Earning with Youtube: how and how much?

I am convinced that many of you at least once, browsing the world’s most famous video sharing site, Youtube, will have asked yourself a few questions.

But does everyone who uploads video content on a daily basis earn money? How does the payment take place? The general answer is simple and obvious, you can earn even thousands ( in some cases hundreds of thousands) by becoming a YouTube partner. But let’s try to understand specifically what this is all about in a few simple steps:

1. 1. you sign up for the affiliate program, (yeah because there is a real program called Youtube Partner Program) which allows all users of the platform to access its special features, such as inserting advertisements in videos. Obviously you have to have specific requirements to be accepted into this program, first of all is a substantial number of views, secondly you need numerous videos uploaded to your channel, without them violating the internal rules of Youtube.
   2. you post a video on your channel (that complies with certain rules of originality, copyright, and is ethically sound), trying to be a huge success in terms of views. My advice is to make one-of-a-kind videos that entertain or bring real benefits to those who watch them. Tutorials in this sense are among the most clicked, just think of an (all-Italian) case like that of Clio MakeUp, where with simple makeup tips precisely, she got millions of views.
   3. Youtube starts paying for videos through a criterion called CPM (cost per thousand impressions), which is the total amount that advertising sponsors pay to the Montain View giant, to run their banners for every 1,000 videos. “Youtubers” receive revenue, the total of which is determined by how much sponsors pay, obviously the amount is never fixed but can vary.
   4. All earnings made through advertising revenue, are paid into the channel owner’sAdsense account, are only redeemable after exceeding the threshold amount provided by the site.

Once these procedures have been explained, we move on to the queen of questions on the subject: how much can a Youtubers earn?

Earning with Youtube: how much does a tube “star” earn?

Let’s make one thing clear right away, to date since this service has been active(2010 or so), there are still very few who manage to “live” only thanks to Youtube. To be honest being able to establish a common ceiling of earnings is improbable, also because the management of Youtube partnerships is a very mysterious topic (none of the “stars” of Youtube, has never revealed his real earnings, almost as if it were a secret sect), some sites such as TubeMogul, have managed to give us an estimate of the earnings of some of the most famous users of the portal, below I give you a small ranking of the top 5 (the figure entered amounts to the monthly earnings):

1. Shane Dawson ($315,000)
   {youtube}urAyOKlgGDk{/youtube}
2. The Annoying Orange ($288,000)
   {youtube}ZN5PoW7_kdA{/youtube}
3. Philip DeFranco ($181,000)
   {youtube}8VuXhjmE8NE{/youtube}
4. Ryan Higa ($151,000)
   {youtube}TuD7Maz5Mzk{/youtube}
5. Lucas Cruikshank ($146,000)
   {youtube}FZm2Gqk16xE{/youtube}

These are people who make millions of hits, surely they have had a lot of luck on their side but you also need talent and commitment, as in all things to earn money safely there are no shortcuts, the only way forward is to make interesting, funny, unique or useful movies that somehow manage to communicate effectively, engaging as many users as possible.

Written by

Valeria Faiola

Project Manager

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