095 - How To Build (And Monetize) Your YouTube Channel

If you're looking to grow a YouTube channel, this episode breaks it down simply. We talked about the common mistakes people make—like disorganization and waiting to hit 1,000 subs—when in reality, you can start making money much earlier. It’s all about being intentional with your content.

I was delighted to have Vickie O'Neil, YouTube Expert,  join me to discuss building and monetizing a YouTube channel, especially for women over 40. She shared real strategies, examples, and encouragement for anyone ready to dive in. No fluff—just smart, actionable advice.

Topics Included

🔹Organize your content – Playlists are more than aesthetic; they guide your viewers like file folders, making your channel easier to navigate and helping position you as an expert.

🔹Start messy, but start – You don’t need fancy equipment or editing skills to begin. Raw, one-take videos with strong value can still build trust and generate income.

🔹You don’t need 1,000 subs to monetize – Use lead magnets, low-ticket offers, or even simple consultation links in your video descriptions to turn views into revenue from day one.

🔹YouTube is built for longevity – Unlike TikTok or Instagram, content on YouTube can continue to get discovered and drive traffic for months or even years.

🔹Women over 40 bring a unique advantage – Life experience, career pivots, and real stories resonate deeply. Don’t discount your voice—use it as your superpower.

🔷 Thank you for listening. If you found this episode relevant don't forget to hit that Follow Button to keep learning and growing with us.

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Go to ContentMarketingSchool.org/5stepvideo

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💙 Find me on Bluesky @annetterichmond.bsky.social

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For additional insights, follow Annette Richmond and Black Dog Marketing Strategies on social media.

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Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:36.002)
Well, good morning, good afternoon, good evening, wherever you are joining us from. I'm Annette Richmond and this is Content Marketing School. And I'm so excited to have Vicki here with me today. Vicki, I sort of found you through our mutual friend, Brenda Miller. Started following you on LinkedIn. And I was like, wow, I gotta ask this smart woman to come on my show.

Luckily for me, you said yes, and I'm so excited to actually meet you and chat with you. So for anyone who doesn't know you, please tell us a little bit about who you are and what you do.

Well, first I want to say thank you so much for inviting me onto your podcast. It's such an honor. Once we connected, I checked out your content too, and you're impressive. So let me just put it that way. And yeah, and I love Brenda. So I am Vicki O'Neill, and I am a YouTube growth expert. I help women over 40 get started and grow their business using YouTube.

Well, you know, I love that. And one of the reasons I love it, because I'm sure you know, as I do too, because you know, I love video that women particularly are so like, I'm over 40. I'm over 50. my gosh, I can't be here. can't be there. So we can talk a little bit about that later, but I'd like to start by talking about your channel. And as I mentioned, we were talking a little bit before we went live that you have it organized.

in such a great way. It shows exactly where to go. There's not an overabundance of playlists like mine where you're like, maybe this, maybe that. You've got, it's really, really well organized. And I'd like to ask you, because I'm thinking people have either no organization or poor organization. I'm kind of leaning towards maybe no organization, just videos up there.

Speaker 1 (02:33.166)
So can you talk a little bit about that? You know why it's important maybe some tips for people who just have their videos up there for you know randomly

Yeah. Yeah. And I think that's awesome that you have yours organized, even though you think you have it over organized, you're already like steps beyond where most people are. So I applaud you for that. Most people, when they start a YouTube channel, just because they don't know how to use the playlists, it will just basically use it as like a video repository, a video, you know, place to just kind of store videos.

So that if they started that way, which I know a lot of people to do, myself included, that's what I was using YouTube for when I first got started too. And then I realized that when you organize it in a way where you kind of think through like how your ideal customer might need information. And so creating playlists, which for anyone who doesn't know like what that might mean or what that might look like, if you're over then you're going to get my reference. It's like having those green hanging file folders.

So the green hanging file folder is like the playlist name. And then those Manila folders that you put in there with the labels on each one, those are like the videos. So when you think of like, if you're going to a meeting and you're like, I'm going to grab this one green file folder and I'm going to take it with me because so-and-so needs it. Same thing is true with playlists. If I've got a client, in fact, I did this recently, somebody was asking me, she actually has a disorganized, funny, funny that you mentioned that.

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (04:08.3)
She said that she was disorganized with her YouTube channel and she wanted to get more organized with it. I'm like, great. And she'd also said that she was struggling with like what to do with it next. So I have a playlist created with how to get started with YouTube. So she was kind of like re-energizing her channel. She had started it, but she wanted to kind go back and take it more seriously now. So it was a perfect playlist to send to her. And I said, Hey, based on where you're at right now,

Cause I took a look at her channel. I'm like, I don't want to say, Hey, start here. Here's the playlist. Here's the playlist. Start with this one. Cause I think it's going to give you the most value. So now when she's in there, she's got access to all these other videos without having to go and search and find them on my channel. So it becomes like organizing. And it's not just about like the aesthetics, which like, as you mentioned, Annette, it's all about, do you look organized on your channel?

But it's also thinking through like, how can you take a playlist and send it to someone to allow them that binging opportunity to really learn what they need to know. But then in the process, they are not only binge watching your videos, but they're also starting to see you as an authority. Because you're creating all of these moments for them to learn and understand and even take them from like where they are and where they want to go. So there's all these benefits to organizing it and having those playlists on your channel.

you know, just start with a few, you can change them. You can delete them. I had one on there and I was like, this really isn't working. So I, I, I deleted it. And when you delete a playlist, it doesn't delete your videos. just right. There's a lot of value in doing it from that perspective. You can optimize them. So it's another opportunity to get seen.

Wow. Okay. So, so I love that analogy because it makes it very easy to understand. And I'll tell you, I think people that are, working in corporate or working in a home office, we still have those files. I have them. mean, I'm sure a lot of people do there. There is still, I'm sure corporate America still has those hanging folders, even if everything is on the computer somewhere. People still want to see, you want to, you know, hold that paper sometimes. Yes. So.

Speaker 2 (06:14.604)
Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 1 (06:20.974)
And one thing I want to mention too is because I know one of your playlists is specifically for like women over 40 and and you know what can for someone's listening a woman over 40 and I'm guessing it might not be only for women maybe people over 40 even. Okay, yeah.

Yeah, it's for animals.

No, but I mean, but it is different. Can you talk a little bit about how that's different than maybe the start here?

Yeah, so it's more or less like looking at it from the perspective of when you're over 40, you bring a lot more to the table than you do if you're 20. So we have life experiences, we have stories, we've got challenges and how we overcame failures. And so we have all these things that we can bring to our videos that a lot of times when you're first getting started with YouTube, you think, just got to create a video and get it out there.

And so when you kind of take a step back and say, can I do with this video? How is it going to help the people who are watching this video? That's what those videos are about. Now, some of them are like how to get started, but it's more to lean into like yourself as woman, as women, if you've had kids or if you've had multiple careers or you're juggling different things, right? Sometimes that can play into what they're doing with their business. If they're already doing multiple things, it's like,

Speaker 2 (07:47.534)
hey, you've done this before and here's the benefit and the reason why, because there's all of these opportunities to find new clients that you may not find on LinkedIn or Facebook or Instagram. And then there's an opportunity to also not only create your legacy over there, but you can also monetize it. So if you're gonna be spending all this time creating content, which is why I talk about this a lot and it probably, it might start getting to people. Cause I'm all like.

Do you want to spend all your time creating and cranking out content and have it only last for 48 hours? Or do want to invest more time up front creating videos that are going to last forever? So that's more or less what I'm talking about in that particular playlist.

No, I love it. love it. And I'm glad that you already mentioned monetizing because, know, I wanted to talk to you about that. Now I am just recently even trying to grow my YouTube channel. I mean, it was really, was like, had less than even 200 people for a long, longest time. And I've had that channel for a long time, but I'm just learning to just, you know, starting to build it.

The monetization is not for me anytime soon. However, I do hear more and more people talking about monetizing their YouTube channel. you're a lot of the content, the things that you talk about is sort of monetization, maybe kind of from maybe from the backend where you're using the YouTube to get leads for your business.

So can you talk a little bit about kind of those two things?

Speaker 2 (09:27.118)
Yeah, definitely. Let me ask you a quick question. When you said that you can't or you're not quite there for monetizing your channel because you have 200 subscribers, why do you think that is?

Because you have, my understanding is you need to have, you know, I don't know, a thousand subscribers and you need to have so many watch hours. And I'm just, you know, and while I don't know all the numbers, I do know that I'm not close to hitting any of them.

Speaker 1 (10:04.787)
No. So that's correct though, right? mean, there are kind of like, you know.

Yeah, you're absolutely correct. So and that's actually what I talk about in the video that I'm releasing tonight on YouTube and it's about monetizing. But so that's what a lot of people think. And that's what I thought, too, is that getting on YouTube that the only way that you can monetize your videos was through the YouTube Partner Program, which is what you're talking about. That's where you can place your ads and videos. You do have to have 1000 subscribers and 4000 public watch hours within a rolling 365 days.

So our friend, Brenda Miller, you probably saw that where she announced it, where she, and I was so happy for her. I was like, yes. So she hit that threshold. Good news for you and I and everybody else who is not at that point is that you can still monetize your videos. And the reason why I say that is because you can do it through lead magnets, which could be free, or you could do it through low ticket offers, which is paid.

too.

Speaker 2 (11:06.094)
So an example is I had a video I published, I want to say maybe in November or December. And it was part of the series that I was creating where it was walking me through like every step of the process. So planning your videos, recording all of those things. So I decided to put a like a low ticket offer in place. It was $1,700. And so with all of these videos, I decided to put that as the link in the description. And that link

it gave you resources for every step of the way. And there were some things that I had to create specifically for that series, but then some other things that I'd put other places that were completely free. So what I did was is I had that link in every single video. And like in my video, I would mention it. Hey, if you're watching the planning video, go ahead and click the link in the description, download the resources I have for you, and you can walk through this with me in each video.

So now I've created an opportunity for them to have exactly what they need that's going to help them with each video I created. And it's only $17. So who can't afford $17?

No, no, I, no, I, no, I love that. love that. And so it's kind of, sounds kind of like, a limited podcast where you create it and it's to draw people in so that the videos are specifically in a series to help people that leads them to this.

Yes, exactly. They're still on my channel. So if you go there, they don't only access it through the playlist. Like you can access it if you just go to my channel and click on videos and you go through, still listed there.

Speaker 1 (12:47.214)
Oh, yes, yes. Yeah. But I'm just saying, I'm just talking about the design of it is to be a series where, and I know I've done that with short form video where I've done a series of videos in a certain theme or something like that. And it has been, it has gotten fairly good engagement for me to do it in that way. But I love that. And it's funny because I am very conscious of putting, talking about whatever, a lead magnet or an

an offer or something like that on my podcast. never ever even thought about it on my videos. And sometimes it's rare, but sometimes I will get, you know, several hundred views on a video if it's a short or something like that, that perhaps people would just, you know, highly unusual for me, but you know, it does happen and I never even thought about it. So you've made me smarter.

It's just a great way to just kind of bring everything full circle for people. But then for us as creators, it doesn't matter how many subscribers you have. You can do it with zero videos. In fact, I'm actually sharing in the video I'm publishing tonight, somebody that I had talked with, I did an interview with her in a different video. But I wanted to talk with her for that particular reason, because when she started her YouTube channel, of course she had zero subscribers. And she was talking through her experience. you know, as a new

as a new video creator, not necessarily just with YouTube, but you've got your phone sitting there. Well, that's what she was using. That's what I typically use too. So I keep it in my computer. But I've got my phone. And so you could actually see her go like this to press record. And then she had a whiteboard and she was talking about one word. And then she'd go back and you could see her go like this. She did zero editing. It was just one take. She uploaded it. She had an offer for...

$33 and it was for like a half hour or something with her. And so the first month she did in January, I think it was 2021. And in that first month she made $220.

Speaker 1 (14:51.97)
Wow, that's, I mean, that's fabulous. I would have thought, my goodness.

And then from there, it's just scaled. She just reported, it was probably about a month or so ago, because I'm connected with her on Facebook. Not a fan of Facebook either, but that's where I spent some time. But she posted on Facebook not too long ago that she just passed over the threshold for, I think it was $80,000. It was like the $1 million mark. So it was around $80,000, $83,000, $86, whatever it is. So now she's making that much money on YouTube.

through her programs only, not the YouTube Partner Program. Wow. programs only.

So, while I am surprised that she would get that much with a video that was recorded like that, I'm so glad that you mentioned it because so many people think your videos have to be perfect. And they don't.

they don't.

Speaker 1 (15:49.176)
But that is a fabulous example of someone who just shared good information. And I think that LinkedIn, although you can do longer videos on Instagram and also on TikTok. And when I live streaming, when I live streamed Instagram, I was able to go into the archive and then share it on my Instagram account.

And so people, and people would, you know, watch it even though it was 30 minutes. But I think that at least when I think of long form video, when I think of, you know, more instructional how-to videos, I think of YouTube, even though I'm on like TikTok more often.

Yeah, exactly. I just think it matters. I mean, you know this because you're on the different platforms too, that it depends on where your ideal target audience is. So they're not just on LinkedIn. So anyone who thinks that that's the only place they need to be, they're missing out someplace, YouTube, TikTok, Instagram, Facebook, someplace, because people are spending time on LinkedIn. That's not the only place that they're spending time.

Well, the thing is too, I'm a big DIYer. I I whitewashed our fireplace. I learned to my hair during the pandemic. And if I want to do something, I'm looking for a video. look on TikTok. TikTok, will say, is usually my first because I'm just looking for something that's kind of quick or maybe a series. Or I go to YouTube. If I'm looking for how to something,

I'm not looking on LinkedIn much as I love it, much as I'm active there all the time. I don't think it's where people go to look for how to pretty much anything.

Speaker 2 (17:37.13)
Yeah, exactly. They're going there for networking and more business oriented stuff, not how tos. Yeah, I agree.

So I also wanted to, we were talking about this a little bit, the idea that, you know, anyone who's on YouTube at all, and I know I've had people like, YouTube has kind of been notorious for flagging, for copyright infringement, primarily video. I'm sorry, primarily music, copyright. And I've had videos where, you know, it was like the music wasn't aired in certain countries or wasn't allowed, or it was flagged.

And for the most part, being flagged for copyright, and to my understanding, if it's just, it's still up there, they let it play, but they just give you a little flag on it, that the main thing is that you can't monetize it. It's not like they're taking it down. Like if you put something on TikTok, they just take it down. They just don't allow it on the platform. But I've had guests on my live show who like, you know, downloaded the interview with me and then they put it on

on, on YouTube and it was flagged like the intro, the outro, or if I play music, I'm demonstrating something. However, as I mentioned to you, I have seen a shift just very recently where I've uploaded something that I created on TikTok and I threw it up there and then it like, gosh, I didn't the music and nothing and nothing. And I've done that. a couple of times I just did it.

today where I uploaded something and I thought, I don't, and I, it has not been flagging yet. When I go through and look as I'm processing through the YouTube, you know, publish and it says no, no copyright, no copyright issues. And so we were kind of talking about why that must be. I'm, I know as soon as we're done here, you're to go and you're going to try it and see what happened. But, but you know, it's, has happened consistently for me.

Speaker 1 (19:40.238)
with a few videos that I've done over the past couple of weeks. And again, as I said, was kind of like, I did it and I was like, I'm gonna have to remove the music or whatever. So what's your thinking on that?

Yeah. So I, that's a great point because it's, I'm surprised that they're being more lenient because if anything, I thought that they would get more strict. So what we were talking about earlier too, and you, came up with the idea and I was just like, yeah, that's a great idea that they might be more lenient because of tick tock, right? So they want to be more competitive, more accepting and not, because if you're going to give people strikes for every little thing that they do, they're going to be like, well, why am I spending time here? I'm just going to go over to tick tock. So I think they might be.

being more lenient for that reason. But what I would say if you're like, I don't want to get strikes. Well, first I want to say the strikes for the most part really don't mean anything unless you get a bunch of them. Or if you get there's different degrees of strikes. If you're stealing people's content, yeah, well, you get reported then that that's a huge, huge strike.

But yeah, that's God,

Speaker 1 (21:27.056)
yes.

Speaker 1 (21:35.502)
Wow. Yeah. So I'm glad you mentioned the captions because even though a lot of the platforms now put them on, you know, like, LinkedIn started and I learned, went to a seminar at my local chamber, did a seminar on copyright and that the ADA came out with something in the last few years where if you have a platform,

you need to have captions on your videos for accessibility, which I believe is something that's relatively new. And I was asking the lawyer who was giving the seminar if that might be why LinkedIn started auto captioning all the videos. And he said, yeah, probably. Because it never was there and all of a sudden, bam, there's captions on the thing. But I still always sort of hard code them. I think that's how the correct term, hard code them or burn them into my videos.

because I want to make sure they're there and I want to make sure that they're legible and everything. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (22:56.371)
yeah.

Speaker 1 (23:47.01)
That's why I will say that I don't have a huge following on TikTok, but I have like enough time to go live and things like that, you know, but, Instagram and, it depends if I, if I spend more time on TikTok, my numbers go up a little bit. Yeah. But Instagram just like hates me.

Speaker 1 (24:09.966)
It absolutely hates me. you know, and if I have found with Instagram that if I do not use their music, they do not show my video.

But their music just is not very good.

Speaker 1 (24:52.13)
Yeah. Well, one thing I want to say, and then we're getting close to the end. So I do want to ask you to share your final thoughts of whenever, but I just saw a TikTok video the other day with someone who, young woman, yeah, I look young to me, but I'm guessing she was probably, you know, I mean like maybe around 30 or in her mid to late twenties.

And she was saying how, you know, Instagram is, our moms are there now. Nobody goes on Instagram. It's just like, that's the mom. And it used to be, I think it was like Facebook and it was like, the moms are on Facebook. So we'll go here. But, and I thought that was so funny. I want to ask you, and I like to ask everyone who's on my show, I've picked up some tips from you. So I thank you for that. I know people listening will pick up some tips and techniques as well.

But what would you like to share, kind of as the final thought, because we couldn't cover everything. I didn't ask you everything. So what would you like to share?

Speaker 1 (27:02.926)
I love that you said that because I did a video not too long ago where in part of the video, I shared a video that I did before I worked with a video coach myself, like in 2021. And here I am sitting at my desk and I had a screen, one of those screens behind me. And I'm like, I'm Annette Richmond and this is a networking nugget. And today we're gonna, I was like, oh my gosh. And it's just cringy.

But you know, but I think it's so true that you go and you, you if you go back and look at anybody's things, unless, I don't know, maybe a very high level influencer that the videos are gone, but you will see that nobody jumps behind the camera and is, you know, engaging and all of that. So one thing that you have to do is tell us your YouTube channel and where people can find you because it was mentioned.

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (28:27.672)
Hey, well again, I thank you so much for joining me. It's been such a delight chatting with you and for everyone else, I will see you next time.