7 Ways That You Can Make Money on YouTube

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Looking to make some extra money on YouTube? Monetizing your YouTube channel is the best option that’s available to help you earn passive income for years.

In this article, we’ll take a look at some of the ways YouTube creators are making money on YouTube and living the best life ever.

Creating videos is tough but you don’t have to over-think it.
Just press record and upload the video. It’s that simple.

Watch this video if you prefer watching a video to reading.

7 Ways To Make Money on YouTube

  1. YouTube Partner Program
  2. Affiliate Marketing
  3. Selling Courses, Ebooks, Programs, Seminars, etc
  4. Sponsored Content
  5. Memberships
  6. Super Chats (During YouTube Live)
  7. YouTube Merch

Now, let’s breakdown each method that creators use to make money on YouTube.

This is not an exhaustive list but it’s a guide to what you can focus on whether you’re a small channel or a big channel or don’t have monetization for your YouTube videos.

  1. YouTube Partner Program (Y.P.P.)

This is the most common way that creators use to make money on YouTube.

To get accepted to the Y.P.P. you need to have at least 1,000 YouTube subscribers and 4,000 hours of viewed content in 12 months.

This is usually difficult for most new YouTubers but with consistency, you can grow your YouTube channel fast. Just focus on creating quality videos that are advertiser-friendly.

Here’s a screenshot of how much YouTube paid me in 2019.

how much money I made from YouTube in 2019

Once you’ve satisfied the Y.P.P’s requirements for the subscribers and the viewed hours, you’ll need to apply to the program and someone will manually review your YouTube channel to know if it is advertiser-friendly.

How YouTube Creators Make Money From
the YouTube Partner Program.

Although it’s not clear what criteria is used by YouTube to calculate how much they’ll pay you, some of the factors that influence how much money you make on YouTube include:

  • How much money advertisers are willing to pay,
  • The type of content you create,
  • The watch time on your videos,
  • If viewers click on the adverts,
  • Session time, and many other factors.

Creators make money when a viewer sees or clicks an advert either at the start of the video (the adverts we Skip), during the video, at the end of the video or at the sidebar of the YouTube player.

When a viewer watches your video and they see an advert, that’s counted as an impression.

If they see 3 adverts, those are three impressions and in your YouTube analytics, you can see how much you make per 1,000 impressions or CPM (Cost Per Mile).

Depending on your watch time, session time, engagement with your content, you can be a small channel with content that resonates well with advertisers and make much more money per 1,000 impressions as compared to big YouTubers who only do vlogs.

2. Affiliate Marketing.

Gone are the days when affiliate marketing was reserved for blogs.

Any buyer with an intent to purchase is easily convinced to buy an item if they see a video review on YouTube.

Studies show that 55% of Consumers use videos to make a purchase decision.

This is true for most of us.

If you want to buy an item on Amazon, the best place to see it in action is when someone else is reviewing it and most definitely on YouTube. This gives you confidence that what you want to buy is worth the money.

Therefore, affiliate marketing on YouTube is an alternative to the YouTube Partner Program and you don’t need to get to the 1,000 subscribers required by YouTube.

Affiliate links are normally added in the description section with an indication that they are affiliate links.

Here’s how Peter McKinnon incorporates Affiliate Marketing
to Make money on YouTube.

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