first month. Needless to say, that’s quite an achievement.

Luna is the first virtual YouTuber on our list whose content does not focus on video game streams. Instead, Luna makes content of a more comedic nature that tend to come in bite size chunks—often under a few minutes in length. The humour involved is not always family-friendly, however, so don’t let that cutesy digital avatar fool you.

Tokino Sora

Moving firmly back into the realm of game streamers, Tokino is a streamer who has a thing for rhythm games, so it should come as no surprise that she dances a lot, as well. One advantage of this is that her content is much more accessible to non-Japanese audiences. After all, you don’t need to know the Japanese language to watch a Japanese person (or digital avatar) dance to music.

By some of the standards set on YouTube, Tokino is quite normal in appearance; no animal parts or outlandish hair. Instead, Tokino presents herself as a regular anime girl with brown hair. However, she does dress like an air stewardess. We haven’t watched enough of her content to know why.

Azuma Lim

Azuma can be a little love-or-hate for some people. She has a quite distinctive appearance with her purple hair and golden firey eye—not to mention the cat-ear hoodie she likes to wear—but it is her voice that can be make-or-break for many people. It is a little high-pitched, even by virtual anime YouTuber standards.

As far as content goes, Azuma is another video game streamer, though she does make other types of videos, such as topical commentary, and she is very engaged with her audience and will often respond to fans. She also makes music and even occasionally tries her hand at English.

Moemi & Yomeni

Next up, we have our first pairing on the list. Moemi & Yomeni are an anime duo that streams video games and makes some very… interesting content. Not, we should stress, family-friendly content. As far as games go, they have a general leaning towards open-world games like Minecraft, and battle royale games like Fortnite.

Expect to see plenty of cats, a whole lot of music, and generally all the things you would expect from animated Japanese entertainment. Moemi & Yomeni are also part of a larger virtual YouTuber family that includes some other popular virtual YouTubers, so you can expect to see a few guest appearances from time to time.

Fuji Aoi

While music is a common theme throughout virtual anime YouTube, Fuji Aoi brings us our first channel where music is the main theme. Expect plenty of cover songs from Aoi, which can make for great background music if you are into the style. There is plenty to choose from, so just pick a playlist and let it run while you get some work done.

Like many of our virtual anime YouTuber picks, Aoi saw some spectacular growth when she first exploded onto the scene, gaining over a hundred and seventy thousand subscribers in her first year. You might not have a clue what she’s saying (if you don’t speak Japanese) but you’ll be able to enjoy the music regardless.

Dennou Shojo Siro

In Dennou Shojo Siro we find another game streaming and dancing combo. In this case, the games tend to be a little eclectic, with everything from Minecraft to Battlefield 5 on the table. Perhaps one of her more unique characteristics is her appearance, which is ghostly pale with white hair. This combined with a somewhat unique laugh has landed her with the nickname of “White Dolphin”.

This channel took less than two years to reach half a million subscribers, so that should give you an idea of the type of quality you can expect, the rest is just a matter of whether you are interested in the content.

Noja Loli Ojisan

One of the first things you might notice about Noja Loli Ojisan is the distinctive features that make her somewhat unique among virtual anime YouTubers. For one thing, she is part fox. At least, she has fox ears and a foxtail. The second thing is her voice, which is that of her male creator.

Whatever you may think about this eclectic combination, it seems to have worked for her, since her channel is approaching two hundred thousand subscribers.

In terms of content, Noja interacts with fans in live streams, hosts roundtable chats with other virtual YouTubers, and even sells merchandise such as a doll of Noja.

Non-Anime Virtual YouTubers

The world of virtual YouTubing is so thoroughly dominated by anime characters that we can comfortable lump what remains after the anime into one section, which is not to say any of the following YouTubers have much in common. We are also not saying that these YouTubers aren’t Japanese—the VTuber phenomenon began in Japan, after all. That being said, there is a specific aesthetic and culture around anime, and these virtual YouTubers do not fit that aesthetic, even if they are Japanese channels.

Apoki

Apoki is a truly multi-platform star, with far more followers on TikTok than on YouTube. She takes the appearance of animated girl (more akin to a Disney or Pixar style than an anime one) and sports large rabbit ears poking through her red hair.

Her main focus is music, and she seems to have aspirations of becoming a legitimate recording artist. Her content often revolves around this, and is an interesting mix of the virtual and real worlds, with Apoki often being blended seamlessly into real-world settings.

Virtual Obaachan (aka Virtual Grandma)

As the (English) name suggests, Virtual Obaachan is a virtual YouTuber who takes the appearance of a cartoon granny, and in that guise, plays a range of video games. There is obviously a lot of mileage to be had from the novelty of a sweet old grandma playing videos games that are not always family-friendly, and the virtual nature of the YouTuber adds another layer of novelty. Further adding to this dichotomy is the fact that she will often talk about things being “immodest” and taboo, and then go ahead and say something taboo without hesitation.

This combination has worked for Virtual Obaachan, as she currently sits at a little over a quarter of a million subscribers.

AI Angel

AI Angel is probably the most popular virtual YouTuber outside of the anime crowd, with over seven hundred thousand subscribers at the time of writing this post. AI Angel claims to be an AI who takes on the form of a human woman so that she can interact with other humans through video chat applications, play video games, react to memes, and a host of other types of content.

What is interesting about AI Angel is that the creators are not going for a cutesy anime or cartoon look with their virtual YouTuber avatar. Instead, they are travelling down the road of realism, and continually update the visuals of AI Angel to improve the realism (as well as refresh her image). AI Angel’s appearance is already quite realistic, and it would not be difficult to believe that, in the near future, she could be so realistic that some viewers would have difficulty recognising that she was a virtual YouTuber.

Code Bullet

Code Bullet is a bit of an odd one out on this list, but we wanted to include him to show another type of virtual YouTuber. Unlike the above examples, Code Bullet is not presenting a character as such, but himself in the guise of an animated avatar.

The avatar in question is a hand-drawn human with an old-school computer monitor for a head who gesticulates to add emphasis to the words being spoken. Though we’re sure it is mainly the content he is making that has landed Code Bullet his nearly two and a half million subscribers, his digital avatar is an intrinsic part of that content. Given that he is by far one of the most popular examples of this kind of channel, it would not be outrageous to assume that the virtual YouTuber aspect of his videos has helped.

Final Thoughts

And that concludes our virtual YouTuber list. For now, at least, virtual YouTube is dominated by Japanese-language channels and anime avatars. More English-speaking channels are popping up, however. And as AI Angel has shown, it is certainly possible to be a successful virtual YouTuber without using anime or speaking Japanese.

We expect this niche to expand into the western world in a bigger way in the near future. How big it will get, we couldn’t say, but with a relatively untapped market of English speakers, growth would seem to be inevitable.

DEEP DIVE ARTICLE HOW TO GET MORE VIEWS ON YOUTUBE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Which Language is Best for YouTube?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 17 January 2021
1 Comment on Which Language is Best for YouTube?

The question of which language is best for YouTube is one with no universal answer that can be applied to every YouTuber in every region.

Ultimately, the best language is the one in which you can make videos coherently and comfortably, but there are other mitigating factors that can pull your choice of language this way or that.

In this post, we’re going to lay out all the different factors to consider when deciding what language (or languages) to release your videos in, as well as some alternatives to consider if you don’t speak the language that would be best for your particular videos.

Most-Viewed Languages

Let’s start with the basics.

The raw numbers, as it were.

If you were purely concerned with reaching the largest possible audience on YouTube, you would naturally want to make content in the language that has the largest possible audience bases such as English Spanish and Hindi.

As per Twinword’s analysis of YouTube statistics, we can use the following numbers as a guide for how the languages are spread out on YouTube from the creator’s side, meaning this is the percentage of videos that are made in each language.

Language	Percentage
English	66%
Spanish	15%
Portuguese	7%
Hindi	5%
Korean	2%
Others	5%

It’s worth remembering that these kinds of statistics change all the time, but there is unlikely to be a significant change in terms of the share of those languages. For example, Hindi could creep past Portuguese without much fanfare, but Spanish would be very unlikely to overtake English any time soon.

Still, these are the percentages in which YouTube content is made but do not necessarily reflect the percentages in terms of the potential audience. For example, English is a second language in many countries, and while the primary language of a given region may not be English, many people in that region will speak it, which would mean they could happily consume English-speaking content, even if they would be more comfortable with a different language.

From a practical standpoint, this detail doesn’t make much difference. If you are primarily concerned with reaching the largest possible audience, you would make your video in the language with the most potential viewers, even if not all of those viewers consider English their first language.

YouTube Audiences

So what of the audiences themselves? It is all well and good saying that the vast majority of the content on YouTube is made in English, but that is a creator bias and doesn’t necessarily reflect the language of the people who are watching that content.

There are no reliable statistics that we could find on language specifically when it comes to YouTube viewers, but there are statistics on things like region, which we can use to make a few educated guesses about the primary language of YouTube’s overall audience. Here are the top ten countries in terms of YouTube views (source).

Country	Number of Views
USA	916 Billion
India	503 Billion
UK	391 Billion
Brazil	274 Billion
Thailand	207 Billion
Russia	207 Billion
South Korea	204 Billion
Spain	169 Billion
Japan	159 Billion
Canada	158 Billion

As you can see from this table, there is quite a diverse spread of nations in the top ten countries viewing YouTube. We can see English, Hindi, Portuguese, and Thai in the top five languages, with plenty of other languages in the rest. Russian, Korean, Spanish, and Japanese.

However, things are not as diverse as they may first appear. For one thing, the three overwhelmingly English-speaking countries in that top ten—the USA, the UK, and Canada—account for 45% of the total views in that table. Granted, 45% is not a majority, but remember that none of the other countries in the top ten shares a primary language. India mainly speaks Hindi, Thailand primarily speaks Thai, Russia speaks Russian, South Korea speaks Korean, Spain speaks Spanish, and Japan speaks Japanese.

Further muddying the waters is the multilingual nature of some nations. For example, India lists both Hindi and English as their official languages, although it is thought that only around ten percent of India’s residents speak English. Still, India is second in our table with over half a trillion views—a potential ten percent bump of that half trillion for English is substantial.

It is also worth noting that, while the vast majority of Canada can speak English, they also have French as an official language, and around a fifth of the population can speak it.

So, what do we take from this? The first thing to take away from all of these numbers is that there is no clear cut statistic or table we can look at that will tell us which language has the most potential YouTube viewers. We can look at the languages which content is made in, but that doesn’t tell us if people are watching content in a language they are not fluent in. We can also look at the nations with the most YouTube viewers, but that doesn’t tell us what language the viewers are watching in.

If you are looking for a single broadest appeal language to make your content in, it is hard to argue with English, which makes sense as YouTube came from and rose to prominence in English-speaking countries.

Working With What You Got

All of the numbers and statistics on which languages are most viewed on YouTube may be irrelevant to you. If you only speak one language, or you can speak another language, but it is difficult to understand, you will struggle to make content in those other languages.

The first gatekeeper along your road to YouTube success is how watchable your content is. You could manoeuvre your videos to be in front of the largest potential audience possible, but if it is not watchable, you will not succeed. The phrase “content is key” may be cliched at this point, but it is cliched for a reason. It is 100% true.

If you have lofty ambitions for your YouTube channel, you may consider learning a language so that you can make content in that language.

For some people, learning a new language is intuitive. They can pick up the structure of the language relatively easy and, with some time and practice, speak the language with more clarity than even some native speakers of that language. On the other hand, there are people who have moved to a foreign country and lived there for most of their life and still have thick accents that make them hard to understand when speaking the local language.

This isn’t a linguistics blog, so we won’t pretend to know the reasons some people can pick up new languages easily and others cannot, but if you are the latter—if no amount of speaking a particular language makes it feel comfortable on your tongue—you would be better placed putting your energies into making the best possible content you can in your own language.

There are other options, of course, but more on that below.

How Important Is Language to Success on YouTube?

This is an important question to ask yourself because the work involved in making your content available in a language other than the one you are comfortable with—especially if you are going to learn a whole new language just so you can speak it in your videos—is considerable.

It is important to establish a realistic sense of what “success” means for you when starting out on YouTube. If your idea of success is being able to pay the bills and live comfortably with the revenue generated from your YouTube channel, you probably don’t need to conquer the world. If we take the data from the top countries viewing YouTube above, the twenty-fifth country on the list—Romania—still accounts for an impressive 63 billion views. The average CPM (the amount you make per one thousand views) on YouTube is typically around the £2-4 mark (after YouTube takes its cut). If we go for the middle ground and assume you will make roughly $3 per thousand views, and we take the average US monthly salary of around $3,500, we can say that you would need to get around 1,200,000 monthly views to match the average US citizen’s salary.

Without a doubt, 1.2 million views per month is a lot, but it is only approximately 0.002% of the total views coming from Romania. Would it be harder to get that many views from a purely Romanian audience than the much larger English audience? Of course. But it is certainly an attainable goal.

Of course, if your idea of success is to conquer the world of YouTube and overtake PewDiePie as the most successful individual YouTuber, that’s different. You’re probably going to need to make videos in English to do that.

At least, for now.

Translations/Captions

We mentioned alternatives to settling for your own language or learning a new one, so let’s talk about that. Making your content available to other languages doesn’t necessarily mean creating that content in those languages.

First of all, YouTube makes it very easy to caption your videos in multiple languages, even to the point that they have an automated captioning service that, while not perfect, is getting better all the time. There are also many transcription and translation services on the web for very affordable rates—typically a dollar or two per minute of audio. Captioning your videos is a good practice to get into regardless of language because it makes your video more accessible to people with hearing problems, but it also provides a way to make your content more accessible to other languages.

The other option is to have your videos translated and recorded so that you can upload alternate language versions of your videos with the translated voice-over dubbed onto it. There are services that will take care of the translation and voice over for you, or you might choose to have the translation handled separately, such as if you have a particular voice-over person you want to work with, but that person doesn’t do the translation.

If you go down the route of alternative language versions of your videos, it is important to make it clear that you have those alternative versions out there. First impressions tend to stick on YouTube, and if someone comes to your video because the content of the video is exactly what they are looking for, but they land on a version of the video using a language they don’t speak, they may dismiss you entirely because they can’t speak that language. Always put links to alternative language versions of a video in the descriptions of those videos, and it would be wise to have some kind of note in the video at the start mentioning that the video is available in other languages.

Final Thoughts

In an ideal world, you would not be concerned with the global reach of your videos. You would make the content you want to make to the best of your ability, continually looking for ways to improve and grow and let the views pan out how they may. That being said, we understand that reality is rarely ideal.

There is nothing inherently wrong with wanting to reach viewers in the largest markets, but it is important to ensure your content is good. Creating a hard to understand video in English when your native language is Japanese, for example, will not just not help your channel; it may actively harm it. If you get a reputation for creating videos that are hard to understand, the people who would have watched that content in the first place may not come back when you have improved further down the line.

If you are learning a new language, use your time making content in your first language to improve and grow as a YouTuber, and hold off on making content in your additional language until you can speak it fluently and clearly.

And, remember; there are plenty of views out there no matter what language you speak.

Tags best language for youtube, languages, youtube stats

DEEP DIVE ARTICLE HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

How Do Virtual YouTubers Make Money?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 30 December 2020
3 Comments on How Do Virtual YouTubers Make Money?

When you first come across the world of virtual YouTubers, it can seem a little strange and exotic, and you might be forgiven for thinking that things work a little differently over in VTuber land (that’s not a real place, by the way). In particular, you may find yourself wondering how do virtual YouTubers make money?

The truth is virtual YouTubers operate in much the same way that regular YouTubers do. Granted, the process of making the content is different, but everything that happens outside of the creation process is more or less the same. We’re going to go over the ways virtual YouTubers make money—bearing in mind that these are also the ways regular YouTubers make money—but there is more to explore here, because while VTubers make their money through many of the same methods, there is a noticeable shift of focus when compared to a typical flesh and bone YouTuber.

But let’s kick things off with those money-making methods.

How Do Virtual YouTubers Make Money?

Virtual YouTubers just like standard YouTubers and influencers make money through the YouTube Partner Program, affiliate marketing, merchandise sales, crowd funding sites like Patreon and brand deals. The only difference between Virtual YouTubers (VTubers) and human influencers is their chosen public persona, avatar or face.

Before we get into the nitty-gritty of VTuber monetisation, we’ll give you a brief overview of the most common methods available to a typical YouTuber. For a more in-depth breakdown, check this post out.

The YouTube Partner Programme

The OG, as it were. This method of monetising YouTube content has been around in some form or another since the earliest days of YouTube monetisation. For eligible YouTubers, you simply opt your channel into monetisation, and YouTube will begin displaying ads beside, over, and during your videos. The revenue generated from these ads is then shared with the YouTuber.

In terms of the amount of money you make, the YouTube Partner Programme is hardly at the top of most YouTuber’s list. You generally have to have a lot of views to make any real money, and even then it is an incredibly unreliable method due to the volatility of the advertising market and YouTube’s own constant tinkering with their terms and algorithms. It is also incredibly inconsistent between YouTubers. Due to the nature of online advertising—which is essentially auction-based—one YouTuber could make many times more than another YouTuber, even if the other YouTuber has the same or more views.

Memberships

For YouTubers with loyal audiences who are either invested in the content that is being produced or invested in the YouTuber themselves, memberships offer a great way to cut out the volatility of the advertising space that we mentioned above.

Unlike advertising, memberships involve your members supporting you directly in exchange for perks that aren’t available to regular viewers. This method is more consistent than advertising. Granted, members will drift away from time to time, but if your content is consistently compelling, new members will replace them, and you are unlikely to see a sudden drop in your earnings—well unless you do something to alienate your members.

This also cuts out many of the issues that have been typified by the “Adpocalypses” that YouTube has brought down upon us. As your members are choosing to support you directly, there is no question of whether the content is suitable, so you don’t need to worry about your revenue taking a sudden nosedive because advertisers have suddenly decided they don’t want their brand associated with your kind of content.

Super Chat

Super Chat is a method that streamers can use to monetise their live streams. Essentially, the live audience can donate a little sum of money (or a large sum, it’s up to them) to get their message pinned to the top of chat for a period. In most cases, the message will also pop up in the video, but that is entirely down to the YouTuber.

Like Memberships, Super Chat has the advantage of not being beholden to changing YouTube monetisation policies and the shifting whims of advertisers. The only real downside is that there is no way for a YouTuber who doesn’t stream to take advantage of it.

Brand Deals, Sponsored Content, and Endorsements

For YouTubers who command enough of an influence in a given area, the prospect of brands coming to you directly (or through an agency) may be on the table. This is where a brand pays you to promote them on your videos, cutting out YouTube in the process.

Though each deal is unique, brand deals are typically more lucrative than the equivalent revenue you would get from YouTube. And, in many cases, you can still monetise your sponsored content through the YouTube Partner Programme, essentially letting you double dip.

Unlike advertising revenue, brand deals are not necessarily predicated on the size of your audience. Of course, the bigger your audience, the more likely you are to get offered this kind of arrangement, but the ultimate value of your content is determined by the conversions generated for the brands that sponsor you. If your videos typically generate a higher-than-average level of interest from your viewers, brands will be willing to pay your more to get their products or services promoted by you, even if you have a relatively small audience.

Affiliate Sales

For YouTubers whose content revolves around products and services—such as YouTubers who review things—affiliate sales are a way to earn revenue from your recommendations.

By signing up for the relevant affiliate programs and linking to the products or services you are discussing in your videos, you earn a commission for every viewer who buys a product or signs up to a service through your links.

You also provide your viewers with a quick and easy way to get to things you are talking about.

Merchandise

For those lucky YouTubers who are able to cultivate an audience that is invested in them, merchandise is another monetisation option.

You could do this through a third-party merch retailer or through YouTube’s own merch shelf. Of course, the success of this is determined by your audience’s willingness to buy your merch.

There is a world of difference between dropping a couple of dollars in Super Chat and buying a twenty dollar shirt from your merch store.

Patreon and Similar Services

In essence, this option is the same as YouTube Memberships, though YouTube has certain restrictions in place—such as requiring your to have at least 30,000 subscribers—before you can make use of that option. Third-party alternatives such as Patreon do not have such restrictions, meaning you can offer your subscribers a way to support you directly much sooner than you would be able to through YouTube itself.

Like Memberships, the basic principle is that your Patreons want to support you directly, but you would generally offer them some incentives, such as exclusive content.

What’s Different for Virtual YouTubers?

The most significant difference between a regular YouTuber and virtual YouTuber is, of course, their appearance (in the videos, of course). People don’t typically want to buy merchandise with a human face on it; we tend to prefer designs and artwork. For virtual YouTubers, their digital avatar is the artwork. With the majority of virtual YouTubers being Japanese anime characters, they have artwork ready to go by just taking a screenshot of their digital avatar.

The next area of difference is how YouTube perceives them. YouTube has been cracking down on videos intended for consumption by children. This is due to stricter regulations on what data can be collected on underage viewers, which in turn leads to advertisers being less willing to show their ads on children’s YouTube videos because they can’t be as accurate with their targeting.

This can present a problem for virtual YouTubers because most of them are cartoon characters, and even though their content may not be intended for children, YouTube doesn’t have the best track record when it comes to separating out videos that should be demonetised from videos that look a bit like videos that should be demonetised.

The final main difference we’re going to highlight is the fact that many of the top virtual YouTubers are run by agencies like Hololive, essentially creating a team of popular mascots to generate revenue. This doesn’t necessarily affect new entries into the virtual YouTube space—the barrier to entry for creating virtual avatars and content is relatively low—but it is an interesting aspect of this space that is worth noting.

Virtual YouTube Expansion?

For the moment, the majority of virtual YouTube is sitting comfortably around its place of origin; Japan. Most of the YouTubers in this space are creating Japanese-language content and seemingly have little interest in expanding beyond that sphere.

That being said, the few virtual YouTubers that have ventured into the world of English-speaking content are doing very well, and there is a strong interest in Japanese anime culture in the west.

These things would suggest that there is a potential explosion of interest in this scene on the horizon, as more people see the potential of English-language virtual YouTube content.

The Creation of Virtual YouTubers

There are several programmes and mobile apps out there that can be used to create digital avatars for use in virtual YouTube content. And, if the above prediction of a boom in interest holds true, it would be reasonable to expect the number of applications available to grow, also.

These pieces of software range from applications for making a digital avatar to applications for animating those digital avatars, with a few options straddling this line and offering both functions in one package. The most useful part of these applications, however, is the ability to animate the digital avatars using things like VR controllers, or webcam-based motion-tracking. Without these techniques, it would be expensive indeed to create the videos, as animating by hand is a lengthy process that requires a lot of skill.

Any financial benefit there is to running a virtual YouTube channel would quickly be erased if the YouTuber were forced to animate their avatar by hand. With motion-tracking technology, the YouTuber can mostly just film themselves as though they were making a regular video, while the software takes care of translating the YouTuber’s movements to the digital avatar.

Should You Become a Virtual YouTuber?

All this talk of a potential explosion of interest may have you wondering if virtual YouTubing is something you could try yourself.

The good news is that there is a very low barrier to entry technologically speaking—you can purchase software that will enable you to animate a digital avatar with a nothing more than a webcam for as little as $15, or even free in some cases. There is also no real restriction on what kind of content you can make. The existing popular virtual YouTubers cover quite a broad spectrum of video types, showing that it is more of a fandom-driven thing than a content-driven thing.

In other words, viewers are coming for the virtual YouTuber more than they are coming for the specific content in the video.

To that end, you should ensure you have something to hang your channel’s hat on. This could be informative or interesting content, or it could be an entertaining personality—ideally, it would be both. As long as you have something to draw viewers interest, you will be fine. Of course, this part at least is true for regular YouTubers, as well.

There are plenty of reasons why you might be interested in taking on a virtual persona rather than getting in front of a camera yourself—camera shyness, privacy, a need to express yourself in different ways—but ultimately that part of the equation isn’t important; you could just do it because you think it’s cool.

Final Thoughts

For the most part, virtual YouTubers make their money the same way as non-virtual YouTubers. The primary differences in that respect are where the focus lays, with virtual YouTubers making more of their money from different areas to regular YouTube. More merch and less Patreon. More Super Chat and less YouTube Partner Programme.

It should be noted, however, that while the top twenty or thirty virtual YouTubers generate a very hefty amount of revenue from their content, there is a very steep drop off after those top channels. There were around 30,000 virtual YouTubers at the start of 2020, and most of them weren’t making much—if any—money at all.

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.

3. Rev.com helps people read my videos

You can’t always listen to a video.

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.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

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.

Best of all, some of their templates are FREE! or you can pay a small fee if you want to go for their slightly more premium designs (pst – I always used the free ones).

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.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Tags how to make money online, make money online without showing your face, tubers, virtual influencers, virtual tubers, vtube, vtubers

HOW TO GET MORE VIEWS ON YOUTUBE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

How to Make Videos Without Showing Face

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 26 December 2020
1 Comment on How to Make Videos Without Showing Face

For a long time, the image that often came to mind when someone thought “YouTuber” was that of a bright and bubbly youngster talking earnestly into the camera, oversharing and jump-cutting all over the place. While there’s still plenty of this today, and though there’s nothing wrong with this format, there is certainly more variety on display these days.

This is fortunate for a lot of would-be YouTubers since it is the idea of getting in front of a camera that acts as a deterrent to them following their YouTube dreams. One of the great things about YouTube is that it provides a path for you to get started in content creation without having to go down the conventional routes of getting a book published or self-funding a short film. It is a low-barrier-to-entry medium that you can cut your teeth on, hone your craft, and, all being well, make a name for yourself. But for those of you that are not comfortable being in front of the camera, it can be a scary prospect in the beginning.

In this post, we’re going to look at some of the more popular ways in which you can make YouTube content without showing your face in the camera, including plenty of examples. So let’s get into it!

Faceless Video Ideas

We promised you ideas for videos that don’t involve showing your face, and that’s exactly what we’re going to give you. Please note that this is by no means a definitive list of all possible videos styles you could make without having your mug in the shot. There are always new and interesting ways to make content, and, while there are usually reasons that these types of videos are most often seen, that doesn’t mean they are your only options.

Of course, you’ll want to be realistic about things—at this point, YouTube is a maturing platform, and there has been plenty of time for people to work things out. The most popular types of content are the types that work. That being said, YouTube is a big platform, and there is room for a lot of different styles. If you dream of being the next PewDiePie, you’re going to have stick to things that have broad appeal in order to capture that large audience. But, if you are happy with a smaller audience, you have much more creative freedom with your content. Don’t be afraid to experiment, think outside of the box, and find your feet as a YouTuber. You just might be the first to think of something new and innovative.

Please note that some of these video ideas have overlap. For example, we mention the “Hands-On” style of video-making and the “Review” video. Many review videos utilise the “Hands-On” method to make review videos. If you think two (or more) types of video listed here might work well together, have at it!

Clip Shows

Just as the name suggests, clip shows are videos that are made up of several different short clips along the same theme. There is no specific type of content that you have to stick to with clip shows, but one of the most popular examples is short, funny clips, such as animals acting weird, people having amusing (hopefully non-lethal) accidents, and generally, anything you might expect to find on the UK TV show, You’ve Been Framed, or America’s Funniest Home Videos.

The tricky part about this kind of video is getting the amusing clips in the first place. We’re going to assume that you don’t have an enormous stash of original funny clips waiting on your hard drive—if you do, great!—but it’s important to remember that content ownership is taken increasingly seriously these days, and you will need to at least try and get permission to use any clips that aren’t your own.

If you can’t find the owner of a particular piece of content and you decide to use it anyway, make every effort to find the original source of the content and credit it in your description. Many pieces of content are managed by companies who will license the clips to you for a fee, which may be something to consider as your channel grows.

Animated Content

If you have a knack for animation, you already have the perfect avenue for making videos that don’t involve your face being on camera. As an added bonus, if you are looking to parlay your love of animation into a serious career, getting your work out on YouTube is a great way to add to your portfolio to show future employers.

Animation content can cover an enormous range of video styles and topics. For example, you could animate your commentary videos to show a quirky cartoon character talking along with your voice. You could make full-featured cartoons with plots and story arcs that continue from video to video. You could make unusual art pieces with important messages.

The main point is that you do not need to have your face on the screen to make an animated video. Or you could strike an interesting middle ground and animate your face, using that instead of your real one.

As countless shows like South Park and Rick and Morty have shown us, cartoons don’t have to be visually artistic masterpieces in order to be popular and successful. If you are putting your animation out there with a view to using it in a future portfolio, do your best work. But if you are making something bigger and animation is just the medium you have to work with, don’t get too caught up in making every frame look perfect. Animation is a lengthy process, and you don’t want to end up taking months between videos.

Also, as a brief side note, animation does not necessarily mean hand-drawn art brought to life. You could also use claymation (or any kind of stop-motion animation) as well as 3D animation, just like VTubers do. If you have a skill, put it to use!

Reviews

Reviews are an excellent way to create content on YouTube without showing your face since the focus of the video is the product or service that is being reviewed. In many cases, the viewers won’t have any interest in your face, especially if the review is of a video game or physical product. In those cases, the viewer often prefers to get a good look at the subject of the review, and having your face in the way makes that harder.

If you have a burning interest in a particular field—such as a particular type of electronic gadget, or a certain genre of game—reviews are also great in the sense that they are easier to monetise away from the YouTube Partner Programme. You can join affiliate programmes like the ever-popular Amazon Affiliates, and give your viewers a way to get to the product you are reviewing in a single click with the advantage that, if they buy said product, you get a cut of the profits. It should be noted that if you do go down this route, be sure to keep your reviews honest. If you get a reputation for saying nice things about your subjects in order to get your viewers to click on affiliate links, you will pretty quickly lose those viewers.

Hands-On Videos

Like animation, hands-on videos have a lot of range. For example, just as we mentioned at the top of this section, the hands-on style of YouTube video is a good match for the above review videos. But what is a “hands-on” video?

In this type of video, your shot is focussed on the subject, which will typically be something small. As a rough guide, no bigger than a typical portable electronic device or board game. The name for this style of video comes from the fact that only your hands play a part, visually speaking. You narrate your content while your hands demonstrate, manipulate, and generally give the viewers something to look at.

A particularly apt example of this kind of video is keyboard demonstrations. The community around mechanical keyboards is a vibrant one, and there are plenty of videos that involve talking about a particular keyboard and then giving a typing demonstration, with nothing but the keyboard and the YouTubers hands ever being in shot. For the review style videos we mentioned, you would use your hands to move the subject to see different angles, highlight different features, and so on. All the while, you would be talking about the product and the aspects you are showing off with your hands.

Documentaries

If you have a flair for storytelling and a healthy curiosity and interest in things, you might want to try your hand at making YouTube documentaries. One thing that the Internet has helped to fuel is an increasing interest in all things by making it easier for people to find those things that they are interested in. The net result is that even the most obscure interests can typically be serviced online, and that applies to documentaries as well.

Documentaries are no longer limited to people braving the wilds of nature to capture breathtaking shots of beautiful but dangerous animals in their natural habitat. These days, YouTube has plenty of smaller documentary makers, making short but interesting pieces on a huge range of things, and the chances are there will be an audience somewhere for whatever you choose to make a documentary about.

Try to remember that documentaries are more than just raw information delivered in the form of a video. You should try to tell a story in your content to keep the viewer engaged, but without distorting or twisting the truth to make things more interesting. The best documentaries are engaging regardless of whether the viewer is interested in the subject matter.

Commentary

If your healthy interest and curiosity revolve around more current events, such as the latest news, celebrity gossip, political events, and things of that nature, you might prefer a commentary video to a documentary. This type of video allows you to voice your opinions on things, deconstructing them and putting your point of view across. And, because you are just talking, you don’t ever need to step in front of the camera.

You could choose to combine this type of video with the clip show method, showing related video clips as you speak. You could even have an animated version of your face.

The scope of commentary video potential is vast. You could be talking about the latest atrocities committed by some government or another, the results of a big sporting event, even a just-released trailer for a new comic book-based movie. With this kind of video, it is especially important to inject plenty of personality into your content. Remember, there are lots of people online making these kinds of videos, and you need to give viewers a reason to want to come to you over a different YouTuber. Your personality may put some people off, but appealing to the lowest common denominator only works if you can get into a position of immense success, to begin with.

Recaps

Recap videos are a little like commentary videos but with less personality. These videos revolve around current events, and there are two significant factors in their success. The first is timing, and the second is exclusivity.

If you are targetting a recap—rather than a commentary video—you are generally going to be delivering content based around something that has just happened and that many of your viewers might have missed. An example of this might be a high-profile boxing or MMA fight that was only available through an expensive pay per view. In an example like that, getting a recap video up as soon as possible after the event will typically net you a lot of views. And the fact that many people will not have access to the fight itself (exclusivity) will also get you a lot of interest.

Now, we mentioned that you don’t necessarily need to inject as much personality into these videos to succeed—and that is true—but it should be noted that if you can get the timing, exclusivity, and personality, you will have a strong foundation for success on your hands.

Final Thoughts

There are, of course, more ideas for how to make videos without showing face, as you will find in the video above. But, if you are looking at this topic because you are a little camera shy, why not try the video below.

Tags facebook youtube ideas, faceless, faceless youtube channel, faceless youtube videos, how to make videos without showing your face, no face

DEEP DIVE ARTICLE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Do YouTubers Have Scripts?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 19 December 2020

Finding your way on YouTube is generally a trial-and-error type of adventure, but it can’t hurt to know how other YouTubers do it when working out what is best for you.

One of the most common questions in this respect is “do YouTubers have scripts?”, and the answer to that is… sometimes.

Every YouTuber does things a little different, and scripting their videos is no exception to that. There are different levels of scripting, however, and by understanding what they are, you should be better placed to work out which will work for you.

So read on, and we’ll take a look at these different levels, and then we’ll get into some tips and tricks regarding scripting your YouTube videos.

The Different Levels of Scripting a YouTube Video

Saying that a video is scripted can be a little misleading since there are different degrees to how much your video can be scripted.

In this section, we’re going to describe the main levels of scripting you might use when making a YouTube video, as well as give you a few examples of types of videos that might use each level.

What Script?

The first level of scripting is no script!

Of course, this method has its drawbacks, but it works great for those YouTubers with the gift of the gab. Not having a script at all is something of a mixed blessing.

If you can pull it off, it can make your videos considerably easier to make, since you don’t need to worry about writing a script in advance and you don’t need to worry about reading that script when you record the video. On the other hand, if you can’t pull it off, you could leave yourself with a lot of editing to do, or an awkward, stilted video in the end. Perhaps even both.

You’ve probably realised by now that the determining factor for whether having no script at all is suitable for you is your own ability to improvise, remember what you have to say, and be entertaining without a prompt. If you are good at freeform speaking, this will be more comfortable for you.

There are many videos where this type of approach is well suited, such as videos where you are interviewing someone, or videos where you are giving commentary on a topic. Just remember the general rule when creating content that less is more. If you find yourself rambling or going off on tangents, rein yourself in. And don’t be afraid to edit bits out later.

Just an Outline

The next step up from no script is some script, but not a complete, word-for-word write up of what you are going to say. Here you would have the main points you plan to address—almost like a bullet point list—along with anything particularly important you need to remember, such as certain phrases, statistics, or something similar.

Outlines are an excellent option for people who are comfortable talking to the camera without too much prompting, but who are perhaps not quite as competent when it comes to remembering everything they have to say. The outline serves to remind you what you have to cover, allowing you to word things however feels right in the moment.

An outline script is mostly good for anything you might go scriptless for but aren’t confident enough in your ability to hit all the beats you need to hit: interviews, commentary, list videos, retrospectives, and more.

Mostly Scripted

Mostly scripted is a level of scripting that covers anything between an outline and a full script.

With a mostly scripted video, you might start with an outline and flesh out certain details, or fully script parts that you want to ensure are articulated properly while leaving other parts in a more outline form.

Fully Scripted

As the name suggests, a fully scripted video has the entirety of the spoken word content written out in advance for you to read as you record. While this form of scripting is great for those who are not comfortable making it up as they go along, or who are not confident in their ability to remember what it is they have to say, there is a trade-off.

While you do not need to be able good at speaking on the fly with a full script, you do need to be able to read aloud from your script. This may not sound difficult if you have never tried it, but it requires a certain amount of skill to do in a way that doesn’t sound wooden. It may take a little practice to get your live script reading to sound natural. Anchor people are often derided for just reading from an autocue for a living, but you may appreciate what they do a little more after trying this for the first time.

Voice Over

From the perspective of the script itself, there is no difference between a voice over script and full script—other than you may write things a little differently for a voiceover video. The difference here comes after.

It is much easier to get a polished, professional-sounding voiceover because you are not recording video of yourself saying it, which means you can edit the audio without it looking weird and disjointed in the finished product. This gives you a little more leeway when it comes to less than radio-ready cadence, mistakes, or accidental noises like sneezing.

Choosing the Right Style of Script for You and Your YouTube Videos

There are many things to take into account when deciding which style of scripted video will work best for you, but ultimately it will boil down to three main aspects.

Memory
Ability to speak off the cuff
Ability to read fluidly from a script

Naturally, if you struggle to remember things the things you are going to talk about, you will need to have some kind of prompt to help you along. How much you struggle to remember your subject matter will determine how much you need to write out in your script, but this is something of a definitive restriction since being able to talk in an entertaining manner off of the top of your head is no use if you can’t remember what you are supposed to be talking about!

Similarly, if you are no good at talking off the cuff, you can rule out having no script at all, and if you are bad at reading aloud in an entertaining manner, you can rule out reading from a full script.

Once you’ve factored those things in, the next big thing to consider is the video itself. Some types of video lend themselves better to being carefully scripted while others don’t. As a general rule, any content that is striving to be professional and informative will likely benefit from being scripted and the additional time and care put into the words used. Meanwhile, videos that are largely personality-driven, such as commentary videos and vlogs, are usually better done off the cuff.

Practice Makes Perfect

Though there are some exceptions, it’s worth noting that, most of the time, you can improve on the aspects you are not as competent at with a little practice.

By taking a little time each day to read a script aloud, or to talk in a freeform manner, you should start to see improvements. It can also help to record your practice sessions and watch them back, as that will help you pinpoint areas you need to improve. It may feel awkward and unintuitive to be making conscious efforts to change things like inflexions and mannerisms when you talk, but if you keep doing it, it will start to feel natural.

There are exceptions to this, such as if you have learning disorder like dyslexia that is preventing you from being able to read your script smoothly aloud. If this is something you face, it is crucial not to let it frustrate you. As the somewhat gruesome saying goes; there are many ways to skin a cat. If improvement in a particular area is not an option for you, don’t dwell on it, put your energies into a style of video that you can do, and work on perfecting that instead.

Tips for Scripting Your YouTube Videos

Regardless of what level of scripting you choose to go with, here are some tips that can help you deliver the best possible content.

Read it Back

Always read your script back before rolling the cameras.

Ideally, read it out loud and carefully pay attention to how the words sound together. Sometimes, things seem to flow together nicely when written down but sound awkward when read aloud.

As you get more experience at writing your scripts, you will gain a more intuitive feel for how words onscreen translate to words spoken aloud, but even successful, professional writers often read their dialogue out before signing off on it.

Get Second Opinions

While you are still finding your feet as a YouTuber, take every opportunity to get second opinions on things like your delivery and tone. This can be done through a live read to a friend or family member, a pre-upload viewing of the video, or a review of a video you have already uploaded.

The idea of reading your content out loud to somebody in person may be a little offputting at first, but it’s worth remembering that doing so will allow you get valuable feedback on your delivery without going through the long process of recording and editing the video.

Play to Your Strengths

Don’t get hung up on trying to do things a certain way when you are more comfortable doing things a different way.

We mentioned above that informative videos often lend themselves better to being scripted, but that does not mean that you cannot make good, informative videos off the cuff.

In fact, given that most of the battle of succeeding on YouTube lies in standing out from the crowd, finding a way to do things a little differently may actually help your channel.

Promotional Content

If you are lucky enough to reach a stage in your YouTube career where brands are willing to sponsor your content, you may find yourself in a situation where you have some pre-written ad copy to read. Essentially a scripted section. Sometimes the brand will allow the content creators they sponsor to do the ad freeform, but that will largely depend on the brand and the reputation of the creator.

If you struggle with things like this, don’t be afraid think outside of the box. You might record your ad copy separately from the rest of the video, allowing you to put a little more time into it, or even get someone else to read it. Just be sure that whatever solution you choose doesn’t violate whatever agreement you have with the brand. For example, some brands may require that the face of the YouTube channel is the one to read the copy, or that the copy be read word-for-word as it was written.

Final Thoughts

One of the most important points we’d like you to take away from this post is that there is no inherently right or wrong way to make a YouTube video. Ultimately, the best method is the one that you are comfortable working with and gets your message across. You should always strive for improvement where possible, and scripting your content (if you don’t already) can certainly help with that, but it should by no means be considered a necessity.

Don’t be afraid to experiment with different levels of scriptwriting, either. You might make a test video where you record a sample of you working with no script, working with an outline, and reading a complete script, and then judge which one you feel works best. Remember, not everything you make needs to be uploaded to YouTube. It is okay to consign things to the editing room floor from time to time.

Get second opinions if you are comfortable doing so, and if you’re not comfortable showing other people your test videos, try to work on that because far more people will see your finished videos if you achieve any success on the platform.

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.

3. Rev.com helps people read my videos

You can’t always listen to a video.

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.

Rev.com can help you translate your videos, transcribe your videos, add subtitles and even convert those subtitles into other languages – all from just $1.50 per minute.

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.

Best of all, some of their templates are FREE! or you can pay a small fee if you want to go for their slightly more premium designs (pst – I always used the free ones).

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.

They have a wide library of videos, graphics, images and even a video maker tool and it wont break the bank with plans starting from as little as £8.25 ($9) per month.

Tags scripts, youtube, youtube scripts

HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

What is YouTube RPM?

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 11 December 2020

YouTube provides many ways for you to track the success of your YouTube channel.

After all, your success is their success, so it is in their best interests to make sure you have everything you need. Among the things YouTube provides you with—indeed, probably the most important thing that YouTube provides you with in this regard—is a raft of metrics for keeping track of how your channel is doing in a range of different areas.

You can track things like what regions of the world are viewing your videos, what demographics those viewers fit into. You can even track what devices they are viewing your videos on. But, most importantly for this post, you can check how your channel is doing in terms of revenue.

The most common metric, and typically the best gauge of how well you are doing financially, is the CPM.

CPM stands for cost per mille and is a metric of how much money you are making per thousand views. It is an industry-standard metric from the larger advertising world and, as such, it is not quite perfect for determining how your channel is doing.

YouTube is an increasingly complex platform with a growing number of ways for you to generate revenue from your channel, whereas CPM is very advertising-focussed.

In fact if you want to know more about CPM I deep dive into what is CPM in my blog.

But now its time to understand the new comer, Enter RPM.

What is YouTube RPM?

RPM—revenue per mille—is a new metric that YouTube has introduced in an effort to give you a much more comprehensive snapshot of how your channel is performing financially. It represents the amount of revenue your channel has generated per thousand streams, but the revenue counted comes from multiple sources, not just advertisements.

Those revenue sources are;

Ads
Channel Memberships
YouTube Premium
Super Chat
Super Stickers
YouTube BrandConnect

There are generally a lot of questions regarding RPM, so we’re going to attempt to answer them all here.

What is the Difference Between CPM and RPM?

The differences between CPM and RPM can be whittled down to three main aspects:

CPM only factors in ad views when totalling up revenue
CPM does not factor in views on videos that aren’t monetised
CPM does not factor in YouTube’s share of your revenue

Overall, RPM is intended to be a much more creator-focused metric than CPM, which is very much intended for advertiser use by its nature. It may take a little adjustment, but RPM should be considerably more useful for YouTubers going forward.

Why is my RPM so Much Lower Than my CPM?

It is important to remember that CPM and RPM are units of measurement and, like any unit of measurement, there are two variables to factor in. For CPM and RPM, those variables are views and revenue, and that makes it a very fluid metric since both variables can change.

CPM only factors in the views from monetised videos, which for most channels means fewer views, since many channels will invariably have some not-monetised content on their channel. CPM also only factors in revenue from ads, which for some channels, means less revenue, as there are other sources of revenue available to you, such as memberships and super chat.

The exact numbers will depend on your channel, but it is entirely possible that you could see your RPM being much lower than your CPM. If your channel does not make use of non-ad-based revenue streams and has a good amount of not-monetised content, the CPM will be higher because your RPM will be factoring in additional views without any additional revenue.

On the other hand, if you make a lot of revenue from things like memberships and super chat and have hardly any views on not-monetised videos, your RPM will be higher than your CPM because the views are roughly the same, but a lot of additional revenue is being factored in.

Finally, RPM factors in YouTube’s cut of your revenue, which is a pretty hefty 45%. This aspect alone will probably be enough to make your RPM lower than your CPM in most cases. The important thing to remember is that RPM is a different way of looking at the existing metrics of your channel.

It does not change your earnings in any way; it just presents a more representative snapshot of what they are.

Is RPM Important?

We believe it is very important because of the clear direction that YouTube is going. YouTubers have long since accepted that YouTube’s built-in monetisation is not a reliable—or even a good—way to make money from your channel. As a result, they have cast their nets wide and found membership platforms, brand deals, affiliate marketing, and more. The key thing here being that none of these things are through YouTube, meaning YouTube are not getting a share of those profits.

As much as some YouTubers believe that YouTube hates them, the truth is YouTube is a business, and everything they do is an attempt to ensure they make money. Being primarily advertisement-based has posed its problems for YouTube, as every adpocalypse has shown. Demonetising thousands of channels doesn’t just hurt the YouTubers; it takes money out of YouTube’s pocket as well.

The solution is pretty obvious, of course. YouTubers have found ways to monetise their content away from the YouTube platform, and in ways that are not beholden to advertisers. It makes total sense that YouTube would look to incorporate those methods into their own platform, where they can take a cut of the profits.

Memberships, YouTube Premium views, Super Chat, Super Stickers—these are all ways in which a YouTuber—and YouTube themselves—can earn revenue in ways that do not involve advertisers. It is essentially a direct transaction between the viewer and the YouTuber (facilitated by YouTube for a small fee, of course) and as such, there are no external forces involved that might want that revenue removed.

The external forces are, of course, advertisers. In an increasingly volatile and reactionary world, advertisers are increasingly picky about the kinds of content they will allow their ads to be shown on. For example, content that includes political commentary, any kind of violence, weapons, things of a sexual nature—all of these things are essentially monetisation suicide because advertisers don’t want their brand associated with that kind of content. Despite this, there are many channels that make the kinds of content that are deemed not suitable for monetisation that are, nonetheless, very popular.

YouTube wants those channels to be able to generate revenue, but they can’t tell advertisers to take it or leave because, frankly, they will probably leave it. So they are introducing other ways for the channels to monetise so that YouTube can still earn revenue from them. And it is entirely reasonable to believe that they will continue adding ways for YouTubers to monetise their channels through the platform itself as new viable ways emerge.

The more alternative monetisation methods to advertising that become available, the more important RPM will be as a metric. It is unlikely that advertising will stop being the primary source of revenue for YouTube as a whole any time soon, but the more you take advantages of non-advertising-based revenue sources, the more RPM will matter to you.

How to Increase YouTube RPM?

To bring your RPM up, you need to adjust the ratio of revenue-to-views. Make sure that as many eligible videos as possible have monetisation turned on, and enable all types of eligible advertisements on those videos.

Next up, make use of the other monetisation methods on offer where you can. Granted, things like super chat and super stickers are not the kind of thing that every channel can make use of, but if you can, use them. The more money your channel is generating for the same views, the higher your RPM will be.

Another thing that will significantly affect your RPM is watch time, and it is a thing that most YouTube experts will tell you is one of the most important aspects to focus on. More watch time does not only mean more opportunity to show ads—though that is undoubtedly a big part of it—it also says very good things about your channel to the YouTube algorithm.

Channel’s that get a lot of watch time are given higher priority in the YouTube recommendation algorithm, which means there will be a greater chance that your content will be recommended to new people. Granted, adding new viewers is a slower way to improve your RPM, but remember the ultimate goal; revenue. Low RPM is not necessarily a bad thing.

A YouTuber with an RPM of $5 and 200,000 views per month is making around $1,000, whereas a YouTuber with an RPM of $2 and 1,000,000 views per month will be making around twice as much. Manipulating your RPM without improving your overall revenue is a pointless endeavour.

My YouTube RPM is Going Down, Should I Worry?

The answer to this question is “it depends”. RPM provides a good snapshot of how your channel is doing, but it is still only a single datapoint. Without taking other factors into account, you cannot make an accurate judgement on the state of your channel. As the example above illustrates, it is entirely possible for a YouTuber to have less than half of the RPM of another YouTuber, and yet still make more than twice as much revenue.

If your RPM is dropping, but your revenue is staying the same—or even increasing—that is indicative of a surge in viewers. This could happen because of a video going viral, or a mention on a much larger YouTube channel. In this case, there’s nothing to worry about. If your RPM settles at this new lower level, you might want to look into ways to more effectively monetise your new views, but there is nothing to be concerned about from the RPM dropping.

On the other hand, if your RPM starts to go up, but your revenue isn’t increasing, that could be a sign that you are losing viewers, but not viewers that generate much in the way of revenue.

Is There Any Revenue RPM Doesn’t Factor?

First of all, it’s important to remember that any YouTube metric can only tell you what is going on through the platform itself. If you are earning money through a service like Patreon, Amazon Affiliates, or even if you are booking live shows or speaking gigs directly off of the back of your YouTube channel, this should all be counted as part of your revenue, but YouTube cannot factor these variables in.

YouTube also cannot factor in brand deals and sponsorships unless they are through YouTube’s BrandConnect service. Finally, RPM does not include revenue made from merchandise sales through the merch shelf service that YouTube provides. Given the direction that YouTube seems to be heading in this area, it would be reasonable to expect that this revenue will someday be incorporated into RPM, but that is not the case yet.

Final Thoughts

When judging any aspect of your channel, it is essential not to get too hung up on any single metric. RPM provides an excellent snapshot of your channel’s financial health, but it is essentially meaningless on its own due to the fact that changes in the number of views you are getting or revenue you are earning overall will change the RPM without it being inherently obvious why.

As a lone metric with no other input, your RPM is a good measure of how efficiently your revenue is being generated. The higher it is, the more value you are getting per view (or, more accurately, thousand views). Without knowing how many views you are getting, or how much revenue you are making, that is about as much as RPM can tell you.

However, in conjunction with the revenue and views metrics, RPM is a powerful datapoint that can tell you a lot about your channel.

Ultimately, the foundation of your approach should be to make the best possible content you can, with additional strategies being considered improvements upon that solid base. You could make use of every strategy known to YouTube and still fail if you don’t have good content, so start there, and your RPM should stay healthy.

Tags best way to make money on youtube, earn money online, make money on youtube, make money online, money, passive income, what is rpm, YouTube CPM, youtube income, youtube money, youtube rpm

DEEP DIVE ARTICLE HOW TO MAKE MONEY ONLINE TIPS & TRICKS YOUTUBE

Top 5 Ways to Monetise Your YouTube Channel in 2021

Post author By Alan Spicer - YouTube Certified Expert
Post date 4 December 2020
7 Comments on Top 5 Ways to Monetise Your YouTube Channel in 2021

“There are more ways than one to skin a cat.”

It’s a horrible old saying that dates to 1840, but there is another part to the saying that you don’t hear too often —

“so are there more ways than one of digging for money.”

This advice applies to YouTube monetisation too.

There are plenty of ways to make money from your YouTube channel apart from the obvious one of shared ad revenue from the YouTube Partner Program.

This post covers the latest rules for the YouTube Partner Program and offers a high-level overview of some alternative ways you can monetize a YouTube channel in 2021.

Here we go.

How Do I Make Money With the YouTube Partner Program?

The best way to approach making money on YouTube is to create a number of income streams. That way, if one bites the dust you still have others to fall back on.

But one method you should always aim to qualify for is the YouTube Partner Program itself. The YouTube Partner Program is where you earn a share of the advertising revenue YouTube makes from showing the short ads before, during, and at the end of videos.

There are five criteria to qualify, you must ―

Have over 1000 channel subscribers.
Have over 4000 hours of watch time in the last 12 months.
Have registered for a Google AdSense account.
Be in compliance with the content rules that YouTube sets.
Be over 18 years of age (ideally).

Having 1000 channel subscribers is self-explanatory. It perhaps seems like a tough ask when you start, but once you begin to regularly put out good content, your sub-numbers can soon stack up.

4000 hours of watchtime relates to the videos that you’ve uploaded to your channel and had watched by others. Say you upload a 10-minute video and 100 people watch all of it, then you have 1000 minutes of watchtime. Don’t delete any of your videos when you start ― any video you remove also erases it’s watchtime from your account.

To register for a Google AdSense account you have to be at least 18 years old. Though if you are under 18 it may be technically possible to link the AdSense account of a parent to your YouTube channel.

Once you’ve met the criteria for the YouTube Partner Program, you still need to apply as It’s not something that happens automatically. Once you’ve applied you may need to wait as much as 30 days for a response as your account has to undergo a human review.

How much can you expect to earn?

According to Intuit, YouTubers, on average, earn $4 per 1000 video views. So to make $100 a day, you’d need to get around 25,000 video views a day.

YouTube doesn’t have to grant you monetisation, though, even if you meet all the criteria. It’s their platform and their rules. So if you do get rejected, or the YouTube Partner Program isn’t available in your country, there are still plenty of ways you can make money from the platform.

Let’s take a look at a few.

How Do I Make Money on YouTube With Endorsements?

Influencing is not a new thing. Businesses have paid prominent people money to promote their products for over a hundred years.

Once you’ve built up an audience for your channel in a niche that lends itself to promoting a product, you can register with an agency like Upfluence. Upfluence matches businesses with content creators to create influencing opportunities.

You don’t have to have a massive following to take advantage of influencing opportunities. But the amount you’re paid will depend on the size of your audience.

YouTube has launched an influencer hub too, called BrandConnect. Eligibility is restricted at the moment to creators located in the USA with over 25,000 channel subscribers.

It’s a fairly new venture for YouTube, so they may roll it out to new locations and relax entry conditions as time moves on.

Of course, you’re free to set up your own influencing opportunities by proactively approaching businesses yourself. Just make sure you have a large enough audience in a niche that plays well with your target company.

How much can you expect to earn?

Top earners can make thousands of dollars per video. But the cash you earn will depend on the size of your audience and the market niche you serve.

Starting with a small channel will likely mean that you only receive a free sample of the product you are endorsing, like a protein shake or an eyeliner for example.

How Do I Make Money on YouTube with Patreon?

You can make money with crowdfunding on YouTube, where you ask people to send you money directly. This is a method best left for those raising money for a good cause. And it could lead to a fraud claim if you aren’t transparent with what the requested money will be used for.

Much better, and a step away from crowdfunding, is using a service like Patreon.

Patreon allows you to create a page where you can distribute additional content not uploaded to your YouTube channel. You tap your fans for a small recurring monthly payment in exchange for access to exclusive content.

You can set several levels of subscription, and save you juiciest content for your top-level subscribers.

Patreon is like having your own pay-TV channel, and you have full control over the content and the schedule.

If you don’t want to commit to the extra workload that running a Patreon account brings on top of an already busy filming calendar for YouTube, consider using the Patreon pay per content model instead.

This lets you charge people to see bonus content as and when you make it.

How much can you expect to earn?

Patreon subscription prices charged by people are usually around the $4-$5 per month mark. This price is small enough for many people not to have to think too deeply about signing up.

And the recurring monthly payments are likely to continue, at least for a while, as many are too lazy to cancel them!

If you can get 1000 patrons paying you an average of $4 per month, then you have an income that most could live on.

Here’s an example from a small YouTuber with an associate Patreon account. Nate Maingard is a singer-songwriter with a little over 5K subscribers. Nate’s Patreon has three levels of subscription priced from around $5 up to about $100 for his biggest fans.

If you look at his Patreon page it says that he has 151 patrons, at the time of writing. You can’t see how that breaks down across the various levels, but he is making a minimum of $500 per month.

How Do I Make Money on YouTube with Merchandise?

You can sell products branded with your logo or channel identity and sell them on YouTube via a merch shelf.

YouTube says ‘The merch shelf allows eligible creators to showcase their official branded merchandise on YouTube. The shelf appears on the video page of eligible channels, but may not be shown on all video pages.’

To access the YouTube merch program, your channel needs 10,000 subscribers and not make content primarily aimed at kids. Your merch should also be visually appealing and desirable enough for your fans to want to buy it.

Some of the items that are best for branding and selling are everyday items that people are likely to make use of. Baseball caps, reusable water bottles, and mugs are all popular choices and cheap enough for an impulse buy.

Make sure that your designs are of good quality, so hire a designer from Fiverr or Upwork if need be.

You don’t need to buy and stock your merch products. You can sign up with a print-on-demand service that can sync with your YouTube merch shelf. When you get an order, it’s automatically sent to the print-on-demand provider who makes the product and ships it directly to the customer.

If you’re in the UK then Printful has a good service. For those elsewhere, YouTube has a page of recommended retailers.

How much can I expect to earn?

This is difficult to approximate. It all depends on your fans, the design, and how much you promote them in your videos. This Sellfy calculator tries to give you a rough idea. Sellfy reckons that 10,000 monthly video views could earn you between $340 and $1,740 from merch sales.

How Do I Make Money on YouTube with Affiliate Sales?

An excellent way to earn extra money from your YouTube channel is by seeking out affiliate sales.

This is where you act as a middle-man between a product seller and buyer. Basically, you are saying to your audience; ‘hey, I think [this product] is really good, you should go buy it’.

When someone buys a product that you recommended, and they followed a special link that identifies you as the referrer, then you earn a percentage commission on the deal.

The great thing about affiliate sales is that earnings are open-ended ― the sky’s the limit.

You can earn a few dollars when someone buys a cheap item on your recommendation. But you can earn hundreds of dollars per sale for more expensive things like premium training courses.

The easiest way to start making affiliate income on YouTube is by signing up with the Amazon Associate program.

You can pick a few products and highlight them in a video. Then, you link to the item using your affiliate link in the video details section underneath.

When a viewer follows the link and buys it you earn a commission. You also earn a commission if they buy something else too ―all sales are attributed to your referral link for that one shopping cart.

I include links to various products that I genuinely recommend in the video description for each one I upload.

How much can I expect to earn?

It’s impossible to say. How long is a piece of string? But you can easily make a living from affiliate sales only on YouTube, as long as you have enough video views.

Conclusion

Like the poor skinned cat I mentioned at the top of this post ― there are many ways to make money on YouTube.

But, your first focus should always be on growing your subscriber count and adding to your video stockpile. Like many things in life, there is a natural order to things on YouTube. One study from 2018 showed that 3% of YouTube channels had 90% of the total views.

To become a money-making powerhouse on YouTube, aim to be a 3-percenter. After that, you have as many ways as you want to earn money from YouTube in 2021 and beyond.

Tags make money on youtube, make money online, monetisation, money, YouTube Monetization, youtube money