ESTHER MORALES

By Esther Morales

All around the world, as people lay around their homes, bored during the quarantine, we itch to find entertainment, and it doesn’t end at Netflix or Hulu. YouTube is home to an enormous amount of content not only related to the coronavirus but also movies, late-night talk shows, and as always, its YouTubers. Did you happen to catch what video slipped in at number 5 on YouTube’s trending page this week? Confessions of Fast Food Employees drew in 2.8 million views and had watchers cracking up. Tucked away in an Orlando loft is the creator behind it all, Adande Thorne, or better known as, sWooZie on Youtube.

For Thorne and his fellow YouTubers, providing video entertainment is their job. Many transitions to self-isolation have been seamless for creators who are experiencing mass increases of viewership and subscribers. YouTubers primarily work from home and are devoting more time to shooting and editing videos than ever before. While some are flourishing, others that rely on being outside have had to adjust their content to indoor shooting, and even with YouTube receiving an overall 15% increase in channel traffic, creators aren’t raking in as much dough as you’d think.

Making money on Youtube all stems from cost per mille (CPM), “mille,” meaning 1,000 in Latin. For the social media giant, this means cost per 1,000 monetized views. For every view of an ad in a video, YouTubers typically receive $0.50-$5. For more notable creators, that pay can typically be $20 or higher per 1,000 views. YouTube is still a business however, so it takes a 45/55 cut of all ad revenue on the site, 45% going to Google, and 55% going to the creator.

But the coronavirus took a hit on advertising rates. In an attempt to preserve funds, companies are now spending less overall on advertisements, and according to the Interactive Advertising Bureau, 70% of media buyers and brands have stopped or adjusted their planned ad spending. As a result, YouTubers all over Twitter are reporting a 30-80% decline in CPM. 

Thorne started his YouTube channel back in 2005, relying on his amateur animation skills and keen storytelling abilities. His YouTube fame shot up in 2011 when his video, Confessions of a Disney Employee, gained 22 million views and his channel has only grown since. His videos are centered around funny and some unbelievable situations he’s been in, brought to life through animation. Some of his most popular videos include My First Kiss, My Girlfriend’s Boyfriend, and Video Game Drug Dealer. Before pursuing YouTube full-time in 2010, Thorne made his living as a professional gamer. As of May 14, sWooZie has acquired a whopping 7.06 million subscribers and continues to grace the trending page.

Over the past 30 days, sWooZie has gained over 70k subscribers and over 22 million video views, which is a 220.8% increase from April 2020. Despite the rapid growth of his channel and increase in views, his CPM has gone down. Typically, Thorne would receive revenue of $20 per thousand views, but since the start of April is now receiving $5.

The 39-year-old creator was wondering how long it would take before the ripple effect of the virus on businesses would affect their marketing dollars and recalled the moment he realized the severity of the impact.

“I’ve been able to pull through, I always prepare for a rainy day. It was just a bit difficult because I didn’t realize this until my most recent video upload from last week,” he explained in our interview through Zoom, “I checked my stats and was like, wait, wait, wait. I’ve been doing $12,000 to $16,000 in the red for the last three videos, not realizing that CPM was down that bad.”

With an average of 10 million views a month, about 50% of those views being monetized, Thorne’s typical monthly income is around $55,000. With his CPM down, these same views now only earn him an income of about $13,750.

Even though overall viewership is up, the revenue doesn’t seem to follow suit. To help make up for this loss, some creators have increased their posting schedules while others struggle to make content. Consider the many different video genres that can be found on YouTube -- from beauty, vlogging, gaming, cooking, to commentary. Traveling or vlog channel content relies heavily on being outside and documenting daily activities as opposed to reaction or animation channels which have been dominating in views for the last couple of weeks and can be made more easily during this time.

Certain creators like Danny Gonzalez, who specializes in commentary, have gone from biweekly uploads to multiple uploads a week, and views are up 124% according to Social Blade a website that tracks social media analytics and statistics. On the contrary, YesTheory, whose videos are usually jammed packed with traveling, has reported a significant drop in viewership of 33%. YouTubers who aren’t used to being restricted have had to slow down production and try to find new ways to keep their subscribers engaged from home.

Luckily for sWooZie, he is mostly isolated all year round, living alone apart from coffee runs, occasional meet up with friends, and eating out. Thorne mainly resides in Los Angeles, CA, but chose to stay in Orlando, FL, during quarantine to be closer to his family. That’s now been replaced with UberEats, FaceTime, and long naps. Apart from being a YouTuber, he also shared that behind the scenes he is also writing films and is working on various projects with The Walt Disney Company.

Though he has an office, he tends to work from the comfort of his California king where he is able to write, edit, and animate with the same consistency and authenticity as before, putting in an average of 30 hours a week. Even with this privilege, comes some pressure to appease the masses.

“At first, I was under the impression that, well, it was like a captive audience now that there are all these people ordered to stay home. What are they going to be doing at home besides looking at Youtube, Tiktok, or being stuck to the internet? I was on it. Everyday bum-rushing. I wanted weekly content to take advantage of the increasing viewership,” Thorne says.

About a month into quarantine, he had to come to terms with the fact that for now, he couldn’t continue to enlist the help of his hired animators to push out videos with his steep drop in revenue. In 2018, as his channel and video demand grew, he sought out budding animators from around the world to assist him. Thorne is still actively in touch with his animators to make sure they have everything they need while being at home but is planning to animate alone for his next couple of videos to help balance out costs.

“It gives you a leg up for thumbnails and storytelling purposes. Animation has given me both longevity and job security. If I want to make a video with just animation, just my face, or both, I can do that and I am still able to produce the same type of content having to be at home 24/7,” he says.

As viewers new and old continue to rely on the platform for entertainment, their time is an investment keeping creators afloat. Thorne hopes that when new people stumble across his channel during the crisis and after, his objectives will continue to shine through一 to make you laugh and to make you think.

Being a full-time Youtuber is not for the faint of heart, it can be rewarding but it can also be risky financially, and takes an immense amount of hard work to be successful. Regardless, one thing is for sure,一 YouTube is standing the test of time and is continuing to allow people from all walks of life to create and share their content amidst COVID-19.

“What I believe Youtube is doing really great is that they’re spotlighting their creators. YouTubers can create content that can’t exist in their fullest form on other platforms like Instagram or Tiktok and pays them to do so. This content that you can’t get anywhere else is the reason you keep coming back.”