Youtube Marketing, I just don't get it. I must be a dummie.

So, I'm pretty new to this whole marketing thing and I've been doing some research by watching what others successful people are doing. Not in an attempt to copy them but just to understand how they are pulling in conversions and marketing what ever they are selling.

My niche has opportunity for some well developed videos, so I've been watching popular channels to see what they do. I always check out these guys with the super popular vlogs and such and I try and figure out how the heck are they monetizing these things. I mean it looks like a full time job so there must be money in it.

I mean there is this one dope who is pretty entertaining, he reviews viral funny vids that people send him. He gets about 2 million views in a week. So I'm looking at what he is doing to make money from his fame...
The best I can see is that he sells some tee shirts with silly inside vlog jokes on them. I'm thinking is that it? 2 million people check what you have to say about kitty videos per week and you sell funny tee shirts?

And there is this other guy who, looks like his full time job must be making YouTube videos. They are pretty cool and get some pretty good attention, but I see nothing in the way of money. I mean they promote his site and there are some adds and crap on the site, but darn it I can't see how he's making money either. I see his "behind the scenes" vids and he's got a team of people helping him make these movies.

So here is my thing, if you were making funny videos and getting 2 million + views per week what the heck could you do with that kind of traffic?

 

Affiliate marketing and/or advertising would be my first guess, but the real money could also be in selling something that only they have. It could be a preparation for that.

 

"So here is my thing, if you were making funny videos and getting 2 million + views per week what the heck could you do with that kind of traffic?"

Well you can make adsense money with that video or you can drive that traffic to your website to make also money with advertisement...you just have to give a message saying click the link below the video....

 

Youtube links may become Google backlinks, which is definitely useful!

 

Good advice, I would like to add that you can also have more videos on your main site and just a few at Youtube to funnel people to your site and stay on it. From there you can run Google adsense or anything else in mind.

 

it depends what your goal is if you just want to be famous or wanna earn from youtube some people just like the fame and the best ways to earn from youtube are from affilates or if you have a web site and the traffic to the popular videos go to your personal web site.

 

not all youtube viewers will click the link below

 

Yes they are right. You could insert adsense in the video. For 2 million views a week and Adsense average cpm of 20c thats $400 right there.

 

These people should have a clickable link to their websites just below the videos and that's where the money is at. You should also take a look at TubeMogul, because there are money making vids on there too.

 

Not sure you can make much with Youtube.

 

Adsense would be the obvious choice, but having 2 million views a month can make you a lot of money. Just make a website and fill it with affiliate links (JV), hype the site with your viewers (don't say it yours of course) and say click the link below. If only a fraction reacts, and a fraction of them sign up with the affiliate you have some serious money. But there are also other methods of making money. YouTube is internet TV, so what about product placement. I remember reading an article about the dude that created Digg, he did (or is still doing) some weekly tech show and big companies are paying big just for him to talk about there products...

 

does anyone know how to make good videos? not necessarily of me dancing in front of a camera but any software out there where you can easily create catchy videos?

 

Camtasia Studio is good for that stuff.

 

If you want to promote your videos, so that people can actually find them, you have to go to my website, its basically the only way to first get noticed anymore.

 

What could you do with that traffic? Become a youtube partner and start making some good money.

Besides that, you could develop a community around the videos. Setup a forum or a blog, and put the site logo or name in the video. If people like the video enough, they will visit the site.

 

Video has a pretty low CTR, usually less than 1% (last time I checked it was averaging around 0.5 - 0.7%). Rather than rely solely on links from youtube to drive your traffic you should try plugging your site in your video by speaking directly to your viewer. Wear a T-Shirt with your web address on it, put the address up on the screen and tell them that there's loads of cool stuff on your site that they should check out or a competition they should enter. Video offers you the opportunity to connect directly with your viewer so take advantage of that connection.

 

Youtube's a good way to get traffic! Just create a video of the subject you are selling (or whatever) and make people want more and they'll click on that link.

 

you do you promote the videos once they are made?

 

it's really a good way to do so ,what i think you need to ensure the quality of the video!!
and supply links for cutomers

 

They make money by:
1. Advertising revenue sharing (the ads that pop up on the bottom, and the square ad on teh right). You have to be asked to be a partner of youtube for that to happen. Generally they only ask people that hit 12K views within a certain time period (can't remember what time period off the top of my head).
2. Product placements. I'm sure you've seen all the top vloggers promote the Kodak ink campaign. They all got paid for that.
3. Affiliate links (sometimes). Phillip DeFranco (sxePhil) promotes Netflix CPA offers sometimes and some other stuff too. I've seen others do it as well. it's not as popular as the other methods though.
4. Privatized sponsorships. Just pay attention as you watch a few videos and you can tell who's sponsored by who... i.e. iJustine, pretty obviously sponsored by apple.
5. T-shirt sales/Other memorabilia sales. Almost all of the top video channels have T-Shirts that they sell to their watchers.
6. Etc... there are tons more ways to monetize. They key is that you don't start monetizing until you have a huge audience, if your goal is to create a youtube presence like the ones you mentioned (top vloggers).


If you just want to use Youtube to monetize your own product, that's a completely different story and basically involves creating clever/viral videos that get watched and simply linking people to your content in the "doobly-doo" (lower description box).

Answered above.