In this instructional video, video strategist Sheryl Plouffe explains how creators with fewer than 1,000 subscribers and under 4,000 watch‑hours can still generate revenue from YouTube. She outlines four monetization avenues—affiliate marketing, influencer marketing, Patreon, and selling one’s own products or services—highlighting that the first three require a sizable audience and are therefore less viable for small channels. Plouffe argues that offering personal products or services (e.g., coaching, courses, consulting) is the most profitable route, illustrating the point with two real‑world sales ($2,500 and $247) that originated from YouTube viewers. She then details three specific places on a channel where these offers can be promoted: the channel art banner, in‑video calls‑to‑action, and the video description. For each placement she describes three funnel models: a traditional lead‑magnet/email nurture funnel, an application‑based intake process, and a direct paid booking system using tools like Calendly and Stripe. The video concludes with a call to action to apply for a strategy call via workwithsheryl.com, a reminder to subscribe, and a note that new videos are released weekly on Thursdays to help creators increase authority and income.
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Do you want to make money from your YouTube videos? Sheryl Plouffe here, video strategist, and I get asked a lot, how do I make money? How do you make money from YouTube videos? Especially if you don't have 1,000 subscribers yet, if you don't have 4,000 hours of watch time. So for smaller channels, newer channels, you can still make money, and there really are 4 different ways that you can make money. Some make more than others. And let me break it down for you. The first one is through affiliate marketing. Affiliate marketing is when you sign up for a— to be an affiliate for a product or service and you get a link and you share that link with your audience, and if they purchase that thing, then you get some money for that. The problem with affiliate marketing is that you really are dependent on having a larger audience. This video is about those of you who have less than 1,000 subscribers on YouTube. So it can be a bit of an uphill battle to use affiliate marketing and make a lot of money at it or a decent amount of money at it, in fact. Influencer marketing is when people pay you to be seen with their— let's say this journal is the product. It could be a water bottle, it could be anything, eyelashes, whatever the case may be. But let's say it's this journal. People will pay you to say, hey, I'll pay you to do a video where you show you using the journal where you talk about the virtues of the journal, where you are just seen using the journal. There could be a different criterion that you would reach in order to show and demonstrate your usage of the product. Influencer marketing is again dependent on having a larger audience. People are not going to be interested in having you pose with their journal if you don't have a big audience. So that can be a bit of an uphill battle as well. Patreon is another way you can make money on YouTube. Patreon— I'm not— I don't use Patreon, but I see a lot of people who are using it. That's— it's like a membership site, and you promote your Patreon account. People will, you know, pay $1 a month, $2 a month, $5 a month, maybe $20 a month to support you in the content that you're creating on their behalf. Again, Patreon gotta have a bigger audience if you want to make any kind of money at that, right? So while Patreon, influencer marketing, and affiliate marketing are ways you can make money, the problem with them is you need a bigger audience in order to make that sustainable. It's really difficult to make a decent amount of money when you don't have a big audience. So that's why I want to focus on the fourth one for you today, specifically of a smaller audience, and less than 1,000 subscribers, your own products and services is the key. Let me give you an example. I have a video on my YouTube channel from a couple of years ago, and I had someone just find me, discover me online, and booked a call. We got online and made a $2,500 sale of a product or service. I can't remember what it was at that time. This was a couple of years ago as an example. Where they found me on YouTube, contacted me like 2 years after the video had been published and said, "Hey, I found you on YouTube. I'm interested in what you do. What do you do?" And I told him, he said, "I'm in." Okay, great. $2,500 sale. A more recent example, in fact, it happened yesterday, I think it was. Someone found me on YouTube 2 weeks ago, saw my video, binge-watched me for a while to make sure I was legitimate and authentic. And then booked a call with me, $247. So, you know, but this happens all the time. These are just two examples, but it happens all the time where people find me on YouTube and they get to know me and they understand where I'm coming from and they see my philosophy and my ideas and my concepts and they go, she's the girl for me. They get on the line and then we see if we're a fit to work together. And sometimes we are and sometimes we're not. But this is how it can work. Now, that is far more profitable than affiliate marketing, influencer marketing, or Patreon when you have a smaller audience. So the interesting thing about your own products and services with a smaller audience is that you don't need to have volume. You just need to have the right person. You only really need one person to convert— the right person to convert into your own product or service, whatever that is. A signature program, a course. So you only really need one, one right person to find your video and want to follow you down that, that, that path and become a client. So it's a far more profitable way for you to make money using your own products and services. But how do I promote that on YouTube specifically? 3 different ways, 3 places on your YouTube channel where you can promote anything, but I'm gonna talk about your own products and services because we've determined that that's really the most profitable way. Your YouTube channel art— there is a place in there where you can put links. You'll see little icons, and then you can put a link to something free or something paid. You can choose whatever you want to put in there. And so you could use that real estate to promote something of your own. You can also include in your videos themselves in the call to action, meaning the action you want people to take in your video, usually at the end, but it can be anywhere in your video where you call people to take an action with you. And then the other place is in the description box of your video. You can put a link to that thing. And there are really 3 things that I recommend that coaches, consultants, small business owners, speakers, and authors do in order to monetize and promote their products and services. One is through what is a traditional funnel, you know, a marketing funnel. In other words, there's a landing page, you put the link to the landing page in your, again, channel art, calls to action, or description. And that funnel, that landing page, is going to offer a free gift where people opt in and in exchange you get their email, you nurture that email, and then you follow up with those people over the course of time. It's a pretty traditional marketing funnel. The second way is to put a link again in the YouTube channel art, calls to action, or in the description of your videos where people apply to work with you, right? So they have to go through a quick questionnaire or application process, and from there you get to choose you know, what you do with that application and you follow through in your sales cycle from that point. But that is a place where you can— that is a thing that you can promote to your products and services. And the third place is, or the third thing, is a purchasing a call with you. It can be very direct. It can be, hey, here's a link to book time. It costs X number of dollars to consult with me for 30 minutes or an hour or 45 minutes or whatever it is. Here's the link. I like to use Calendly for that. Calendly has the ability to— you can set it up through Stripe where people can look into your calendar on your booking link, pay you directly for your time, and, and then off you go. You get paid, they book on your calendar, and it's really very simple. So those are 3 different ways that you can set things up in conjunction with your YouTube channel in the, again, channel art, call to action, or description to promote your products and services. Now, I'm just scratching the surface of this, but I want to paint a picture for you of what's possible. What is possible for you if you have less than 1,000 subscribers, you haven't reached that all-important 4,000 hours of watch time, but you're getting there. By committing yourself to your audience and you're doing your videos week in and week out, you will reach that echelon. You will get there. But for the time being, I want you to still have hope and strategy on how you can still monetize without those, without reaching those 4,000 hours and 1,000 subscribers. It's absolutely possible. So if you'd like to know more information about how I can help you, go to workwithsheryl.com, apply to work with me. You get a 15-minute or 45-minute call with me based on the answers to your question, and if I think I can help you, I'd be happy to jump on and help you decipher what is the best way for you to monetize your current YouTube videos and really look at your strategy and figure out a way that we can get you there faster. Thanks so much for watching. Be sure to check out these other videos on my channel, subscribe and hit the bell. New videos come out every Thursday to help you increase your authority and income with video. Thanks so much for watching and I'll see you in the next one.
