What’s all the fuss about YouTube Partnerships anyway? Why would someone want to devote hours/days/weeks of their time sitting in front of a camera or hunch-backed over a computer editing videos to upload to YouTube? In this post, I’ll go over some of the top advantages (and disadvantages, for that matter) of becoming an official YouTube Partner.
Advantages
You make money from advertising revenue sharing
Perhaps the biggest draw of becoming a YouTube partner is the presented opportunity of actually cashing in on the videos you make. The advertising revenue generated by your page is contingent on how many viewers click-through on your online advertisements (pay-per-click; PPC) and how many people actually view your video (CPM; cost-per-mille, or cost per thousand viewers). The CPM is a flat rate of$20.00 per 1,000 views of your video. The advertising revenue made from your YouTube page is then divided between YouTube, the AdSense publisher, and the partner who has provided the video itself.
Unfortunately for us non-parters, existing YouTube Partners are required to sign a confidentiality agreement precluding them from talking about their ad-generated revenue on YouTube. Because of this, it is difficult to know with certainty the exact earnings of most of these users. I’ll go into more detail about this in a later post.
You receive greater exposure on YouTube
Second to the money you receive from your videos comes the elevated exposure on YouTube. When you become a partner, your videos are put at the very top of search lists. This increases your likelihood of views, and subsequently, the number of subscriptions to your channel. Both of these elements contribute to your success as a YouTube Partner.
You’re offered more customization options for your channel
For anyone like me who has just started making videos, you become instantly aware of how little control you have over the appearance of your page and videos. For instance, you are only able to choose from 3 thumbnail images to represent your video. These 3 snapshots are pulled by YouTube from your video, and are often quite unflattering.
Partners of YouTube can customize their channel pages with skins – backgrounds tailored to your brand’s image, colors, logos, etc. They can choose their own video snapshots to use as the thumbnail, or they can use any JPEG picture from their photo library instead. Partner are afforded with a much higher level of control over their video content compared to non-partners.
You have proprietary rights over your videos
Before you’re made partner, YouTube owns the rights to your videos. YouTube can manage, restrict or remove your content as they see fit. However, once you’ve been accepted as a YouTube partner, you own the copyright and distribution rights of your original videos – with no exceptions.
Disadvantages
Restrictions on “original content”
YouTube partners must own the copyright and distributions rights to all video and audio content they use – without exception! They are only allowed to use third-party content with the direct permission of that content provider, and that provider will receive a portion of the advertising revenue from the video. Any violation of these terms could result in immediate termination of the partnership.
Restrictions on user location
As of now, YouTube partnerships are only available to users living in Australia, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Ireland, Japan, New Zealand, Spain, the United Kingdom and the United States. Users outside of these countries are permitted to apply for partnerships, but the chances of being accepted are significantly lower.
Strict rules of YouTube Partnerships
There are several rules that must be followed in order to maintain your YouTube partnership and stay in good-standing. These rules often restrict many aspects of what you can and cannot do in terms of your videos, optimization, and page design. Some of these include:
– You may NOT direct user attention to the advertisements on your page via arrows, other directional gimmicks, or by saying things like “click this ad” or “support me by visiting these ads”
– You may NOT place misleading pictures alongside the advertisements
– You may NOT compensate viewers for clicking ads or performing keyword searches for your own benefit
These are just a few of the rules for YouTube partners. To read more about this subject, visit this link on keeping your page in good-standing with YouTube.
Greater exposure means a greater likelihood of unwelcome visitors
Of course, with greater visibility come the inevitable cyber-bullies of the world wide web. YouTube partners – any YouTube user, for that matter – are offered a variety of privacy settings for their videos. You can make videos private, available only to those you accept as “friends”, or you can set them to public. In the event that you make your videos public, you can select the option of filtering which comments are allowed on a case-by-case basis, or allow any and all comments to show on your video’s page.
In order to increase views and subscriptions, making your videos public and open to all comments is your best bet. However, it is imperative that, in the words of YouTube Partner Michael Buckley that you “don’t let the praise go to your head, or the bullying go to your heart” when it comes to viewer comments. You have to take them with a grain of salt and just keep doing what your doing!
Hopefully this provided you with a greater explanation of the benefits of becoming a YouTube Partner. Stay tuned for more detailed posts on these individual advantages and disadvantages!
Katy@UNT 
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