r/PartneredYoutube • u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M • Sep 08 '26
Question / Problem Realistically, what is the path to full time?
Hi everyone,
I've been doing YouTube for about 2 years now on top of my 60hr per week job.
I usually work about 18 hours per day during the week between my job and YouTube.
I have about 150k subs now along with 60M views.
At the moment, I only post shorts. The reason why I only post shorts is because I create very high quality/complex shorts that are on face, story driven videos and all my own camera shots. Scripting each short takes me a few hours, then filming for one short usually takes about a day or two, then editing usually takes about a day or two.
I average about 100k on the low end and 15M on the high end for views on each of my shorts. I also crosspost to TikTok and Instagram reels, where I have a combined follower count of 20k.
my full time job pays me about 50k per year after taxes, and on YouTube adsense I usually make about $1k to $2k per month, and with sponsors I can make up to $4k per month.
I am also signed to an influencer agency that manages my email inbox, collaboration requests, etc.
But, the issue is that my income isn't consistent. Since I only have the time to upload one to two shorts per week, I pass on a lot of sponsorship opportunities. I try my best to accept all of them, but I find when I do it's literally impossible for me to deliver what they are wanting unless I just don't ever sleep.
I want to replace my full time income with YouTube before quitting my job, but I'm struggling to find a viable path to get there without quitting first and taking a big risk. The only way I see myself being able to do that is by literally not sleeping which ofc isn't an option.
The other issue is that working this much for much longer just isn't sustainable anymore. I'm getting older (im 25M) and getting 4 hours of sleep 5 days a week for the past 2 years is really starting to take a toll on me mentally, physically, and my social life/relationships have basically been nonexistent for years now because of this. I think if I was to continue this schedule for the next 5 or 10 years I would probably develop some really horrible health issues that might be nonreversible.
Also, I understand that i need to expand into longform content. I have a ton of ideas for videos I can make for longform and I would love to get into it, the problem is that shorts already take up 100% of my time outside of work.
I've been told to just slowly work on a video overtime, but at that rate i would upload maybe 1 long form video every 4 to 6 months which just isn't worth it in my opinion.
SO, what do you think is the best course of action? I have an opportunity coming up soon to move back in with my parents and not have to pay rent, so my only bill would be car insurance, food, and a few subscriptions.
I'm just worried it won't work out and I'll then have a year gap in my resume that I'll have to try and explain away, not to mention my career is hard to get a job in, its extremely competitive and there aren't many jobs available to begin with. My career is in social media management.
I know im the only one who can truly answer this question, but based on what you've heard, do you think it's worth it to take the risk, should I just keep going on like I am now, or quit YouTube all together and take the safe route with just having a normal job?
28
5
u/Lynnfomercial Sep 08 '26
Are you planning on a $50k/year salary indefinitely? That is not a lot of money imo. It also doesn’t account for things like health insurance and retirement savings. What salary do you ultimately need to land at long term for your future lifestyle and needs? If it was me, I’d start by answering those questions. Replacing just your salary in this moment seems naive.
0
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
My job now pays about 50k/year in salary after taxes and does not offer any benefits (no insurance). So regardless I will have to buy my own insurance anyways.
My career will never hit a decent salary unless I go the management route (ex. content manager, marketing manager, etc.) which I really dislike managing people as my success relies on them and not on my own merits. I was a manager in my last role and easily worked 80 to 90 hour weeks while on salary and only getting paid for 40 of those hours. I only made it one year before deciding that is def not what i want to do with my life. Everyone that I had met in those roles were also pretty miserable or stressed all the time so doesn't seem like its worth the tradeoff to me.
But, if i stay as an individual contributor, I may never make a salary above 70k. The only way I could possibly make enough money to ever buy a house or have a family would be if my content was able to make enough money (unless I just went the management route and accepted I will hate my life until I retire).
And my content will never make enough money unless I quit my job and have the time to really scale it.
Right now, I can survive off $3k per month. I can pretty easily maintain $3k per month without much issue from content alone.
For my future, I would need at least 100k salary i think in this economy to comfortably afford a house and have kids.
if being a manager is off the table, and my current career path doesn't have a pathway to that kind of salary in the next 5 years, then what options do I have? My content HAS to work. It's the only other option I got.
2
u/Due_Change6730 Sep 08 '26
I’d go for it as I’m in the same situation as you: bet on yourself you won’t regret it even if you fail. You know what you will regret? Not going for it.
1
u/Lynnfomercial Sep 10 '26
I’m a Director of Digital Marketing, so I get what your saying about how people management removes you from the hands on work. That’s definitely true. Writing has always been my strongest talent and I haven’t written in years because of my career progressing into management.
I will say, though, I manage a team of a dozen people in Asia, Europe, and the US. They’re all making six figures as individual contributors with healthcare, 401k, etc. So I think salary range depends on your employer and industry. (I’m in the life sciences/biotech industry).
I work a standard 40-hour work week remotely. But I also manage a team with 10+ years of experience in their roles. Once you’re managing senior level marketers, it’s quite a different experience. My job really centers around getting obstacles out of their way.
I suppose $3k/month is manageable if you live in the right area. I’m in Boston. That wouldn’t even cover my mortgage (or the average rent).
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 10 '26
How long did it take you to land that role? and what was your career progression like?
1
u/Lynnfomercial Sep 10 '26 edited Sep 10 '26
Director of a global team? I have 15 years experience.
I made it to Senior Manager in about 10 years. My team are a level below that or at that level. They’ve all got 8-10 years experience.
I have 2 advanced science degrees and kind of fell into marketing. My starting salary in this industry was around $50k/year, but that was a while ago. Everyone on my team has marketing degrees. Some just have undergrad. A few have MBAs but I don’t feel that’s necessary. I look for experience when I’m hiring.
We manage a $5 million digital marketing budget for campaigns, not including the always on stuff. Junior contributors make somewhere in the 90s to start.
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 10 '26
Wow, that's incredible.
I would love to private message you about career advice if you'd be okay with that!
1
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u/lifesabeach2024 Sep 08 '26
Bro, going to be totally honest with you here.
YouTube sucks.
At any moment, they can demonetize or shut down your channel, sometimes with little explanation. If you depend on that income, you’re fucked.
It happened to me. In 2022, all of my channels were randomly demonetized. I had to fight to get them back, and it happened to a lot of other creators too. Some never got their channels back. I honestly think the only reason I eventually did was because I had a big following on X that gave me some leverage.
The reality is YouTube is increasingly a marketing engine for businesses.
The creators who really win usually have a product or service behind the content. For them, 1,000 views means 1,000 people exposed to their brand. That's valuable even if YouTube pays them almost nothing for those views.
For a creator who relies purely on ad revenue, it’s completely different. 1,000 views isn't worth much. Your earnings depend on performance, and while you can influence that to some extent, creators quietly become irrelevant every day.
I've been doing YouTube for five years and have built three successful long-form channels. And honestly, next year I'm considering cutting my content creation down by 90% and putting that time into things I actually own and control.
I hate what YouTube has become, but I understand why it happened.
Once you stop looking at YouTube as a career and start looking at it as a distribution and marketing platform, it makes a lot more sense.
There are very few people who are truly "YouTubers" anymore. Most successful creators are really using YouTube to sell something else.
And YouTube takes a massive cut while giving creators very little security. It's a terrible deal, but they get away with it because there isn't a serious competitor.
Honestly, I'm surprised nobody has built one. I know a LOT of creators who are fed up with YouTube.
6
u/EckhartsLadder Subs: 1.0M Views: 415.2M Sep 08 '26
YouTube is the single greatest path to financial independence as a creator and it's not even close. This is complet nonsense.
> Once you stop looking at YouTube as a career and start looking at it as a distribution and marketing platform, it makes a lot more sense.
Yawn.
> There are very few people who are truly "YouTubers" anymore. Most successful creators are really using YouTube to sell something else.
Blatantly untrue.
> And YouTube takes a massive cut while giving creators very little security. It's a terrible deal, but they get away with it because there isn't a serious competitor.
YouTube provides the literal infrastructure we are getting rich off of. They host our videos and find us our ads.
-1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
I plan on turning my unique tech products that I design and build into real products, that would be my sell.
But, I can't do that while working full time and doing content. I have already maxed out my available free time.
-1
u/Precarious3145 Sep 08 '26
Honestly, I'm surprised nobody has built one.
There have been but they all fail or barely gain any traction. One of the bigger ones was Blip. You can say it's a terrible deal but I don't think you understand the infastructure that goes into creating an video housing platform that's free to upload with no real limitations that includes the insane reach.
I find it hard to believe that you're running three "successful long-frm channels" at the same time and you weren't doing something that'd be worthy of demonitization.
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u/Localmate25 Sep 08 '26
Took me a while to go full time. Short form is unlikely to be your only full time vehicle. I went full time by diversifying my revenue heavily so that Adsense is about 15-20% of my total annual revenue.
Look at your entire business strategy. YouTube isn’t a destination, it’s a tool along with many others that can make you money. Grinding 24/7 on Shorts with sponsors as your 2 revenue sources is not a long term path. Look at your overall goals and create a business plan that will lead you to exit your job when it makes sense and your new media gig can make you real money.
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
So the goal should be to build out the other streams first before building out YouTube?
I had wanted to sell my tech devices that I make, but in order to get them production ready it would be at least a couple of years of prototyping and testing before getting to that point.
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u/Localmate25 Sep 08 '26
Not necessarily before, but in whatever manner makes you sustainable revenue. Build it out alongside your current video workflow.
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u/theonejanitor Sep 08 '26
If you insist on doing Shorts, you absolutely need to focus on Tiktok and Instagram. YouTube Shorts pay absolute shit and are not a path to full time, unless you're getting hundreds of millions of views every month. In my experience tiktok and insta reels pay a lot better, but also probably have more competition. If you are trying to go full-time ASAP, you need to have a longform strategy, that's honestly the answer.
In terms of time - life is all about priorities. I do YouTube full-time and the only reason I am able to is because I got laid off from my job and decided to spend a year broke as shit living off of unemployment. I used that time to go all in on the channel. And even then it took me several years after that to really make stable income. This sucked and I honestly am not sure if it was a wise decision, but 10 years later it has been worth it.
You have to choose what you care most about. First of all, do you love creating content? If you're in it just for the money, you're gonna burn out regardless of what you do.
But the real question is, are you willing to give up the stability to chase a dream. If you're looking for a 100% risk-free, fool proof option, it doesn't sound like there is one. You need to imagine the absolute worst-case scenario and decide if you can deal with that. What if you have to live off of 1k a month for 2 years? Is that too devastating or could you make it work? The answer is different for different people. I basically did that. It sucked but I survived it and now have a dream job.
Then you need to figure out what is necessary to minimize the chances of seeing this worst case scenario play out. You need to have a strategy for success and you need to set measurable goals. Not just "I'm gonna grind and see what happens". If you have goals and a strategy, it is much easier to imagine yourself succeeding.
IMO succeeding as a content creator is 100% achievable by anyone who puts in the work and knows what they are doing. The hard part is actually knowing what to do.
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u/Dohunk Sep 08 '26
Get sponsors, make 4k per month, hopefully that pays for your life, quit job.
Then you can spend 60hrs extra a week on YouTube, I bet you’d be able to figure out how to make as much as your job with YouTube with that much extra time ontop of an already working channel
1
u/Dohunk Sep 08 '26
Everyone keeps saying not to do short form, I only do long form and it pays better. But it’s a whole different business and you’d need to relearn everything. Just do what works for you and that’s shorts, there’s people making millions from shorts only.
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u/ToTYly_AUSem Sep 08 '26
People say don't do shorts becuase starting Feb the revenue is going to be difficult to maintain
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u/Dohunk Sep 08 '26
That just kicks out all the people who can’t, meaning people who can will make more
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u/ToTYly_AUSem Sep 08 '26
Except it's not just those that can. It's those that can maintain. So quitting your job and making this full time is even more risky.
I'd argue most people can't keep up those stats every 90 days unless they're working with a company or in extremely rare cases or producing such click-bait content that it cant be enjoyable.
Not even the most successful TV shows maintain the same numbers consistently throughout all time.
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u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
I think you might need to figure out how to transition to long form to go full time. I am also signed through an integration agency and I have to turn down deals because I am booked out through december!
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
The issue with placing all my bets on long form without quitting my job would mean one video every few months. I just don't see how that could get me to replace my full time job without millions of views per video. I would also essentially be starting back at zero which might take me another couple years before I get back to a good spot. I think that might be higher risk
5
u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
Oh yeah no, I wouldnt suggest quitting your job until AFTER youve proven that YouTube can make enough for your needs. I still work my salaried job and I just crossed over six figures (projected, the last three months extrapolated into a year) with my youtube!
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
That's awesome, great job.
I have had three months in a row where my income was $8k, $11k, then $8k again, but that was combined with my full time job making me $4k per month.
1
u/The-Past-Magician Sep 08 '26
Wanted to chime in here. I am in a very similar boat to you and work a 9-5, as well as YouTube each week from 5-9 and for several hours on the weekend. I do this with a good friend of mine, so our channel is co-owned. We push out an hour long video each week and he is doing YT full-time based on ad-revenue alone.
The trick is doing long-form whilst doing your 9-5. Maybe it takes a year or two to fully transition, but it CAN BE DONE.
Best of wishes to your endeavors bro!
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u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
I just re-read through your post; I've changed my stance and it might be controversial.
I think you should move in with your parents, set up a dedicated studio, quit your job and just go for it for a year and see what happens. Keep doing shorts, but also do longs beside them, replace the time you used to spend at your 'regular job' with doing long form videos, and replace the money you used to make at your job with free rent.
Nows the time, while youre in your 20's, in my opinion. I spent my 20's playing in a band for almost no money and even that ended up being worth it to me!
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
Thanks for the advice. I'm thinking im gonna go for it, take the risk, and hope it works out.
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u/kasumitendo Sep 08 '26
There's no reward without risk. The time to take risk is in your youth because you can and will bounce back from failures. It's hard to do that when you have a spouse and three kids and a lot of responsibility. I'd say not to be one of these people that never give their dreams a chance, but you have to take full inventory and ask if your dream is realistic and what your skills and weaknesses are. It has to be logical every step of the way without wishful and magical thinking. I've been taking these risks my whole life and I've had to restart several times. Things crash and burn or the landscape changes. It is what it is, if you're the kind of person that can weather those changes.
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u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
I love that. I hope it lasts forever. Im 47 and loving it, making tech reviews. I have a whole LLC set up around it now - I pay myself a salary technically and the rest of the money stays in the company as an s-corp so I can dodge some taxes. It's been fun figuring it all out.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
I have an LLC set up around mine as well. Already been writing off most purchases, which is a great benefit. I also do Canvas UGC on the side as well which brings in around $2.6k per month on top of my FT job and YouTube.
It kinda sucks to do but it helps.
0
u/The-Past-Magician Sep 08 '26
Wanted to chime in here. I am in a very similar boat to you and work a 9-5, as well as YouTube each week from 5-9 and for several hours on the weekend. I do this with a good friend of mine, so our channel is co-owned. We push out an hour long video each week and he is doing YT full-time based on ad-revenue alone.
The trick is doing long-form whilst doing your 9-5. Maybe it takes a year or two to fully transition, but it CAN BE DONE.
Best of wishes to your endeavors bro!
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
wait... I just realized who you are. You're videos are awesome!!! I've actually watched a ton of your content in the past. Really great stuff man, you've been a huge inspiration to my own channel.
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u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
Thank you! I love that!! I just saw further down, you talking about how you are also in tech, and you make original things. What’s your channel name?
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
I'm happy to share privately, but I don't wanna share it publicly
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u/SpaceDesignWarehouse Channel: Space Design Warehouse Sep 08 '26
But you have 60 MILLION views!? Thats basically half of the number of adults in America that have already seen you!!
Im curious enough to follow along in this story to DM you though.
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u/casualti21 Sep 08 '26
You would need around 400,000 long form views per month to hit $50k a year in advertising income, assuming your audience is mostly US with a $10 RPM. Depending on your content and audience the RPM will vary. Keep in mind, this is just the long form ad income. Affiliate, short form ads, and sponsors will supplement that.
My advice would be to test the waters with long form. Your next project should be a long form video that you also transform into a Shorts version. Just see how it goes. Also see if you can find long form content ideas that don’t take months to make. 1-2 videos a month would be better.
1
u/kasumitendo Sep 08 '26
The reality is, and it took me a lot of time to accept, is that for long form you need a format and style that allows you to produce more than 1 video every 2-4 weeks (or longer). The algorithm has a bias towards recency.
The reaction channels figured out it but took it too far. They get on camera and the stuff they react to is their b-roll. No making it, no finding and licensing it, no animating, whatever.
The better option for longevity and brand building is a full face cam and face cam + screen recording. I started doing this and can bang out 2 videos a week, and could go three if I make them shorter and do less research.
Sadly, we have to compromise on our vision and we can't present our best. We have to put quantity and recency first, because without that, we might as well be pissing into the wind.
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
In my experience that doesn't work for my niche.
I posted for over a year focusing on quantity and went no where. It wasn't until I significantly upped my quality and spent more time on my content did it explode.
I also see that is true for others in my niche. The ones killing it are the ones with the highest quality content. The low quality ones aren't making it.
1
u/kasumitendo Sep 08 '26
I hear you. But I also didn't say to make low quality videos. I'm just saying that you can't create cinematic masterpieces every single time and expect to publish enough content to matter. The slower you go, the more you need every video to be a homerun, and that's simply not going to happen. Quantity has primacy, with quality being as high as possible without reducing quantity (I mean this in terms of reasonability, I'm not at all saying to spam trash).
It's up to you, but just think about it. In what ways can you reduce the complexity of your filming and editing while not reducing the visual flair and especially not detracting from the information.
All the hyper-editing and multiple camera angles and motion graphics don't matter if the information sucks. The information is king, which is why streamers are getting the big views with low visual editing. People want information first. If they want to see a spectacle they can watch a movie or go outside.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
I agree, I just never had a homerun when i focused on quantity. I had posted over 100 videos and all of them flopped. As soon as I focused on quality i started averaging 100k to 1M views per short pretty much instantly.
I think that's part of the reason why people watch my videos in the first place, its part of my personal brand. It makes my content more entertaining which ultimately is the goal and differentiates me from all of the other sea of tech creators who don't have the skills to make videos like I can.
A big inspiration to my content is Chandler Gonzalez, check out his shorts. Mine are very similar in quality.
I've always followed the principle that each video should be better than the last and that's what's gotten me to where I am now.
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u/ickN Sep 08 '26
What type of content is it specifically? What type of story telling? Do you have the opportunity to mention or use products in your videos that you can tag? If so you should be tagging at least one product in every video.
In addition to that, you’ve got the other things right about doing more brand deals and making long form. With your content type are there any products you can offer? Can you make a simple app or anything for your audience? Let us know more details about the content and we’ll be able to help more.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26 edited Sep 08 '26
For sure, my niche is tech. Specifically, I build unique pieces of tech from scratch. I come up with an idea, design it, order the materials, film the process of me figuring out how to build it. Then, I write the script based on what happened and tell the story, then I go back and film an extra 50 to 100 shots to compliment the story, then I film the on face voice over, then i edit everything down into one cohesive story.
This while process takes about a week. Every step takes a long time to execute to a high level.
My long form would essentially be the same style, just bigger projects I've wanted to do for awhile that are just too big for a short.
I've estimated that one of these big projects with my full time job would take me at least 4 or 46months, maybe longer.
1
u/ickN Sep 08 '26
Ok. To start, make sure you’re tagging all of the tools you use and if possible the other things you need to put it together so viewers can buy what they need to build their own.
Next, it’s more work but you can start collecting emails and doing more affiliate marketing by setting up a “get all my builds through the link in profile” mention. Don’t do that in every video, but make it a point to do it occasionally. In the download there would be links to everything someone needs for any project you’ve made, maybe even instructions if you’re willing to do that work. Even better if you have pics so it’s presented well.
You only need each email once so set it up with a cheap option where they can log back in to get the most recent project.
Out of the views you’re getting, most are probably watching for entertainment but some will be interested in the projects.
OR, you could set up a Patreon or YouTube membership where you make these things available for a monthly fee. Easier sell from long form but worth trying in shorts.
I would start there and see if there is an interest from your viewers. Without having to do that full setup, you can use something basic like gum road for the first test and just put one project in it. If people bite, you have proof of concept and can start working on the rest.
Also, you can do this aggressively by putting the call to action in your video or start it passively by putting the link in your bio and seeing if people find it on their own.
1
u/oodex Subs: 1 Views: 2 Sep 08 '26
The way would be longform. Shortform full time creators exist, but most of them take on a huge risk (as in the income varies so much it's also sometimes below the required amount to pay for everything) and Shorts are way more volatile than longform content. Given that something like YouTube is already volatile to begin with, that's the last thing you want. The good news is once you have a longform channel going, it's really hard to lose that again to a degree it becomes existentially threatening. Like yes, views will go up and down all the time, you might even go on a longterm decline, but almost all longform channels I've seen maintain a base audience and will eventually hit a rise again, given that they can actually change something in content.
For the 1-2k a month, for me that would be around 110-220k views a month. RPM highly varies across longform creators, but if your channel grows you relatively quickly get to a point of revenue that you could even lose 75% of your income and would still be way better off compared to a regular job. Though that part highly depends of your regular costs/living expenses.
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
Do you think its viable to post one long form every 4 to 6 months or so and generate a full time income?
My niche is tech. Specifically, I build unique pieces of tech from scratch. I come up with an idea, design it, order the materials, film the process of me figuring out how to build it. Then, I write the script based on what happened and tell the story, then I go back and film an extra 50 to 100 shots to compliment the story, then I film the on face voice over, then i edit everything down into one cohesive story.
This while process takes about a week. Every step takes a long time to execute to a high level.
My long form would essentially be the same style, just bigger projects I've wanted to do for awhile that are just too big for a short.
I've estimated that one of these big projects with my full time job would take me at least 3 or 6 months, maybe longer.
Without my fulltime job, i could cut that time down to a couple weeks at most, assuming im doing about 10 to 12 hours per day of work.
3
u/kasumitendo Sep 08 '26
Do you think its viable to post one long form every 4 to 6 months or so and generate a full time income?
Not a chance in hell.
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
That's what I was thinking as well. Might be better to just focus on shorts then, take a leap of faith and go all in on long form.
1
u/kasumitendo Sep 08 '26
You gotta stack the deck in your favor. At minimum I would say you need to be publishing 1 long form video a week. 2 would be better. I'd transition away from shorts slowly so you can keep some revenue flowing. And start building a long form catalog of evergreen videos so that tide can start rising, but once you start you need to keep that ball rolling so you can get the exponential growth of landing in more and more people's watch list. And the more recent you are in their watch list, the higher chance of being promoted to them again. And that'll just expand more and more. But you have to keep it moving once you start, even when it sucks at the start.
You might actually have a head start with your shorts audience. Some may hurt you by not clicking, but eventually they'll not be shown your long forms. The ones that do click may give you that head start of data in terms of "now YouTube knows what type of viewer likes my long forms".
1
u/Oatbix Sep 08 '26
I’m not in the tech niche but this sounds like a relatively similar process could easily be a 10 min or so video? I know more scripting and recording yourself but you’re capturing the process and shots already. Maybe not every week but every 2 weeks or a month put something out? You know better than me there of course though how manageable that is.
I’m always super interesting in these conversations though. I’m much earlier in the journey than you, about 6 months but things have gone pretty well so far. The mind does drift towards the possibility of this actually being full time.
One thing no one else has said but you are so young at 25 man. I’m guessing you have some savings built up? Moving in with your parents and going all in for a year to see what happens doesn’t sound too crazy. I know you mentioned your job isn’t an easy one to get, but worst case you’re 26 and back on the job market, and this stuff all counts as valuable experience, you’re essentially running your own business. Out of all the people I’ve seen thinking about quitting their job to give it a go you seem to be in a good position
1
u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
The actual build process only accounts for maybe 10% of the short, the rest of the short is shots that I get after the build is complete and I'm finish writing the script. These extra shots are what actually build the story, this usually equates to about 50 to 100 extra shots on top of the actual build process shots.
For a long form 10min video i would probably need to get around 1000 shots or so, maybe more.
I have about $20k saved up, I've never spent a dime of my income from content creation, I could make this $20k last me about a year i think if I don't have a big rent payment every month.
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u/oodex Subs: 1 Views: 2 Sep 08 '26
4-6 months? You right now have no longform audience. Shorts and Longform rarely overlap. I've seen hundreds of Shortform creators that get millions of views on their Shorts and struggle to break 100 views on their longform. So for you to turn this into what I mentioned, you'd first have to build up a longform audience, possibly even on another channel since all those Short viewers get your longform recommend but are statistically insanely unlikely to click on it. They watch shorts. So they crush your CTR (and even if they click, your watch duration). Videos can still break out after that if you get quite lucky, but you are pretty much starting the longform journey with a huge handicap.
In regards to what you need for upload frequency, this would entirely depend on your RPM and views you get. Like if you get 2m views on the videos then 2 a year are absolutely enough (for the 1-2k), though it's insanely difficult to maintain an active community with such rare uploads.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
Yes I agree, so im kinda at a loss at what the path forward is for me. Am I just screwed? Should I just accept this dream is just impossible for me to do with my current work schedule?
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u/oodex Subs: 1 Views: 2 Sep 08 '26
Just make a longform video and see how it works out. Upload it on the main channel and on a new channel. If you decide to monetize the new video eventually, delete it on the main channel (e.g. if the new one worked out) or youtube can punish you for uploading the same thing monetized multiple times. You could also make a third channel and upload it there, with a few days in difference. Great videos will always get views, but lets be realistic barely anyone makes 10/10 videos even with the best effort. So uploading it multiple times with some time difference and going with the channrl that worked is the best bet.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
I thought you could get a copywrite strike for uploading the same video on two different channels?
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u/oodex Subs: 1 Views: 2 Sep 08 '26
You can upload a video x times but once you monetize more than 1 you can get into trouble. Ive never seen someone get into trouble for uploading the same video multiple times. Heck, I regularly do that when I check for music issues
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u/Precarious3145 Sep 08 '26
It's possible. I don't watch tech but a channel I watch does this https://www.youtube.com/@CrossingCrafts/videos. They post videos every 3-5 months of long builds and they do pretty well. Then you have channels that do video essays or research topics.
One problem that you'll face is building up an audience to get that point. You have 150k subs right now for short form but there's a strong chance those won't transition to long-form views. You should try reediting your older shorts into a single long video and posting those as an inbetween. You say you already have it edited as a single story so it should be easy to put them back together, just removing any "previously, I-". That'll start to expand your reach for people that prefer long-form.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 08 '26
The problem is all my shorts are filmed in vertical. I have thought about turning them into long form but since they are all filmed in vertical that wouldn't really work.
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u/Daily_concern Sep 08 '26
You can turn them into long form by combining them into a long video like a compilation, it doesn’t matter that it’s vertical. You could also caption them and do other things. You can add some horizontal scenes too if they are finished tech pieces you can add commentary now.
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u/redkinoko Sep 08 '26
Told myself the only way I will go full time is if my combined income from content is roughly 1.5-2x of my day job to factor in the inconsistency in earnings.
I barely hit 1x so I think I'm still far away from it.
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u/Ok-Lingonberry3539 Sep 08 '26
Can you make compilations of the shorts into long videos? That’d be the easiest way to make a boatload of money if your audience follows you to the long form videos.
It’s probably a totally different niche, but check out Shawna The Mom on YouTube. She started with TikToks and then cross posted. Then people got hooked on her stories and she puts her shorts into long form compilations once the whole story line for a longer episode is complete.
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u/Access_Solid Sep 08 '26
Too risky for me imo. I don’t see myself quitting my job to pursue yt full time and I have 2 monetized channels.
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u/Beginning-Cat8706 Sep 09 '26
The solution is sitting right in front of you.
You're making 1-2k per month. You need to reinvest that money into the channel.
Identify your most time-consuming task(s) that you can hire someone else to do and then hire it away. From there, your output will increase and odds are your cash input becomes exponential.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 09 '26
I do already reinvest the money but it all goes into the materials needed to make the tech
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u/ytbm Subs: 501.0K Views: 142.9M Sep 09 '26
Problem with shorts is to make a consistent living on that (I'm talking years and years and years) the views you'd have to get monthly would be absurd. IMO the view-to-revenue ratio for shorts is hilariously bad. Long form you just don't have that same pressure
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u/LOLitfod Subs: 100K Views: 84.3M Sep 09 '26
Realistically, 1. Increase quantity of shorts without compromising quality. This would take more time and might require hiring additional help.
Increase quality of each short. More views=more money
Start making long form content for a higher rpm. However, you are starting from scratch for a long form audience and it might or might not turn out well. Revenue might take a hit during this transition.
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u/Hungry-Secretary157 Sep 10 '26
Would it be best just to make a new channel with long form and cross promote the channel from the short form channel?
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u/ItsLikeHerdingCats Sep 09 '26
You’ve got a nice side gig that can certainly ebb and flow based on what YouTube does to their system.
My channel is doing extremely well this year and between Adsense ($500-$750 a month) and affiliates ($1000 or so), it’s fun to wonder what it would do if I did it full time.
I do long form. Shorts I use as teaser trailers to my long form.
The changes I’ve seen to shorts makes me think this is YouTube’s way of slowly shedding it
Most of my viewers are treating YouTube as a streaming service to watch on TV.
That said. I know how you feel. I hate my job and I’d love to do my own thing too.
But once you rely on YouTube for mortgage, health insurance, retirement and everything else - and one blip to the algorithm could be chaotic.
I don’t know the answer. But I certainly understand how you’re having this internal debate in your mind too!
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u/RobJames007 Sep 10 '26
4 hours of sleep per night for 2 years? If I were you I would change that immediately. I don't think you realize how important getting enough sleep is. You could be damaging your heart and causing other issues too. You need to aim for around 6 - 8 hours of sleep per night. 7 hours is a good average but 4 hours is definitely not enough and could lead to very serious health issues.
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u/Accomplished-Comb335 Subs: 150k Views: 60M Sep 10 '26
I understand, but it really just comes down to a lack of better options. If I want to be successful on YouTube, I don’t have a choice. Due to how many hours I am required to work per day at my job, it doesn’t leave enough time in the day for me to spend on YouTube in order to get anything done. So, i’m willing to accept heart issues in the future or other health issues if it means I can do YouTube full time, Even if living this way takes 20 years off my life I would much rather that then spend those last 20 years having to work a job i hate.
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u/gekogekogeko Sep 08 '26
I don't think there is a path for shorts creators to make it to full time without corporate backing.