Giving YouTube a Serious Shot

[YOLO420TSLA]

Back Story:

I've been messing around with uploading YouTube videos for several years now (7 Years). Still I've never managed to make anything from it until last year which was all due to affiliate links.

My previous goals (for YouTube) were:

• Make my first $1 - Done

• Make my First $100 - Done

Now I'm thinking that a better goal would be to just get monetized (1k subs + 4k hours of watch time) since apparently once this happens and you get monetized YouTube will start to push your videos more (theory being that you are monetized so why not - Still YT plans on monetizing videos even if you do not meet the requirements It's still a business after all - So maybe this information is/will shortly be out of date?).

I plan on only keeping my YouTube goals on this forum. Which YouTube is currently my #2 goal. In reality it's not YouTube - YouTube is just my way of saying build a career/making money in a way that is enjoyable (more enjoyable) - YouTube is the path I want to go down and see what I can make happen in 1-2 years - Could be a nice side income that is also enjoyable along with me learning a lot in the process. If YouTube doesn't work out I'll likely go to college/build a career (or just higher paying job and continue to invest in stocks) on a more traditional path - The Goal is to make 1.5k-2k per month doing YouTube (also includes TikTok) by June 2023.

Current plan is to upload every day. If this ever becomes overly burdensome for me I'll move to 5 videos per week.

I'm still working out on my content - My content is investing - Mostly Tesla & Dogecoin/Cryptocurrency.

I think there is a lot of potential for #short videos. So I'm only doing #Short videos as of right now. I actually like these shorter videos a lot - Just pack as much information into 1 min and upload to YouTube and TikTok. Still the future isn't clear for short videos yet. I find myself enjoying them and I imagine others will also - I also enjoy doing them most videos that are 10 mins long shouldn't be 10 mins long IMO.

May move towards 3 short videos then a couple 5-10 min long videos in the future.

As of right now:

• Goal: 1k Subs/4K Hours - 6-12 months is my estimated time (December 2021-June 2022) (Monetization)

Focus:

• Upload every day

• Get Ring Light for videos

• May need to improve audio/audio consistency in videos - Some seem to be way louder than others Pretty sure it's due to me talking too loud in some videos/getting too excited (may not be an entirely bad thing still the pitch seems to go a little too high may be able to fix this in editing) Could also be me being further away from the mic (is mounted on the camera) in some videos

• May get a backdrop/LED light that changes color to make the background look better - Current focus is on getting the light and experimenting with this - Backdrop can come later

 

[Radical]

Nice man

I recently (as in like 2 days ago) got a channel i built for my family up to 1k subs. Its a gardening channel, the audience is like 90% female age 55+. Weird world to operate in lol

4k hrs watch time is actually the harder one to hit if you focus on short videos, we are still 300 hrs short as we did 1k subs in like 7 months. But a decent view count on 1 a day should manage that

I dont know if he still posts on here much but DNPTHC built a channel up to like 20k subs

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

4k hrs watch time is actually the harder one to hit if you focus on short videos, we are still 300 hrs short as we did 1k subs in like 7 months. But a decent view count on 1 a day should manage that

Yeah that is one concern I have. Still if I can get enough views and enough people watch till the end doesn't seem impossible. May look into longer videos in the mix.

4k Hours = 240k mins

Should be there if my channel gets to 500k-1 million total views. Also have older longer videos, but most of them get less views than the shorts.

 

[MakingAComeback]

Awesome stuff guys!

I have just started on YouTube myself

https://www.youtube.com/channel/UC57QQXs_iGvFm7fHiTDrz5g

So, if anyone wants to hammer content creation, well like Khabib said to Conor in round 2, LETS TALK NOW!

MAC

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

Figured I would make an update to this post. - 2/17/22

So yeah I uploaded videos every day and it worked out very well.

Made mostly #short videos and they don't count towards the 4k watch time hour, so I'm making more videos that are longer than 1 min long to get that watch time for monetization (already over 1/4th of the way there)

Otherwise uploading every day was hard and took me a while to actually do it consistently.

Since October my channel went from having like 80-120 subs with not that many views to having over 2k subs and over 1 million views on my channel.

Still working towards making money off YouTube I'm probably at $300 or slightly less overall.

Hoping that scaling up regular videos and getting that 4k watch time will put in me a solid position.

I'm putting in the work, and if it doesn't workout within 1-2 years I may pursue something else. Still my channel is growing fast so maybe it's right around the corner?

*EDIT* Not why sure I didn't mention it, but I uploaded 5 videos per days for like 3-4 months straight. That helped the growth a lot most all of them were #short videos (Less than 1 min long). Only goal/plan with YouTube is to keep uploading 1-5 videos per day. I now make more longer videos for the watch time hours for monetization. I have over 500 videos right now (previously I didn't have that many videos uploaded). Also focusing more on making the content a bit higher quality since I allowed myself to make some lowish quality content so I can pump out more videos.

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

Update: Quit making videos on the channel above.

Currently have 5,039 subs - 2.9 million views

Made around $1000 - $2000 total from the channel in 2 years of uploading videos (made way below minimum wage)

$10 from AdSense (YouTube shorts program - never actually received the $10 since I believe you have to make $100 before you get paid)

So basically made nothing.

Ended up getting a higher paying job and that really leveled up my finances.

Also started a new YouTube channel last year that focuses on affiliate links.

Ended up making $5593 for the whole year (10 months of uploading videos in 2023)

Made $250 from previous channel

All of this was from affiliate links

Current channel that has averaged a bit over $500 per month and currently has 413 subscribers and 82k views - 0 short videos

It's a nice side income since a lot of the time spent on it is during my free time (do the majority of my editing on my phone)

Higher Quality videos + Affiliate links was my strategy

For the amount of time I put in and the income I received I probably made around minimum wage. Still there is a path towards making more money per month. Having a good/high paying real life job seems to be the way to go and YouTube is more of a side hustle that could potentially become more in the future

 

[Adrizzle]

Appreciate the update man. YouTube has always interested me, the numbers indicates the level of work to make money

 

[MakingAComeback]

Update: Quit making videos on the channel above.

Currently have 5,039 subs - 2.9 million views

Made around $1000 - $2000 total from the channel in 2 years of uploading videos (made way below minimum wage)

$10 from AdSense (YouTube shorts program - never actually received the $10 since I believe you have to make $100 before you get paid)

So basically made nothing.

Ended up getting a higher paying job and that really leveled up my finances.

Also started a new YouTube channel last year that focuses on affiliate links.

Ended up making $5593 for the whole year (10 months of uploading videos in 2023)

Made $250 from previous channel

All of this was from affiliate links

Current channel that has averaged a bit over $500 per month and currently has 413 subscribers and 82k views - 0 short videos

It's a nice side income since a lot of the time spent on it is during my free time (do the majority of my editing on my phone)

Higher Quality videos + Affiliate links was my strategy

For the amount of time I put in and the income I received I probably made around minimum wage. Still there is a path towards making more money per month. Having a good/high paying real life job seems to be the way to go and YouTube is more of a side hustle that could potentially become more in the future

Awesome brah!

Top insights on how to grow a YouTube channel?

Advice on getting more views, subs, etc?

-MAC

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

Awesome brah!

Top insights on how to grow a YouTube channel?

Advice on getting more views, subs, etc?

-MAC

With my first channel I just talked about things that got views and had a lot of hype (Cryptocurrencies for the most part) - I mostly made negative videos about them if I made more positive videos I probably would have done better since 5k subs for almost 3 million views is a horrible ratio of views to subs

Second channel I just review bank accounts, credit cards, and other things related to finance that people will naturally look up (the money comes from the affiliate links) - I also spend more time making these videos and the quality is much higher

For your YouTube channel I would imagine the main money maker would be a program or coaching - Maybe Amazon affiliate links for Books/other products?

If you could make videos on whatever topic is popular related to your niche, or review products related to your niche that might work out if people are actually searching for whatever it is and it's not overly saturated

Otherwise take whatever I say with a grain of salt since I'm not a YouTube expert

 

[Adrizzle]

Yo so you’re saying to make money from YouTube, you should sell a product/service, affiliate, your own digital service, physical product.

Would it be better to develop a digital service/product and then figure out videos to make for it or start making videos and then figure out how to make a product?

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

Yo so you’re saying to make money from YouTube, you should sell a product/service, affiliate, your own digital service, physical product.

Would it be better to develop a digital service/product and then figure out videos to make for it or start making videos and then figure out how to make a product?

If you are interested I'd just go ahead and start then figure everything out later.

I went the affiliate route since it allows me to make money despite not being eligible for monetization.

Also most creators that share how much they make off of YouTube usually make most of their money outside of ad revenue.

Full disclosure: YouTube can be pretty brutal. It requires more time and effort than I thought it would require.

 

[klondike]

I think 'content' has peaked after the bull run over the last 10 years: podcasts, youtubes, all of it.

Not sure about what country you're in, but a huge part of the benefit of running a small business in the US are the tax advantages. I suggest getting "Tax Savvy for Small Business" by Fishman for mind-blowing deductions -- your small business income is zero-tax or better, while your salary is at 25+%.

Second channel I just review bank accounts, credit cards, and other things related to finance that people will naturally look up (the money comes from the affiliate links) - I also spend more time making these videos and the quality is much higher

I'm interested in making consumer-facing financial analytics apps---how much would you charge for a short mention in a video, and how many viewers do you have? I have been hesitant on going this route because there's no way to audit viewership before purchasing an ad.

 

[YOLO420TSLA]

I think 'content' has peaked after the bull run over the last 10 years: podcasts, youtubes, all of it.

Not sure about what country you're in, but a huge part of the benefit of running a small business in the US are the tax advantages. I suggest getting "Tax Savvy for Small Business" by Fishman for mind-blowing deductions -- your small business income is zero-tax or better, while your salary is at 25+%.

Second channel I just review bank accounts, credit cards, and other things related to finance that people will naturally look up (the money comes from the affiliate links) - I also spend more time making these videos and the quality is much higher

I'm interested in making consumer-facing financial analytics apps---how much would you charge for a short mention in a video, and how many viewers do you have? I have been hesitant on going this route because there's no way to audit viewership before purchasing an ad.

My views are too inconsistent. Some videos get hardly any views while some videos will get 1k-10k views.

If your app doesn't already have people looking up reviews for it I probably won't be able to drive any meaningful traffic to it.