How To Become A Youtuber

Want To Start Your Own YouTube Channel?

  We know getting big on YouTube isn’t easy. But if you want to learn how to become a successful YouTuber, this article is the right place to start.

Find Out What To Do

Pick Your Genre

First thing’s first, figure out what genre you want to work in. There’s four main genres on YouTube right now, and we’ll go over them all right now:

Comedy/Vlogging. These focus on the laughs and audience engagement. Many comedy videos will go for comedic real-life skits, pranks or even animations/parodies. Vlogging is typically considered a “personal” type of video, but most vlogs focus on comedy and funny moments to maximize audience engagement and monetization potential.

• Gaming. Gaming is a diverse genre of different titles that different people enjoy for different reasons. Many people who want to know how to become a successful YouTuber are also asking how to be a successful YouTuber gamer, since gaming video is one of the biggest forms of content on YouTube and the Internet in general right now. People like watching other people play video games- who knew?
• Technology/Fashion. That’s right: tech nerds and fashionistas belong in typically the same genre. This is because the most popular form of content for both of these genres is review content- that is, videos made to review the latest, greatest products in tech and beauty. Many of the biggest YouTubers in both of these circles also enjoy free review samples for certain products and are often cited as influencers in their fields.
• Educational/Howto. Last but not least, there’s educational/howto videos! Make no mistake: just because you see the word ‘educational’ doesn’t mean we’re talking about Pre-K videos. Most educational content on YouTube dives deeps into matters about philosophy, science, culture and more.

Pick Your Type Of Content

So, you’ve figured out your genre, but what type of content do you want to do within that genre?

• Comedy/Vlogging. Most of the popular comedy content on YouTube are skits acted out by a group of people, real-life pranks (be careful with these!) and song/animated parodies. Vlogging, meanwhile, is typically only popular with a certain type of content: fashion YouTubers vlog between videos, but some vloggers also take their content in a journalistic direction and do news videos, like Phillip DeFranco.
• Gaming. So, gaming videos. You can do basic game reviews, you can do in-depth explorations of a game’s theming/mechanics, you can do video game trivia on games and the consoles they’re released on…or you can just post gameplay highlights. You can also crossover with comedy and do some skits based on video games, or with howto and teach about advanced game mechanics. If you want to know how to be a successful YouTuber, chances are at least a few of you want to do that with gaming. Fortunately, there’s a wide variety of things you can do with this medium!
• Technology/Fashion. It’s always strange to blend these two, but the content type is fairly similar, as outline before. Product reviews are the most popular kind of content for these genres. Fashion YouTubers can look into StyleHaul to start getting products to make videos on, but smaller fashion/techtubers will have to start making their own content before getting review copies. A good place to start would be reviewing your own pieces of tech/fashion equipment in a unique way, and to make videos on the latest news. At least a few of you are inspired to learn how to become a successful YouTuber by the fashion YouTubers at the top, right?
• Educational/Howto. Educational videos can cover pretty much any in-depth look at a topic that you like. It’s best to focus on subject matters you’re knowledgeable about, or that you know people have a great interest in. Howto videos are simple tutorials, but you can teach people how to do anything from sweep a floor to playing a piano to cooking a recipe. If you have a unique skill or just want to share your way of doing things, make a howto video! (Note: HowToBasic is not included in this category.)

Start YouTube-ing

Produce On A Schedule

If you want to know how to become, you need to produce content on a regular schedule. The schedule of your content production depends on the kind of content you’re making, though you want to at least put out one video per week. Upping that to two/three videos per week is ideal, and some channels may even be able to do daily videos. However, try not to ever go over one video for each day of the week: if you start flooding your subs with too much content, they will unsubscibe, and you can’t typically earn that back.

Learn To Make Money Through Ads And Influencer Marketing.

A key part of how to become a successful YouTuber is knowing how to make money off of YouTube. First, you’ll need to become a YouTube partner, and enable monetization on most, if not all of your videos (don’t monetize videos with copyrighted content!). Ad revenue doesn’t make a lot of money, especially not while you’re small, but it will start giving you good funding as you move up the ladder on YouTube. Around the time you breach 1-2K subscribers, it’s smart to start looking at influencer marketing and sponsorship opportunities to get extra money for your channel.

An influencer, by the way, is a figure (usually a content creator or celebrity) that a businesses uses to spread their brand and product, generally with sponsored spots in their videos, sponsored reviews/overviews, or even subtle plugs like using the product in their videos. There are many platforms you can use to take advantage of influencer marketing and sponsorship opportunities on YouTube, including Reelio and FameBit.

Work With Other Youtubers.

Finally, it’s important to remember that you aren’t alone. If you want to know how to become a successful YouTuber, one of the biggest secrets is learning how to work with other successful YouTubers. Finding content creators who make similar content can help you get shoutouts and collaborations that will help both of you grow your channels. There’s a lot more you can get out of another content creator, too- more on that in a bit.