In this informal monologue, the creator debunks the common myth that YouTubers earn money directly from likes, explaining that likes do not generate ad revenue. To illustrate how likes affect a channel’s performance, he describes an experiment where two identical videos—same title, tags, and description—were uploaded, and only one received a like. The liked video rose higher in search results despite identical view counts and watch time, demonstrating that likes improve ranking. He further explains that YouTube’s recommendation system heavily weighs engagement metrics such as likes, dislikes, and comments, which can surface videos on the homepage and sidebars, leading to more views and, indirectly, more ad revenue. The speaker cites his own “My Worst Intros” series as an example of high‑engagement content that gains organic recommendations. While acknowledging that likes are beneficial, he expresses personal annoyance with frequent like requests and “like goals,” noting he only asks for likes on videos where he has invested significant effort. The talk concludes with a light‑hearted sign‑off.
Chapters
Insert generic video intro here. Occasionally I'll be watching a YouTube video, I'll go to the comments section, and then I'll see a comment asking, "Why do YouTubers ask for likes?" And every time someone leaves that comment, some person with a master's in internet common sense comes along and replies to that comment saying, "YouTubers ask for likes because they get paid when you like the video." YouTubers make money because businesses pay to place ads before their video. You clicking that like button does not generate them revenue, or at least not directly. And I'll explain what I mean by that by showing you this experiment. So what I'm gonna do is I'm gonna upload two videos with the exact same title, tags, and description. So when you search a certain phrase, those two videos are the only two videos that pop up. And then I'm gonna search that phrase, I'm gonna click on the second video, I'm gonna like it and watch it all the way through, and then I'm gonna watch all the way through the first video And the idea is because both videos have the exact same title tags and description, both videos have 1 view, you know, 100% watch time, but the second video has a like and the first video doesn't, the second video should come up above the first video. And I already conducted this experiment and it was a success. Video number 2 moved up in front of video number 1 because this video didn't have a like, this video had a like, so it moved up above it. So basically what I was trying to say earlier is You clicking that like button doesn't earn them money. They don't get like 10%, you know, 10 cents, a dollar, whatever, whatever people make up for you clicking that. But you clicking that like button does help them in search results, which will equal more views, which equals more ads seen, which will equal more revenue for that YouTuber. Another reason why YouTubers ask for likes besides search results is because the recommended videos on the side of this and on your YouTube homepage, those videos are all based off of engagement. If a video has a lot of likes, dislikes or comments, has a lot of engagement, then it's going to appear recommended for random people and it's gonna appear on people's homepages. My Worst Intros series, people typically like that video even if I don't tell them. It just gets lots of likes, it gets lots of comments, people complaining about the intros, so it has super high engagement and a lot of the views on My Worst Intros series come from being recommended to other people and come from other people's homepages. It's not even, it's not even anything I do, it's just it has lots of engagement so So it just appears randomly throughout YouTube. YouTube does the work for me. And that is what other YouTubers are hoping for when they ask you to like the video. Now having said all of that, asking for likes is still annoying. I hate it. I especially hate like goals when people are like, "If we get 500 likes, I'll upload a video tomorrow." That to me is really annoying, and I will admit I have asked for likes, you know, occasionally. If I spend a ton of hours making a video, I will ask people to like it because I put lots of effort into it. And I want other people to discover it, but I do not do it on every video because it is repetitive and it's really annoying when someone says 500 likes with that stupid sound effect, like, go, I don't know what I'm saying. But yeah, likes do help. It doesn't make people money directly, but in a way it does make 'em money. And that, what am I saying? I have a ping pong ball here. We should, oh, I missed. All right, walk your dog, kill squirrels, take out the trash, do your dishwasher. Bye. Mr. Bezo. Mr. Bezo.
