Started as a form of entertainment, creating and sharing videos on social media platforms have become a means of making money. The monetization of content transforms hobbyists into influencers. The virality and the fortune involved with this activity attracted even celebrities and other prominent names to hop in. In a short period, vlogging and influencer marketing both became lucrative industries.

What is Vlogging?

Vlogging is the popular shortened term for video blogging.

The videos involve the content creator – or the owner of the vlog – showing his or her travel, personal stories, reaction to other videos, product reviews, skits, tutorials, etc. They can be almost anything as long as the content appeals to the audience and doesn’t violate community guidelines.

What is Influencer Marketing?

Influencer marketing makes use of popular personalities on social media.

These content creators have a great following and a high number of views, which are both factors in determining their profitability. No wonder businesses saw this as a modern marketing strategy because social media personalities can influence their fans easily through their content. Product mentions and endorsements from the so-called influencers are effective to boost brand awareness or even sales.

How to Earn as a Vlogger or Influencer

Here are the seven ways a vlogger or influencer makes money:

1. Setting up a YouTube Channel

If you want to focus on vlogging, create a solid plan in establishing your YouTube Channel. It’s your personal space in the video-streaming platform where you can share engaging content. However, YouTube requires you as the creator to gain a minimum of 1000 subscribers and your channel should get at least 4000 watch hours for the past 12 months.

Hitting this requirement enables you to become a member of the YouTube Partnership Program. It activates the monetization of your content in various ways. These include:

• Ad revenue – If brands find your channel suitable, they may choose to place paid ads, and these will pop into portions of your videos. You must be 18 years old and above.
• Merchandise shelf – If you’re 18 years old with 10,000 subscribers, you can place your merch on YouTube’s merchandise shelf for sale.
• Channel memberships – If you are 18 years old and with 30,000 subscribers, you can sell channel memberships where your fans can pay you more for exclusive perks and content.
• Super Chat payments – YouTubers, at least 18 years old, can highlight messages from their fans who paid for it on live chats or live streams. This feature is not offered to all countries.
• Youtube Premium revenue – When a YouTube Premium subscriber watches your video, you automatically get a portion of their fee.

Celebrities can easily start a YouTube channel with their popularity. However, some YouTubers started from zero subscribers to earning huge profits due to their charisma, unique content, and consistency.

2. Selling merchandise of your brand

When you have established a good number of followers, you become a brand. You can now offer more like a brand on top of your content. Design, create and sell this merch to your followers. As mentioned you can sell it on YouTube, but there are so many social media platforms to introduce your products. As a social media personality, you already have a cluster of customers.

3. Join an affiliate program

If you think that you still need to get more followers, the present number of your fans can still help you earn through affiliate marketing. You look for companies offering affiliate programs and convince your fans online to visit affiliate links. This is another way of earning, which is quite similar to sponsored content.

4. Make sponsored content

This is direct work with companies as compared to ads revenue. You get a deal with other brands to create content that talks about their product or services. As a rule, you must inform the viewers that this content is sponsored. The contract is between you and the company, so YouTube doesn’t get a portion from that earnings. It means big profit, especially if the brand is popular.

This approach applies to all social media platforms where you create videos. You

5. Licensing your content

If you know what copyright is, this is how it works. You get to limit how your original content will be used by other parties. A lot of online content gets viral for media to take notice of, and by licensing them you get paid if the media decided to use these contents on air.

6. Fans paying you directly

There are various ways fans will pay you for exclusive perks and features. Examples are YouTube Super Chats, Patreon, OnlyFans, Medium, and others. Fans can also send you stars or gems on your live streaming, and these can be converted into cash.

7. Crowdfunding

It’s the modern approach to soliciting donations. You present a goal that you want to achieve, and those fans and other people who believe in that cause will send in funds to show their support. It depends on you if they will get rewards in exchange.

Social media has gone a long way from being a platform to merely share interests to becoming a new model of marketing. Making money out of online popularity, views, and followers prove to be highly profitable. Thus, the government intends to place taxes on this newfound source of income. Anyone can be a vlogger or social media influencer, but it takes a lot to stand out especially that content creators grow every day. But once you did it, it pays well.