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Are you looking to start and grow a YouTube business? If so, you need more than click-worthy videos to make your entrepreneurial dreams a reality. If you want to eventually sell products of your own, such as ebooks, PDF guides, or merchandise, uploading videos is just the beginning.
Read More: 5 Tips to Start a YouTube Channel for Your Business
In this episode of TubeTalk, we chat with creator and business owner Steve Dotto about why YouTube is just one part of a business. Dotto got his start on television during the 1990’s. Since then, he started the DottoTech YouTube channel, where he teaches people how to use innovative technology, like Zoom, Rev, and Slack. In the grand scheme of his business, Dotto shows people how to promote their products and services online.
Need some ideas to grow your YouTube business? Here are three recommendations from Dotto himself.
Like YouTube, email lists are for offering value. You get to go beyond the shiny appeal of video-making and show people why they need your services. For example, if you have a graphic design channel, your email newsletter might include design tips you haven’t shared on YouTube. If you’ve developed a product (which we recommend!), you can advertise that too. You might sell design templates or ebooks to help people learn graphic design.
Read More: Making Money on YouTube - 7 Tips to Start a Successful Business
You don’t need thousands of YouTube subscribers to start a successful newsletter. In a recent TubeTalk interview, Desiree Martinez, social media marketer and YouTube creator, said anyone can start from zero.
“The first video you make, have an opt-in to get people’s email address…. When your video shows up as the answer to someone’s question, they won’t care how many videos you’ve done before that to qualify what you’re doing,” Martinez says.
Ready to build your email list? Use any of these services to create a value-driven newsletter:
We know what you’re thinking about this next tip. Hosting webinars is an old internet practice that few YouTube creators embrace. Why should anyone create them?
The answer has to do with our first tip. Creating a value-driven newsletter is great for your YouTube business. But convincing people to subscribe to a newsletter without some kind of incentive is tough.
Fortunately, a webinar solves that problem.
“A big part of my business is a series of webinars that we do,” Dotto says. “As big of a fan as I am of YouTube and [how] it allowed me to recreate what I did on television, I’m also a huge fan of the live formats. Not necessarily live streaming on YouTube, [but] webinars…. When I saw with a webinar that you could reach an unlimited sized audience with real engagement, and where you can capture their email address, [I knew] you could bring them in if you deliver value.”
The process is straightforward: Create a free, one-hour “training” about anything your audience wants to learn in exchange for viewers’ emails.
To create engaging webinars:
Dotto prefers webinars to YouTube live streams because there’s no way to collect emails using the latter. But he still acknowledges the power of a well-planned live stream. Both have their place within a YouTube business.
“Live streaming’s big benefit is viral sharing – the opportunity to bring new people in,” Dotto says. Webinars’ big strength is accountability. I get your email address, and I get permission to talk to you.”
Hosting a webinar doesn’t have to be complicated. Software like WebinarJam provides an easy setup that skips the super technical stuff. It lets you stream directly to YouTube, create custom registration pages, offer a live chat to viewers, and more.
Building a business on YouTube is easier when you have courses to sell. Imagine creating a digital course on bitcoin mining that costs $100. If just 10 of your YouTube subscribers sign-up, that’s an easy $1,000. And because the course is static and replayable, you’re collecting passive income without doing extra work.
Read More: Starting a YouTube Career - 7 Steps to Monetize Your Passion
Digital courses are powerful. But before you start pumping out video tutorials, consider your audience. A helpful course to you might be an unnecessary course for your subscribers. On the flip side, what you see as unnecessary might be beneficial for subscribers.
Dotto can attest to this. He says his business model comes from listening to his audience and creating solutions for their problems. That’s how he built a successful course around Evernote, a popular note-taking app.
“I loved Evernote,” Dotto says. “I was just sharing on it, so I thought, ‘They probably want a course on this.’ So I asked them, ‘If I did a course, would you buy it?’ They said, ‘Yeah.’”
The course was wildly successful. Dotto created something he knew people would buy because he had the foresight to ask what they wanted.
As you can see, growing a business on YouTube requires diversification. Here are seven steps to build new streams of income on YouTube.
Lydia Sweatt is a writer, bookworm, and bass guitar enthusiast. When she goes outside, a bicycle goes with her.
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