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When you are starting a YouTube channel or a blog or a website, there are several ways to earn from these platforms, from affiliate marketing and selling products to sponsorships and events. In fact, there are so many viable options for monetization that it can feel overwhelming. To pick the best starting point, you need to understand who you are and what your channel is all about. If you are consistently delivering valuable content, and building your audience, you can begin to monetize your content easily.
But there are several mistakes beginners make that guarantees they will fail at monetizing their content. This article will tell you all about those mistakes and thus you can avoid them.
Mistakes to avoid when monetizing content
Don’t Look for Immediate Success
I’m sorry to say it but you are entitled to absolutely nothing. You have to value your audience first, build your channel gradually then think about making money from it. Remember, this is a free platform. You get to speak to a global audience and impact their lives, but you’ve got to do that first before you deserve any reward. Of course, it would be fantastic if YouTube was a completely level playing field, and everybody would enjoy the success that they deserve, depending on the content that they create.
There will be some creators who will go viral with appalling content, while others slave away creating magnificent content that never gets seen by the audience that deserves to see it. Unfortunately, that is YouTube, but the moment you assume that you should get this or that or this creator shouldn’t get this because your content is better is the moment where you’ve lost the mindset of YouTube and who should be rewarded for the content – it’s your audience first and then you.
Don’t Create Off-Topic Content
You have certain content which gets moderate views on the channel. Then you suddenly change the topic of the content and it gets more views than ever. It seems like a big success but in actuality, it doesn’t work quite well in long term. You are going to lose some regular viewers because of the topic change. For example, you go from becoming a travel channel to a beauty channel, or a financial channel to a laptop review channel. The sudden change might get you new viewers but you will lose a lot of regular viewers.
Don’t Take a Lengthy Break
Some channels have thousands of subscribers. And the most recent videos are getting barely a couple of hundred views. And when we scroll through their list of videos, six, seven years ago the videos they were making were getting tens of thousands of views but unfortunately the channel took a long break, and in that time the landscape of YouTube has changed radically.
This often happens with tutorial channels that were some of the first on the platform, providing answers to questions that hadn’t been yet asked on YouTube. And there weren’t enough channels providing answers. So even with questionable thumbnails and content that wasn’t brilliant, because the competition was so few and far between at that time, these channels were able to clean up. Now with far more sophisticated creators, who are really savvy with their production values, and enticing thumbnails, they’re finding that they just can’t compete anymore.
If you’re going to have a break for a month or a week you’re probably going to be okay. But, doing a hard stop on your channel, and then coming back in a few years and expecting the same traction, I’m afraid that’s just not going to be the case. During that time YouTube will find a better content creator than you.
Don’t Delete Your Content
If you delete a video it removes all of the views and all of the watch time. That way you are damaging the metrics on your channel. This is especially important for people working towards monetization. Secondly, don’t be embarrassed about the content that you’ve already got on your channel.
If you look at some channels, you can see the hundreds of terrible videos creators put out on their channel before they got all the success. So it’s nice to see some creators become a star on YouTube from absolutely nothing.
Don’t Go for Ad Money Immediately
Another mistake we see creators make is letting a monetization opportunity overshadow what’s good for the audience. If a brand wants to promote its product on your channel, make sure its product is appropriate for your audience. Even if they’re offering a lot of money, don’t agree to it if the monetization deal doesn’t provide relevant, meaningful content for your loyal viewers. Otherwise, you will hurt your channel and lose their trust.
If you have a beauty channel where you provide makeup and hair care tips, and an electronics company approaches you to promote their TVs, it’s not a good deal. If you agree to it, you will damage the integrity of your channel, because your viewers look to you for beauty tips. It’ll feel to your audience like you sold out for a quick buck.
These are the mistakes every new YouTube creators make initially, and it’s totally okay. You will learn more with the experience. But you should avoid making these mistakes if you want to earn money for real.
As a content creator, I’ve always stressed the fact to focus on the content and then on monetizing. Work towards getting more readership for your blog, viewers for your channel than monetizing right from the word go! Let me know your thoughts in the comments below, Tweet to me at @Atulmaharaj, DM on Instagram or Get In Touch.
