You can have a million subscribers and still earn a penny from YouTube. Being the largest social platform, with more than 2.5 billion users. YouTube onboards the whole ecosystem, from creators to viewers to advertisers. An ecosystem that entertains users, helps in selling products & services, and lets you earn from content creation. However, creators started seeing their YouTube earning drop. It can be an algorithm update, a change of monetization policy, or a new phase of YouTube. In this blog, we’ll discuss the reason for the YouTube revenue drop and methods to address it.
How Can You Earn on YouTube?
Before we understand why YouTube earning drop. Let’s see all the ways you can earn on YouTube, so that you get an understanding of how your potential earnings are affected.
YouTube Partner Program(YPP): To earn from Ad placement, you need to be eligible for YPP. The requirements are:
- 4000 (watch hours/views) within 12 months
- 1000 Subscribers
- 10 Million Public Shorts views within 90 days
- An active AdSense account is linked to a YouTube channel
- No active community guideline strikes
- YPP should be available in your region
YouTube Shopping: You can earn by listing your products in the YouTube Shop feature. You can also earn by adding Product Tags. Where viewers from YouTube TV scan the code, and mobile or desktop viewers click the product image to make the purchase, letting the creator earn a commission.
Live Streaming: By doing a live stream, you are giving unique visitors to YouTube, and those viewers can donate Superchat. Additionally, when they buy Superstickers, you also get a commission on it. Additionally, YouTube recently announced that in the US and Taiwan, when the audience purchases jewels from stream, creators get YouTube Rubies, which can be converted into real earnings.
Affiliates: In addition to YouTube, you can add your own affiliate links in the description. When someone makes a purchase, you get a commission. These earnings are totally separated from YouTube.
Channel Memberships: You can start a channel membership and upload exclusive content that can be seen only by paid members.
YouTube Premium: When users who have paid for YouTube Premium watch your content, you also get some earnings from it.
Why Does My YouTube Revenue Go Down?
As you can see, there are multiple ways to earn on YouTube. Still, creators have seen YouTube earnings drop in recent years.
Change in Algorithm: YouTube monetization policies, community guidelines, and terms get updated, so does the algorithm accordingly. For example, when AI content rose, YouTube prioritized authenticity and originality to prevent AI slop.
Change in niche: You might have started your career in some niche, but later changed it, thus impacting your earnings. For example, PewDiePie began as a gamer uploading horror game-related content. But now it’s more family-oriented and tech-related.
Seasonal content: If you add only trendy content, you’ll see a dip in earnings over time. The YouTube trends are temporary. Which gives your earnings, but after the trend ends, so do the earnings.
Promotion Only: A creator needs to add Evergreen content that provides value to users. If you do excessive promotion, you are set to be marked by the YouTube algorithm. Eventually, you will see views only when promoted.
Advertiser Biasing: Advertisers want their ads seen as early as possible. The priority is to look for videos with high watch time or to place ads within the first few minutes of the videos.
How to Create a Steady Income on YouTube?
Let’s see some methods to handle the YouTube earning drop along with an overview to adapt those into your channel.
Don’t rely on Ad placements only
Yes, I know from the start, we talked about the importance of Ad placement. But earning from ads requires continuous efforts. They provide more revenue, but we have seen YouTube earning drop. Other earning options, such as YouTube Shopping or Channel memberships, are like investments. They compound and magnify the earnings.
For example, initially, your Shop earnings will be low, but your Shop earnings and YouTube fame are proportional. When your fame increases, so do the earnings from the Shop.
Keep people on your channel
Long story short, if viewers stay on your channel longer. You will earn anyhow. Create a content strategy to keep people coming back to your channel. For example, create Shorts that bring users to longer videos, then to products, the Shop tab, etc.
Long-form videos are best for persuading users to visit the Shop tab, memberships, and affiliate links. Additionally, if you have a huge viewership or subscriber base, you can do more live streams to earn from Superchats.
Showcase your content strategically
Create a stack of monetization opportunities and promote those videos. If you have a video with a brand deal, then you can share access with advertisers using brand partner access. This brings transparency and provides a chance to share your engagement rate. The access brings more sponsorship deals to other videos or future projects.
Stay updated with YouTube BrandConnect and tell advertisers you’re the best fit for business. Cold mailing or social media DMs were good, but now stats are also essential to make the deal credible.
Promote the videos
When you see a YouTube earning drop trend. You should promote your YouTube video. The promotion has become a standard practice among YouTubers. By doing this, you are separating yourself from the crowd.
It’s normal to see your highest-earning video go full bland. You can again spark engagement by promoting your YouTube videos, bringing the cycle back, potentially impacting your earnings.
Conclusion
Many factors can affect your YouTube earnings. The change of algorithm, watch preference, niche, ad costing, etc. The factors help you understand the channel growth and its impact on your earnings. The creators have seen YouTube earning drop, so in the blog, we tried to answer why does my YouTube revenue go down. Started with understanding all sources of earning on YouTube and how it takes down the earnings, and later saw the methods to make your YouTube earnings steady.
Frequently Asked Questions
Q1. Why are my YouTube earnings decreasing?
The YouTube earnings are decreasing because of lower ad rates(CPM), low advertisers spending, changes in the YouTube algorithm, shifts in audience preferences, etc.
Q2. Why does my YouTube revenue go down?
Your YouTube revenue decreasing takes place due to lower ad rates, seasonal spends, algorithmic changes, policy changes, etc.
Q3. Why did YouTube views suddenly drop?
The sudden drop might occur due to an algorithm shift, lower audience retention, poor CTR, inconsistent uploads, a change in watch preferences, or a policy revamp.
Q4.How did my 80% YouTube earnings drop overnight?
The primary reason for such a drop is invalid traffic, artificial engagement boosts, and policy violations. The recovery from such an occurrence also takes time.