Tag Archives: venetianprincess

Online Video

ABC News Features YouTube Stars (and Income Accuracy)

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Two out of three YouTube stars (Jody Rivera/VenetianPrincess and Greg Benson/Mediocrefims) featured in ABC News’ story on “YouTube Top Earners” were among the dozen profiled in my “Beyond Viral” book.

Coincidence?  Or did the student author, Clay LePard (a member of the ABC News on Campus bureau at Syracuse University) forget to read his journalism manual on source citation? Hey it got Greg and Jody some press, as well as Ryan “Nigahiga” Higa. So it’s all good.

Now onto the estimates by Tubemogul (see Business Week)… while being directionally accurate and based on decent assumptions, they are often quite wrong… according fellow YouTube creators with whom I’ve spoken. Of course we’re all obliged by contract to keep the numbers to ourselves. I do know that the income estimates by Tubemogul for some individuals (who have fewer views than I) are paradoxically higher than my own actual income. It’s also worth noting that those Tubemogul estimates don’t include the more lucrative but sporadic sponsored videos.

The reality is that it’s total conjecture since even with total view counts, the actual income per video can range radically depending on the advertiser bidding. What’s important is that a) some do make enough to live comfortably, b) nobody knows how long it will last, c) it’s extremely difficult odds to live on YouTube income.

And as I like to remind people… if I calculated the time I’ve spent on YouTube and arrived at an hourly salary, I’m quite sure that I’d beat it working at Taco Bell. But I enjoy it, so I don’t bother with the math. At least the blog is profitable. Oh wait- that’s right. It’s got no revenue stream. Well ya get what you pay for.

Online Video

Poptart Taps Top YouTube Musicians

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Credit to Poptart for tapping the two most-subscribed YouTube musicians: DaveDays and VenetianPrincess, and for taking over the homepage to promote the campaign (exhibit A). Let’s look objectively as possible at this campaign to see what worked and didn’t…

Interactive YouTube Banner Promotes Poptarts Via DaveDays & VenetianPrincess

The homepage takeover caught my attention first, even though I’m subscribed to both of these musicians and enjoy their work. Had Poptart not included them in the homepage ad, I probably wouldn’t have noticed the ad and certainly wouldn’t have looked further.

While the YouTube pop-tart channel isn’t seeing loads of views or positive ratings (see exhibit B below)…

Presumably designed to provide continuity and increase branding and engaging, Kellogg commissioned some more highly produced videos. These did not score as well (see comments, views, ratings and comment clouds)

…VenetianPrincess and DaveDays are getting a more positive reaction on the videos they create and distribute on their channel.

For instance, here’s the score on DaveDays video seen more than 750,000 times. Nearly 80 percent gave this video a “thumb’s up,” which is just slightly lower than recent ratings of his non-promotional videos.

Nearly 80 Percent Thumbs Up (for the DaveDays video).

What worked:

  • Kellogg did a great job tapping people who are already known on YouTube, and it certainly cost them less than getting stars.
  • The videos, as evidenced by views and ratings, were better received than ads.
  • The homepage takeover page helped drive views and brand engagement. It’s important to couple webstars with a media buy since neither alone is as effective.

What could it improve?

  • The biggest problem this campaign faces is that it’s completely dependent on the talent and their musicians. The notion of a “battle on taste” is devoid of any humor, or “reason to engage” with the brand or its channel. These two are capable of far funnier musical parodies (check out Dave’s Miley videos or Jody’s song parodies for proof). So presumably they were not given great direction or creative freedom.
  • I’m not sure the expense on the “play-by-play” transition videos was worthwhile, unless it cost a lot less to shoot than it appears. It might have been better to toss in another YouTuber, and have them figure out a more organic way to connect the videos and work in the branding.  Those promotional videos got hosed on ratings and comments (see below):
Poptart's Videos, by Contrast, Got Low Views and Poor Ratings