There comes a moment in every YouTube creator’s journey when it’s time to climb the big looming...
When it comes to making a living off your YouTube channel, the word of the day is diversify. Diversify, diversify, diversify!
Diversify your revenue, that is. When you’re just starting out building your YouTube channel and audience, relying on a single stream or source of income is fine — joining YouTube’s Partner Program to earn ad revenue, for example. But you’ll soon learn it won’t hold up in the long term. Ad rates fluctuate, and you can’t guarantee that even if your number of views stays steady or even increases that your ad revenue alone will stay steady.
Forming a partnership with a brand can be extremely lucrative too. But again, you can’t guarantee those brands will be around forever either, and it can require a lot of work to set up the partnership and create the content.
What if there were a way you supplement your income from your YouTube channel without actually doing much of anything?
As part of its efforts to add more monetization opportunities for YouTube creators, YouTube launched YouTube Merch, a platform for easily selling merchandise for your brand directly through your channel.
Your loyal fans have proven time and again that they love you and your content. YouTube Merch lets you give them the chance to prove their enthusiasm to the entire world and support you by letting them buy cool merch with your channel’s unique designs.
Learn more about this opportunity, how to get started with YouTube Merch, and best practices to make it work for you, below!
What Is YouTube Merch?
YouTube’s Merch feature allows you to choose, link, and connect an eligible merchandise platform or retailer directly to your YouTube channel. You’ll be able to display your merchandise on YouTube’s virtual Merch shelf. This means your audience can easily purchase t-shirts, hats, stickers, and more straight from your channel.
The Merch shelf can appear on your video pages directly below your video’s description. There’s also the option to add a Store tab to your channel homepage where your fans can browse your items.
Animator and vlogger Rebecca Parham’s channel Let Me Explain Studios showcases a Merch shelf below her videos featuring graphic tees reflective of her art style and popular stories.
One of the perks of YouTube Merch is that you don’t have to do all the work yourself of selling, printing, and shipping out merchandise. Gone are the days when creators would have to keep a big box of t-shirts in their closet and send them out individually each time someone ordered something. The merchandise platforms and retailers take care of all of that for you, freeing up your time to work on your videos and other components of your business.
Yes, the retailers will take a cut of your profit from your merchandise — they’re all businesses too, after all — but most YouTube creators find that the profit they get with minimal effort makes it more than worth it.
Who Is Eligible to Use YouTube Merch?
The main qualification for YouTube Merch is that your channel has been approved for monetization and that you live in a country eligible for the YouTube Partner Program. Other than that, your videos just have to meet YouTube’s standard content guidelines for monetization and community guidelines — and your channel can’t be marked as Made for Kids.
Who Can View and Buy Things Through YouTube Merch?
As of 2021, viewers located in 24 different countries can view purchase content through your YouTube Merch shelf. This includes the United States, the United Kingdom, India, Japan, Australia, Germany, and many more. Your viewers in other countries won’t have access. If your audience is primarily based in a country not included among those 24, it might be prudent to look for an outside merchandise print-on-demand site in the meantime.
When Should You Start Selling Merch?
There’s no right or wrong answer to this question — once you’re eligible for YouTube Merch (see above), you can sell. But the best time to start is when you start seeing a demand for it. Signs it might be time to start selling merch include:
- Your audience is asking for it! Check out your comments section. Are people asking for a t-shirt or stickers? If so, give them what they want, pronto!
- Your main competitors in your niche are doing it, and their audience seems into it.
- Your catchphrases or slogans are catching on. If you’ve got a regular catchphrase or motto or something similar that you’re starting to notice your fanbase echoing in their comments or DMs to you, then chances are good, it’s time to put that on some merch! Inside jokes, mascots, or other call-outs to your audience’s favorite content on your channel is a great choice too.
Remember: your fans will buy your merch because they know it’s a way to support you so you can keep creating the content they love. They’ll also buy merch related to your brand for the same reason they buy other branded things: to identify themselves with it.
Wearing or owning merch with your channel’s brand is a way for your audience to show that they’re “in the know” about how awesome you are, and to promote your channel to others.
What Sort of Merch Should You Sell?
You’ve got a range of options when it comes to merch — everything from t-shirts to pint glasses to posters, fitness apparel, and beyond. But you should only list items that your audience might actually buy. In other words, the type of merch you add is going to depend largely on your brand and audience.
Influencer LaurDIY’s YouTube Merch store encourages fans to DIY their own tie-dye designs using a tie dye kit and white clothes (with Laur’s logo) that they can use as their blank canvas.
How will you know what your fans want? Well, that’s easy enough — use YouTube’s cards feature to add a poll to your video and ask them yourself!
What Should You Put on Your Merch?
You should put something that’s distinctive and representative of your brand on your merch. This could be your logo, your channel name, an inside joke, a cool graphic that represents some of your popular content, or your catchphrases.
Bodybuilder and fitness influencer Kali Muscle’s merch features one of his standard catchphrases: Don’t be jealous!
If you’re not a designer yourself, no worries. Try reaching out to your network or asking which designer other creators you follow use. Or look for a freelance designer you can hire on a freelance marketplace site like Fiverr or 99Designs.
Working with a designer means you’ll need to put some initial investment into your merchandise (i.e., you need to pay the designer, duh!). If you need to work with a professional graphic designer, that’s one reason why it might make sense to hold off on starting your merch store until you’re sure there’s enough demand for your merch so you’ll get a decent return-on-investment.
How Much Should You Charge for Your Merch?
Look at what other creators in your niche charge for their merch. Think about what you yourself would pay. Make sure you’re making enough of a profit to make this whole endeavor worthwhile (especially if you’re paying a graphic designer), but don’t make prices so high that no one will actually want to buy it!
Luckily, most merchandise retailers and platforms allow you to adjust your pricing so you can always lower them if needed (or raise them — slowly! — if your demand is high.)
What’s the Best Way to Promote Your Merch?
Once you’ve created your store and set up your YouTube merch shelf, your next step, of course, is to promote it! Here are a few ideas to help raise awareness and increase your merch sales:
- Wear and/or use your merch in your videos
- Write great descriptions on your sales page
- Promote your merch at the end of your videos on your video end screens
- Include links in all your video descriptions
- Post a video all about your merch (showing it off, talking about what it means, etc.)
- Pin a top comment in your comment section with a link to your merch
- Pin a merch item during one of your livestreams
- Host giveaways and contests where you give out some free merch to your fans!
To promote his merch, influencer and cat fanatic Joey Graceffa is wearing one of the t-shirts on his Merch shelf in this video. He also includes NEW MERCH and a link prominently at the top of his video description.
Get creative and don’t forget to remind your audience periodically that your merch exists after you launch it for the first time, too!
Ready to Get Started with YouTube Merch? Here’s How.
When you’re ready and you’re eligible, you can get started with exploring your YouTube Merch options through YouTube Studio:
- Log in to YouTube Studio.
- Cick Monetization from the left-hand menu.
- Choose the Merchandise tab.
This will guide you through some next steps and options, including choosing/linking a retailer or platform and more.
Happy selling!
TL;DR:
YouTube Merch is pretty much the easiest way possible to earn some extra revenue with very minimal effort by selling merch for your channel directly through YouTube. You can display your merch in a Store tab, toggle a Merch shelf on to display below the descriptions of your videos, and more. Use your audience as a guide when deciding when to start selling merch and what to sell. And don’t forget to get creative when promoting your merch, too!
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