High earnings on YouTube have not been a fantasy for many years. It’s a real way to run a business on your own terms. Affiliate marketing is a proven way to quickly monetize video content and gain additional income without unnecessary formalities.

How to earn money with affiliation

Affiliation is a win-win collaboration in which every party involved makes money. The publisher, i.e. the YouTuber or another online creator, earns commissions from the sale of recommended products from the advertiser’s store. The advertiser earns because they sell more thanks to the publisher’s recommendations and share a commission with them.

To be able to earn money by recommending products, you need to join the affiliate program of the brand you want to promote. Then the YouTuber, i.e. the affiliate publisher, recommends selected products from the affiliate programs in their videos and adds affiliate links in the video description. For every transaction completed by a user after going through an affiliate link, the YouTuber receives a predefined commission on the sale.

Importantly, working in affiliate programs gives every YouTuber a lot of freedom: they can recommend products and encourage people to buy them in line with their own style. The YouTuber decides for themselves what they recommend and why. They can openly encourage viewers to purchase selected products, emphasising that each purchase will generate a commission for them. They can also recommend products in a very subtle way, highlighting only their benefits without directly urging people to buy. In such a case, most users may not even realise that they have clicked an affiliate link that will generate a commission for the YouTuber.

You can find the list of available affiliate programs in the webePartners network HERE.

How to make money on YouTube with affiliate links

Thanks to affiliate links, anyone can earn money. Affiliate marketing allows publishers to generate income without having their own product. All you need is access to the internet and a channel on YouTube, Instagram, TikTok or any other social media platform.

There is no “entry threshold” defined by the number of visitors or the level of engagement on the publisher’s channels. Affiliate programs also accept publishers who are just starting their online activity and YouTube channels with small reach. The key is the systematic development of content and building authority within your own audience, which over time increases the chances of establishing cooperation with more demanding advertisers.

The key to earning from affiliate marketing is creating substantive and valuable content for a given target group and carefully selecting brands and products for affiliate activities. In this way, publishers not only increase their revenue, but also build a strong personal brand that attracts a loyal audience.

How to generate an affiliate link in 30 seconds

The affiliate link generator is used to create affiliate links, i.e. active URLs that make it possible to track actions and transactions that occur thanks to clicks on those links. The affiliate system tracks orders in online stores that are completed via affiliate links and automatically calculates commissions from those purchases for the owners of the affiliate links. This is exactly how you can earn money by recommending products and services online.

How to make money on YouTube with Barter and Flat Fee

At webePartners, we have created a dedicated module for establishing collaborations with brands at pre-defined rates. The amount of remuneration for the advertising activities carried out is determined by the publisher, i.e. the YouTuber (or the owners of other social media profiles).

After registering, go to the OFFERS/BARTERS tab and create an offer for cooperation with brands. Two steps are enough for your offer to appear in the Offer Catalogue and be available to all brands that are registered on our platform:

ADD AN OFFER by filling in the form in the >>>My offer tab. Thanks to an offer on Barter terms or in the Flat Fee model, you will receive a guaranteed value of products or a fixed fee for the publication, without having to generate any sales.

YOU CAN ADD SEVERAL OFFERS if you have several advertising spaces. You can offer activities on all spaces at the same time or only on selected ones. You can offer a variety of activities at different rates.

How to start earning on your YouTube channel

To become an affiliate publisher, you don’t have to incur any costs. Registration as a publisher in an affiliate network is free (it has been and will be), just like access to all promotional tools and the full functionality of the affiliate platform.

Earning money through affiliation on YouTube – key advantages

• An opportunity for small and niche channels

• Complete freedom in choosing the products and services you recommend

• No additional formalities in cooperation with brands, only publisher account registration

• The possibility to end the cooperation at any time

• Freedom in how you operate and recommend products

It is worth emphasizing that YouTube creators do not sign any contracts with advertisers and brands whose products they recommend. It is enough to register with an affiliate network, and the network itself takes care of all the formalities. To make the cooperation between publishers and advertisers as effective as possible, bureaucracy is reduced to an absolute minimum. For the same reason, YouTubers (publishers) can end their participation in the partner program at any time, without giving a reason.

You can find more about earning on YouTube through affiliation in this article: Earning on YouTube – how to monetize even a small amount of traffic.

Affiliation versus other types of earnings on YouTube

How to make money on YouTube through other monetization methods

Some time ago, Robert Nawrowski — who runs a channel about new technologies — shared with us his methods of earning money on YouTube. Earning on the platform is now very common. Even creators of small channels can count on a monthly cash injection, although these are not staggering amounts. YouTube earnings can be generated from several sources. The first of them is joining the YouTube Partner Program, which gives us access to:

• Google AdSense ads, meaning the display of banner ads, video ads, and overlays before your videos. This tool allows you to earn money from YouTube without having to look for advertisers on your own, because the system continuously supplies them. Importantly, this option is not only for YouTubers but also for bloggers and other websites. However, remember that AdSense does not always work, because many people (in Poland it’s half of all Internet users) have AdBlock enabled, and then such ads are not displayed. As a result, the number of views drops, and therefore earnings drop as well.
• Product shelves – your viewers can purchase the products you offer, which appear on the video watch pages. This option is available from 10,000 subscribers.
• Channel memberships – interested viewers make monthly payments in exchange for offered bonuses. Here you must collect at least 30,000 subscribers.
• Super Chat and Super Stickers – payments made by viewers so that their messages stand out.
• YouTube Premium – you receive a portion of subscription fees if Premium users watch your videos. However, they must be Premium subscribers.
• Joining an affiliate network and participating in affiliate programs of any brands. We will expand on this topic more in the following sections of the article.
• Collaboration with brands (Influencer marketing) Many companies look for ambassadors for their products or simply offer one-time collaborations with YouTubers who create content that fits their brand. This is how haul videos with Renee often appear on StylizacjeTV, and how Coca-Cola appears on the channels of Martin Stankiewicz or Rezigiusz.

Entering into collaborations with brands is not easy, because someone has to notice you and find your channel interesting. This is especially difficult nowadays, when the platform hosts a massive number of creators. So it is worth standing out and reminding brands about yourself, for example by tagging them on social media and showcasing their products in your videos, even if these are unpaid activities.

YouTube Partner Program and YouTube earnings

When it comes to the formalities related to earning through the YouTube Partner Program, there are not many, but there are certain rules that must be followed.

• First of all, you must be at least 18 years old to independently join the Partner Program.

• You must live in a country or region where the YouTube Partner Program is available.

• You must have over 1,000 subscribers.

• You must achieve over 4,000 hours of public watch time within the last 12 months.

• You must also link your account with the AdSense tool.

Depending on which service of the YouTube Partner Program you want to use, you must meet additional requirements. For example, channel memberships require 30,000 subscribers.

IMPORTANT:
Remember that verifying the account submitted to the YouTube Partner Program takes quite a lot of time. The standard waiting period for acceptance to the program is at least one month, which — due to the enormous number of applications — may be even longer.

Why do we need YouTube Premium? Earnings from YouTube Premium

YouTube Premium is the latest concept from the internet giant. It is a combination of all branches of this platform in one (YouTube, YouTube Music, YouTube Kids, Google Play Music). However, in this case it is a paid service. So what is so special about it that users decide to pay a monthly subscription?

• Watching videos without ads

• The ability to download videos and watch them offline

• The ability to play videos in the background

• Full access to YouTube Music

• The ability to download music and listen offline

• Watching videos without ads and in offline mode on the YouTube Kids platform

You can try YouTube Premium for 30 days completely free of charge. Later, the cost for one month of use is PLN 23.99. You can cancel the subscription at any time.

When it comes to making money on YouTube, YouTube Premium is the only place where subscriptions have great significance, because it is from them that earnings can be generated. You receive a share of the total revenue from all YouTube Premium subscriptions, calculated on the basis of the time users spend watching your content.

YouTube Music and earnings on YouTube

YouTube Music is an application created in response to the needs of users who use the service mainly to listen to music. Many people wonder why it was created if Google Play Music already exists, which belongs to the same owner. The reason is competition. In terms of music content, Google cannot compete with giants such as Apple Music or Spotify. It may be different with the YouTube brand, which has always been associated with music. The creators focused primarily on an intuitive interface that makes the application easier to use and on high responsiveness. It is worth mentioning that YouTube Music does not include all audio files that can be found on the platform. It contains only licensed tracks and audio versions of music videos and videos related to musical performances (concerts, acoustic sessions, covers). The biggest advantage of YouTube Music? You can play music in the background, which is not possible in the classic version of the platform.

How the best earn on YouTube

Let’s take a look at three channels that have achieved huge success, each representing a completely different niche.

RedLipstickMonster

She started as a girl passionate about makeup, piercings, and tattoos. She launched her channel in 2008 and has been active on the platform ever since. At the beginning, she presented herself as an ordinary twenty-year-old living in Wrocław and working in a piercing studio. Today, she is a regular in Warsaw’s salons, has published three books, and recently released a new ebook. She is also invited to television shows and appears in videos created by many other YouTubers. She creates a wide range of content, is influential and recognizable. What hasn’t changed is that Ewa Grzelakowska-Kostoglu has a strong community behind her — a community that has matured and evolved with her over the last twelve years. She currently has 1.46 million subscribers, and viewers love her for her authenticity, honesty, and the fact that she always stays true to herself. From a business perspective, she generates huge earnings on YouTube, which allows her to treat running the channel as a full-time job. However, it wasn’t always this way, and her example shows that through hard work, consistent publishing, and — most importantly — the ability to win people over, you can achieve a great deal.

5 sposobów na…

A channel that wins primarily with its concept. It was created in 2013 by five “boys next door” who wanted to share their hacks for various everyday topics. Each of them is good at something different, so among the episodes you can always find something for yourself. Currently, the group has gathered 2.26 million subscribers and continues to grow dynamically, and it is worth noting that the channel is exclusively in Polish! Among the content of the guys you will find, for example, 5 ways to make snacks for a party, 5 ways to make a face mask, or 5 ways to survive student life. Their topics have now expanded somewhat. They do challenges or interesting projects, e.g., a guitar made from a shovel. The earnings on YouTube that they generate are enough for each of them to treat this channel as a profitable job.

ReZigiusz

Currently twenty-four-year-old Remigiusz Wierzgoń began his YouTube career in 2008. He was only 12 years old then! He didn’t even dream that this platform could one day become the source of most of his income, allowing him to live at a very high standard. The channel was founded out of a passion for computer games and attracted both young people the creator’s age and older viewers impressed by his gaming skills. Today, the profile of the channel has changed significantly. It is now dominated mainly by challenges and vlogs. You can find videos titled “I spent a night in prison” or “I pay my buddy 10 zł for every 1000 views of the video.” Even though ReZigiusz completely changed what his channel is about, he has still maintained the engagement and loyalty of his viewers, thanks to whom he can create and generate very high YouTube earnings. Currently, his channel has over 4 million subscribers.

As you can see, each of these people had a different idea for themselves and chose a different way of earning money on YouTube. Nevertheless, when creating their channels, they followed the rules mentioned above, which resulted in the fact that today working on the platform has become their profession.

How much can you earn on YouTube per month

You already know what generating earnings on YouTube looks like, so this is the best time to tell you how much you can earn. These are of course only examples, because each situation is treated individually.

When it comes to advertisements alone, we are dealing with Google Ads, thanks to which we can display display or video ads. The division of the amount obtained from such ads is as follows: 55% of the total goes to the YouTuber, and 45% remains in the hands of Google. How much does one ad view cost? As much as the advertiser is willing to pay for it! Sometimes it is 0.5 PLN and sometimes 5 PLN. On average the rate is around 2 PLN. So if a video has 100,000 views, the YouTuber earns 200 PLN.

Another issue is the rates offered for product placement, appearing at a brand event, or preparing a sponsored post. Such activities are paid much more generously, but they are also not an everyday occurrence. Earnings generated in this way on YouTube are difficult to define within rigid limits, because everything depends on the recognizability, popularity, and reputation of the specific YouTuber. The difference is truly huge, because the smallest creators may receive several thousand PLN (6–8) for a single placement, while the most recognizable people may receive several hundred thousand (even 160!).

In the case of affiliate programs, the rates also vary, but here everything largely depends on the engagement of both the influencer presenting the product and their followers who use the affiliate links. The amount of compensation offered depends on the commission set by the Advertiser. Additionally, significantly higher rates are granted to publishers participating in premium programs.

Of course, it should be remembered that this is only the revenue that YouTubers obtain. However, all expenses associated with professional video production must be deducted. Nevertheless, it can be confidently stated that owners of channels with large reach can safely treat this occupation as their only source of income.

How to create a YouTube channel in order to earn money

Are you wondering what fields YouTube channels can cover? There are basically no limitations. Sports, fashion, beauty, health, politics, interviews, lifestyle, music, artistic fields, psychology, business, comedy… This is only a drop in the ocean of possibilities! However, even the best idea has no chance of success (in terms of high YouTube earnings) if you don’t gather a community. So an interesting idea + engaged users is what allows you to generate an appropriate level of income from your activity on this platform.

Many people would like to achieve success on the level of channels such as Imponderabilia, StylizacjeTV or Martin Stankiewicz. If you don’t know these creators, nothing is lost, because at any moment you can get familiar with them if the world of YouTube business interests you. The only thing you need to know at this stage is the fact that these are communities gathering respectively 183,000, 957,000 and 1.3 million subscribers, meaning people who follow the videos. This means that enormous crowds of people watch most of the videos released by these influencers. For them, earning money on YouTube is an everyday thing.

How to make your channel encouraging enough so that you can earn income from recording video formats?

A good idea

The foundation of a good channel is the idea. When watching any video in which YouTubers talk about the reasons for their success, you can hear that the most important thing was that they had a developed, concrete idea. They knew there was something they could offer others, even though their immediate surroundings were not necessarily as interested in the topic as they were. That is why they decided to go a step further and use the platform to build a community of people who would also be eager to exchange experiences on that topic.

Many YouTubers who now achieve great success started long ago, when earning money on the platform wasn’t even within the realm of dreams. For them it was simply a place where they could talk about their interests and meet people who were also fans of a given topic. Older channels are mainly those from creators in the beauty and lifestyle fields. This trend came to Poland from America and was adopted very well. Flagship influencers from this area who function online and generate truly large YouTube earnings include, among others, the previously mentioned Karolina Gołębiewska from the StylizacjeTV channel, Joanna Cymbalista (PannaJoanna), Karolina Ziętek (Karolina Ziętek), Ewa Grzelakowska-Kostoglu (RedLipsickMonster) and Joanna Ferdynus-Gołuszko (Maxineczka).

All people who have been watching videos on YouTube for many years know that these women were the ones who started when the platform was only a place to express passion and build a community, not generate income. Today everything looks different. Videos are more professional, more thoughtful and consistent with the theme of the channel, but there is no doubt that everything is still based on the idea that guided them from the beginning. Of course this does not mean that only very old channels can make money on YouTube. Relatively new productions are also doing great. For example, places such as MarKa or Ula Pedantula are successful even though they have been on the YouTube scene for only a few years.

A community, but… an engaged one

Another extremely important aspect of building a YouTube channel is, of course, an engaged community. The number of subscriptions is important, but not the most important thing. You should also pay attention to the number of views on each video and the comments. Even if at the beginning you gather 10, 20 or 100 thousand fans, but they are not active (meaning they do not comment, evaluate or watch your videos), then unfortunately high earnings on YouTube will not be attainable. An engaged community is an absolute must-have for every social media profile. That is why it is so often noticeable that many YouTubers do not operate only on this platform but also communicate with their followers via Instagram or Facebook. This happens because thanks to those additional sources, they can give users the feeling of “being up to date.” Engagement can also be built through discount codes (e.g. obtained in affiliate programs), deals or giveaways for viewers. This is important, because then the audience feels that the creator is thinking about them and wants to give them something in return.

Good quality materials

Nowadays, the approach to video quality has also changed. A few years ago, an ordinary smartphone with a good camera was enough to create the videos viewers wanted. Today the matter is much more complicated. Most people who record, even those who are just starting out, invest a lot in equipment (i.e. cameras, microphones, lighting, etc.) and in editing. A good example is Magdalena Mołek, known to us until now from television, who as a gift for her 44th birthday opened a channel this year. She created a place meant to replace the TV shows she participated in, but where she couldn’t fully do what was in her heart. That was her motivation to start her adventure on the platform. However, as she herself says, she is still far from generating earnings on YouTube and for now is mainly investing her private money into developing the channel.

Regularity

Regular posting is an absolute necessity. Many people who have been creating content on the platform for many years believe that one of the factors that allowed them to grow their channels and generate earnings on YouTube was their commitment and consistent publication of videos, even if at the beginning they were watched by only a dozen people. Perseverance and determination meant that more and more viewers appeared by accident and stayed longer because new videos, added systematically by the creator, kept showing up for them.

Authenticity

The final point is honesty and naturalness. The idea is that viewers know they can trust you and that you recommend products that genuinely work for you. For example, if you join a partner program and begin promoting bicycle accessories on your beauty channel, viewers may perceive it as a pushy form of advertising. That’s why it’s important to match all collaborations to the nature of your channel. Referring also to the first item on our list, it’s important that the idea behind your channel is truly aligned with you as a creator. If you see that fitness vloggers are popular and suddenly want to become one of them, but you know that you have little in common with sport, you can be sure that viewers will notice. Today’s audience is very observant and sharp, so there is no way to sell them a false image.