do video essays make money on youtube

How to Make a Video Essay (with 5 Inspiring Examples)

• Serra Ardem

In the world of digital media, video essays are a canvas where creativity meets critical thinking. From pre-production planning to post-production editing, these videos require a careful balance of visual elements, narrative structure, and technical skills to effectively communicate your ideas.

In this blog, we will:

• Explore different types of video essays
• Guide you on how to make a video essay step-by-step
• List 10 best practices for creating compelling video essays
• Share 5 great video essay examples for further inspiration

Let’s get started.

What is a video essay?

A video essay is essentially a written essay brought to life through the use of video footage, narration, music, and other multimedia elements. As a form of creative nonfiction, it blends the depth of written essays with the power of visual storytelling.

Best video essays are:

• Personal and reflective; often explore the author’s personal experiences, feelings, and thoughts.
• Multifaceted and creative; combine various forms of media to keep viewers engaged.
• Argumentative or analytical; present a thesis and support it with evidence, or break down and analyze a particular subject.
• Thought-provoking; aim to stimulate viewers’ critical thinking and intellectual curiosity.

Before we delve into the steps on how to make a video essay, let’s take a look at its different types:

How to Make a Video Essay Step-by-Step

Whether you’re exploring a personal story or making a strong argument about a current issue, video essays offer a powerful format for self-expression and analysis. Here is how to make a video essay in 3 stages:

Pre-production

• Choose your topic and define your thesis statement. Select a topic that interests you and that you understand well. Then develop a clear and concise thesis statement that outlines the main argument or claim of your essay. For example, if you’re creating a personal college application video, your thesis might focus on how a specific experience shaped your worldview or contributed to your personal growth.
• Gather research materials. Conduct thorough research to gather information that supports your thesis. Make sure to organize your sources so you can reference them accurately during the production and editing phases.
• Develop an outline and craft a script. Break down your outline into introduction, body, and conclusion. List the main points you will cover in each section. This will ensure that your essay flows logically and smoothly. Then write a script that expands on your outline.
• Create a storyboard. You don’t have to be a professional artist; just sketch out a basic visual plan of how your video will unfold. Map out the key scenes, shots, and visual elements that correspond to your outline. Include captions and notes to describe each shot.
• Prepare your equipment and software. Gather the video equipment for your video production, such as camera, microphone, tripod, and lighting. If you’re going to use AI tools, familiarize yourself with the software and test it with sample footage to ensure it works as expected.

• Set up your equipment. Position your camera, lighting, and microphone according to your script. Make sure that the camera is stable, the microphone is properly set up for clear audio, and the lighting is adjusted to enhance visibility and create the desired mood.
• Record or generate your video. Follow your script and storyboard to shoot the necessary footage. Pay specific attention to framing, focus, and audio quality during recording.

If you’re using an AI video generator, provide the tool with your script, and select the desired style or aesthetic for your video. The AI will then process your input and generate the video essay. You may need to provide additional details or make adjustments during the generation process.

10 AI Video Generators for Beginners (with Best Practices)

Post-production.

• Edit your footage. Import it into your chosen video editing software. (Popular options include Adobe Premiere Pro , Final Cut Pro , and DaVinci Resolve .) Arrange clips according to your script and storyboard, trim unnecessary parts, and correct any visual or audio errors for a polished final look. In case of AI video generators, review the generated content carefully and utilize the tool’s editing features as you need.
• Incorporate music, sound effects, and text overlays. Make sure that auditory elements complement the mood and do not overshadow narration. Integrate text overlays to introduce sections, highlight key points, or provide additional context. All these elements must be seamlessly integrated and add value to your video essay.
• Add subtitles and a transcript . Subtitles will make your video essay accessible to a broader audience and facilitate comprehension for those who prefer or require visual text. Always check if captions are synchronized with the audio and accurately represent the spoken content. Meanwhile, generate a transcript of the video to provide a textual version of the content, which can also aid in SEO and accessibility.
• Do a final review and make necessary adjustments. Watch your video essay in its entirety to ensure that all elements are cohesive and effective. Consider seeking feedback from others to confirm that your video conveys your message clearly.
• Export and upload your video essay. Choose the appropriate format and resolution for your intended platform. When uploading your video, write a compelling title and add an eye-catching thumbnail to attract viewers. Include relevant keywords and tags to increase discoverability.

10 Best Practices for Making Video Essays

In addition to the instructions mentioned above, these 10 best practices on how to make a video essay can make your content even more impactful:

• Rehearse your script. Practice makes perfect, so rehearse your timing, intonation, and pacing to reduce the likelihood of errors and improve overall presentation.
• Have a strong opening and closing. Start the video essay with an intriguing introduction to grab your audience’s attention, and end with a strong conclusion to reinforce your main points and leave a lasting impression.
• Avoid rambling or going off on targets. Stay focused on your main points and do not include unnecessary elaboration or unrelated anecdotes, as every segment must contribute to your thesis.
• Incorporate data or statistics. Present them in a clear and understandable way, utilizing visuals like charts or graphs to make it more relatable for viewers.
• Use B-roll footage, graphics, and animations to enrich your main content. These elements can help you illustrate complex ideas, reinforce your arguments, and make your video essay more memorable.
• Provide high-quality audio. Minimize background noise during recording, and adjust audio levels and eliminate any distracting sounds during post-production.
• Prioritize accessibility. Include subtitles and closed captions to aid deaf and hard of hearing viewers while maintaining high contrast between text and background for better readability.
• Encourage audience interaction. Add calls-to-action (CTAs) for viewers to comment, like, share, or subscribe, and ask them to share their opinions and experiences related to the topic.
• Track and optimize. Regularly check view counts, watch times, and engagement rates to understand how well your content is performing and analyze the data to refine your approach.
• Experiment and have fun. Try different approaches, such as using various editing styles or narrative techniques, and stay open-minded along your creative journey.

Add AI Subtitles to Your Video Essay

This will not only improve the accessibility of your video essay but also boost its SEO performance and multiply your viewership.

5 Powerful Video Essay Examples

Featuring an example from each category, these 5 videos can inspire you with various approaches on how to make a video essay.

Personal Video Essay

This college application video is a great example of a personal video essay. With a clear structure, it demonstrates why the person is a good candidate and utilizes editing features smoothly. The effective use of graphics, background music, subtitles, and transitions all contribute to the success of the video.

Argumentative Video Essay

This argumentative video essay named “How Discounts Keep You Poor” shows the importance of well-done research for this kind of content. The main argument is supported by solid reasons and examples, which are highlighted with eye-catching text overlays. The call to action at the end of the video invites viewers to share their own thoughts on the subject and subscribe to the channel.

Analysis Video Essay

Titled “Why Do Movies Feel So Different Now?” , this analysis video essay focuses on how movies have evolved since modernism. Based on movements like postmodernism and metamodernism, the content is organized into chapters to create a logical flow. A professional voiceover accompanies high-quality footage from movies, all creating a final harmonious piece.

How to Add Chapters to Youtube Videos

Experimental video essay.

Going beyond traditional video game reviews, this experimental video essay explores gaming as a perfectionist . It adopts unique audiovisual techniques to blend in-depth analysis with unconventional storytelling. The clever use of humor and game footage also adds an experimental flair to the typical video essay format.

Hybrid Video Essay

This hybrid video essay titled “drowning in entertainment: the age of distraction” combines personal, argumentative, analysis, and even experimental formats to delve deep into how we interact with information today. It uses attention-grabbing B-roll footage, still images, and text overlays to enhance the narrative. The talking head sections further personalize the content, allowing the creator to build a direct and engaging connection with the audience.

Frequently Asked Questions

How long is a video essay.

This can vary depending on the complexity of the topic, the target audience, and the platform on which the video essay is shared. Typically, video essays last from a few minutes to over an hour. It’s important to keep the length aligned with the content’s depth and engage the viewers without overwhelming them.

How do you get ideas for a video essay?

For personal video essays, consider experiences that have shaped your perspective or lifestyle. For argumentative and analytical video essays, pressing social issues or cultural trends are excellent sources of inspiration. Meanwhile, hypothetical scenarios (e.g., future possibilities) or artistic interpretations can fuel ideas for hybrid and experimental video essays.

What to wear for a video essay?

Students shooting an application video essay can opt for business casual attire.  YouTubers and content creators might choose outfits that align with their personal brand and content style. Business professionals can wear a collared shirt or blouse to convey a polished and professional look. Each outfit choice should reflect the context of the video and enhance the overall presentation.

How to make a video essay for YouTube?

You can follow the steps above to make a video essay for YouTube. For this specific platform, it is especially important to use relevant keywords and design an eye-catching thumbnail to draw viewers in. Take advantage of YouTube’s end screens or cards to promote related video essays.

How to make a video essay for class?

When making a video essay for your class, make sure you understand the topic, length, and any other guidelines correctly. Organize your thoughts in a logical sequence, plan the footage you’ll use to support your points, and rehearse your script beforehand. Ensure audio and visual quality while recording and editing the video, and don’t forget to have fun!

Featuring actionable tips, this blog covered the steps on how to make a video essay and listed 10 best practices for making this kind of content even more polished and memorable. It also shared 5 inspiring video essay examples in different types.

Here are our 3 golden rules for creating an impactful video essay:

• Define and stick to your thesis statement. This will be the core of your video essay and help you stay focused during the production phase.
• Have a strong beginning and end. Both should be carefully crafted to hook your audience from the start and provide a satisfying conclusion that ties everything together.
• Utilize various multimedia elements. Incorporate video footage, images, text overlays, and music to express complex ideas and maintain viewer interest.

Follow the tips in this blog to refine your video essay creation process, and feel free to experiment with different formats along the way.

About Serra Ardem

Serra Ardem is a freelance writer and editor based in Istanbul. For the last 8 years, she has been collaborating with brands and businesses to tell their unique story and develop their verbal identity.

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How to make a video essay: A guide for beginners

What type of content do you primarily create?

Video essays are an incredibly popular genre on YouTube, and many new creators are eager to have their views heard on topics in culture and politics. But making a video essay involves a lot more than just sitting in front of a camera and pressing record. This guide is intended for beginners who don’t quite know where to start. 

What is a video essay?

A video essay’s primary defining feature is that it sets out to make an argument. It is, to put it simply, like an essay you wrote in school. Video essays often cover politics, popular media, or science.

But unlike the essays you wrote in school, video essays need extensive visual accompaniment, whether that’s footage (or B-roll ), still images, or animation.

Here’s how you can get started:

Step 1: Craft a thesis

Good video essays will have a central thesis explored throughout the piece. If you can’t summarize your thesis in a sentence (sometimes two), you’ve still got work to do. The best theses immediately leave the viewer wanting to know more. Test it on friends: If you state your thesis to friends and get reactions of curiosity or excitement you’re on to something.

Consider one of my favorite video essays, whose thesis is right in the title: "Why Snowpiercer is a sequel to Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory."

‎ Sometimes, a thesis is a little more subtle, but nonetheless important. In Yhara Zayd’s video on horror movies, she argues that horror has always been a genre for social criticism.

‎ The rest of your video isn’t just proving that thesis, though that’s important. You'll want to explore the twists and turns of the idea. What questions does your thesis raise? What are the big doubts about your thesis, and how do you address them? How can we zoom out from your thesis and ask even bigger questions? 

Step 2: Determine your audience  

Your audience will dictate what level of complexity and detail you should cover in your video. If you’re an engineering channel, maybe you want to appeal to working engineers who understand the jargon of the profession. But if you’d like a broader audience, you’ll need to take the time to define terms and give background information. The best video essays usually appeal to both—their topics are unique enough to be interesting to people with prior knowledge of the topic, while accessible enough to be understood to a casual viewer.

Step 3: Organize your research early

Your video essay should have lots of supporting evidence. Aside from the usual list of articles and books, video essays can also use visual evidence.

If you’re commenting on media, that means hyper-specific shots and lines of dialogue. If you’re commenting on history, that means old news clips. Filmed interviews are a great resource regardless of the topic.

Whenever I'm trying to cover a show, I’ll watch the show (sometimes twice), take extensive notes, pause to write out lines of dialogue, and mark where specific moments supported various themes, motifs, or ideas. 

I've always regretted telling myself I’d remember a specific line or shot because I'd find myself spending an hour to hunt it down later in the process.

Whether you’re commenting on news footage, video games, or film and TV, I cannot stress enough how much extensive notetaking will improve your video essay later in the process.

The same advice goes for any books or news articles you might cite: annotate extensively and cite them in your piece.

Step 4: Familiarize yourself with "fair use"

Many video essays source footage from the news, TV, and film without licensing them. I'm not here to give advice on the legality of that, but I do think any video essayist should familiarize themselves with fair use .

Fair use is a set of criteria that a creator can use to defend their use of copyrighted work. It's not a license to freely use copyrighted work if you think you fit those standards; it’s a series of tests a judge should weigh in court. 

Usually, it doesn’t come to that. Most copyright issues go through YouTube’s copyright claim system , which you should also read up on. A film studio may claim your content, or block it altogether, for using their copyrighted material. YouTube allows you to appeal these claims , but if both parties won’t give up, the question can only be settled by a judge (in the US, at least).

Step 5: Start your script

Be sure to use a two-column script, rather than just writing out everything as if it were a traditional essay.

In one column, you’re writing what you’re saying, or what the footage is saying. In the other, write what you plan to show. Your notes here should be specific enough to help you later in the editing process. You may want to add a third column for notes, or sources to cite later.

Writing a video essay follows some different rules than what your English teacher might have expected. Most video essays use a conversational style, and include words, phrases, and grammar that would never fly with the written word. Sometimes that includes filler words, like starting a sentence with “so” or putting an “um” for effect. Just don’t overdo it.

Other writing rules still apply. Be concise, use active verbs, and otherwise just make sure you sound like a human.

Step 6: Film (or record)

You don’t need a $10,000 filming setup to make good video essays. Plenty of  people start with just a microphone, completely avoiding the camera altogether in what's known as a faceless YouTube video .

The two most important things to recommend: get good sound, and be natural. People can tolerate a lot of visual sins, but usually won’t put up with bad audio quality. Similarly, you don’t need to have the charisma of a talk show host, but people have no tolerance for on-screen performances that seem forced or fake.

That is all to say, get a decent microphone and be yourself. If you’re on-screen, buy a cheap teleprompter setup for your phone or camera.

Step 7: Start editing

There are many options for video editing software out there (and Descript is a great one), even for people with limited video editing experience. This article isn’t long enough to be an editing guide , but a few quick tips for a true novice:

• Don’t linger on any one visual for too long. Instead, mix up the visual interest of your video.
• Emphasize important concepts with text on screen.
• Take the time to learn a little about color grading .
• Clean up any noticeable background noise .

Step 8: Figure out your title and thumbnail

This may be the last step of this article, but it should often begin while you’re brainstorming. Your title and thumbnail should generate intrigue without giving it all away. Video essays often lean on titles with “How” and “Why.” Lessons from the Screenplay is a good example:

But video essays can also make provocative statements that make the viewer curious about how you’ll back it up. Consider Kurzgesagt – In a Nutshell’s “ Smoking is Awesome ,” which I promise is not pro-tobacco.

Step 9: Publish

Finally, it's time to put your video out into the world and see how it fares. Your first video essay won't be perfect. It's important to put your work in public, take in feedback, and move on to your next project. Like all things, skill comes with time.

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The video essay boom

Hour-long YouTube videos are thriving in the TikTok era. Their popularity reflects our desire for more nuanced content online.

by Terry Nguyen

The video essay’s reintroduction into my adult life was, like many things, a side effect of the pandemic. On days when I couldn’t bring myself to read recreationally, I tried to unwind after work by watching hours and hours of YouTube.

My pseudo-intellectual superego, however, soon became dissatisfied with the brain-numbing monotony of “day in the life” vlogs, old Bon Appétit test kitchen videos, and makeup tutorials. I wanted content that was entertaining, but simultaneously informational, thoughtful, and analytical. In short, I wanted something that gave the impression that I, the passive viewer, was smart. Enter: the video essay.

Video essays have been around for about a decade, if not more, on YouTube. There is some debate over how the form preceded the platform; some film scholars believe the video essay was born out of and remains heavily influenced by essay films , a type of nonfiction filmmaking. Regardless, YouTube has become the undisputed home of the contemporary video essay. Since 2012, when the platform began to prioritize watch-time over views , the genre flourished. These videos became a significant part of the 2010s YouTube landscape, and were popularized by creators across film, politics, and academic subcultures.

Today, there are video essays devoted to virtually any topic you can think of, ranging anywhere from about 10 minutes to upward of an hour. The video essay has been a means to entertain fan theories , explore the lore of a video game or a historical deep dive , explain or critique a social media trend , or like most written essays, expound upon an argument, hypothesis , or curiosity proposed by the creator.

Some of the best-known video essay creators — Lindsay Ellis, Natalie Wynn of ContraPoints, and Abigail Thorn of PhilosophyTube — are often associated with BreadTube , an umbrella term for a group of left-leaning, long-form YouTubers who provide intellectualized commentary on political and cultural topics.

It’s not an exaggeration to claim that I — and many of my fellow Gen Zers — were raised on video essays, academically and intellectually. They were helpful resources for late-night cramming sessions (thanks Crash Course), and responsible for introducing a generation to first-person commentary on all sorts of cultural and political phenomena. Now, the kids who grew up on this content are producing their own.

“Video essays are a form that has lent itself particularly well to pop culture because of its analytical nature,” Madeline Buxton, the culture and trends manager at YouTube, told me. “We are starting to see more creators using video essays to comment on growing trends across social media. They’re serving as sort of real-time internet historians by helping viewers understand not just what is a trend, but the larger cultural context of something.”

A lot has been said about the video essay and its ever-shifting parameters . What does seem newly relevant is how the video essay is becoming repackaged, as long-form video creators find a home on platforms besides YouTube. This has played out concurrently with the pandemic-era shift toward short-form video, with Instagram, Snapchat, and YouTube respectively launching Reels, Spotlight, and Shorts to compete against TikTok.

TikTok’s sudden, unwavering rise has proven the viability of bite-size content, and the app’s addictive nature has spawned fears about young people’s dwindling attention spans. Yet, the prevailing popularity of video essays, from new and old creators alike, suggests otherwise. Audiences have not been deterred from watching lengthy videos, nor has the short-form pivot significantly affected creators and their output. Emerging video essayists aren’t shying away from length or nuance, even while using TikTok or Reels as a supplement to grow their online following.

One can even argue that we are witnessing the video essay’s golden era . Run times are longer than ever, while more and more creators are producing long-form videos. The growth of “creator economy” crowdfunding tools, especially during the pandemic, has allowed video essayists to take longer breaks between uploads while retaining their production quality.

“I do feel some pressure to make my videos longer because my audience continues to ask for it,” said Tiffany Ferguson, a YouTube creator specializing in media criticism and pop culture commentary. “I’ve seen comments, both on my own videos and those I watch, where fans are like, ‘Yes, you’re feeding us,’ when it comes to longer videos, especially the hour to two-hour ones. In a way, the mentality seems to be: The longer the better.”

In a Medium post last April, the blogger A. Khaled remarked that viewers were “willing to indulge user-generated content that is as long as a multi-million dollar cinematic production by a major Hollywood studio” — a notion that seemed improbable just a few years ago, even to the most popular video essayists. To creators, this hunger for well-edited, long-form video is unprecedented and uniquely suitable for pandemic times.

The internet might’ve changed what we pay attention to, but it hasn’t entirely shortened our attention span, argued Jessica Maddox, an assistant professor of digital media technology at the University of Alabama. “It has made us more selective about the things we want to devote our attention to,” she told me. “People are willing to devote time to content they find interesting.”

“People are willing to devote time to content they find interesting”

Every viewer is different, of course. I find that my attention starts to wane around the 20-minute mark if I’m actively watching and doing nothing else — although I will admit to once spending a non-consecutive four hours on an epic Twin Peaks explainer . Last month, the channel Folding Ideas published a two-hour video essay on “the problem with NFTs,” which has garnered more than 6 million views so far.

Hour-plus-long videos can be hits, depending on the creator, the subject matter, the production quality, and the audience base that the content attracts. There will always be an early drop-off point with some viewers, according to Ferguson, who make it about two to five minutes into a video essay. Those numbers don’t often concern her; she trusts that her devoted subscribers will be interested enough to stick around.

“About half of my viewers watch up to the halfway point, and a smaller group finishes the entire video,” Ferguson said. “It’s just how YouTube is. If your video is longer than two minutes, I think you’re going to see that drop-off regardless if it’s for a video that’s 15 or 60 minutes long.”

Some video essayists have experimented with shorter content as a topic testing ground for longer videos or as a discovery tool to reach new audiences, whether it be on the same platform (like Shorts) or an entirely different one (like TikTok).

“Short-form video can expose people to topics or types of content they’re not super familiar with yet,” Maddox said. “Shorts are almost like a sampling of what you can get with long-form content.” The growth of Shorts, according to Buxton of YouTube, has given rise to this class of “hybrid creators,” who alternate between short- and long-form content. They can also be a starting point for new creators, who are not yet comfortable with scripting a 30-minute video.

Queline Meadows, a student in Ithaca College’s screen cultures program, became interested in how young people were using TikTok to casually talk about film, using editing techniques that borrowed heavily from video essays. She created her own YouTube video essay titled “The Rise of Film TikTok” to analyze the phenomenon, and produces both TikTok micro-essays and lengthy videos.

“I think people have a desire to understand things more deeply,” Meadows told me. “Even with TikTok, I find it hard to unfold an argument or explore multiple angles of a subject. Once people get tired of the hot takes, they want to sit with something that’s more nuanced and in-depth.”

It’s common for TikTokers to tease a multi-part video to gain followers. Many have attempted to direct viewers to their YouTube channel and other platforms for longer content. On the contrary, it’s in TikTok’s best interests to retain creators — and therefore viewers — on the app. In late February, TikTok announced plans to extend its maximum video length from three minutes to 10 minutes , more than tripling a video’s run-time possibility. This decision arrived months after TikTok’s move last July to start offering three-minute videos .

As TikTok inches into YouTube-length territory, Spotify, too, has introduced video on its platform, while YouTube has similarly signaled an interest in podcasting . In October, Spotify began introducing “video podcasts,” which allows listeners (or rather, viewers) to watch episodes. Users have the option to toggle between actively watching a podcast or traditionally listening to one.

What’s interesting about the video podcast is how Spotify is positioning it as an interchangeable, if not more intimate, alternative to a pure audio podcast. The video essay, then, appears to occupy a middle ground between podcast and traditional video by making use of these key elements. For creators, the boundaries are no longer so easy to define.

“Some video essay subcultures are more visual than others, while others are less so,” said Ferguson, who was approached by Spotify to upload her YouTube video essays onto the platform last year. “I was already in the process of trying to upload just the audio of my old videos since that’s more convenient for people to listen to and save on their podcast app. My reasoning has always been to make my content more accessible.”

To Ferguson, podcasts are a natural byproduct of the video essay. Many viewers are already consuming lengthy videos as ambient entertainment, as content to passively listen to while doing other tasks. The video essay is not a static format, and its development is heavily shaped by platforms, which play a crucial role in algorithmically determining how such content is received and promoted. Some of these changes are reflective of cultural shifts, too.

Maddox, who researches digital culture and media, has a theory that social media discourse is becoming less reactionary. She described it as a “simmering down” of the hot take, which is often associated with cancel culture . These days, more creators are approaching controversy from a removed, secondhand standpoint; they seem less interested in engendering drama for clicks. “People are still providing their opinions, but in conjunction with deep analysis,” Maddox said. “I think it says a lot about the state of the world and what holds people’s attention.”

That’s the power of the video essay. Its basic premise — whether the video is a mini-explainer or explores a 40-minute hypothesis — requires the creator to, at the very least, do their research. This often leads to personal disclaimers and summaries of alternative opinions or perspectives, which is very different from the more self-centered “reaction videos” and “story time” clickbait side of YouTube.

“The things I’m talking about are bigger than me. I recognize the limitations of my own experience,” Ferguson said. “Once I started talking about intersections of race, gender, sexuality — so many experiences that were different from my own — I couldn’t just share my own narrow, straight, white woman perspective. I have to provide context.”

This doesn’t change the solipsistic nature of the internet, but it is a positive gear shift, at least in the realm of social media discourse, that makes being chronically online a little less soul-crushing. The video essay, in a way, encourages us to engage in good faith with ideas that we might not typically entertain or think of ourselves. Video essays can’t solve the many problems of the internet (or the world, for that matter), but they can certainly make learning about them a little more bearable.

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What is a Video Essay? The Art of the Video Analysis Essay

I n the era of the internet and Youtube, the video essay has become an increasingly popular means of expressing ideas and concepts. However, there is a bit of an enigma behind the construction of the video essay largely due to the vagueness of the term.

What defines a video analysis essay? What is a video essay supposed to be about? In this article, we’ll take a look at the foundation of these videos and the various ways writers and editors use them creatively. Let’s dive in.

Watch: Our Best Film Video Essays of the Year

Subscribe for more filmmaking videos like this.

What is a video essay?

First, let’s define video essay.

There is narrative film, documentary film, short films, and then there is the video essay. What is its role within the realm of visual media? Let’s begin with the video essay definition. 

VIDEO ESSAY DEFINITION

A video essay is a video that analyzes a specific topic, theme, person or thesis. Because video essays are a rather new form, they can be difficult to define, but recognizable nonetheless. To put it simply, they are essays in video form that aim to persuade, educate, or critique. 

These essays have become increasingly popular within the era of Youtube and with many creatives writing video essays on topics such as politics, music, film, and pop culture. 

What is a video essay used for?

• To persuade an audience of a thesis
• To educate on a specific subject
• To analyze and/or critique 

What is a video essay based on?

Establish a thesis.

Video analysis essays lack distinguished boundaries since there are countless topics a video essayist can tackle. Most essays, however, begin with a thesis. 

How Christopher Nolan Elevates the Movie Montage  •  Video Analysis Essays

Good essays often have a point to make. This point, or thesis, should be at the heart of every video analysis essay and is what binds the video together. 

Related Posts

• Stanley Kubrick Directing Style Explained →
• A Filmmaker’s Guide to Nolan’s Directing Style →
• How to Write a Voice Over Montage in a Script →

interviews in video essay

Utilize interviews.

A key determinant for the structure of an essay is the source of the ideas. A common source for this are interviews from experts in the field. These interviews can be cut and rearranged to support a thesis. 

Roger Deakins on "Learning to Light"  •  Video Analysis Essays

Utilizing first hand interviews is a great way to utilize ethos into the rhetoric of a video. However, it can be limiting since you are given a limited amount to work with. Voice over scripts, however, can give you the room to say anything. 

How to create the best video essays on Youtube

Write voice over scripts.

Voice over (VO) scripts allow video essayists to write out exactly what they want to say. This is one of the most common ways to structure a video analysis essay since it gives more freedom to the writer. It is also a great technique to use when taking on large topics.

In this video, it would have been difficult to explain every type of camera lens by cutting sound bites from interviews of filmmakers. A voice over script, on the other hand, allowed us to communicate information directly when and where we wanted to.

Ultimate Guide to Camera Lenses  •  Video essay examples

Some of the most famous video essayists like Every Frame a Painting and Nerdwriter1 utilize voice over to capitalize on their strength in writing video analysis essays. However, if you’re more of an editor than a writer, the next type of essay will be more up your alley. 

Video analysis essay without a script

Edit a supercut.

Rather than leaning on interview sound bites or voice over, the supercut video depends more on editing. You might be thinking “What is a video essay without writing?” The beauty of the video essay is that the writing can be done throughout the editing. Supercuts create arguments or themes visually through specific sequences. 

Another one of the great video essay channels, Screen Junkies, put together a supercut of the last decade in cinema. The video could be called a portrait of the last decade in cinema.

2010 - 2019: A Decade In Film  •  Best videos on Youtube

This video is rather general as it visually establishes the theme of art during a general time period. Other essays can be much more specific. 

Critical essays

Video essays are a uniquely effective means of creating an argument. This is especially true in critical essays. This type of video critiques the facets of a specific topic. 

In this video, by one of the best video essay channels, Every Frame a Painting, the topic of the film score is analyzed and critiqued — specifically temp film score.

Every Frame a Painting Marvel Symphonic Universe  •  Essay examples

Of course, not all essays critique the work of artists. Persuasion of an opinion is only one way to use the video form. Another popular use is to educate. 

• The Different Types of Camera Lenses →
• Write and Create Professionally Formatted Screenplays →
• How to Create Unforgettable Film Moments with Music →

Video analysis essay

Visual analysis.

One of the biggest advantages that video analysis essays have over traditional, written essays is the use of visuals. The use of visuals has allowed video essayists to display the subject or work that they are analyzing. It has also allowed them to be more specific with what they are analyzing. Writing video essays entails structuring both words and visuals. 

Take this video on There Will Be Blood for example. In a traditional, written essay, the writer would have had to first explain what occurs in the film then make their analysis and repeat.

This can be extremely inefficient and redundant. By analyzing the scene through a video, the points and lessons are much more clear and efficient. 

There Will Be Blood  •   Subscribe on YouTube

Through these video analysis essays, the scene of a film becomes support for a claim rather than the topic of the essay. 

Dissect an artist

Essays that focus on analysis do not always focus on a work of art. Oftentimes, they focus on the artist themself. In this type of essay, a thesis is typically made about an artist’s style or approach. The work of that artist is then used to support this thesis.

Nerdwriter1, one of the best video essays on Youtube, creates this type to analyze filmmakers, actors, photographers or in this case, iconic painters. 

Caravaggio: Master Of Light  •  Best video essays on YouTube

In the world of film, the artist video analysis essay tends to cover auteur filmmakers. Auteur filmmakers tend to have distinct styles and repetitive techniques that many filmmakers learn from and use in their own work. 

Stanley Kubrick is perhaps the most notable example. In this video, we analyze Kubrick’s best films and the techniques he uses that make so many of us drawn to his films. 

Why We're Obsessed with Stanley Kubrick Movies  •  Video essay examples

Critical essays and analytical essays choose to focus on a piece of work or an artist. Essays that aim to educate, however, draw on various sources to teach technique and the purpose behind those techniques. 

What is a video essay written about?

Historical analysis.

Another popular type of essay is historical analysis. Video analysis essays are a great medium to analyze the history of a specific topic. They are an opportunity for essayists to share their research as well as their opinion on history. 

Our video on aspect ratio , for example, analyzes how aspect ratios began in cinema and how they continue to evolve. We also make and support the claim that the 2:1 aspect ratio is becoming increasingly popular among filmmakers. 

Why More Directors are Switching to 18:9  •  Video analysis essay

Analyzing the work of great artists inherently yields a lesson to be learned. Some essays teach more directly.

• Types of Camera Movements in Film Explained →
• What is Aspect Ratio? A Formula for Framing Success →
• Visualize your scenes with intuitive online shotlist software →

Writing video essays about technique

Teach technique.

Educational essays designed to teach are typically more direct. They tend to be more valuable for those looking to create art rather than solely analyze it.

In this video, we explain every type of camera movement and the storytelling value of each. Educational essays must be based on research, evidence, and facts rather than opinion.

Ultimate Guide to Camera Movement  •  Best video essays on YouTube

As you can see, there are many reasons why the video essay has become an increasingly popular means of communicating information. Its ability to use both sound and picture makes it efficient and effective. It also draws on the language of filmmaking to express ideas through editing. But it also gives writers the creative freedom they love. 

Writing video essays is a new art form that many channels have set high standards for. What is a video essay supposed to be about? That’s up to you. 

Organize Post Production Workflow

The quality of an essay largely depends on the quality of the edit. If editing is not your strong suit, check out our next article. We dive into tips and techniques that will help you organize your Post-Production workflow to edit like a pro. 

Up Next: Post Production →

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How to Make Money on YouTube: 7 Effective Strategies

If you’re wondering how to make money on YouTube, look no further than these 7 strategies for monetizing your channel and your creative work.

Okay, ad revenue is the most obvious way to make money on YouTube. But it’s not the only way—or, to be honest, the best way.

(Spoiler: the best way to make money on YouTube is all the ways .)

YouTube is half the internet : that’s 1.9 billion users logging in every month. But at the same time, 500 hours of video are uploaded to the site every minute.

So you already know this article is not going to be about how easy it is to buy a Swiss watch with the ad revenue from your YouTube views. (Though if you have millions of video views, you could probably at least rent one . Wait, don’t .)

Read on, and we’ll lay out 7 ways to earn income from your YouTube channel, complete with step-by-step instructions .

Table of Contents

Bonus: Download the free 30-day plan to grow your YouTube following fast , a daily workbook of challenges that will help you kickstart your Youtube channel growth and track your success. Get real results after one month.

How to make money on YouTube

1. join the youtube partner program.

The YouTube Partner Program is how regular YouTubers get access to special features on the platform.

You don’t need to be a partner to make money on YouTube (just setting up an AdSense account and getting views is enough to handle that), but being a Partner makes it a lot easier.

YouTube Partners have access to multiple income streams: not just video ads, but YouTube Premium subscription fees, and features that tap your loyal fans’ wallets directly like Super Chat, channel memberships and the merchandise shelf (more on these later.)

Step 1: Start a YouTube channel

Don’t worry, we have a handy guide for this. It’s called ‘ How to create a YouTube channel .’

Step 2: Make your channel successful enough that it meets the YouTube Partner Program requirements

To join the program, you need a minimum of 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours in the previous 12 months.

Here are some ideas for how to get more of those precious YouTube views .

Create. Schedule. Publish. Engage. Measure. Win.

Step 3: Set up an AdSense account

This is simple. Just follow YouTube’s official guide to AdSense accounts .

Step 4: Explore your new monetization features

Each monetization channel has different eligibility requirements. For instance:

• Ad revenue: to earn ad revenue, you must be at least 18 years old, and you must c reate content that is advertiser-friendly . Basically, the less controversial your videos, the more YouTube advertisers will be comfortable running ads on them, and the more money you make.
• YouTube Premium revenue: if a YouTube Premium member watches your video, you get a portion of their subscription fee. (This one is automatic, which is nice.)
• Channel memberships: in order to sell channel memberships to your subscribers (i.e., your fans opt in to pay you an extra amount), you need to be at least 18 and have more than 30,000 subscribers.
• Merchandise shelf: in order to sell merch from YouTube’s merchandise shelf, you must be at least 18 years old, and have at least 10,000 subscribers.
• Super Chat payments: if you want your fans to have the ability to pay to have their messages highlighted in your live chats during your live streams, you must be at least 18 (and live in a country where the feature is offered).

Step 5: Submit to ongoing reviews

As a YouTube Partner, your channel will be held to a higher standard, according to YouTube. You have to follow not just the YouTube Partner Program policies , but the Community Guidelines . Not to mention staying on the right side of copyright law.

2. Sell your own merch

Maybe you identify as a content creator first, and entrepreneur second. (Just remember that even Drake sells t-shirts.)

Alternately, you’re an entrepreneur first and video creator second, which means you probably already have a product, and you’re designing your YouTube marketing strategy to sell it.

Either way, merchandise is a viable way to make money on social media — especially on YouTube.

Step 1: Imagine and design your product

Merchandise for your channel is meant to both represent and feed your audience’s connection with you. That means your merch should be unique.

Hawaiian YouTube star Ryan Higa launched his milk-based energy drink Ninja Melk to leverage the popularity of his viral comedy, Ninja Melk . While he also sells t-shirts and other merch from his online shop, Ninja Melk’s appeal is broad enough it has its own website .

Pro tip: You might have more ideas for merch than you can possibly stock. So start by dipping your toes in the water with one or two items. But make sure you engage your audience in the decision-making process. Poll them as to what they want. Or build buzz by offering one-off products related to big subscriber-count milestones.

Step 2: Source and/or build your product

In most cases, you’ll need a manufacturer, supplier or wholesaler to make and deliver your product. Some suppliers will deliver it to you, and some will spare you the headaches of inventory, shipping and returns by handling it themselves.

If you’re not sure where to start, check out Shopify’s how-to on the topic of finding a brick-and-mortar company to make your dream a reality .

Step 3: Create your shop and landing page

You’ll need a separate website to handle purchases. If you want to link it directly from your videos (and you do), refer to YouTube’s list of approved merchandise sites .

Step 4: Enable your YouTube Partner merchandise shelf

YouTube Partners can also use the shelf feature to sell their channel’s merchandise. If you’re eligible, follow YouTube’s instructions to enable it.

Step 5: Promote your product in your videos

This is where your charm comes in. Wear or use your merch in your videos. Feature viewers who have bought and are using it. (If we were on another platform, we might call this ‘user-generated content,’ or possibly ‘solid gold’).

And don’t forget to add your store’s link to your video descriptions, and include end screens and cards with compelling calls to action .

Pro tip: Don’t forget to say thank you. Because it’s polite. But also because it’s an excuse to remind people how great and popular your product is, one more time.

3. Create sponsored content

You don’t have to be on Instagram to be an influencer. The advantage of the # sponcon strategy is that you don’t have to give YouTube a cut of your earnings. You negotiate directly with the brand, and they pay you directly. No wonder it’s a popular way for YouTubers to make money.

If you can offer brands a large and/or engaged audience—and your content is relevant to their target market— they probably want to hear from you .

For instance, YouTuber Aaron Marino, a.k.a. Alpha M , is big in the men’s lifestyle space. How big? So big that even his videos that explain his brand partnerships have brand partners.

Step 1: Find a brand to partner with

Quality is important, when it comes to the names you work with. You probably already have a wish list of dream brands. Whether you’re aiming for the stars or building yourself up grassroots-style, make sure you perfect your brand pitch before you send it.

Also consider signing up with an influencer marketing platform. These are intermediary websites that help marketing teams find appropriate influencers to work with. FameBit was one of the first to focus on YouTubers, for instance.

Step 2: Make a deal

According to this recent study by influencer marketing platform Klear , YouTube videos are, on average, the most expensive type of sponsored content brands can buy from influencers. Basically, YouTube influencers are able to charge more for their videos than they would for Instagram Stories or Facebook posts, because video is just more expensive to produce.

While your rate will vary on your audience’s size, engagement and relevance to your potential partner, know your worth before you sign a contract.

Step 3: Be transparent about your #sponsored #ad

Sponsored content is advertising. That means you need to make sure you’re in step with Google’s Ad policies . The FTC (U.S.) and ASA (U.K.) both have guidelines of which you should be aware, too, if you’re American or British. Transparency is good for your legal health, but also for your relationship with your audience. YouTube has a visible disclosure feature to help you make sure your audience is aware that you’re advertising to them.

4. Become an affiliate partner

If your YouTube audience is loyal and engaged, but not quite there yet headcount-wise, look for companies investing in affiliate marketing.

YouTubers affiliated with businesses encourage their viewers to visit the brand’s online store or specific product pages. They then get a percentage of sales made through their — you guessed it — affiliate links.

In terms of setup and logistics, affiliate partnerships are similar to sponsored content deals, so follow the steps from tip #3 to get started.

5. Get your fans to pay you directly

This strategy for making money on YouTube includes a few different income streams, but they all have one thing in common: you have to make it easy for your fans to show their appreciation with their credit card.

Step 1: Host live chats where people can use Super Chat

In early 2017, YouTube replaced their previous Fan Funding feature with Super Chat . This is a feature that is only available to YouTube Partners while they live stream.

Essentially, your viewers can make their comments more visible—they’re highlighted and pinned for a set amount of time depending on how much they pay—in the live chat stream.

Step 2: Encourage your fans to become channel members

YouTube offers the ability to let your viewers pay you to become members of your channel. In exchange, they get custom emoji, badges, and access to members-only exclusives like Live Chats with you.

For instance, Wintergatan is a Swedish band that also makes elaborate marble machines and posts videos about it to their YouTube channel. They regularly thank their channel members in their videos. They also make it clear what the money from memberships supports:

You’ll need to build out a promotion strategy to convince people to become members, which may or may not include several tiers of membership. Like Super Chat, this feature is only available to YouTube Partners.

Step 3: Encourage your fans to become YouTube Premium subscribers

This step is the last on our list for this strategy because it benefits your channel only indirectly. That said, when YouTube Premium members watch your channel, you get a cut of their subscription fee. (And so does every other channel they watch.)

6. Use crowdfunding

Soliciting donations online is now commonplace. Whether you’re looking to build ongoing revenue from a pool of small monthly donations, or looking to fund a personal, channel-related project, crowdfunding is how many YouTubers make money.

Step 1: Set up a crowdfunding account

YouTube has a list of approved crowdfunding sites to choose from.

For recurring funding Patreon is a top choice. Meanwhile, sites like GoFundMe or Kickstarter are best for one-off campaigns to get a new mic, or new laptop, or new … spleen.

Even household names like Walk Off the Earth or Veronica Mars (ok, she’s a fictional character) have used Patreon to fund their projects, be they music videos or feature-length films.

Step 2: Promote your campaign in your videos

Detail your specific goals so that people know exactly what they can expect when you’ve succeeded.

Also, offer enticing perks that stack as your fans choose how much they want to donate.

For more information and inspiration, check out this detailed guide to crowdfunding strategies .

Step 3: Go beyond YouTube

A successful campaign is a multi-platform affair. We have some advice on how to promote your YouTube channel (and by extension, your crowdfunding campaign) everywhere else.

7. License your content to the media

When a video goes viral, every news outlet wants to get their hands on a copy in order to replay it for their audience. Fortunately, established media companies are well aware that they need to pay for what they use. And voila, you’ve got yourself another way to make money on YouTube.

As a content creator, licensing your most successful work to the media can be as simple as making sure you’re easy to find.

Step 1: Keep your contact details updated on your About page

You never know when lightning will strike. Even if you don’t have a business manager, set up a generic email account that you can point to for business inquiries.

Step 2: Sign up to a video rights marketplace

Jukin Media is a great place to start. Even if you don’t have a viral video like the Chewbacca mask lady (see below), media outlets often need timely footage to round out their reporting.

For instance, Jukin has an entire catalogue of ‘ newsworthy ’ videos that you can contribute to, if you happen to have exclusive footage of a major natural disaster, plane crash, or plague of locusts .

How much money can you make on YouTube?

Sadly, this age-old question has one infuriating answer: it depends .

The sky is the limit, as 9-year old YouTuber and multi-millionaire Ryan Kaji’s story proves. But getting into 7-digit territory takes a lot of time, consistent work and luck.

YouTube revenue relies heavily on AdSense . In simple terms, YouTubers get paid for each ad view on their channel. But rates vary across geographies, demographics, and even industries (software ads may have a higher CPM than, for example, clothing ads).

On average, YouTubers make between $3 and $5 per 1,000 video views through AdSense . If your channel is reaching a lot of people, this can stack up to a pretty paycheck. It’s not uncommon for big creators to cash out upwards of $200,000 each month from AdSense alone.

But even if your channel is trending and AdSense revenue is filling up your bank account, remember that YouTube fame depends on many factors, some (or most) of which are out of your control — the YouTube algorithm can change, as can your audience’s tastes and needs.

To make sure that the money you make on YouTube turns into a healthy and consistent income, follow our 7 tips and branch out. Merch, branded deals and crowdfunding can make you money even if, for whatever reason, your AdSense paychecks go down.

With Hootsuite, you can easily upload, schedule, and promote your YouTube marketing videos across multiple social media networks from one dashboard. Try it free today.

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Paige Cooper is a lapsed librarian turned copywriter turned inbound marketing strategist who spends her days growing the Hootsuite Labs YouTube channel.

Karolina Mikolajczyk is a Team Lead on Hootsuite's Inbound team and an associate editor of the Hootsuite blog.

After completing her Master’s degree in English, Karolina launched her marketing career in 2014. Before joining Hootsuite in 2021, she worked with digital marketing agencies, SaaS startups, and international enterprise businesses, helping brands and social media content creators grow their online presence and improve conversions through SEO and content marketing strategies.

Karolina lives in Vancouver, BC. She likes to spend her free time bike touring wine bars and hanging out with her two cats, Juju and Tuna.

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10 Tried and Tested Ways to Make Money on YouTube in 2024

• how to make money on youtube

Have you ever wondered how your favorite YouTube creators make money from their videos? What if we told you there are a bunch of ways to do this on YouTube - even if you don’t have a ton of subscribers? 

In this one-stop-shop guide we’ll share with you 10 tried and tested ways to help you start making money on YouTube, including a section which will cover how you can do so even without making videos.

Here’s what we’ll cover: 

1. How to make money on YouTube with ads? 2. How to make money using YouTube Premium? 3. How to make money on YouTube through fan funding? 4. How to make money on YouTube by partnering with brands for sponsored content? 5. How to make money on YouTube videos through affiliate marketing? 6. How to make money on YouTube selling merchandise, digital products or services?  7. How to make money with music on YouTube (Content ID)? 8. How to make money on YouTube with product reviews?  9. How to make money on YouTube without showing your face? 10. How to make money on YouTube without making videos?

Sounds super interesting? Let’s jump right in.

1. How to make money on YouTube with ads? 

Advertising is the most common way for creators to earn money on YouTube. The YouTube Partner Program (YPP) allows creators to monetize their channels in a number of ways, but it’s primary use is for ad revenue. (We’ll talk about some other features later)

To set up your account for monetization, you’ll need to become a YouTube partner and create an AdSense account. AdSense is the platform through which you'll receive payments from YouTube, so this is a critical step. 

To set up your AdSense account, simply follow these steps , or go here and click "Sign up now".

Note: You can monetize more than one YouTube channel with the same AdSense account. So, if your brand has multiple YouTube accounts and you're setting up monetization features on each one, you’ll only need one AdSense account.

In order to qualify for the YouTube Partner Program, you’ll need: 

- At least 1,000 subscribers - At least 4,000 hours of watch time in the past 12 months - Reside in a country where the program is available 

( Click here for more details on the eligibility criteria )

To check whether you’re eligible for the YPP: 

- Navigate to the right corner of your screen, and click on the circle with your account name on it - Select YouTube Studio from the drop down menu - Click on Monetization on the right hand panel to see whether you have met the eligibility criteria 

Once you’ve met the minimum requirements, YouTube will review your application and make sure you’ve followed its policies before enabling monetization on your account. Once you’re accepted into YouTube’s Partner Program, all you have to do is turn on ads in your YouTube account to start earning!

Note: If you haven’t uploaded a video or posted on the Community tab in 6 months or more, YouTube can disable monetization - so make sure you stay active!

YouTube pays creators according to the number of ads watched , and not the number of times they watch your videos. You’ll start getting paid as soon as you’re accepted as a YouTube Partner, but you’ll only be able to transfer the money from your AdSense account after you’ve made your first $100. 

If you’d rather watch a video on YouTube payments, check this out:

For every 1,000 ad views, advertisers pay a certain rate to YouTube. YouTube then takes 45% and the creator gets the rest (55%). On average, YouTube monetization for 1000 views (also known as CPM – Cost Per Mille) ranges from $0.5 to $7. 

So for example, if you have 10k views at $1 per 1000, you’ll have earned $10 - but will only receive $5.5 in your Adsense account. 

The reason why it’s so difficult to talk about ‘average’ income when referring to YouTube is because it depends on a number of factors. 

This includes:

- Location of your viewers: creators in the US command the highest ad rates - Time of year : ad rates skyrocket from November-December and drop in January - Type of content: finance videos and tech product reviews are usually higher paid  - Video length: YouTube allows creators to include a second ad after 8 minutes, which has led to many creators being able to double their revenue on longer videos - Target audience

While these factors will contribute to your base rate, how much money you earn on YouTube is largely dependent on the number of views your videos receive. 

If you need help retaining your audience and increasing views, check out this blog. 

Please note that your content could get excluded from ad revenue if it doesn’t conform to YouTube’s guidelines on advertiser-friendly content. This includes sexually suggestive content, content with violence, inappropriate language, controversial subjects and more. Read the guidelines carefully to make sure your videos don’t get excluded. 

Pro-tip: Create YouTube videos like a professional even if you’ve never edited a video before with InVideo's library of 5000+ ready-to-use templates . 

2. How to make money using YouTube Premium?

YouTube Premium is a subscription service that offers users access to exclusive content and ad-free viewing. While creators earn revenue through ads on the free version, YouTube Premium offers a share of their revenue from subscriptions, which can give your income a healthy boost. 

The basis for revenue on YouTube Premium is based on watch time. Watch time is the total amount of time in aggregate that viewers spend watching your videos.

So for example, if one channel receives a higher watch time than another, it gets a larger chunk of the money, which means you’re competing with other YouTubers for a share of watch time. However Premium members can also download your videos to watch offline on mobile and play them in the background — which can help substantially increase your watch time.

You receive a 55% share from YouTube’s subscription revenue. So if you’ve earned $100 from YouTube Premium, $55 will be transferred to your AdSense account at the end of the month. 

To see how much money you’ve earned from YouTube Premium you’ll have to navigate to the Revenue section in YouTube Studio. Here’s an example of Cathrin Manning ’s YouTube Premium analytics for the month of September.

If you’ve already turned on ads for your YouTube videos, you won’t need to do anything to start earning money from YouTube Premium. YouTube will automatically transfer any additional income earned from ad-free views to your AdSense account along with your earnings from ads. 

While it’s unlikely you’ll make as much money from Premium as you would from ads, it can still give your income a healthy boost. 

It might take some time to earn money with ads and watch time on YouTube - and you’ll only start bringing in a significant amount once you have a ton of views. 

Pro tip: For YouTube, experts suggest that your videos have a run time of over 10 minutes so that you can maximise on ad revenue. But at the same time, unless your channel specifically. makes super long form content, stick to videos between 10-15 minutes long to keep engagement rates high. The best part about making videos under 15 minutes long is that you don’t need to download any editing software. You can actually edit these videos online by signing up for a free account on InVideo.

Create pro YouTube videos easily

Without learning pro skills

If you’re concerned about how to make money posting videos on YouTube when you don’t have a large following, we’ve got you! The following ideas we’ve covered don’t need you to be a YouTube Partner to start earning. 

3. How to make money on YouTube through fan funding?

Your audience are your biggest champions. Whether you have a large following or a small number of highly engaged subscribers, getting your fans to support you can be a fantastic way to bring in some money. Fans can support you through channel memberships, SuperChats, Super Thanks (YouTube Partners only) or fan funding platforms.

A. Channel Memberships

Channel memberships let viewers support your channel through monthly payments in exchange for member-only perks. YouTube allows you to set up to five levels of membership and add custom perks at each level. This can include member-only videos, live streams, community posts, as well as custom channel badges, shoutouts, and emojis. Creators can charge what they like for each level. For channel memberships, YouTube takes a 30% cut.

For example, popular YouTubers Prince Charming offers viewers the opportunity to support his channel from as little as $2.99.

B. Super Chats

If you’re a gamer or a livestreamer Super Chats is one of the best available options for you to make money off YouTube. It allows YouTube Partners to create a tipping jar for viewers to donate whenever and however much they feel like during live streams and make their comments more visible (and therefore more likely to receive attention). Comments are highlighted in vibrant colors - red, green or blue - and include the donor’s name, and how much money they have spent. 

Here’s an example of a user donating to highlight their comment in a gamer’s Super Chat.

Viewers can pay between $1 and $500 to get their comment pinned at the top of the chat. The amount of time a comment stays pinned depends on how much money the viewer spends. For example, a $100 Super Chat stays pinned in the live chat for one hour; a $300 Super Chat stays pinned for three hours. 

C. Super Thanks

Super Thanks , is similar to Super Chats but allows fans to donate to videos, and not just live streams. The feature allows viewers to thank creators for their videos by clicking on a heart emoji next to a video. 

For example, on Ali Abdaal’s channel you can donate between $2-$50 on any of his videos using Super Thanks.

YouTube Partners can also get access to a merchandise shelf where creators can sell custom merch. We’ll cover this further in our section on merchandising . 

D. Fan funding

Fan funding platforms allow users who appreciate your content to support your work through one-time or monthly donations - and you don’t need to be a YouTube Partner to start! Recurring donations from even a small number of fans can provide you with a steady additional income. Like YouTube channel memberships, most creators provide fans who donate with a few perks and freebies to make them feel valued and thank them for their support. 

Some popular fan funding options include:

One of most popular fan funding platforms, Patreon makes it really easy for creators to get paid. Fans can subscribe to their favorite creators for as little as a dollar a month and receive exclusive rewards. Patreon also allows you to launch membership-only video channels through YouTube at a small fee per month.

Dream’s Patreon page is a great example of receiving support from the Patreon community. Note how you can support their work for as little as $5 a month. Providing a wide range of support options makes it easier for more people to show their support.

2) Buy me a coffee

An easy way to get supporters to give small amounts equivalent to a cup of coffee. The best part is that it’s really easy to set up and use - you can get a custom link in less than 5 minutes!

Nick Nimmin , uses Buy me a Coffee to ask for support for his podcast, Comments over Coffee. This works well since they’re both coffee themed and incentives listeners to support him for $5 a coffee. 

Lets you get a combination of both one-off and recurring donations - especially useful if you’re organizing in-person events. The platform is quite popular in Europe

Francois Theurel , a French writer and director, uses Tipee to ask viewers to support his YouTube channel where he reviews popular films. 

4. How to make money on YouTube by partnering with brands for sponsored content?

Brands are investing more and more of their marketing budgets on influencer marketing, targeting YouTube creators with a loyal following. This creates a massive opportunity for creators, especially as YouTube is the highest-paid platform for brand partnerships. While brand sponsorships are usually reserved for the more famous YouTubers, companies also look to engage with micro-influencers, so don’t immediately dismiss the idea if you don’t have a ton of subscribers. If you’re looking at how to make money vlogging on YouTube, brand sponsorships can be one of the most profitable avenues.

Take, for example, vlogger Natalie Barbu. Her vlog (shown below) gives her audience a peek into her daily routine, focusing on her planning process. So she covers softwares like Asana and Google Calendar and finally introduces Skillshare, which is sponsored. This fits in organically with her content and doesn’t disrupt the user experience for her viewers whilst still letting her work with brands on her channel.

If you’re looking for brand partnerships, a good way to get started is to add your channel to an influencer marketplace to get discovered by brands both large and small. Here’s a few you can reach out to:

- Intellifluence influencer marketing network, specializing in influencers ranging from peer level micro-influencers up to minor celebrities with millions of followers. - Upfluence is a self-serve platform, allowing it to set its pricing at a level affordable by small and medium-sized businesses, although companies like Microsoft and PayPal also utilize its services. - Heepsy is a great influencer marketing platform with a network of both micro-influencers (as low as 5k followers) and macro-influencers, making it a good place to be if you have a smaller following. 

Businesses on influencer marketplaces range from those who offer free products in exchange for features, to brands willing to pay large amounts for the right influencer. Select platforms that best suit your needs - but sign up for a couple, since it’s a good idea to list yourself in as many places as possible to ensure maximum visibility and get the right brands to come to you.

When partnering with a brand, be up-front about it to your audience. Choose the brands you work with carefully and don’t endorse anything you don’t actually like or believe in, since this could do more harm in the long-term. 

It is good practice to include a disclaimer along with your affiliate links to be as transparent as possible about your income. See how Nick Nimmin does this on his videos: 

Your negotiating power will depend on a number of factors including - audience demographics, reach, content quality, and how unique and profitable your niche is. Brands usually pay between 5 to 15 cents per view, but you might be able to negotiate a better deal if the brand is a good fit.

If you’re looking to work with brands and have a strong following you might also want to think about getting verified on YouTube for greater credibility.

5. How to make money on YouTube videos through affiliate marketing?

If you’re looking for ways to make money on YouTube videos, you can’t ignore the earning potential affiliate marketing brings to the table.

Affiliate marketing is when a creator like you earns a commission for marketing a company’s products. Each affiliate (i.e. creator), is given a custom link through which their audience can purchase featured products or services. Affiliates then get a percentage of every purchase made through their unique link. Since there's little risk involved for the brand (they only pay when they make sales), almost anyone can sign up for an affiliate link, making it very easy to get started. 

Here’s an example of how Marques Brownlee , a YouTuber famous for his product tech reviews adds affiliate links to products in his videos. 

Begin by approaching brands working in your niche that use products you already love. Make sure your viewers would want to use the products you feature - if you do art tutorials, it’s more likely that viewers will want to purchase brushes or paint rather than the equipment you use to make your videos. 

It’s quite common to directly approach companies in the ecommerce space for affiliate opportunities, and brands are usually responsive. You can also sign up to one of the affiliate programs mentioned below.

Popular affiliate programs include:

- Click Bank - earn from 1% to 75% commission depending on the vendor - Amazon's Affiliate network - you can earn up to 10% per sale -  Walmart Affiliate Program - earn up to 4% on eligible sales. Only for creators based in the US

In fact, we at InVideo have a super lucrative affiliate program ourselves that you can check out here .

You can review products, do endorsements or make a vlog of your favourite new brand and add your affiliate link in the YouTube video description . 

Place affiliate links in your video descriptions, through pinned comments or in your replies to subscribers in the comments. 

Note: Don’t forget to add an affiliate disclaimer, clearly stating that you will get a commission on any purchases made. It’s important to be as transparent as possible when it comes to paid placements and ads, so always disclose affiliate links (or brand partnerships) to viewers.

6. How to make money on YouTube selling merchandise, digital products or services?

Selling a product or service that’s relevant to your audience is a great way to make an income from YouTube. If you have a smaller audience, advertising custom t-shirts, ebooks and other digital products can become a significant revenue stream that’s not dependent on millions of views. 

YouTube now offers its YouTube Partner Program members the option of merchandising by integrating third-party merchandising platforms on YouTube. 

For example, YouTuber Millie Adrian , has integrated Spreadshirt with her YouTube page - note the additional tab on the menu bar - so viewers can purchase her merchandise directly from YouTube. 

If you’re not a YouTube Partner yet, you can still create a third-party store and add links to it in your video descriptions. Once you’ve met the criteria for merchandising on YouTube, all you have to do is plug this in. You’ll need at least 10,000 subscribers to activate YouTube’s merchandise feature.

Here are a few sites where you can create and sell merchandise for your channel:

- Spreadshirt (integrates with YouTube) - Teespring (integrates with YouTube) - Redbubble - Amazon Merch

Don’t forget to use your merch in your own videos to get people to buy. Funny slogans or taglines are quite popular, so if you’re worried about developing complicated designs - just use words.

Learn more about setting up merchandising by watching this video: 

You can also sell digital products like courses or e-books based on your expertise. Digital products can offer YouTubers a steady long-term passive income, for a one-time effort. For example a cookery channel could sell a recipe book, or offer a monthly paid cooking session to interested subscribers. The most important thing while selling products is making sure you offer value to your subscribers - if you can’t take the time out to create an ebook, it’s better to stick to the easier option of merchandising. 

Don’t forget to provide links to your products or services in your video to make it easy for users to purchase your products after watching

7. How to make money with music on YouTube: Content ID  

If you’re interested in knowing how to make money singing on YouTube or creating your own music, a content ID could help you multiply your revenue. What’s more - you don’t have to be part of the YouTube Partner Program to start earning.

What is a content ID?

A Content ID is a tracking device for audio files that can identify your music when used in other videos on YouTube. This allows you to generate ad revenue from any video content that contains your copyrighted sound recordings. Your content must be original, so if you’re looking to share mashups, compilations, remixes, or audiovisual works that have additional authors, you won’t be able to monetize it.

How does it work?

Upload your music using a digital distributor , and opt for monetization (you can also apply for a Content ID yourself, but this can get complicated). YouTube will then begin searching for videos that use your music. When a video is found using your music, an ad will be placed on that video. As the artist, you’ll get a portion of the ad revenue.

Besides your own music, think about creating soundtracks that people may want to use in their videos, since this is likely to be used more often and get you more revenue. 

Pro Tip: Access millions of stock videos, photos, animations, filters, and music tracks only on InVideo .

Learn more about monetization through content IDs here:

In order to get started with a content ID, we recommend signing up with a digital distributor that manages the distribution of your content across digital channels (including Spotify or Amazon Music). Here are a few you can reach out to:

- DistroKid - one of the most popular music distributors around - CD Baby - offers a one time fee instead of a yearly or monthly subscription - AWAL - your content will have to be approved before you join their network

8. How to make money on YouTube with product reviews?

Software and tech products are the most common types of product reviews around - probably because they’re also the ones that make the most money. 

Tech companies often pay YouTubers or supply them with free gear for additional exposure during new product releases. The key to getting paid for product reviews is to find your niche and build a strong community around it. 

If your channel is too general you’ll find it difficult to communicate your value to companies looking for exposure, as a niche demonstrates in-depth knowledge and expertise. Companies want to work with experts in their field rather than a generalist who reviews everything from shopping sites to toys and tech. You’ll also find it harder to compete with the thousands of other YouTubers doing the same thing. 

Even if you have a smaller number of subscribers, if your community is strong, companies will readily send you free products to review. Check out this video for some tips on how to get free products to review. 

How to make money on YouTube as a kid - using product reviews?

Reviewing games and toys can be a great way to get discovered as a kid on YouTube while sharing the toys you love and use often. Ryan Kaji, star of the children’s YouTube channel Ryan’s World, who reviews toys and games is one of the highest earning YouTubers in the world. 

If you’re trying to figure out how to make money on YouTube under 18, there are a couple of things you need to keep in mind: 

- In 2020, YouTube was fined for violating the Children's Online Privacy Protection Act (COPPA), and was forced to curb advertising on kids channels. This has severely restricted income opportunities.  - You’re only allowed to post videos if you’re over 13 and a parent or guardian will have to accept terms and set up your AdSense account for payment. - It is illegal to create a channel on your own if you’re under 13. You will need parental supervision to create and post videos on YouTube  - For Parents: As a parent, it’s important to monitor and guide your child if they want to start their own channel. Don’t forget to mark your channel as ‘Made for Kids’ to enable other children to find you. If creators fail to label their channels correctly they risk being fined by the FTC.

Children’s content remains some of the most popular videos on the site , so the potential of kids creating content on YouTube can’t be ignored. 

Reviewing toys and other products made for kids is a great niche to get started with - you can make money through affiliate links , sponsorships or ask toy companies for free products. 

9. How to make money on YouTube without showing your face?

If you want to learn how to make money on YouTube, but you’re camera shy, don’t be discouraged - there’s a ton of ways to make videos without having to show your face! 

Product reviews , unboxing videos , software tutorials and even cooking videos don’t need you to be in the video to be successful. If you’re nervous about speaking, overlay a soundtrack and simply add text to your video to highlight features or give instructions. 

In this software tutorial by Sali Kaceli , he uses overlaid text to signal a new chapter or give instructions to viewers. Viewers who want to learn how to use Excel, might find watching him speak more distracting and prefer to observe the steps and instructions on the screen to better understand how to replicate this on their own.

For more super ideas on how to make money on YouTube without showing your face, check out this video:

Using video templates for your Faceless Videos

While making faceless videos, it’s important to stick to a particular style or theme as this will help subscribers easily identify your work and keep your YouTube channel consistent. A video template is a great way to achieve consistency and you can easily replicate the same template for new videos. It will also help speed up the editing process and make your videos look more professional. 

We, at InVideo have made it super easy for you to find and customise a template for your YouTube videos,with a library of 5000+ video templates to choose from, so you’ll be sure to find one that’s a good fit. 

To search for templates go to InVideo , and search for the type of video you want to create. You can also scroll through all the templates currently available. 

You can edit your video using a template on InVideo in 5 easy steps: 

Step 1: Log in or sign up for InVideo (you can sign up for a free version)

Step 2: Search for pre-made templates using keywords or scroll through the templates available. 

Step 3: Select a template you’d like and click, ‘Use this template.’ 

Step 4: Edit your template. InVideo’s library contains a ton of royalty free tracks and stock images you can use for your faceless videos. Add text, images, audio from the side panel. You can also customize your video by animating your text. 

Step 5: When you’re done editing, preview your video and if you’re satisfied select download. You can also share your video directly on YouTube.

Note: If you’re using InVideo’s free version, your videos will contain a watermark. You can upgrade to their subscription plan at less than $10 a month.

10. How to make money on YouTube without making videos?

Let’s face it, creating high-quality videos that garner the level of support you’ll need to monetize them isn’t easy. Instead, think about creating compilation videos. Curating videos is so in-demand that YouTubers who create compilation videos can have millions of subscribers and views. 

Before you start, think about genres that you’re an expert in or topics you would like to curate for - it’s important to find your niche since this will help you select the best possible clips. Once you’ve decided the type of videos you’d like to compile, all you have to do is select a few good clips and edit them together. Finding the right clips is a talent in itself, since along with the more popular videos, you’ll also have to include some that are great but haven’t had as many views. This adds value to your subscribers who don’t want to spend time looking for videos themselves, and trust that you’ve found the best stuff on the internet for your niche.

WIN Compilation , has a channel with over 100,000 subscribers just from curating great videos. Their ‘Best of’ series is wildly popular and can get up to half a million views:

YouTube has a library of videos that fall under the Creative Commons License, which lets you publish other people’s content and earn money from it. If you find a video with the CC-BY license , you can use and tailor it to your liking. You can also use copyrighted content provided you follow the Fair Use Doctrine , which allows the use of short clips for the purpose of comment, criticism or news. So you’ll have to include an opinion or add some graphics in order to fall within these protections.

For example, “Spill Sesh” the popular YouTube gossip channel with over 500k subscribers, summarizes the latest drama of famous YouTubers. The creator herself never appears on camera, but provides commentary while playing short clips and screenshots from other YouTubers’ videos which may be copyrighted.

And we’re done! 

Wrapping Up

YouTube as a platform is ever growing and now you have 10 different ways you can leverage it to make money off it. Remember, your YouTube channel can be monetized even if you don’t have millions of subscribers. Your earning potential isn’t only determined by the number of subscribers and views you have, but also by engagement levels, your niche, and the revenue channels you explore.

If you’re just starting out on YouTube, you would want to check out this step-by-step guide on how to make a YouTube video and this checklist of essential YouTube equipment for every budget. You can also check out this compilation of 16 first YouTube video ideas that can help you hit the road running.

And if you're looking to create gold-standard videos in minutes, sign up for  InVideo today!

Last but not least, if you have any questions or want to continue the conversation, you can hop over to the InVideo community and learn from 25K other marketers and video creators just like you!

1. How many views do you need to make $1000 on YouTube? 

Asking how many views on YouTube to make money isn't an accurate question since the exact amount of money you’ll make on a video depends on a number of factors - including advertiser interest and location. For example, content created in the US can get more money for views than elsewhere but a channel promoting tech products will probably earn more through advertising than one about cat videos. 

On average, to make $1000 you’ll need to have a million views. At the high end, that’s about $0.002, or one-fifth of a cent, per click.

2. How much money does 1 million YouTube views make? 

YouTube advertising rates vary wildly so making an estimate is difficult. Expect to earn between $1,000 to $2,000 for a million views. While the number of views determines how much you get paid, technically you are paid by the number of ads your audience views and not the views of your video. 

The amount of money YouTube will pay depends on:

- The number of views your video receives - The number of clicks an ad receives - Ad type - skippable vs. non-skippable (Advertisers pay more for non-skippable ads since users watch them from start to finish)  - Ad Blockers (if viewers use ad blockers, you won’t receive any revenue)  - Video length (YouTube allows you to run a second ad after 8 minutes. Longer videos can sometimes earn twice or thrice the amount because of this) - Location (YouTubers based in the US earn higher rates than those elsewhere) 

3. Do you need 1000 subscribers on YouTube to get paid? 

Yes, but this is not the only thing you’ll need. You’ll have to sign up for the YouTube Partner Program and meet the following basic criteria:

- Have at least 1,000 subscribers - Reach 4,000 valid public watch hours in the past 12 months - Create an AdSense account

You’ll also have to be approved to join the partner program. After which, you’ll only get paid if you reach a balance of $100 or more from views. This means you’ll need to garner 20,000 views if you receive $5 per 1,000 views to get paid by YouTube. 

If you’re asking how many subscribers do you need to make money on youtube, the answer is 1000, but only having 1000 subscribers won’t get you paid. 

4. Does YouTube pay every month?

Yes, Youtube pays on a monthly basis - in most cases via direct deposit on the 21st of the month. The money will arrive through your AdSense account. YouTubers outside the United States may be paid by mailed checks or wire transfers if AdSense isn’t available in their region. 

Earnings are transferred the following month. For example earnings accrued in June will be transferred to AdSense in mid-July. Finalized YouTube earnings for the previous month are added to your AdSense account balance between the 7th and 10th of the month. 

The earnings are paid out if you meet certain eligibility criteria: 

- Your earnings reach your local payment threshold   - There are no holds on your account - Monetization is not suspended for your channel - You're in compliance with YouTube monetization policies

5. How to see how much money you make on YouTube?

If you’re in the YouTube Partner Program, the Revenue tab will show you how much money you’re currently earning from your videos, and which ones are the most profitable. 

To view your revenue reports:

1. Sign in to YouTube Studio . 2. From the left menu, select Analytics . 3. From the top menu, select Revenue .

Here you will see revenue earned based on 3 criteria, RPM (the amount of money you’ve earned from several revenue sources per 1,000 video views), CPM (your estimated average gross revenue per 1000 playbacks where one or more ads are shown) and monthly estimated revenue. 

Unless you're part of a multi-channel network (MCN), all payments are issued through your AdSense account once the earnings have been finalized.

View your finalized earnings: 

To view your finalized earnings you’ll have to visit your AdSense account. Finalized earnings for the previous month are added to your AdSense account balance between the 7th and 10th of each month.

Here's how to view your finalized earnings in AdSense:

1. Sign in to your AdSense account. 2. On the left, select Settings and then Payments.  3. You'll see your total earnings for the selected timeframe and your last transactions.

For more on how to see how much money you make on YouTube click here . 

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The Ultimate Guide to YouTube Monetization in 2024

YouTube has more than 2.49 billion users globally , making it the second most popular search engine globally . You may not have started a YouTube channel for the sole purpose of making money, but there are numerous ways your uploads can generate income for you. 

If you have high-quality content that people want to see, you can succeed as a creator on this platform because of the size of the audience. This guide will walk you through the process of monetizing your YouTube channel in 2024.  

• The Ultimate Guide to YouTube Monetization in 2024:

What Is YouTube Monetization, and How Does It Work?

How to make money on youtube, how to increase views on your youtube videos, frequently asked questions.

YouTube monetization means earning revenue from your YouTube videos. The YouTube monetization model is relatively straightforward. To make money from YouTube, you must first become a YouTube Partner by joining the YouTube Partner Program . To join this program, your YouTube channel must:

• Follow the official YouTube channel monetization policies.
• Be based in a country where the program is available. See the list of eligible countries here.
• Have no active Community Guideline strikes.
• Have 2-Step Verification turned on. This applies to the Google Account your YouTube channel is registered with.
• Have access to the advanced features on YouTube. See the list of features here .
• Have active Google Adsense linked to your YouTube account. You can also set up new Adsense by following the official YouTube Help Guide .

Businesses that want to advertise on YouTube create these adverts through Google AdSense Network. 

These advertisements can be displayed at any point throughout the video. Owners of these videos are compensated each time a viewer sees the complete advertisement.

YouTube Monetization Policies

When you're aiming to make money on YouTube, it's essential to follow YouTube's monetization policies . These rules are designed to ensure that your content is suitable for advertising and aligns with the platform's standards. They cover various aspects, including YouTube’s Community Guidelines, Terms of Service, Copyright, Rights Clearance Adjustment policies, and specific program policies.

Key Policies for Monetization

• Advertiser-Friendly Content: Your videos need to be suitable for advertisers. This means avoiding content that could be considered offensive or inappropriate. Ad-friendly guidelines are crucial for maintaining monetization through ads.
• Commerce Product Module (CPM): To use fan funding features like Super Chat or channel memberships, you must accept the CPM and adhere to the associated policies .
• Reviewer Assessments: YouTube's reviewers regularly check channels to ensure compliance. They look at your channel’s main theme, most viewed videos, newest videos, biggest proportion of watch time, video metadata, and your channel’s "About" section. This comprehensive review helps maintain the quality of monetized content.
• Community Guidelines: Every video and the overall channel must comply with YouTube’s Community Guidelines . Violations can lead to demonetization or content removal.
• Program Policies: Being part of the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) requires compliance with all program policies and YouTube’s Terms of Service . This includes avoiding repetitious content that offers little variation or value.
• Content Quality for Kids and Families: If your channel is marked as "made for kids," it must meet specific quality principles to stay monetized. Low-quality content can lead to suspension from the YPP.
• Creator Responsibility and Integrity: Maintaining honest and respectful behavior is crucial. Deceptive practices or artificially inflating engagement metrics can result in penalties, including temporary or permanent demonetization.
• Policy Updates: YouTube frequently updates its policies to adapt to changes in the platform and regulatory environment. Stay informed by checking YouTube’s policy changelog regularly to ensure your content remains compliant.

If you are looking for ways to make an income off your YouTube channel, here are 12 ways you can do so:

• YouTube Partner Program
• Through affiliate marketing
• Being a YouTube Influencer
• Channel memberships
• Content licensing 
• YouTube Shorts Fund
• YouTube Premium revenue
• Selling online courses
• Selling merchandise
• Super chat and super stickers
• Crowdfunding
• Driving traffic to your blog using YouTube videos

1. YouTube Partner Program

To begin earning money from your YouTube videos, you must first become a member of the YouTube Partner Program . AdSense monetization of YouTube videos using Google AdSense is one of the most prevalent and straightforward methods of generating income from your YouTube videos. 

Once you've linked your YouTube channel to your Google AdSense account, you'll be able to submit your videos in consideration of monetization through AdSense. If your video meets the monetization requirements set out by YouTube, it will be authorized for monetization. You must meet the following requirements to join the YouTube Partner Program:

• Have at least 1,000 subscribers
• You must have at least 4,000 hours of watch time in the past 12 months
• Adhere to the above-mentioned YouTube Partner Program requirements

Before permitting monetization on your account, YouTube verifies your application and ensures that you have complied with its regulations. Getting a response from YouTube about your application for its Partner Program might take up to a month.  

The only thing left to do is switch on advertising on your YouTube account once you've been accepted into the YouTube Partner Program and start making money from ads.

What if Your Application for the YouTube Partner Program Was Unsuccessful? What Are Your Options?

If your application for the YouTube Partner Program is turned down, you will be given a broad explanation. There is no way to know exactly what material caused the rejection, so you may have to edit your channel based on guesswork. But the good news is that you can reapply in 30 days .

If you believe that any of your videos violate the community's rules, you should make the necessary changes. You may have to remove copyrighted material from your video and re-upload it as a last resort.

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2. Affiliate Marketing

Another lucrative source of income for YouTubers is affiliate marketing . When you promote a product through affiliate marketing, you’ll get paid a commission . Signing up for an affiliate program is the first step to achieving this. 

There are various options available depending on your location. Each affiliate is provided with a unique link that directs customers to the promoted product or service. You can promote your affiliate link by creating video marketing for that particular product and then include your affiliate link in the video description.

Any of the following might work as a suitable video:

• a review of the product 
• an unboxing video
• a how-to video 

Remember to p ut an affiliate disclaimer , telling your audience that you will get paid a commission if they purchase through your link. You can mention that in the video or include it in your video description as well.

For every sale completed through your unique link, you will gain commissions. Find affiliate programs for products in your niche or register with affiliate networks. The following are a few well-known networks for affiliate marketing:

• ClickBank 
• Amazon Associates

3. Be a YouTube Influencer

Influencer marketing and sponsorships are becoming increasingly popular, and brands are spending their marketing budget on influencers who have already gained the trust of their target demographic. 

If you can get the appropriate partnerships, this opens up many possibilities for you as a creator. Influencers on YouTube may earn a substantial amount by advertising products and services from businesses , just like in affiliate marketing.

Companies would be interested in working with you if you have a large and engaged following and your content is relevant to their target market. Getting brands to partner with you can be difficult, especially if you don't have a large following. 

One way to overcome this barrier is to sign up with an influencer marketing agency like Viral Nation and Fanbytes by Brainlabs.  As a rule of thumb, it's better to list yourself on as many platforms as possible to ensure maximum exposure and attract the right businesses.

Always remember to label advert videos as “ paid promotion ” if you're producing sponsored content. Google's ad policies should also be followed to avoid penalties on your account.

4. Channel Memberships

Source: youtube.com

Channel memberships allow viewers to support your channel by making monthly payments in return for exclusive benefits available only to members. Up to five tiers of YouTube membership may be created, with specific bonuses added to each level as you go through them. 

To create one, you must have a minimum of 1,000 subscribers and be over 18 to be eligible . If you want to use this feature, you must also be a YouTube Partner Program member.

To receive bonus content or unique privileges, you'll be able to ask your subscribers to become members of your channel, who will then be required to pay a little monthly charge ranging between $0.99 and $100 in exchange . 

If, for any reason, you violate the community standards or have your account canceled, your members will get a refund for the most recent month of their membership.

5. Content Licensing

Your content can be licensed for money if you ever manage to make a big-hit viral video . Most likely, you’ll have requests to utilize your YouTube video from different media sites requesting to use that particular video! 

Since that video is licensed, they will have to pay to use it in their channel or publication. You can do this for some of your most popular videos. 

To make it easier for others to get in touch if they want to use your viral video, you should include an email address in your “about page” on your YouTube channel. It's also an option to list your videos in a marketplace so that the right people can quickly locate and purchase your content.

6. YouTube Shorts Fund

YouTube Shorts are short, vertical videos, mostly generated with a smartphone and posted straight to YouTube using the YouTube app, similar to how Instagram Stories are uploaded to Instagram. The maximum video length for a YouTube short is 60 seconds . 

So how do you as a creator make money from this? Well, through YouTube Monetization.  YouTube Shorts monetization began in May 2021 with this initial stage. 

Only the creators of YouTube Shorts who match the platform's criteria will be compensated. The following requirements must be satisfied to be eligible for YouTube Shorts rewards:

• At least 1,000 subscribers
• At least 10 million valid views in the last 90 days

7. YouTube Premium Revenue

YouTube Premium allows creators to replace YouTube ads with ad-free viewing to generate an additional source of revenue. Subscribers to YouTube Premium do not see any advertisements, regardless of who generated the content. Instead, a percentage of the membership money received by YouTube Premium is distributed to the content creators who created the video .

A user's monthly money is distributed between the creators whose videos they have seen the most during the month if they have a YouTube Premium membership. If you're already a monetized creator, all that is required is that your content is watched by YouTube Premium subscribers.

8. Sell Online Courses

Creating and selling online courses are fantastic methods to generate money on YouTube. Offering an online course is a great way to make your skills more marketable to your audience. As long as your course offers something of value to your subscribers, they'll be more than happy to invest their money and sign up.

An online course might be in the form of an e-book or a video. Remember that whichever format you use, be sure to provide high-quality content that impacts your audience and delivers value. It is easy for people to know if you underdeliver, which can make people start doubting your services or stop interacting with your channel. As a result, you can lose out on a lot of potential income.

9. Sell Merchandise

If you want to make money from your audience, you should consider selling merchandise to them. Buying shirts, caps, and notebooks is a great way for subscribers to demonstrate their support for your channel. This approach is the most effective for channels with larger audiences.

If you want to sell your designs, you can upload them to Printful or Printify's online platform, where consumers can purchase them and get them by mail straight from the platform. The good news is that you don't even need to be involved in the process.

In addition to boosting your channel's subscriber count, selling branded products is a terrific method to monetize your YouTube channel and earn visibility for your business online and offline. 

It's easier to make money by selling merchandise than using AdSense. Rather than depending on the number of hours watched or views accrued, you're banking on a steadily expanding fan base to keep buying your merchandise. You must be 18 years old and have 1,000 subscribers or have an  Official Artist Channel to use the merchandising feature.

10. Super Chat and Super Stickers

Another excellent technique to generate money on YouTube is via Super Chat and Super Stickers. This feature is accessible to you as a YouTube Partner when live streaming . Super Chat or Super Stickers may be activated in a live chat for a small fee to make your subscribers’ messages stand out from the rest. 

They will also receive personalized badges and emoticons during your live sessions. In addition, they get access to members-only benefits like live chats with you. To be eligible, you must be at least 18 years old and reside in a country where Super Chat is available.

11. Crowdfund

Source: gofundme.com

Even though you already use channel memberships, there are additional ways for you to earn money from your viewers. Crowdfunding using YouTube can help you generate money as a creator. Be mindful though as this might be off-putting to some of your subscribers since it might come off as begging. 

In truth, if you provide high-quality videos, people will be more than happy to give money to your channel. Also, your success is determined by your specialization and the benefits that you can provide your funders. To raise money for your project, check out crowdfunding websites like Kickstarter or GoFundMe.

12. Driving Traffic to Your Blog Using YouTube Videos

YouTube is an excellent tool for creators to advertise their brand, gain new customers, and improve their website or blog traffic. An ad-supported or monetized website or blog may entice users to explore more and gain further insight into the subject matter you're discussing. Most websites or blogs see an increase in revenue as their traffic increases. 

The first step is to create a blog using the same name and logo you already have on your YouTube channel.  Your blog and YouTube channel should appear and feel the same, so make sure they have a lot in common in terms of design. 

Once it is set up, you can include the link to your blog or website in the video link description.

Getting a significant number of views on your videos is necessary to get consistent revenue from your YouTube channel. Here are eleven tips on how to boost your YouTube views.

Create Good Content

It doesn't matter how many strategies and advertising campaigns you employ for video creation. To achieve success on YouTube, you must create videos that people want to watch and watch all the way through. 

In the end, it all boils down to the quality of your content . If you're unwilling to provide value to your audience, you won't make your content marketing effective. First, determine what information your potential customers want to know before creating videos that can solve their problems.

Improve Your Video's Search Ranking by Doing Research

Apart from being a social media platform, YouTube also serves as a search engine, like Google. YouTube SEO, or  optimizing your videos  for search, is a proven way to increase views on your videos. 

YouTube SEO is a powerful way to rank your videos. It is important to research and use keywords related to your content when uploading or editing a video on YouTube.

Businesses, bloggers, and video marketers use this method to get their videos to rank higher in YouTube search results. This strategy involves understanding YouTube's algorithm and optimizing your video with those specific requirements.

YouTube SEO can be done by adding keywords and tags in the video description, title, and tags section. You should also include keywords in the video’s title, description, tags and thumbnail.

YouTube's algorithm considers several factors in determining which videos appear in search results. You can use tools like vidIQ or TubeBuddy for your SEO research.

Have Keyword-Rich Descriptions

The description of your video may convey your message more effectively to both search engines and your visitors. Having the ability to catch the attention of your viewers is essential for the ranking of long-tail keywords. 

Use End Screens and Cards 

The length of time spent watching a video is a good indicator of how interested viewers are in the subject. The greater the number of individuals who view your YouTube video, the greater their interest in what you have to say. Another advantage of having a solid relationship with the audience is that they are more inclined to view additional content from you in the future. 

YouTube cards are banner-like alerts that appear in the top right corner of your video and direct your viewers to a piece of content. An end screen, similar to a card, is intended to direct your most engaged viewers to a related piece of content. When your video is ready to come to a close, an end screen appears.

Customize Your Thumbnails

One of the most effective techniques to get your YouTube channel recognized is to create your own  YouTube thumbnails . A good title and thumbnail can work together to attract a viewer's interest. It is essential to create thumbnails for your videos since it makes them more appealing and helps to project a much more professional look. 

No research is required for the creation of a compelling thumbnail. Using the same font and style across the template will make it more unified and consistent with the channel's branding. For example, you can see that the most popular YouTubers all have a unified style for their video thumbnails.

Source: MrBeast

You can also use basic graphic design tools  like Canva to achieve this. 

Transcribing Your Video Content

When it comes to YouTube videos, there has been a lot of debate over whether including subtitles or transcripts can help you rank higher in search engines. Closed captions, on the other hand, can enhance YouTube views since they appeal to viewers from various countries and those who are visually impaired.

To receive the most number of views possible from YouTube's organic results, you must appear high in the search results on Google. Most YouTubers are tempted to go the quick route and buy views.  But this is not a long-term solution because YouTube’s algorithms monitor behavioral analytics more than traditional metrics, like views. 

Create a Blog Post for Each Video

Blogging is one way you can make money off YouTube through traffic. You can drive traffic from your blog to your YouTube channel. It takes a little more work to convert your videos to blogs, but with time, it yields results. 

Posting videos is a tried-and-true method of improving the quality of the user experience of those prospects who like to watch rather than read. You can embed your YouTube video into your blog post and watch your views increase.

Create Playlists

The playlists you create should allow people to see your content in the order it was created. The remainder of your videos will begin to play whenever the first video ends, increasing the number of views for each one as the series progresses.

You may increase the number of people who view a playlist by publishing it on your channel, embedding it, or asking your subscribers to share it with their friends. Each one should be unique from the others, and the order in which they are played should add to the overall flow and relevance of the set. Below is an example of how these playlists look.

Source: Mark Rober

Work With Other Creators in Your Niche

Some of YouTube's most popular creators have benefited from cooperating with other users to reach a broader audience. With each video you collaborate on, you will get new subscribers. Furthermore, if you collaborate with a well-known and renowned content creator, their viewers are more likely to become subscribers. 

To have a successful YouTube collaboration, finding the right partner is critical. You should collaborate with creators who share your industry's interests for your video to look more professional. Sticking on the subject of popular YouTubers, here's an example of two popular faces on the platform collaborating.

Source: Nick DiGiovanni

Build and Facilitate a Community

Apart from being a video-sharing platform, YouTube also allows engagement between creators and subscribers. So if you want to obtain more views on YouTube, you'll need to treat it like any other social media platform . Additionally, you need to actively engage your audience for them to keep coming back for more of your videos. 

If someone asks a question, take time to give a helpful answer to encourage other viewers to leave comments. It will be easier for you to create your brand in a niche of devoted subscribers if you participate fully. 

Be Consistent

Obtaining a large number of YouTube views takes time. The platform has its own set of regulations to guarantee that high-quality video content is delivered to its viewers consistently and frequently. 

Try to establish many active subscribers using the tips mentioned above, and you'll find that they account for the vast majority of your views, which in turn generate more money for you when you monetize your YouTube channel. 

YouTube has given thousands of global creators the opportunity to make money from what they are passionate about. As a creator, all you have to do is decide which kind of monetization method is the most effective for your channel. 

Alternatively, you could try two or more monetization methods on your channel and see the ones that work best. 

How do you get monetized by YouTube?

To get monetized by YouTube, you must join the YouTube Partner Program first. Our article explains in depth the steps and requirements to do so.

How many views do you need to get paid by YouTube?

To get paid by YouTube, you need to follow all of YouTube’s monetization policies and live in a country or region where the YouTube partner program is available. You can apply for monetization once you have 1,000 subscribers and more than 4,000 watch hours in a year time frame. 

How do I get 4000 hours on YouTube?

Here are tips to get 4000 hours on YouTube: 

• Make your videos long enough to cover your topic thoroughly
• Don’t announce the end of your video
• Understand your audience to retain them

Can I monetize 1 minute video on YouTube?

There is no best length to monetize YouTube videos. However, for optimal revenue sakes, your video should be around 8 minutes to monetize. Monetizing one minute YouTube videos is not ideal. You can place extra mid-roll ads in videos around 8 minutes.

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News and Events

10 ways to monetize on YouTube

By Robert Kyncl , Chief Business Officer, YouTube

Aug 03, 2021 – minute read

With the launch of the Shorts Fund, creators and artists now have 10 ways to make money and build a business on YouTube.

One of the things I admire most about creators is their incredible range of talents and skills. They’re storytellers, directors, editors, marketers, and entrepreneurs — all in one. To give creators the opportunities they need to find success, YouTube has evolved from being just a place where people upload and share videos. It’s now a destination where creators can find new audiences, connect with fans in different ways, and build growing businesses.

In just over the last three years, we’ve paid more than $30 billion to creators, artists, and media companies.

We laid the groundwork for this modern-day creator economy over 14 years ago when we launched the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) — a first-of-its kind business model that shares the majority of revenue generated on the platform with creators. In just over the last three years, we’ve paid more than $30 billion to creators, artists, and media companies. And in Q2 2021, we paid more to YouTube creators and partners than in any quarter in our history.

Along the way, we’ve continued investing in new monetization options for creators beyond advertising, including  Paid Digital Goods , merchandise, branded content and more. Our shared goal with creators is to help them build robust and diversified business models that work with both their unique content and community of fans.

Today, with the launch of the Shorts Fund, creators and artists now have 10 ways to make money and build a business on YouTube. Here’s how:

1.  Shorts Fund

The YouTube Shorts Fund, a $100M fund distributed over 2021-2022, launches today! Each month, we'll reach out to thousands of eligible creators to claim a payment from the Fund - creators can make anywhere from $100 to $10,000 based on viewership and engagement on their Shorts. The Shorts Fund is the first step in our journey to build a monetization model for Shorts on YouTube and is not  limited to just creators in YPP — any creator that meets our eligibility criteria can participate. Check out all the details here.

We're also dedicated to providing funding via our Black Voices Fund and Kids Fund .

3.  YouTube Premium

4.  channel memberships, 5.  super chat  , 6.  super thanks, 7.  super stickers, 8.  merchandise, 9.  ticketing, 10.  youtube brandconnect.

We’re driven to keep developing new ways for creators to take their businesses to the next level because when they succeed, we succeed as well. At YouTube, we share in celebrating each new milestone hit, or goal achieved. As creators become the next generation of media companies, we’ll continue to deliver more ways to help them do just that. 

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• Masterpieces of Streaming

The video essays that spawned an entire YouTube genre

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by Wil Williams

Polygon’s latest series, The Masterpieces of Streaming , looks at the new batch of classics that have emerged from an evolving era of entertainment.

Like every medium before it, “video essays” on YouTube had a long road of production before being taken seriously. Film was undervalued in favor of literature, TV was undervalued in favor of film, and YouTube was undervalued in favor of TV. In over 10 years of video essays, though, there are some that stand out as landmarks of the form, masterpieces to bring new audiences in.

In Polygon’s list of the best video essays of 2020 , we outlined a taxonomy of what a video essay is . But time should be given to explain what video essays have been and where they might be going.

Video essays can be broken into three eras: pre-BreadTube, the BreadTube era, and post-BreadTube. So, what the hell is BreadTube? BreadTube, sometimes also called “LeftTube,” can be defined as a core group of high production value, academically-minded YouTubers who rose to prominence at the same time.

A brief history of video essays on YouTube

On YouTube, video essays pre-BreadTube started in earnest just after something completely unrelated to YouTube: the adoption of the Common Core State Standards Initiative (or, colloquially, just the “Common Core”). The Common Core was highly political, a type of hotly-contested educational reform that hadn’t been rolled out in decades.

Meanwhile, YouTube was in one of its earliest golden eras in 2010. Four years prior, YouTube had been purchased by Google for $1.65 billion in stock, a number that is simultaneously bonkers high and bonkers low. Ad revenue for creators was flowing. Creators like PewDiePie and Shane Dawson were thriving (because time is a flat circle). With its 2012 Original Channel Initiative , Google invested $100 million, and later an additional $200 million, to both celebrity and independent creators for new, original content on YouTube in an early attempt to rival TV programming.

This was also incentivized by YouTube’s 2012 public change to their algorithm , favoring watch time over clicks.

But video essays still weren’t a major genre on YouTube until the educational turmoil and newfound funds collided, resulting in three major networks: Crash Course in 2011 and SourceFed and PBS Digital Studios in 2012.

The BreadTube Era

With Google’s AdSense making YouTube more and more profitable for some creators, production values rose, and longer videos rose in prominence in the algo. Key creators became household names, but there was a pattern: most were fairly left-leaning and white.

But in 2019, long-time YouTube creator Kat Blaque asked, “Why is ‘LeftTube’ so white?”

Blaque received massive backlash for her criticisms; however, many other nonwhite YouTubers took the opportunity to speak up. More examples include Cheyenne Lin’s “Why Is YouTube So White?” , Angie Speaks’ “Who Are Black Leftists Supposed to Be?” , and T1J’s “I’m Kinda Over This Whole ‘LeftTube’ Thing.”

Since the whiteness of video essays has been more clearly illuminated, terms like “BreadTube’’ and “LeftTube” are seldom used to describe the video essay space. Likewise, the importance of flashy production has been de-emphasized.

Post-BreadTube

Like most phenomena, BreadTube does not have a single moment one can point to as its end, but in 2020 and 2021, it became clear that the golden days of BreadTube were in the past.

And, notably, prominent BreadTube creators consistently found themselves in hot water on Twitter. If beauty YouTubers have mastered the art of the crying apology video, video essayists have begun the art of intellectualized, conceptualized, semi-apology video essays. Natalie Wynn’s “Canceling” and Lindsay Ellis’s “Mask Off” discuss the YouTubers’ experiences with backlash after some phenomenally yikes tweets. Similarly, Gita Jackson of Vice has reported on the racism of SocialismDoneLeft.

We’re now in post-BreadTube era. More Black creators, like Yhara Zayd and Khadija Mbowe, are valued as the important video essayists they are. Video essays and commentary channels are seeing more overlap, like the works of D’Angelo Wallace and Jarvis Johnson .

With a history of YouTube video essays out of the way, let’s discuss some of the best of the best, listed here in chronological order by release date, spanning all three eras of the genre. Only one video essay has been selected from each creator, and creators whose works have also been featured on our Best of 2020 list have different works selected here. If you like any of the following videos, we highly recommend checking out the creators’ backlogs; there are plenty of masterpieces in the mix.

PBS Idea Channel, “Can Dungeons & Dragons Make You A Confident & Successful Person?” (October 10, 2012)

Many of the conventions of modern video essays — a charismatic quick-talking host, eye-grabbing pop culture gifs accompanying narration, and sleek edits — began with PBS Idea Channel. Idea Channel, which ran from 2012 to 2017 and produced over 200 videos, laid many of the blueprints for video essays to come. In this episode, host Mike Rugnetta dissects the practical applications of tabletop roleplaying games like Dungeons & Dragons . The episode predates the tabletop renaissance, shepherded by Stranger Things and actual play podcasts , but gives the same level of love and appreciation the games would see in years to come.

Every Frame a Painting, “Edgar Wright - How to Do Visual Comedy” (May 26, 2014)

Like PBS Idea Channel, Every Frame a Painting was fundamental in setting the tone for video essays on YouTube. In this episode, the works of Edgar Wright (like Shaun of the Dead and Scott Pilgrim vs. The World ) are put in contrast with the trend of dialogue-based comedy films like The Hangover and Bridesmaids . The essay analyzes the lack of visual jokes in the American comedian style of comedy and shows the value of Wright’s mastery of physical comedy. The video winds up not just pointing out what makes Wright’s films so great, but also explaining the jokes in meticulous detail without ever ruining them.

Innuendo Studios, “This Is Phil Fish” (June 16, 2014)

As documented in the 2012 documentary Indie Game: The Movie and all over Twitter, game designer Phil Fish is a contentious figure, to say the least. Known for public meltdowns and abusive behavior, Phil Fish is easy to armchair diagnose, but Ian Danskin of Innuendo Studios uses this video to make something clear: We do not know Phil Fish. Before widespread discussions of parasocial relationships with online personalities, Innuendo Studios was pointing out the perils of treating semi-celebrities as anything other than strangers.

What’s So Great About That?, “Night In The Woods: Do You Always Have A Choice?” (April 20, 2017)

Player choice in video games is often emphasized as an integral facet of gameplay — but what if not having a real choice is the point? In this video, Grace Lee of What’s So Great About That? discusses how removing choice can add to a game’s narrative through the lens of sad, strange indie game Night in the Woods . What can a game with a mentally ill protagonist in a run-down post-industrial town teach us about what choices really mean, and how is a game the perfect way to depict that meaning? This video essay aims to make you see this game in a new light.

Pop Culture Detective, “Born Sexy Yesterday” (April 27, 2017)

One of the many “all killer no filler” channels on this list, Pop Culture Detective is best known as a trope namer. One of those tropes, “Born Sexy Yesterday,” encourages the audience to notice a specific, granular, but strangely prominent character trait in science fiction and fantasy: a female character who, through the conceit of the world and plot, has very little functional knowledge of the world around her, but is also a smoking hot adult. It’s sort of the reverse of the prominent anime trope of a grown woman, sometimes thousands of years old, inhabiting the body of a child. When broken down, the trope is not just a nightmare, it’s something you can’t unsee — and you start to see it everywhere .

Maggie Mae Fish, “Looking For Meaning in Tim Burton’s Movies” (April 24, 2018)

Tim Burton is an iconic example of an outsider making art for other outsiders who question and push the status quo ... right? In Maggie Mae Fish’s first video essay on her channel, she breaks down how Burton co-opts the anticapitalist aesthetics of German expressionism (most obviously, The Cabinet of Dr. Caligari ) to give an outsider edge to films that consistently, aggressively enforce the status quo. If you’re a die-hard Burton fan, this one might sting, but Jack Skellington would be proud of you for seeking knowledge. Just kidding. He’d probably want you to take the aesthetic of the knowledge and put it on something completely unrelated, removing it of meaning.

hbomberguy, “CTRL+ALT+DEL | SLA:3” (April 26, 2018)

Are you looking for a video essay with a little more unhinged chaos energy? Prepare yourself for this video by Harry Brewis, aka hbomberguy, analyzing the webcomic CTRL+ALT+DEL, and ultimately, the infamous loss.jpg. But this essay’s also more than that; it’s a response to the criticisms of analyzing pop culture, saying that sometimes art isn’t that deep, or that works can exist outside of the perspective of the creator. This video is infamous for its climax, which we won’t spoil here, but go in knowing it’s, at the very least, adjacent to not safe for work.

Folding Ideas, “A Lukewarm Defence of Fifty Shades of Grey” (August 31, 2018)

Speaking of not-safe-for-work, let’s talk about kink! Dan Olson of Folding Ideas has been creating phenomenal video essays for years. Highlighting “In Search of Flat Earth” as one of the best video essays in 2020 (and, honestly, ever) gives an opportunity to discuss his other masterpieces here: his three-part series dissecting the Fifty Shades of Grey franchise. This introduction to the series discusses specifically the first film, and it does so in a way that is refreshingly kink-positive while still condemning the ways Fifty Shades has promoted extremely unsafe kink practices and dynamics. It also analyzes the first film with a shockingly fair lens, giving accolades where they’re due (that cinematography!) and ripping the film to shreds when necessary (what the hell are these characters?).

ToonrificTariq, “How To BLACK: An Analysis of Black Cartoon Characters (feat. ReviewYaLife)” (January 13, 2019)

While ToonrificTariq’s channel usually focuses on fantastic, engaging reviews of off-kilter nostalgic cartoons — think Braceface and As Told By Ginger — takes this video to explain the importance of writing Black characters in cartoons for kids, and not just one token Black friend per show. Through the lens of shows like Craig of the Creek and Proud Family , ToonrificTariq and guest co-host ReviewYaLife explain the way Black characters have been written into the boxes and how those tropes can be overcome by writers in the future. The collaboration between the two YouTubers also allows a mix of scripted, analytical content and some goofy, fun back-and-forth and riffing.

Jacob Geller, “Games, Schools, and Worlds Designed for Violence” (October 1, 2019)

Jacob Geller ( who has written for Polygon ) has this way of baking sincerity, vulnerability, and so much care into his video essays. This episode is rough, digging into what level design in war games can tell us about the architecture of American schools following the tragic Sandy Hook shooting in 2012. It’s a video essay about video games, about violence, about safety, and about childhood. It’s a video essay about what we prioritize and how, and what that priority can look like. It’s a video essay that will leave you with deep contemplation, but a hungry contemplation, a need to learn and observe more.

Accented Cinema, “Parasite: Mastering the Basics of Cinema” (November 7, 2019)

2019 Bong Joon-ho cinematic masterpiece Parasite is filled to the brim with things to analyze, but Yang Zhang of Accented Cinema takes his discussion back to the basics. Focusing on how the film uses camera positions, light, and lines, the essay shows the mastery of details many viewers might not have noticed on first watch. But once you do notice them, they’re extremely, almost comically overt, while still being incredibly effective. The way the video conveys these ideas is simple, straightforward, and accessible while still illuminating so much about the film and remaining engaging and fun to watch. Accented Cinema turns this video into a 101 film studies crash course, showing how mastery of the basics can make a film such a standout.

Kat Blaque, “So... Let’s Talk About JK Rowling’s Tweet” (December 23, 2019)

In 2020, J. K. Rowling wrote her most infamous tweet about trans people, exemplifying a debate about trans rights and identities that is still becoming more and more intense today. Rowling’s tweet was not the first, or the most important, or even her first — but it was one of the tweets about the issue that gained the most attention. Kat Blaque’s video essay on the tweet isn’t really about the tweet itself. Instead, it’s a masterful course in transphobia, TERFs, and how people hide their prejudice against trans people in progressive language. In an especially memorable passage, Blaque breaks down the tweet, line by line, phrase by phrase, explaining how each of them convey a different aspect of transphobia.

Philosophy Tube, “Data” (January 31, 2020)

One of the most underrated essays in Philosophy Tube’s catalogue, “Data” explains the importance of data privacy. Data privacy is often easily written off; “I have nothing to hide,” and “It makes my ads better,” are both given as defenses against the importance of data privacy. In this essay, though, creator Abigail Thorn breaks traditional essay form to depict an almost Plato-like philosophical dialogue between two characters: a bar patron and the bar’s bouncer. It’s also somewhat of a choose-your-own-adventure game, a post- Bandersnatch improvement upon the Bandersnatch concept.

Intelexual Media, “A Short History of American Celebrity” (February 13, 2020)

Historian Elexus Jionde of Intelexual Media has one of the strongest and sharpest analytical voices when discussing celebrity, from gossip to idolization to the celebrity industrial complex to stan culture . Her history of American celebrity is filled to the brim with information, fact following fact at a pace that’s breakneck without ever leaving the audience behind. While the video initially seems like just a history, there’s a thesis baked into the content about what celebrity is, how it got to where it is today, and where it might be going—and what all of that means about the rest of us.

Princess Weekes, “Empire and Imperialism in Children’s Cartoons—a super light topic” (June 22, 2020)

This video by Princess Weekes (Melina Pendulum) starts with a bang — a quick, goofy song followed by a steep dive into imperialization and its effect on intergenerational trauma. And then, it connects those concepts to much-beloved cartoons for kids like Avatar: The Last Airbender , Steven Universe , and She-Ra and the Princesses of Power . Fans of shows like these may be burnt out on fandom discourse quickly saying, “thing bad!” because of how they view its stance on imperialization. Weekes, however, has always favored nuance and close reading. Her take on imperialization in cartoons offers a more complex method of analyzing these shows, and the cartoons that will certainly drum up the same conversations in the future.

Yhara Zayd, “Holes & The Prison-Industrial Complex” (July 7, 2020)

2003’s Holes absolutely rules, and Yhara Zayd’s video essay on the film shows why it isn’t just a fun classic with memorable characters. It’s also way, way more complex than most of us might remember. Like Dan Olson, Yhara Zayd appeared on our list of the best video essays of 2020, but frankly, any one of her videos could belong there or here. What makes this analysis of Holes stand out is the meticulous attention to detail Zayd has in her analysis, revealing the threads that connect the film’s commentary across its multiple interwoven plotlines. And, of course, there’s Zayd’s trademark quiet passion for the work she’s discussing, making this essay just as much of a close reading as it is a love letter to the film.

D’Angelo Wallace, “The Disappearance of Blaire White” (November 2, 2020)

D’Angelo Wallace is best known as a commentary YouTuber, someone who makes videos reacting to current events, pop culture, and, of course, other YouTubers. With his hour-long essay on YouTuber Blaire White, though, that commentary took a sharp turn into cultural analysis and introspection. For those unfamiliar with White’s work, she was once a prominent trans YouTuber known for her somewhat right-wing politics, including her discussion of other trans people. In Wallace’s video, her career is outlined — but so is the effect she had on her viewers. What is it about creators like White that makes them compelling? And what does it take for us to reevaluate what they’ve been saying?

Chromalore, “The Last Unicorn: Death and the Legacy of Fantasy” (December 3, 2020)

Chromalore is a baffling internet presence. With one video essay up, one single tweet, and a Twitter bio that simply reads, “just one (1) video essay, as a treat,” this channel feels like the analysis equivalent of seeing someone absolutely captivating at a party who you know you’ll never see again, and who you know you’ll never forget.

This video essay discusses themes of death, memory, identity, remorse, and humanity as seen through both the film and the novel The Last Unicorn . It weaves together art history and music, Christian iconography and anime-inspired character designs. It talks about why this film is so beloved and the effect it’s had on audiences today. It’s moving, deeply researched, brilliantly executed, and we will probably never see this creator again.

Khadija Mbowe, “Digital Blackface?” (December 23, 2020)

“Digital Blackface” is a term popularized by Lauren Michele Jackson’s 2017 Teen Vogue essay, “We Need to Talk About Digital Blackface in Reaction GIFs.” The piece explains the prominence of white people using the images of Black people without context to convey a reaction, and Khadija Mbowe’s deep dive on the subject expands on how, and why, blackface tropes have evolved in the digital sphere. Mbowe’s essay involves a great deal of history and analysis, all of which is deeply uncomfortable. Consider this a content warning for depictions of racism throughout the video. But that discomfort is key to explaining why digital blackface is such a problem and how nonblack people, especially white people, can be more cognizant about how they depict their reactions online.

CJ the X, “No Face Is An Incel” (April 4, 2021)

Rounding out this list is a 2021 newcomer to video essays with an endlessly enjoyable gremlin energy that still winds up being some of the smartest, sharpest, and funniest discussions about pop culture. CJ the X, a human sableye , breaks down one of the most iconic and merch-ified Studio Ghibli characters, No Face, who is an incel. This is a video essay best experienced with no knowledge except its main thesis—that No Face is an incel—so you can sit back, be beguiled, be enraptured, and then be convinced.

TCL’s 85” Class XL Collection

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12 Ways to Make Money on YouTube: Ads, Subscriptions, & More

Last Updated: September 15, 2024 Fact Checked

Set Up Your Channel

Add great content, meet the requirements, monetize your videos, set up google adsense, gain an audience, become a youtube partner, enable channel memberships, turn on super chat and super stickers, let viewers give super thanks, check your analytics, market your videos.

This article was co-authored by Timothy Linetsky and by wikiHow staff writer, Rain Kengly . Timothy Linetsky is a DJ, producer, YouTuber, and music educator based in San Francisco, California. He has been making music for over 15 years, and is known for his YouTube channel You Suck at Producing, in which he does music production tutorials for over 330,000 YouTube subscribers. In addition to teaching music production, he releases his own music as Underbelly. He has taught at schools such as Beat Lab Academy and Pyramind. He is also an Ableton Certified Trainer, and has worked closely with the company to produce tutorial videos and educational content. His original productions have garnered millions of plays on Spotify, and in 2020, he released his debut album Machine Yearning as Underbelly to critical acclaim. This article has been fact-checked, ensuring the accuracy of any cited facts and confirming the authority of its sources. This article has been viewed 11,913,113 times.

Do you want to make money from YouTube videos? While earning thousands of dollars off the bat probably isn't realistic for most people, you can start getting paid quickly, especially if you have a strong subscriber base. Once you've created your channel and built your audience, you can monetize your videos in your YouTube Studio dashboard. Additionally, you can use Google AdSense to provide additional income from your videos. This wikiHow will show you how to get started making money off YouTube regardless of where you're starting.

Things You Should Know

• Create your channel, upload videos, and gain an audience to monetize your videos.
• Set up Google AdSense to make money per click from your videos and market them in places other than YouTube.
• If you have at least 4,000 watch hours in the previous year, over 1,000 subscribers, and a linked AdSense, you can join the YouTube Partner Program.
• YouTubers make money through advertisements. It does not matter how many videos your video itself has or how many subscribers you have.
• You will not receive money from viewers who have the AdBlock extension because it stops ads from playing. You will receive money from those who have YouTube premium, however.
• Age-restricted videos are not eligible for monetization. This is why YouTubers tend to filter out profanity or mature content to prevent their video from becoming age-restricted.
• YouTube is very strict about copyright. Since you are generating revenue, "fair use" does not apply so you must have permission from the copyright holder to use their content.

• Create your account or use your existing one. Add keywords to help people find your channel, which is key to making money on YouTube. You can add keywords by navigating to the Advanced section of your Channel Settings. Make sure that your keywords are relevant to your content.
• Your username can also work for or against you. If it's short, easy to remember, and original, people will be more apt to remember you. However if you are using an existing account, you can always change your username by editing it on your Google+ account. Keep in mind, you can only change your user name 3 times at maximum before you have to wait 90 days to change it again.

• Even if your content isn't great at first, keep at it. Practice makes perfect. Try to make each video better than the last. You will often learn as you go.
• Improve your content by either using a better camera or trying better editing software or techniques. Also try to improve the way things are filmed. Use a tripod , have a friend help you or light your scenes better. It all helps for a better end product which in turn helps you get a better audience. If you don't want to buy bright white lights, you can sit near a sunny window, or do it outside.
• By uploading content regularly, you can help hold an audience, which can help you earn money. People are more likely to subscribe if you add content regularly.
• Make sure to tag your videos with keywords that describe the content, as well as an eye-catching description. These will help drive people to your video from YouTube searches.

• You can monetize a video as it uploads by clicking the Monetization tab and checking the “Monetize with Ads” box.
• To monetize a video after it has been uploaded, open your Video Manager and click the “$” sign next to the video that you want to monetize. Check the “Monetize with Ads” box.

• Go to www.youtube.com and click "My Channel" on the webpage.
• Click the link called "Video Manager" on the top bar.
• Click channel and Enable on monetization.

Timothy Linetsky

Our Expert's Story: "I turned my YouTube channel into a business through offering private lessons, which has been my main source of income. I also used my channel to get a job at the school I now work at because they saw I have a presence on YouTube and that I can teach. There are other ways, too, like ad revenue or sponsorship opportunities, which are both helpful."

• You need either PayPal or a bank account and a valid mailing address as well as other information so AdSense can verify who you are and who to send the money to. You only gain money per ad click and a smaller amount per view but it adds up over time. This is why having an audience is key.

• Sometimes there will be haters, so you just have to ignore them. If you want to thrive, you have to be confident.
• Try to get your YouTube channel out there. Use methods such as press releases to help your channel gain notoriety. With press releases, for example, you can get an article about your YouTube channel published on hundreds of news sites with thousands if not millions of readers. This can drive traffic to your channel and possibly help you get verified as well.
• Keep uploading content and try to get people hooked. Send your video out on Twitter and Facebook . Share it with people. Distribute it elsewhere on the internet. Subscribers are essential to becoming a partner.
• Interact with your viewers by responding to comments and making occasional videos directly related to viewer comments and questions. Connecting with your community will bring more members into that community. One good way to do that is pretty simple, shout outs.

• You can apply for YouTube partnership at any time through the YouTube Partner page. In order to gain access to the most powerful Partner programs, you need to have 15,000 cumulative watch hours for your channel over the last 90 days.

• To enable channel memberships, you must meet the minimum requirements. You must have more than 1,000 subscribers, be a YouTube Partner, be over 18 years old, have a Community tab, and your channel cannot be set as "made for kids".
• As this is a relatively new feature, meeting the requirements doesn't necessarily mean you'll automatically get channel membership access.
• If you have access, you'll see the option to begin channel memberships on the Memberships page .

• This gives incentive to viewers who want a greater chance of their message being read to everyone watching. The bigger the purchase the amount, the longer the message will be pinned to the chat.
• You can moderate all Super Chats and Super Stickers. You'll be able to add a list of blocked words to avoid abuse. You can also remove them at any time while keeping your earnings.
• To use Super Chat and Super Stickers, your channel must be monetized, and you must be in an eligible __cpLocation.

• After buying a Super Thanks, a colorful animation with play over the video for the viewer. They'll also get to post a distinct, customizable comment in the video's comment section.
• This lets your viewers stand out over other viewers while giving you extra support.

• Use these tools to see how your content is resonating with your audience. You can change your content or your marketing if you're finding that you aren't attracting the users that you want to.

Community Q&A

• Always check if the content you upload is copyrighted before posting a video. Thanks Helpful 91 Not Helpful 11
• Be consistent in your channel and try to avoid toxic words and respect your YouTube family. Thanks Helpful 63 Not Helpful 11
• Gaming and comedy are the most popular genres. Thanks Helpful 57 Not Helpful 10

• Partnerships with YouTube for most people do not earn very much. Unless you have a huge success, don't plan on a job-free life. Thanks Helpful 37 Not Helpful 3
• The average cost per thousand views is generally between $0.25-4.00 USD. Thanks Helpful 46 Not Helpful 5
• Copyrighted content can get your videos taken down, and possibly banned. This includes images, videos, movie clips, etc. If you are found to be reusing copyrighted content without owner's permission, your account will be demonetized. Be sure to consider what is fair use and what is not. Thanks Helpful 40 Not Helpful 6
• Earning money will depend on many factors, including the target audience, channel type, audience engagement, and views. Thanks Helpful 27 Not Helpful 7

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• ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/72857?hl=en
• ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/7636690
• ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/9277801
• ↑ https://support.google.com/youtube/answer/10879035

About This Article

1. Set up your channel. 2. Upload content. 3. Gain an audience. 4. Enable monetization in the Video Manager . 5. Accrue 4000 hours of watch time and 1000 subscribers. 6. Set up Google AdSense. 7. Market your videos elsewhere. 8. Become a YouTube partner. Did this summary help you? Yes No

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How to earn money on YouTube

If you’re not in one of the countries/regions above, there are no changes to the YouTube Partner Program for you. You can view this article for the YPP overview, eligibility, and application instructions relevant to you.

Check your eligibility for the expanded YouTube Partner Program. If you’re not eligible yet, select Get notified in the Earn area of YouTube Studio. We’ll send you an email once we’ve rolled the expanded YPP program to you and you’ve reached the eligibility thresholds. 

Due to the extraordinary circumstances in Ukraine, we will be temporarily pausing Google and YouTube ads from serving to users located in Russia. Learn more .

You can earn money on YouTube by applying for and being accepted to the YouTube Partner Program . Only channels that follow our YouTube channel monetization policies may be able to monetize.

Intro to Making Money on YouTube

A few notes

• We won’t tell you what you can create on YouTube, but we do have a responsibility to do right by our viewers, creators and advertisers. If you’re in the YouTube Partner Program, you can earn money through YouTube. When in the YouTube Partner Program, we hold you to a higher standard.
• To make sure we’re rewarding good creators, we review your channel before you’re accepted in the YouTube Partner Program. We also constantly review channels to make sure you’re meeting all our policies and guidelines.
• You may be liable to pay taxes on your earnings from YouTube; find out more below.

Ways to make money in the YouTube Partner Program

You can make money on YouTube through the following features:

Each feature has its own set of eligibility requirements on top of subscriber and view count requirements. If our reviewers believe that your channel or video is not eligible, specific features may not be available. These extra thresholds exist for two main reasons. The most important one is that we have to meet legal requirements in every area where the feature is available. Then, because we want to reward good creators, we need to make sure we have enough context on your channel. Generally, this context means we need more content to review.

Keep in mind that we constantly review channels to make sure your content is in line with our policies.

Minimum eligibility requirements to turn on monetization features

Once you've been accepted in the YouTube Partner Program, you may get access to these monetization features:

Your YouTube earnings and tax liability

Earning money on YouTube or receiving Shorts bonuses are a great way to be rewarded for good, engaging content on the platform. Keep in mind that you may be liable to pay taxes to your country of residence on any income earned from your monetized videos on YouTube. Check with your local tax authorities for detailed guidance.

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