I am a psych nurse and my channel is about empowering survivors of all kinds of abuse to move forward and rebuild their life into something even better than it was before. I've been at this for about 10 months now and have 14k subs and close to 2 million views. I didn't start my channel with the idea that I could make any money from it--I just started it because it's a topic I'm passionate about. And because I am so on fire about this topic, I put out a lot of videos (I'm up to around 155). Passion is a really necessary ingredient in becoming successful in anything because you'll need it to carry you through the low times. I'd say whatever anyone goes into, be passionate about it enough that you can dedicate a ton of time to it for the next 3-5 years. If you can't, then perhaps consider finding you are that passionate about.
My goal now is to be able to do this full time within the next 6-12 months--but I'm not planning on just relying on YouTube income to make that happen. I plan to start a podcast, and I have a series of books I'm writing (just to name a few ideas I have in the works). My income from YouTube adsense isn't reliable and fluctuates wildly. I would never consider quitting my job over an income stream that is that much of a wildcard. If I had some sponsors that might be different.
...Hindsight being what it is, what really helped me to get to the place I am today with subscribers and views is:
- I put out around 30 videos within 2 weeks (and continued at the pace of 1-2 day for many months)
- I was focused on providing info with the hopes of helping others
- I put out my videos in a related topic (Mine were on the red flags of abusive people)
- I put them out in a playlist
This "strategy" (which wasn't on purpose) lead me to get 345k views that first month--with no "platform" or community. My earlier videos are pretty rough too--so it's not that they were great quality. My videos served a purpose and helped to solve a problem. I say this, because I don't really don't think there's anything special or unique about me or my videos, it was more my approach (that I fell backwards into) that worked well.
...I highly recommend people to learn about internet marketing and to watch everything they can from Tim Schmoyer and Derral Eves.
I hope that helps. Stay passionate. Keep creating.
