A Creator on YouTube Earns $20,000 a Month to Make 1-Minute Videos

In a bid to beat rival platforms like Instagram and TikTok, YouTube has revealed that numerous creators are now monetizing their short videos on the platform and earning a sizable paycheck. This push comes at a huge cost to the platform owned by Google as it allocated tens of thousands of dollars every month to pay out Shorts creators, including popular figures like beauty influencer Sydney Morgan.

In response to the challenges faced by its TikTok-inspired feature, which the tech giant released to stand out in the competitive short-form video landscape, YouTube introduced revenue-sharing for short-form videos last year. In a recent blog post, the platform revealed that over a quarter of its 3 million creators in the YouTube Partner Program now earn income from Shorts, often on top of revenue from traditional long-form content.

Having grown up learning makeup hacks from YouTube makeup creators who came to the scene before her, during the pandemic, beauty creator Morgan began posting her content on Instagram and then YouTube. Even though she began her posts in 2020, Morgan said her YouTube audience only exploded the year after when the platform introduced Shorts. When the feature launched, Morgan posted Shorts displaying emoji-inspired makeup looks that brought in 30 million views.

“The nature of short-form content is that it can be consumed so quickly, and it’s the best format to cast a wide net and pull in new viewers,” she said. “I use Shorts as a supplement to reach new audiences and funnel them into my long-form now.”

Morgan explained that Shorts is her main source of income now, contributing approximately $20,000 per month, which makes up two-thirds of her total YouTube earnings.

“I make more from just YouTube Shorts (revenue) sharing in a month than I can make on other comparable platforms in a year,” she said.

YouTube remains confident in its longstanding history of collaborating with creators to further develop short-form videos. The tech giant highlights its ability to offer compelling incentives to creators to try out new formats, attracting new users to the platform.

In an exclusive interview on Thursday, Amjad Hanif, YouTube’s vice president of product, said, “We look at it as giving creators the tools they need to reach viewers where they are, and viewers are definitely into short-format, snackable content, in addition to all the other formats that we offer.”