Trying to Understand How Musicians Can Make Money from YouTube

We’ve all endured the pre-roll commercials before YouTube videos and clicked away from the adds that appear in the lower part of the video window. But those ad impressions are the things that pay the rights holders of the videos we watch. But how exactly does that all work? A great question.  I refer you to DIY Musician.

One of the questions we get asked most frequently by artists who are enrolled in our YouTube Monetization program is “how much money will I earn per view?”

The first thing that should be clarified when answering this question is the fact that YouTube monetization is not based on views so much as it is based on earning ad revenue generated by your videos and user-generated content (UGC) that features your music.

So let’s morph the question slightly into “how much will I earn per advertisement on YouTube?”

There are a ton of factors that determine whether an ad will be shown on your videos and how much money you’ll earn from that ad impression, so let’s walk through the various steps and factors that affect your YouTube revenue.

Here’s a quick rundown of the four main ad types on YouTube:

* Non-skippable video ads

* Skippable video ads

* Overlay ads

* Display ads

Read on. It’s important.