Thinking of starting a YouTube channel, perhaps to indulge that creative streak you feel pinching you in the heart.
Or maybe you want to prove to yourself that you can do it, well, whatever your reasons, here are the fundamentals; things you should know before starting a YouTube channel.
My name is Dennis Ohuru, a YouTuber with 4 plus years of experience on YouTube, I’d like to think I know a thing or two about the platform
Who Owns Youtube
YouTube is an online video-sharing website that was founded by three former PayPal employees; Jawed Karim, Steve Chen and Chad Hurley in February of 2005.
After early successes, and seeing the platform’s future potential, Google acquired YouTube in October of 2006 for $1.65 billion.
Today, market analyst Michael Nathanson puts the value of YouTube at over $400 billion.
Is YouTube A Public Company
In a sense, yes, you see, YouTube as a company is owned by Google, which in turn is owned by Alphabet Inc
And Alphabet Inc. is a publicly traded company; so you could buy shares of Alphabet Inc. which in turn would make you part owner of all its subsidiaries, YouTube included.
How does YouTube work
YouTube is made up of billions of videos, these videos have to be stored somewhere right? Of course they do.
YouTube videos are stored in data centres (physical locations scattered around the world) Each YouTube data centre houses servers that store the billions of videos that have been and continue to be uploaded to YouTube.
The videos are then delivered to audiences around the world using Google’s CDNs. (Content Delivery Networks)
Content delivery networks are servers spread across the globe that ensure people in those geographical locations are served content much faster.
Google has a dedicated CDN just for YouTube called the YouTube Content Delivery Network.
So what YouTube does is store popular content in as many CDN locations across the world while less popular videos are stored in its data centres, fetched and delivered to a watcher on YouTube upon request.
Stats about YouTube in 2024
Here are a few interesting statistics about YouTube in 2024;
- Youtube is the second most visited website in the world after Google with close to 75 billion monthly visits
- There are over 50 million YouTube channels on YouTube
- India has the most number of YouTube users with the USA a close second
- 8% of all YouTube views come from India and the USA contributes a total of 4%
- The most viewed video on YouTube is Baby Shark with over 12 billion views
- Indian record label T-series is the most subscribed YouTube channel with over 264 million subscribers
- The most subscribed individual is MrBeast, an American content creator with over 254 million subscribers
- Around 3 million videos are uploaded to YouTube every single day
Types Of YouTube videos
In 2024, there are two types of YouTube videos;
- Long-form content
These are the traditional videos on YouTube, uploaded and served in the aspect ratio of 16 by 9, also known as widescreen or horizontal videos.
The maximum upload size for a long-form video on YouTube is 12 hours or 256 GB.
The best setting for a long-form video is to upload it in MP4, 1080p full HD or 4K and H.264 video codec.
- Youtube shorts
YouTube shorts are a new form of YouTube videos uploaded and served in the aspect ratio of 9 by 16, also known as portrait or vertical videos.
The minimum time limit for a YouTube short is 15 seconds and the maximum is 60 seconds.
What Camera Should You Use
A question most people considering starting a YouTube channel have is? What camera should I use to make YouTube videos?
The answer to that question is that the best camera is the one you have; or better still, the one you can access. Don’t wait until you can afford premium gear to start on YouTube.
Start with what you have, and the great thing is, these days most mid-level smartphones can take great videos.
However, if you can spare a few bucks, start with a beginner to mid-level camera, and practice on it until you master it before upgrading.
I wrote two very useful articles that may point you in the right direction concerning the camera question. Here they are;
- The Best Beginner And Midrange Cameras Under USD 1000
- Canon M50 Review, From A 3-Year Owner And Youtuber
The latter post is a review of my own camera which I’ve had for close to 4 years now; The Canon M50.
How to Make YouTube Videos
One thing I wish I had known before I started YouTube is the importance of choosing a topic for your YouTube channel before you start.
The importance of niching down: You see, with the number of YouTube videos being what they are, the fastest way to succeed on YouTube is choosing a topic and making videos about that topic over and over again.
This way, the YouTube algorithm learns about your channel faster and is better able to serve and recommend your content to people who are interested in your niche.
Popular niches on YouTube
Some popular niches on YouTube you can choose from are;
- Beauty and makeup
- Gaming
- Travel and adventure
- Finance and investment
- Food and cooking
- Health and Fitness
- Tech
- Product reviews and unboxing
Once you choose your niche, watch a few videos in that niche just to get a sense of how they were done.
Watch a few videos on video editing as well to understand the basic principles of video editing.
And then start experimenting, your first videos will be horrible especially if you’ve never made videos before;
People who are already in the cinematography field have an advantage in that area, but keep going and soon you’ll be making videos you can be proud of.
How To Open A YouTube Channel
First and foremost, sign up for a Gmail account; (your email account on Gmail is the Gmail account I’m talking about)
If you already have a Gmail account then basically have a YouTube channel. The two are intertwined together, more on that later.
Sign in to YouTube on your computer or mobile.
Click your profile and navigate to create a channel.
Follow the prompts, fill in your details and choose a name for your YouTube channel and you are set to go.
How To Upload YouTube Videos
Once you have created a YouTube channel, click on your profile and navigate to YouTube Studio.
As a YouTube creator, you will be using the YouTube studio to:
- Upload videos to YouTube
- Monitor the performance of your YouTube channel as well as individual videos
- Get analytics and statistics concerning the performance of your YouTube channel
- Monetise your YouTube videos once you get to the YouTube monetization threshold
In YouTube Studio, click on the create video icon, (it has a plus sign) and choose upload video.
You can monetize the progress of your video uploading to YouTube, once it is complete, you can choose to keep it as a draft or publish the video and make it live on YouTube.
How to Design YouTube Thumbnails
YouTube functions on two main principles;
- The principle of CTR (Click through rate)
Basically, how many people click on your video when they see it recommended to them on YouTube?
- Audience retention rate
How long do they keep watching your video once they click on it?
If you have a good click-through rate, to mean that your thumbnail is appealing to audiences, and if your video is interesting enough that people keep watching once they’ve clicked on it, then you’ve basically mastered YouTube.
The dreaded YouTube algorithm (the Machine learning tool) that controls the YouTube video recommendation system will be a friend of your YouTube channel and your YouTube channel will grow in leaps and bounds.
50% of the equation of YouTube success is good YouTube thumbnails.
To design good YouTube thumbnails you can use free online graphic design tools like Canva and Snappa.
Both are powerful graphic design tools and come with plenty of pre-made templates that you can customize and make your own.
As with everything, practice designing YouTube thumbnails and over time you will get better.
How To Make Money On Youtube
To make money on YouTube, you must be in the YouTube partner program.
To get into the YouTube partner program, first, you have to attain YouTube’s monetization threshold.
The YouTube monetization threshold ensures that only serious channels can be monetized, people willing to go the distance with YouTube.
YouTube requires a channel to attain the following threshold before it is considered for monetization:
- Your YouTube channel must garner 4000 public watch hours in the last 12 months
- And have over 1,000 subscribers
- If you are creating shorts, you need 1,000 subscribers and 10 million public short views in the last 90 days
- You must be living in a geographical location where the Youtube partner program is available
- Your channel must follow YouTube monetization policies and community guidelines (Not very complicated)
Once you have attained the relevant watch hours and subscribers needed to qualify for the YouTube partner program.
And if you live in a geographical location around the world where the YouTube partner program is available.
You can then apply to the program from your YouTube studio. YouTube will check your channel against its community guideline policies, and if you pass then you are approved and you can monetize some or all of your videos.
There are several ways to make money on YouTube including;
- Watch page ads (The advertisements served to viewers when watching YouTube videos)
- Shorts ads (The ads served to viewers when watching shorts)
- Channel memberships
- Supers
To read more about each of those methods, read this article by Google.
SUMMARY
There are other ways you can make money on YouTube that are outside the traditional earning mechanisms controlled by the YouTube partner program.
Including sponsored content and affiliate marketing; let me know in the comments in you want me to write on those topics.
You can also schedule a paid consultation with me on anything discussed in this post as well as other content creation and YouTube questions you might have.
Check out my consultancy rate on my pricing page.
Thank you for reading.
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