Making Money as a YouTuber
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Being a YouTuber and making money from YouTube is one of the biggest opportunities available right now. All of the methods here have reportedly been in use for almost 20 years on YouTube, and I’ve personally been doing it for over a decade. Even though things are changing with the creator economy, the opportunity is still huge. But it’s not easy, especially if you’ve never made money from the internet before and you don’t know how any of this stuff works. I’m gonna share with you the easiest ways that you can make money as a content creator, even if you’re new, even if your channel’s not monetized yet, and even if you don’t get a ton of views. We’re only gonna focus on the methods that you have complete control over, so you can start implementing these things in your very next video.
Affiliate Marketing
The very first method for making money on YouTube is called affiliate marketing. If you’re not familiar with it, it’s simply where you get a commission for referring people to specific products and services. There’s passive affiliate marketing, where you just put links in your video description and hope people go down there and find them. And then there’s active affiliate marketing, which is a totally different thing, because you’re making content decisions around bringing attention to those links you have available.
The active and intentional approach is going to end up bringing you more sales. However, some people aren’t comfortable with that, and if you’re not, you can take the passive approach. But if you are doing it actively, then you’re literally making videos for the purpose of mentioning those products or services. Those can be review videos, list videos, or included in any content you make, but it’s where you bring up that particular product, and then you mention that you have it available down in your video description.
Example: Woodworking Channel
For example, let’s say somebody has a woodworking channel. They have all kinds of things laying around their shop, clamps, tools, the tables they work on, all kinds of stuff. While they’re making the video, whatever it is that they’re using, they could look on Amazon to see if that thing is sold there. If it is, they could sign up to be an Amazon associate and put a link to that thing down in their video description.
While making the video, they could say something like, “By the way, this saw that I’m using, it’s one of my favorites. It’s by a company called Pack Saws. I’ve got a link to this down in the description if you wanna check it out.” Then they’d get back into the video. It’s a subtle mention, non-interruptive, and doesn’t feel like you’re being sold anything. The person interested in checking out that saw will go down to the description, click the link, and the creator would be able to earn a commission if they end up purchasing it. With an Amazon link specifically, that creator would typically get commissions on anything else that person buys off Amazon within the following 24 hours too, not just the item they clicked through for.
Viewer Intent
If you’re trying to generate real income through affiliate marketing, it’s also worth considering viewer intent, which is basically your chances of getting a sale based on what the viewer is expecting from the video. Say you have a review video about a product and somebody’s searching for a review on that exact product. There’s a good chance they’re already in the middle of a buying decision, so the intent to purchase is going to be much higher than if you just passively mention the product while talking about something else.
When you’re coming up with video ideas for affiliate marketing, it helps to ask yourself whether you want to catch somebody and introduce them to a product they had no intention of considering, or whether you want to make something more search targeted, like a review or a list video, that reaches people already closer to buying. Going in with that awareness upfront makes it a lot easier to judge whether a video underperformed on sales because of the topic or because of how the product was presented.
Finding Affiliate Programs
You might be thinking, “I’m on board with everything you’re talking about with affiliate marketing, but I don’t know where to start when it comes to finding things I can promote for my type of content.” The first thing you wanna do is hop on Google and search “affiliate programs for” plus your niche or type of content. You can also go to ChatGPT, use deep research mode, and ask it to find affiliate programs based on your type of content after explaining what you make. On top of that, if you meet the requirements, you can sign up for Amazon’s affiliate program, since they sell pretty much everything and have programs for most mainstream types of content.
Recurring Commissions
If you’re a content creator who makes content around software or other digital products, there’s a good chance you can also land recurring commissions. That’s a great way to grow your income quickly, because if somebody signs up through your link, you keep making money on them month after month while also picking up new signups on top of that. I’d look for those opportunities first.
Only Promote What You Believe In
As a bonus tip, and probably the most important one, make sure you don’t promote things you don’t actually stand behind or think are good. If you tell people something is great, they buy it, and they end up unhappy, they’re not going to trust your next recommendation. But if you consistently recommend things that hold up, people will keep trying what you suggest. For the long game on YouTube, only promote good stuff.
Personal Products
Next up is personal products. Whether you’re doing woodworking, crafting, or even gaming, people are doing this. You can create products in the form of PDFs, merch, or other things people find useful, and make those available through your content. In my case, I have a website called Tuber Tools where I sell graphics. I used to have a PDF planner you could load into an iPad that made sales, and I recently made an iPhone app called New Creator that you can find in the App Store, which helps with a bunch of things around running a YouTube channel. Those things by themselves have generated a solid amount of income, and the New Creator app is just getting started but is already generating real income.
Merch
Most people aren’t gonna be able to make an app, but merch is free to set up. You can use a service like Spreadshop, Teespring, or Fourthwall. All you need is a graphic, and you can put it on coffee mugs, hoodies, pillows, blankets, and all kinds of other products.
Guides and Checklists
Depending on your type of content, you can put together guides, checklists, and similar resources. A friend of mine does travel content and reportedly makes $8,000 a month off of itineraries. The idea is you can go into Google Docs, which is free and part of your YouTube account, and write checklists, full guides, or even e-books. Export that as a PDF and upload it to a service like Gumroad, Sellfy, or SendOwl. Once your PDF is up, you fill out some information, maybe add a graphic, and then link to it in your video description so people can click through and get your product.
Courses
Another common personal product is courses, where you take what you know about something, make videos around it similar to your YouTube content, and organize it into a clear path for people to follow before making it available for sale. Once the videos are made, you upload them to a service like uscreen.tv, Kajabi, or Thinkific, then send people through your video description link to purchase the course.
When it comes to pricing, you have options, people can buy one time, or you can charge monthly if there’s ongoing maintenance involved with the course. That part’s up to you. Some easy digital products to put together include guides, e-books, merch, courses, apps, graphics, overlays, digital art, music, presets, templates, wallpapers, planners, checklists, maps, itineraries, and printables.
Keep in mind that with personal products, you’re creating additional things and dealing with customer service here and there. There’s more work involved on top of the creation itself, compared to affiliate marketing, where all you have to do is bring awareness to something rather than build and maintain it.
Services
The next way to make money as a content creator is through services, and they come in all different forms. There’s UGC, or user-generated content, and an entire industry of people who post in communities like the Reddit UGC community and get work from people looking for content creators to make videos for them. A lot of UGC creators are underpaid, but you don’t have to be if you know how to make good content.
You can also offer any area of expertise you have to your viewers through links in your video description. When I first started this channel, I got the opportunity to work on another channel that wasn’t monetized yet, and that’s how I got hooked on YouTube. I knew I wanted to go all in, and the first way I did that was through offering services.
Design Packages
I built a website where I sold digital products, and as part of that, I offered design packages, things like a channel header, a lower third graphic, a thumbnail template, and an in-screen template, so clients would have a nice branded look throughout their videos. Offering those services as I picked up more clients let me go all in on YouTube while I built up the affiliate side of things and learned how to drive more affiliate traffic. Once that traffic started picking up, I added a membership side to my graphics site, and it grew quickly enough that I was able to stop offering services and lean into things that were more passive.
Consulting
Consulting came next, and it’s lucrative. I didn’t plan on doing it, but people wanted it, so I gave it a shot and it worked. Eventually you get to a point where services are going well, but they’re taking up all your time, and that’s where things like affiliate marketing and your own products, income that isn’t tied directly to the hours you put in, really start to matter.
Offering Services Without a Website
You don’t need a fancy website for this, and it doesn’t have to be complicated depending on what you’re offering. I worked with a guy who wanted to get into fashion consulting through his fashion content, and when I asked if he had anything set up for people to hire him, he said no. I told him to just put a blurb in his video description letting people know the service was available, along with his email, and mention it in the video. In his very next video, he got his first consulting client from that. If you have any expertise or a way to help people shorten their learning curve, that’s a valuable service you can offer if you have time for it.