YouTube is a video streaming platform that allows its content creators to monetize off of qualified uploads. However, many believe they have to make videos, as in ones that require one to sit in front of a camera and speak, in order to have a chance at monetization success. As it turns out, this isn’t at all true. Keep reading to discover How to make money on YouTube without making videos
Many people are not comfortable sitting and talking to a camera, whether it is because they do not feel they have the personality for it, or they are self-conscious about their appearance. However, a great number of YouTube channels are very successful with the creator of the channel never showing their face, and sometimes not even making their voice audible. Some channels are hugely successful without actually making the videos at all.
If you have a channel centered on an effective niche idea, you can make money on YouTube even without making videos. How can you accomplish this seemingly impossible feat? By the time we are done with this article, we can show you a strategy for not only doing this but also earning around $1,500 per day, and giving you an example of a channel doing just that!
How to make money on YouTube without making videos
The following are the necessary steps to make money on YouTube without making videos.
Step 1: Choose Your Niche
The first step is to select a niche that your channel will lean into. There are a lot of niches to choose from, though some will be more effective than others. However, you have to find the balance between a niche you feel you can contribute quality content and one that successfully resonates with viewers interested in that niche.
Therefore, when selecting your channel’s niche, you need to make sure that it hits a few pertinent criteria points. First and foremost, you need to choose a niche that has longevity, or in other words, one that is not a fad.
The best way to determine if your idea for a niche fits the bill is to check out other videos on the topic, assuring that the great majority of those you find have over 100,000 views. You will also want to make sure that the videos have good CPM or the amount paid per every 1,000 views. This amount should fall into the range of $10 to $50.
To have good CPM, you need a channel that fits into one of the highest CPM niches. These include:
- Finance
- Health
- Movies
- Automotives
- Business
- Making Money Online
- Technology
- Real Estate
- Health
- Travel
- Investing
- Marketing
- Makeup
- Insurance
- Legal
Your niche should also be able to fan out into sub-niches, as you might find it hard to make a lot of content strictly for one niche. Finally, make sure that you are not relying solely on ad revenue from Google Adsense, so try to expand to other monetization forms such as affiliate marketing.
Step 2: Find The Right Keywords To Market Your Videos And Your Channel
The next step is to determine the right keywords to use for your channel. One of the most important tips for achieving viral status on YouTube is to focus on metadata, or channel descriptor terms, which inform YouTube as to what your channel is focused on. If the metadata matches the topics of your videos, then your uploads will start being recommended to those watching your videos and even those who are watching videos from other channels but in your niche.
The other benefit of keyword research is that finding keywords will generate ideas for more videos that you can produce in your niche. It will also give you clues as to what terms people in the niche search for YouTube the most, which will help you develop video ideas (we will get to that part shortly).
When you start looking for keywords, start by thinking about what you would type in to find the videos in your niche if you were the one looking for them. Then consider what other people might type for the same reason. So if your niche is an online business, write down the keywords that apply to that. As you get a list together, you will have a collection of your seed keywords (main keywords) that describe what your channel is about.
Best Tool to come up with the best keywords that rank
VidIQ: Next, you will want to enter these keywords into a YouTube tool called VidIQ. This tool will help video creators find the best keywords to use in their titles and tags to improve the visibility of their videos and channels on platforms like YouTube. It analyzes trends and data to suggest relevant keywords that will increase the chances of a video or channel being discovered through search or recommendations.
Step 3: Come Up With Ideas For Videos
The next step is to come up with the best video ideas you and using what you feel are the 15 to 20 strongest keywords collected in the last step. You can, again, look at other popular channels in your niche to help generate more ideas. When you look at these channels, sort their video library by “most popular” and use those as ideas for your own videos, seeing as they already have a proven track record of popularity.
Here are some methods you can use to come up with ideas for YouTube videos:
- Start with a brainstorming session: Set aside some time to sit down and write down as many ideas as you can think of. Don’t worry about evaluating the ideas at this stage, just try to get as many ideas on paper as possible.
- Look at trending topics: Check out the trending page on YouTube or Google to see what people are interested in right now. You can also use social media to see what topics are popular and consider making a video on one of those topics.
- Look at what your competitors are doing: Check out other channels in your niche and see what types of videos they are making. This can give you some ideas for your own channel.
- Ask your audience: Reach out to your audience and ask them what they would like to see from your channel. You can do this through a survey or by asking for suggestions in the comments or on social media.
- Use a keyword tool: Use a tool like Google’s Keyword Planner or Long Tail Pro to see what people are searching for online. This can give you ideas for videos that will be more likely to be discovered through search.
- Think about your own interests and passions: What do you enjoy doing or talking about? Chances are, there are other people out there who are interested in the same things. Consider making videos about your hobbies or passions.
Step 4: Create The Videos
Now, is the step that might cause you to scratch your head: making the videos. Yes, this is about making money without having to make videos….of yourself, but it would be tough to not make videos and succeed on YouTube. The key is that you won’t be making videos with yourself in front of the camera or even doing the narration.
With that said, when you are starting a niche channel, you will need to figure out what works, and for that to happen you have to test-run some things. So to start, you should create between 30 and 35 videos. While there is no exact science to determine that number, you will need enough to see what works best.
What you will need to gather for the creation of your video, however, is free stock photos and videos, alongside a video editor and a voiceover method. Storyblocks is an example of a site where you can get stock materials or you can use Depositphotos or Envato Elements, and Filmora offers a great tool solution for video editing. If you don’t feel comfortable taking these tasks on yourself, you can always hire a professional freelancer from Upwork or Fiverr to do it for you. Additionally, Canva is a great tool to use for thumbnail making.
Step 5: Uploading The Videos
Once you have created the 30 to 35 videos, the next step is to upload them. Of course, there is no requirement that you wait until the whole lot is created to begin uploading, but some creators like to secure a backlog so they can post them daily buying them time to make additional videos.
In either case, when you post the videos, they need to be optimized so that when people search for them, the algorithms deem them optimally matched to the search queries. That means the video has to have an optimized title, appropriate keywords in the properly formatted description, and a catchy thumbnail to generate great click-through rates. There is a lot to learn about video optimization, which we will not cover here, but we encourage you to dig deeper into this topic.
Step 6: Learn And Improve From Video Analytics
Once your videos have been uploaded, give them a period of time to be found and watched. It is likely that at least a handful of videos from your initial set of uploads have taken off and done relatively well. Regardless of the results, you will want to collect the analytic data from them and use it to optimize your future videos.
Don’t be discouraged if success is slow to come as this is a learning process and growth through which your channel will develop better content, as well as better optimized video practices. We recommend using Tubebuddy for great tips on how to make the best of your videos.
Step 7: Monetization
Next is the part everyone is interested in: the payoff. The monetization of YouTube videos is one of the main reasons that people get into making videos on YouTube. Unfortunately, far too many people get this step entirely wrong. The problem is people go all in for ad revenue, and while that is absolutely something to do, as we noted earlier, it’s not to put all of the stock into for sure. There need to be other methods to monetize alongside it.
The reason for this is that ad revenue does not kick in until your channel has 1,000 subscribers and your videos amount to over 4,000 watching hours. While there will be a time that you surpass that threshold, it takes a while, which means it cannot be a method relied on to make you money.
One great method to make money from YouTube without making forward-facing videos is to promote and sell other people’s products. Once the product is purchased through the link you provide alongside your videos in the description, you earn a portion of the sale. This is known as affiliate marketing. It is a very easy method to make passive income but is overlooked by far too many creators.
Actually, once you start earning ad revenue, you might very well find that the affiliate partnership will earn you more than ad revenue overall. There are no thresholds to reach, no milestones to attain, and you put the links in once, and let the watchers do the rest.
IF none of these methods are making you enough money, then we suggest to you to turn your expertise into your own thriving business. Start a professional Course teaching your targeted audience about the main subject of your channel. Use Thinkific to create a professional course website.
Step 8: Outsource
Now, if you want to make money without making any videos, you can actually do that by having someone else do the video making for you. Once your channel is set up and earning money, you can start working with other creators who will create and produce the videos for you.
Of course, you should still do the research and legwork to get the proper information together, but you can hire people to do everything else from writing the script to doing voiceovers, and creating thumbnails to creating the videos themselves. You can hire freelance professionals at Fiverr or Upwork to do this all for you.
So what should you do with all this free time you now have? Well, you can repeat the process by starting additional YouTube channels and producing more content.
The Example, As Promised – Unexplained Mysteries Channel
We promised at the beginning that we would show you a faceless YouTube channel that is highly successful and monetizing so well that Social Blade rates them as earning about $1,500 daily. Consider the success of the Unexplained Mysteries channel on YouTube which makes videos about strange facts, horror, history, and the unexplained. They use stock photos and videos, with a narrating voiceover.
There is no question that it requires research and time, but the tradeoff is that the production of these videos is not challenging so anyone can do it with some effort. And your channel can have those successful results too. Actually, even if you earned a fifth of what Unexplained Mysteries makes, that is still $300 per day of revenue. And if the videos you put are timeless, so they will still be earning money a decade from now. If your YouTube channel is still going strong then, the earnings will be exponential.
Make Money On YouTube Without Making Videos Final Comment:
Creating a YouTube channel which you can make easy videos for, or hire others to make them for you, is certainly possible. Not only that, but with time, optimization, and learning, it is even doable. If you dig through Social Blade, you will find that many channels out there, including possibly your favorites are doing just that!
Congratulations on finishing the article about how to make money on YouTube without creating videos! If you’re looking to grow your channel and build a solid audience, the next logical step is to focus on getting your first 1,000 subscribers and achieving the required 4,000 hours of watch time. Click on How to get your first 1000 subscribers and 4000 hours watch using Pinterest to read and learn about how to use Pinterest to achieve these milestones and set the foundation for a successful YouTube channel.
Frequently Asked Questions:
What is the easiest way to make money on YouTube?
There are several ways to make money on YouTube, but the easiest method is through advertising revenue. To start earning money, you will need to enable monetization on your YouTube account and have an AdSense account linked to your channel. Then, create engaging and high-quality content that will attract viewers and advertisers. As you grow your audience, you can also explore other revenue streams such as sponsorships, merchandise, and affiliate marketing.
What is the minimum views to get paid on YouTube?
To be eligible to earn money from ads on your YouTube videos, you need to have at least 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours of watch time on your channel within the past 12 months. These are the minimum requirements set by YouTube in order to join the YouTube Partner Program.
I’m Thomas, founder of Vid Gators, a platform dedicated to helping people earn money through Video Content . With experience in channel monetization, brand collaborations, and video-driven traffic, I share strategies and insights to guide others toward success on the platform.
