One question that I constantly asked myself years ago was, how do people on YouTube (aka YouTubers/Content Creators) make money. I mean most of us don’t pay for the content we access on the video sharing site.
It took me a while to discover that the adverts we see when watching YouTube videos is how content creators make their dough. After this discovery the next question that naturally came to me was how much money do Zimbabwean YouTubers make?
This is a harder question to answer because 1) the data available to the public doesn’t disclose exactly how much content creators make and 2) local content creators partner with local brands for advertising and this advertising isn’t accounted for in the estimated revenue data available to the public.
Finally, the last thing to keep in mind when looking at YouTubers revenue is that the final amount also varies based on the following factors;
- Number of views – more viewers usually means more money (but not ALL the time)
- Location of viewers – A viewer in Zimbabwe is less lucrative to advertisers than a viewer in the USA. This is primarily because very few local companies are advertising on YouTube.
All that is to say the revenue estimates below are exactly that – ESTIMATES. The tool we used to compile the data is called Social Blade which tracks user statistics for YouTube, Twitch, Instagram, and Twitter. Please note that generally we have realised that the lower value estimate is closer to the truth.
| Content Type | Content Creator | Videos | Subscribers | Estimated Monthly Earnings | Estimated Annual Earnings | Social Blade Rank |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Comedy | ||||||
| BUSTOP TV | 879 | 83 300 | $423 – $6 800 | $5 100 – $81 300 | B | |
| Magamba TV | 229 | 12 700 | $35 – $564 | $423 – $6 800 | B- | |
| P.O Box Reloaded | 80 | 24 300 | $46 – $743 | $557 – $8 900 | B- | |
| Madam Boss | 362 | 44 800 | $89 – $1 400 | $1 100 – $17 100 | B- | |
| Mai T’s Diaries | 281 | 721 | $140 – $2 200 | $1 700 – $26 800 | B- | |
| Madhorofiya Rebublic | 43 | 1030 | $16 – $265 | $199 – $3 200 | N/A | |
| Nigel The Slick Pastor | 126 | 17 900 | $87 – $1 400 | $1 000 – $16 800 | B- | |
| Comic Pastor | 280 | 53 100 | $120 – $1 900 | $1 400 – $23 100 | B- | |
| Shows | ||||||
| College Central | 31 | 56 700 | $483 – $7 700 | $5 800 – $92 600 | B | |
| Music | ||||||
| Winky Online | 76 | 78 200 | $209 – $3 300 | $2 500 – $40 200 | B | |
| Jah Prayzah | 94 | 216 000 | $538 – $8 600 | $6 500 – $103 300 | B | |
| Chillspot Records | 189 | 5 070 | $259 – $4 100 | $3 100 – $49 700 | B | |
| Nyamayaro Media | 45 | 42 100 | $16 – $253 | $190 – $3 000 | C+ | |
| News | ||||||
| ZTN | 1 287 | 11 300 | $51 – $815 | $611 – 9 800 | B- | |
| Techzim | 310 | 2 620 | $4 – $63 | $47 – $755 | C+ |
One of the things that stands out for me is how popular College Central has become overnight on the back of Wadiwa Wepamoyo.
The complexity of YouTube monetization is also clear because there is no clear correlation between subscriber counts and revenue.
An example of this can be seen between Mai T’s Diaries and Madam Boss’ channels. Mai T has less than a 1000 subscribers and is making anything between US$1700 – U$26 800 whilst Madam Boss’ channel has just under 45 000 subscribers is estimated to be making US$1100 – US$17 100.
How Accurate are social blades estimates for revenue earned on YouTube?
Social Blade’s data on YouTube is garnered from estimates based on revenue per thousand impressions (RPM) which is the estimated earnings for every 1000 impressions.
The site uses a ranking methodology – Social Blade Ranking – to assess the quality of a channel and in their own words, this is how the ranking works;
When Social Blade was created we first just listed rankings based on number of subscribers and number of views, but it quickly became evident that this was not an accurate indicator of how people were actually doing on YouTube.
Someone could have a bazillion subscribers that they cheated to get without having any actual views. The SB ranking system aims to measure a channel’s influence based on a variety of metrics including average view counts and amount of “other channel” widgets listed in.
If you have a A+, A, or A- SB rank, then you can consider yourself very influential on YouTube. If you’re not there quite yet, don’t fret – just keep up the good work!
Social Blade explainign how their ranking works
In our experience, the Techzim channel was $15 above the lower end of the monthly revenue estimate which stresses how important it is to keep in mind that these are estimates and unless the data is coming directly from the content creator then only use this data as estimates.
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7 comments
Hi Mudzingwa, great article. I’m happy our content creators are earning something. I have a question on adverts. Does the content creator get paid when I watch the advert or when I click on the advert link?
yes there get paid per click some even per view of the advert …
Great article there ..my QN is to wat extent are online content generators making money using online social platforms. Support e view
How did Mai Tt get monetization with less than 1k subs
hie so how do they receive the money here in Zimbabwe since pay pal is not allowed
They don’t need pay pall bank works just fine
What means do they use to receive money?
Local Banks?