Dutchie Abroad
Exploring the world one video at a time!
I’ve been on this forum for a while now and there is one thing that I frequently see: unrealistic expectations. People who are expecting money, fame or subs when in reality, it really isn’t that simple.
Let’s start with talking about money. Youtube is NOT an easy platform to make money on. Disregarding people who are able to run a business in a niche that they might already work in, a lot of Youtubers are just gamers, fashion vlogger or travel vloggers with no budget or experience. Youtube is not just a platform, but a business as well. They don’t exist to generate money for you, they need you to meet certain expectations to avoid losing money themselves. That is why they are constantly tweaking the monetization rules. Making a living out of Youtube is hard. You might point fingers at bigger Youtubers saying ‘but they are doing it’, but they probably had different circumstances and above all, a lot of luck.
Yes, luck is involved. But I don’t want to disregard their time and effort hey put into in. Most of the really big Youtubers that are still around today started their channels 5, 8 or even 10 years ago. They’ve been doing this for a very long time and probably without a profit for 80% of the time they have been doing it. People on this forum who are looking to ‘make it big’, be ready to invest a hell of a lot of time and effort and be patient. YT fame doesn’t happen overnight.
Talking about fame. You might again point fingers to people who started a channel and hit 1k or 10k within their first month. These people often have different circumstances working in their favour. Having a famous family member, being friends with a Youtuber that is already big, or bringing an already established fanbase with you from another platform (Instagram, Vine) will of course influence your growth immensely. Don’t compare yourself to them, but look at people with a similar starting point to adjust your growth expectations.
Your growth expectations are probably mainly focussed on the amount of subscribers and views you have. As I said, don’t look at successful Youtubers and expect the same amount of growth they are having. You won’t get your first 100 subs in a month. Think in terms as half a year, or maybe a year, depending on your type of content and how much you (can) upload. Youtube is especially sensitive to exponential growth. This means it will be VERY SLOW in the beginning, but will probably pick up as you get more subs. A LOT of people mention that getting their second 100 subscribers took them way less time than those first 100.
This snowball effect is due to multiple reason. First, as you have more subscribers, you are more likely to grow a fanbase that supports your channel with views, likes and they might even recommend others to go check out your channel. Another, and probably the biggest, factor is Youtubes algorithm. The algorithm looks for popular videos to put in trending and related videos to put in the recommended section. The more views and likes your video has, the more likely it is that the algorithm picks it up, recommending it and leading to even more views. The snowball effect, if you will.
So, I guess what I wanted to say with this wall of text is: Adjust your expectations and be patient. Work hard on your channel, enjoy making your videos and let everything else come as it comes. Not everyone will be the next Pewdiepie, but at least you can celebrate hitting your own milestones as you slowly grow bigger and bigger
Let’s start with talking about money. Youtube is NOT an easy platform to make money on. Disregarding people who are able to run a business in a niche that they might already work in, a lot of Youtubers are just gamers, fashion vlogger or travel vloggers with no budget or experience. Youtube is not just a platform, but a business as well. They don’t exist to generate money for you, they need you to meet certain expectations to avoid losing money themselves. That is why they are constantly tweaking the monetization rules. Making a living out of Youtube is hard. You might point fingers at bigger Youtubers saying ‘but they are doing it’, but they probably had different circumstances and above all, a lot of luck.
Yes, luck is involved. But I don’t want to disregard their time and effort hey put into in. Most of the really big Youtubers that are still around today started their channels 5, 8 or even 10 years ago. They’ve been doing this for a very long time and probably without a profit for 80% of the time they have been doing it. People on this forum who are looking to ‘make it big’, be ready to invest a hell of a lot of time and effort and be patient. YT fame doesn’t happen overnight.
Talking about fame. You might again point fingers to people who started a channel and hit 1k or 10k within their first month. These people often have different circumstances working in their favour. Having a famous family member, being friends with a Youtuber that is already big, or bringing an already established fanbase with you from another platform (Instagram, Vine) will of course influence your growth immensely. Don’t compare yourself to them, but look at people with a similar starting point to adjust your growth expectations.
Your growth expectations are probably mainly focussed on the amount of subscribers and views you have. As I said, don’t look at successful Youtubers and expect the same amount of growth they are having. You won’t get your first 100 subs in a month. Think in terms as half a year, or maybe a year, depending on your type of content and how much you (can) upload. Youtube is especially sensitive to exponential growth. This means it will be VERY SLOW in the beginning, but will probably pick up as you get more subs. A LOT of people mention that getting their second 100 subscribers took them way less time than those first 100.
This snowball effect is due to multiple reason. First, as you have more subscribers, you are more likely to grow a fanbase that supports your channel with views, likes and they might even recommend others to go check out your channel. Another, and probably the biggest, factor is Youtubes algorithm. The algorithm looks for popular videos to put in trending and related videos to put in the recommended section. The more views and likes your video has, the more likely it is that the algorithm picks it up, recommending it and leading to even more views. The snowball effect, if you will.
So, I guess what I wanted to say with this wall of text is: Adjust your expectations and be patient. Work hard on your channel, enjoy making your videos and let everything else come as it comes. Not everyone will be the next Pewdiepie, but at least you can celebrate hitting your own milestones as you slowly grow bigger and bigger
