💰 The Easiest Way to Earn Money on YouTube

How to YouTube #14

Hey YouTubers,

Too many of us struggle along without the funds to pay for help with our channels. If we had an extra $1000 a month coming in to hire a freelance video editor, it’d be so much more sustainable (and way more fun).

Not only is making money early in your YouTube journey helpful because you can re-invest it, but it’s essential for a feeling of momentum.

And you have to treat your channel like a business if you want to be in this game for the long haul.

So today, I want to share the simplest way to make money on YouTube for educational YouTubers.

The Method

When I was first getting started with YouTube whilst working as a management consultant, I thought there was no way to earn money other than through Adsense or sponsorships.

I thought I had no commercial value.

But I was wrong.

Around the time that I quit my consulting job, I made a whole bunch of popular videos about consulting.

And ever since I posted those, I’ve gotten loads of messages about getting help with consulting job applications.

I replied to them as best I could and thought nothing more of it.

But if I’d wanted to earn money, and help them even more, I could’ve put a link to book a call with me in the video descriptions and charge people for a 30 or 60 minute zoom call to talk about their problems.

I just had a look at my comments on this channel and conveniently, this one just came through 3 days ago to help me prove my point.

It might look a bit dodgy lol, but it’s evident of demand.

So the method here is simple.

Charge for your time as a coach or consultant relating to the topic of your channel.

All you need to do is put a Calendly link in your video description for people to book a call (and mention it in your videos). That’s it.

Why This Works

You don’t need lots of credibility or millions of views to do this.

You just need to know more than some people in your audience, who have the money and desire to pay you for help.

It works because there are so many people without access to high quality information that can help them in their specific scenario.

Sometimes, watching another YouTube video just doesn’t cut it. You need a real person to talk to.

Look at this guy Reece Daniels. He makes very low production videos about personal development, one of the most competitive niches on YouTube.

He has had a few videos blow up in the past year, but his most recent videos haven’t got huge views and he doesn’t appear to have any other credibility. Look at this description.

It almost looks too easy, but honestly, if you design the right offer for your audience, there’s a reasonable chance you can get some clients with even just 100s of views.

Reece’s Calendly looks like this. He appears to have 4 clients and charges $70 per hour.

Whatever your channel is it’s likely that you share information about something. Whether it’s finance, pets, personal development, tech or teaching people how to play Dungeons and Dragons, it doesn’t really matter, as long as it’s somewhat educational.

Hopefully, your viewers will watch your videos and feel like you know what you’re talking about.

And then a percentage of those viewers will pay for more specific help from you. Some might even pay just to get to chat to you, who knows. The internet is a big place.

But for most educational YouTubers, it’s not that hard to show that you know more about the topic than your audience (hopefully you do!).

The Takeaway

If you’re struggling for cash, there is almost no down side to doing this. The worst case scenario is that no one books and you lose a small amount of money on the Calendly subscription.

The upside is making some money, helping someone and learning about your viewers.

You can start at whatever hourly rate makes you feel comfortable and increase it from there.

You might think you don’t have any skills that people would pay you for, but if you don’t, that’s potentially an indication that you’ve not set up your channel in the right way and you’re not leaning into your expertise enough.

You also might not have a big enough audience yet, and that’s fine, but this is a great first step to be aware of when viewers do come through.

Let me know if you get anywhere with it :)

Have an epic week making videos!

Tintin 🧑‍💻

The YouTube Tin

🎥 Video: In this video on Creator Booth from Ed, he talks through this same method I’ve outlined above even more.

🎥 Video: This is a great 10 minute interview with Todd Beaupre, the Product lead for YouTube homepage and recommendations since 2014, about how the algorithm works.

🚀 My own channel: I have a low lift YouTube channel so I can share more interesting things that I’m learning about YouTube to help you guys out.