My First Income on Youtube (and What I Did To Get Monetized)

In the past months, I’ve been out to create new income streams. The excitement is on!

You see, I’ve been managing my own blogs for two years. Thankfully, those years taught me the dos and don’ts of content writing and SEO. Hard work earned me a full-time income, and now, I finally had the opportunity to leave my day job to focus on blogging full-time.

Now that I’ve proven to myself that blogging does work, I decided to set a new goal and expand my income streams.

Of course, you know what it is:

Make a Youtube channel and monetize it.

In this post, I’ll share my journey to monetizing videos and how much my first income is on Youtube.

If you’re someone who also wants to start a channel, or is already on the way there, I hope you find my experience helpful.

Let’s start!

My Journey To Getting Monetized

So here’s the context: I started the channel in March 2022 and got monetized in October of the same year. So before I was eligible, I worked for eight months to achieve it.

I wouldn’t say 8 months was a “long” wait because I know many others took more than a year before they got it. I believe 8 months was a short period, and that’s why I’m super thankful.

In my channel, I only uploaded 22 videos, and it’s a miracle that I’ve reached the Youtube Partner Program (YPP) requirements of 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 watch hours without any paid promotions. Believe it or not, I grew it organically. Just like everybody else, I started with zero audiences in the Youtube space.

I’m quite a researcher and a curious one, so I always visit other vlogs and channels to gain more knowledge. But I wasn’t exempt from trials and errors.

I almost stopped creating videos in June because my terrible editing frustrated me. I remember receiving about 5-10 pieces of negative feedback about the quality, so every time I look back at the old videos, I cringe!

But as a creator, I gotta do what I gotta do. I embraced the harrowing feedback and pushed through.

But on the next videos, I was determined to improve. 

If you’re wondering how I achieved monetization after 22 videos, here’s what I believe helped me:

1. My channel was informational.

Did I vlog? Oh no, no. I’m the first to say I’m not an interesting and entertaining person at all. I’m an ordinary human you’d see spending time alone in a cafe, minding my own business.

However, despite the lack of personality to entertain people, I used a rather formidable strength of mine — I love sharing my insights, observations, and psychological analysis of people.

So what did I do? Instead of showing my face to people, I resorted to what I think is a more effective way to deliver my message — a faceless Youtube channel. I converted my blog posts into scripts, had them audio recorded, and worked on animations.

In this case, I didn’t have to show my face, but viewers still responded and engaged well with golden information. 

If you want to be successful in your channel, that’s the first thing you should consider — the value you provide to your viewers.

2. I chose a low-competition niche.

If you want to start a profitable one, try finding a low-competition niche. Analyze your competitors and make sure you provide value more than anyone else in that space.

That’s how you slay and be authoritative.

3. I outsourced.

Creating an animated video took 2-3 weeks, so I had to work extra hard since I’m also juggling my blogs and channel.

On top of it all, I admit I’m a slow worker! It takes me days to finish a task simply because I pour my heart and soul into it.

But despite my efforts, I realized my methods wouldn’t work, and this is too much work for me. Blog writing is time-consuming, and Youtube videos, even more. That’s when I decided to ask for assistance and get the proper tools.

Although I was skeptical about putting out money for a channel that hasn’t given me any revenue yet, we can’t deny that this is how businesses work.

If we want to run a profitable business, we must get serious and invest in what’s needed.

That said, in August, I:

• hired a voiceover freelancer at Fiverr
• hired my sister for the video editing
• upgraded to Canva Pro (the editing software we use)
• and asked for my partner’s help with another animator role
• while I also do video editing on the sides.

Overall, I spend about $30-$95 every month, and we publish 1-3 videos monthly. 

4. I promoted it to my friends.

It’s possible to grow our channel organically without our close friends and family knowing it. However, being impatient, the moment my subscriber count reached 900, the wait was killing me, so I had to promote them to my family, friends, and neighbors. 

But aside from that, I never dealt with any paid ads or bought subscribers. All organic, with the aid of my friends.

My Publishing Schedule

I don’t have a strict publishing schedule, and for a good reason. It’s not that I don’t want to publish regularly; I do. But currently, my Youtube channel is a second priority next to my main blog.

As mentioned above, it’s time-consuming to create a video. But in the next few years, who knows, I’ll probably put all my efforts there. Since I also run my blogs, I need to be a superwoman to passionately take charge of everything.

So what’s my publishing schedule? I usually publish on weekends, with 1-3 videos per month. As much as possible, we only publish a video when it’s ready, not burn ourselves out and publish so-so videos for the sake of “consistency.”

One video a month is better than none.

One quality video is better than five unhelpful ones that people gain nothing from.

My 2022 YouTube Income Report

Now, here’s what you’ve been waiting for. The big reveal!

How much is my first income from Youtube?

Brace yourself, because this isn’t similar to the mindblowing amount you usually see from others.

As of 22nd December 2022, here’s my Youtube income channel report:

From March-September 2022, I had no earnings but published 3 videos every month on average.

I got monetized on the 6th of October and earned $74.49.

Google AdSense threshold is $100, so I can’t withdraw it. My earnings are carried to the next month.

In November, I got 26 videos out and earned $207.31, totaling $281.8 for my first Youtube earning!

And, of course, let’s not forget to subtract my expenses of $30-$95.

Nonetheless, I’m hopeful the channel will grow from here. 

Not bad. Yay!

What I Realized After Getting 1,000 Subscribers

What does it look like to be monetized? Here is what I realized after getting monetized:

1. Your subscriber list grows faster after 1,000 subscribers.

I realized that getting the first 1,000 subscribers was the hardest part.

When I was at 950 subs, I saw people subscribing and unsubscribing in huge numbers, and I was frustrated why. I’ve read forums about similar experiences, and one statement resonated: people judge your channel based on your subscribers count.

And I believe that. Some people don’t want the idea of other people benefiting from them.

But you bet, after getting 1,000 subscribers in October, people were no longer reluctant to subscribe to my channel, so my list tripled in December with 2,839 subscribers.

That’s the quickest growth I have experienced since I started Youtube.

2. People click more on titles that pique their curiosity.

If your video is helpful, Youtube suggests them to people. Now, the next step you should worry about is how to make them click. As for me, I keep a balance between optimizing my title for SEO and catching people’s curiosity.

Whether it’s in question form, a controversial statement, or a clause, make sure your viewers will want to click on your video because of the title. 

For example, titles like:

• 7 Secret Behaviors of Men In Love With You
• If You Think You Have No Friends, Watch This…

But also make sure you’re not doing any clickbait practices. Provide what’s expected.

3. Mid-roll ads only appear in 8-minute-long videos.

Most of my videos are 5-7 minutes long. After getting monetized, I learned that you could only get mid-roll ads if your video is over 8 minutes. 

Sometimes, I think about making my videos longer. But, hmm, I don’t like my videos to be filled with fluffs, so I’ll keep my ways.

Conclusion

If you want to have a successful channel, you need to do three things:

1. Start.
2. Consistency in publishing. (Don’t stop!)
3. Learning the hows and improving your videos.

Sometimes, the biggest challenge is staying motivated when things go wrong. But in these times, you have to keep some blind faith combined with a keen analysis of what works. If you’re willing to do the work and keep trying until something clicks, then there is no doubt you can make it, too!

 

This is my first salary on Youtube. I hope this income report gave you insights. Thanks for reading!