Monetizing Your YouTube Shorts: 7 Essential Tips for Creators

As YouTube’s Shorts monetization program launched on February 1st, many content creators were eagerly awaiting the opportunity to earn ad revenue through the popular short-form vertical video format. TheSoul Publishing, the online media company behind popular channels like 5-Minute Crafts® and 123 GO!, was an early adopter of the format and equally looking forward to this new opportunity.

Victor Potrel, VP of content distribution at TheSoul Publishing, recently discussed the company’s approach to monetizing Shorts on The Digiday Podcast. He noted that while the platform’s revenue-sharing program is exciting, the short video format monetization will come from many different approaches and tests and trials from creators, platforms, and advertisers.

Despite this uncertainty, Potrel emphasized that TheSoul Publishing isn’t planning to overhaul its short-format video strategy in order to capitalize on the program. He explained that while it’s important to embrace new features and programs from platforms, creators shouldn’t drastically change what they do.

To help content creators navigate the Shorts monetization landscape, here are seven tips that take into account TheSoul Publishing’s insights:

1. Meet eligibility criteria. Before monetizing Shorts content on YouTube, creators must meet eligibility criteria. A creator or publisher’s channel must have at least 1,000 subscribers or 4,000 public watch hours over the past year. Alternatively, they must have at least 10 million public Shorts views in the last 90 days. Once creators meet these eligibility criteria, they can monetize their Shorts content through ad revenue.
2. Manage monetization expectations. While Shorts monetization presents an exciting opportunity, creators shouldn’t expect to earn significant revenue right away. It may take time to see how the system works and how much money Shorts creators can realistically expect to earn.
3. Understand the impact of music on revenue. Music plays a significant role in vertical video trends, so it’s unsurprising that some of the revenue generated from Shorts will go to the artists. However, creators shouldn’t change their content creation process solely based on the potential for more revenue.
4. Focus on growth and reach. While monetization is important, creators shouldn’t lose sight of their long-term goals. For TheSoul Publishing, growth and reaching new audiences are also important goals, and Shorts is just one tool for achieving them.
5. Don’t overthink revenue share calculations. YouTube will use complex calculations to determine how to divvy out ad revenue to creators and publishers, but it’s not worth overthinking these calculations. Instead, creators should focus on creating high-quality, engaging content that resonates with viewers.
6. Use Shorts to drive traffic to longer-form content. Shorts can be a powerful tool for driving traffic to longer-form videos and building bridges between different formats and viewers. TheSoul Publishing uses this strategy to create new intellectual properties and grow their presence on streaming channels.
7. Continue to experiment and innovate. As with any new platform or format, there will be a learning curve as creators figure out what works best for them. The key is to continue experimenting and innovating throughout 2023 and beyond in order to create out-of-the-box content that resonates with old and new audiences alike.

In conclusion, monetizing Shorts content on YouTube is a step in the right direction for the industry and will support further growth of the format. To be successful, creators must produce engaging content, keep up with trends, adapt content to each platform, work within multiple content formats, drive audiences to longer-form content, and stay ahead of the curve.