How I became a YouTube Partner

Hey there, time traveller!
This article was published 04/03/2012 (5145 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

A lot of people ask me how I make money from YouTube and I simply tell them: “I make videos.” Now, I know that sounds simple, but it really is easy — the complicated part is how I got there.

During spring break in 2010, I was staying in a New York City apartment with my family. It was late at night, everyone else was asleep, and I was up on my MacBook. I was on YouTube, watching tech videos. I had recently acquired a MacBook and I was trying to figure out a few things on it.

I used YouTube as my teacher and resource. I really admired what these tech reviewers did, and I wondered if I could do this myself. So I scrolled to the top right of the page and clicked “Create an Account.”

Now the first thing I struggled with was creating a good, catchy YouTube name. In high school, my grandpa was nicknamed Bellix and I thought that was pretty neat. But I needed to make that name more interesting, so I put an “i” in front of it like the Apple products did.

After I had the YouTube channel created, it was uphill from there.

What I started doing was giving tutorials on how to use Apple computers. I made videos talking about how to change the screen saver, how to make your computer stay awake for a while — really basic things. I kept making videos because I really enjoyed it. I started interacting with other techy YouTubers on social media sites and building relationships with them. I started becoming more and more involved in the YouTube community.

At that time, I had roughly 100 subscribers and 1,000 views. In case you don’t know, a subscriber is a person with a YouTube account who subscribes to your video feed. This means every time you make a video, it appears on their home page. Having subscribers is crucial to the YouTube partnership. Like I said before, I constantly made videos, trying to get more and more viewers. I enjoyed interacting with them in the comment section of my videos and helping them with their technology problems.

After about six months of creating YouTube videos, I decided I was going to apply to the YouTube Partnership Program. I had grown to 500 subscribers and roughly 20,000 views. I was naive applying so early, but I did anyway. The YouTube Partnership Program allows you to have advertisements appear on your videos, which then generate revenue. There is no trick or scheme to being accepted to this program, you really just need a constant stream of quality YouTube videos, along with a fan base behind you of roughly 1,000 subscribers and 100,000 views.

While I wasn’t a YouTube Partner, I made the videos for free, and I had no problem doing that because I really enjoyed it. I got denied the first time I applied for partnership but decided I would apply again in another six months.

Six months later, I had 1,500 subscribers and 120,000 views, so I applied again, this time making sure all my answers on the application form were high-quality and had no grammatical mistakes. I clicked that send button, and waited for a very long time. The typical wait to find out if you were accepted was two to four weeks. After four weeks, I didn’t hear anything and was super-bummed.

Then, two months later when I was at school, I heard my iPod buzz. I made sure the teacher wasn’t looking and I checked to see what the new email was. I thought maybe it was a comment on one of my videos or a new subscriber. But out of the blue, it said, “Congratulations iBellix, you are now a YouTube Partner.” I can’t tell you how ecstatic I was. I was now going to be making money off all my videos and make even more money for the future videos I was going to create.

I’ve been a YouTube Partner for quite some time now. I’ve made more than 200 videos, and have 5,000 subscribers and 2,000,000 views. I’ve kind of veered away from YouTube, as it’s not my passion as it used to be, but I still put up the occasional video review. I have been lucky and blessed to be a YouTube Partner, since it has provided me with a steady stream of income. Now, I know you are most likely wondering how it pays. Some months I can make $150, others it can be $500. It all depends on how many views I’ve received.

It’s a really fun thing to make YouTube videos and I’d recommend it to anyone.

If you have any more questions, feel free to send me an email at ibellix@gmail.com. You can view my videos at YouTube.com/iBellix and follow me on Twitter @thedavidbell.

Thank you very much for reading!