Earn a living on YouTube

Everyone has seen the news articles which crop up from time to time about people who earn thousands of pounds (or, more likely, dollars) from their videos on YouTube.

Everyone has seen the news articles which crop up from time to time about people who earn thousands of pounds (or, more likely, dollars) from their videos on YouTube. As a work for yourself idea, it is among the simplest and the best thing about it is that once you are up and running, it is pretty much self sustaining. The run in is quite long, though and unless you have a real talent as a video photographer or performer, it is best not to rely on success on YouTube.

The road to earning a living on YouTube is long and sprinkled with pitfalls. One thing which you don’t usually find out until it is too late is that if you apply to have your video accepted onto the money generating side of YouTube and it is rejected, you have to wait two months before you can apply again. This can be a serious setback if the YouTube idea is all you have planned as your home based work idea so if you need to earn some money in the short term, this is perhaps not the best plan you could come up with. On the other hand, if you are playing the long game and are prepared to put in quite a lot of work, then it is potentially a big earner.

Everyone has seen the sneezing baby and the hundreds of cute pet videos on YouTube and of course they were mainly fortuitous moments when someone happened to have the camera pointing in the right direction at the right time. It is probably not possible to predict this kind of viral phenomenon so if it is your intention to go out deliberately to get YouTube success, you need more planning. Anything you put up on YouTube has to be your own original copyright, so don’t even bother to record a performance of anyone else’s songs, because not only could that lead to trouble with the copyright owner, but it will earn you nothing.

Make sure that the person you film getting knocked unconscious with a ladder or similar hilarious mishap gives you permission, or you can’t use that either. Probably the best way to go if you want to use YouTube as a serious business opportunity is to record a ‘how to’ video, with cooking and DIY being very popular. The site itself is very helpful to the would be entrepreneur in fact, with useful guides and tips and a very user friendly interface when you come to apply for your video to be linked to paying ads. Google Adsense is similarly easy to negotiate so if you are computer savvy enough to get your video out there, you will manage the rest of the process with ease.

The main things to remember are that quantity and quality are both important; not everyone can strike it rich with a sneezing baby, although as a working mum you probably have at least one baby handy! Find a niche and look to fill it, whether it is that recipe for icecream or a foolproof way to mend a tap or even a simple video of you reading a poem – as long as it is original. Good luck!

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