You are probably thinking I interviewed him prior to writing this article, but the fact is, I did not. All the things I know about this Youtube superstar comes from the same online information everyone reads. But I do know a little bit more because of my experience in internet marketing and that’s why I’m here to answer the question about how does Pew Die Pie makes money online.
Who Is Pew Die Pie?
Also known as the world’s greatest YouTuber, Swedish-born Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg is a university drop out who went on to become an online gamer and commentator on his official channel called Pew Die Pie. Since 2006, he has produced about 3,500 videos and garners over 96 million subscribers, as of April 2019.
Today, he earns about $15 million dollars per year by simply doing what he likes. Sounds like something we all want for our bank account too, right? So, what exactly contributed to all the fame, glory and wealth? Most of the answers are actually on his channel. If you haven’t noticed before, here’s the rundown.
Strategy #1 – YouTube Advertisement
Big companies come to YouTubers for the advertising space. During online streaming, companies will promote their ads to your audience either before and/or in between the span of the video. The revenue is then split between the two – YouTube keeps 45% and the creator receives 55%.
There are several factors that influence the earnings though.
- The Cost Per Mille (aka CPM) refers to the cost of 1,000 impressions/views greater than 30 seconds of an ad video. Most CPM rates are between $4 to $10, at the gross average of $7.60. If so, you get to earn $4.18 per 1,000 views after YouTube takes its cut. Sometimes, it could go as low as 10 cents too.
- CPM can increase during special seasons such as Christmas or during the NFL.
- A higher number of subscribers can potentially lead to more ad views. However, a qualified impression dictates that the viewers must watch the ads for at least 30 seconds from the start. Anything less than that will not be counted as a view.
Just to give an idea of how much PewDiePie makes per video, here’s a calculation I make using the YouTube Money Calculator. The system uses all kinds of factors and variance to come up with a rough estimation.
That’s almost $13K for just one video! Crazy, right? No wonder YouTubers work so hard to create new videos and encourage people to subscribe to their channels all the time. There’s real money to be made here!
Strategy #2 – Affiliate Marketing
Since an audience can take a while to grow, it is not wise to rely on ad revenues alone. One of the most common routes YouTubers take to diversify their video income is through affiliate marketing. It allows them to earn sales commissions from brands and companies whenever they recommend products to the audience.
This can be anything, from video production gears to the items within the topics of discussion. In the case of PewDiePie, he shares two things – an ergonomic chair and a stream deck device that he so often uses. You can see the posting of two different affiliate links below one of his videos.
The first one takes you to Clutch Chairz, a company that designs and sells high quality and comfortable chairs for gamers. This is a private affiliate offer and it pays in three levels;
- Level 1 (up to 5 chairs per month) – 5%
- Level 2 (up to 15 chairs per month) -7%
- Level 3 (more than 15 chairs per month) – 10%
One unit of chair sells about $400 so that means you could earn anywhere between $20 to $40, depending on the volume of sales conversion.
The second one takes you to Amazon, specifically the Elgato Stream Deck product page. This item sells for about $250 per unit and according to the latest fee schedule, the commission for electronic products is 4%. That rounds up to about $10 per sale.
Now, considering the level of influence that PewDiePie has in the gaming community nowadays, it wouldn’t be surprising to make a few thousand per month just from the Amazon Associate program alone.
Of course, this isn’t as lucrative as advertising revenue, but for beginners, affiliate commissions can help to sustain operational costs such as domain fees, hosting fees and etc. while you gradually grow a strong online presence.
Strategy #3 – Sell Merchandise
Another interesting thing is that PewDiePie actually has a clothing brand that he founded with his fashion-designer girlfriend. The merchandise offers high-quality unisex clothing and home products that are ethically made. It’s called Tsuki and it’s an eCommerce store powered by Shopify.
Obviously, the profit here wouldn’t be as transparent as it takes into account the production costs, logistics as well as some marketing work. Still, it’s a good stream of income to have especially for creating loyalty with the audience.
The thing I like about all these three strategies is the nature of recurring income. You do it once, leave it there and earn passive money as a result. Now, when I say passive, it doesn’t mean not doing anything, but rather leveraging from time to grow your income exponentially into the future.
- Once a good video is published, it will continue to grow in audience size over the years. For as long as you don’t delete the video and keep up with the minimum engagement, you can potentially enjoy continuous monthly ad revenues and affiliate commissions.
- As with an online store, you can sell 24/7 globally. There’s no maintenance of a brick-and-mortar shop and you can always promote to preexisting customers by collecting their emails.
Planning Out Your Money Making Strategies
I am quite sure PewDiePie also makes money from acting and sponsorship, but that’s beyond our discussion here. The main reason I pointed out the three strategies is that these tasks are something we – the less popular group of people – can all do without needing extraordinary talents.
If you’ve been thinking about making legitimate money online, you can certainly draw some inspiration from the man himself here. Here’s how you can go about picking the right options;
- You Tubing
Good for people who are comfortable presenting in front of videos and enjoy engaging with a large virtual audience. Possessing a creative skill will be an added advantage here because it makes you stand out from competitors within the same niche.
Downside – Growing a fan base can take years and you need to constantly create high video outputs to keep up with the trends and demands.
Great for all groups of people, introverts and extroverts alike. If you are passionate about something and like to share ideas and knowledge with people, you can definitely find an affiliate program that is both interesting and profitable.
If you are not keen on videos, publish a blog instead and engage with your audience through informative articles. Use the tool below to create a free site with WordPress if you haven’t already done so.
Just like PewDiePie, you can promote anything from the Amazon rack and earn additional commissions even from products that you didn’t mention. The selections are massive in the marketplace and there’s something for every single niche.
However, Amazon has some hard rules like they would terminate your account if you don’t generate any sales within 180 days so if you find yourself stuck in this situation, there are always other affiliate programs to go to. You can search for them individually online or browse through the options on the following affiliate networks;
- ShareASale
- Rakuten Linkshare
- Conversant (formerly known as Commission Junction)
- Affiliate Window (AWIN)
Apart from that, you can also consider promoting digital goods such as audiobooks, specific programs or software that can potentially fetch higher commissions (between the range of 20% to 50%) due to their low operational costs.
Downside – Generating traffic to your site can take some time. You need to have a good grasp of keyword research and constantly producing valuable content that is both interesting and relevant to convert readers into buyers. Don’t feel dismayed though – here’s a great training platform that can help.
- Online Store
Good for preexisting retail businesses or those with experience selling goods online. If you are looking to build your own brand or want to make more sales with merchandise, setting an online store is the way to go.
Downside – A lot of work is needed on the back office like planning, creating and then marketing. Hence, the increase in the cost of production too. Not ideal for solopreneurs with low investment budgets.
In Conclusion
No matter which strategies you choose, one thing is important and that is the audience. When there’s no audience, there’s basically no one to sell to. However, to get an audience, you must first offer something valuable and content in the form of knowledge/information is the best way to do that.
In the case of PewDiePie, he shares his passion for gaming and helps others become better at it. What about you? What can you give to others?
I hope by showing how PewDiePie makes money online, will inspire you to start your own entrepreneurial journey whether it’s through making YouTube videos, affiliate marketing or building an online store.
Meanwhile, please check out my recommended training platform to learn more about online marketing. Feel free to leave your thoughts or questions down below and I’d get back to you as soon.
I have actually followed this guy for quite some time and I had no idea the insane amount of money he makes. He is definitely an inspiration and we can all learn a lot from him.
Making money through YouTube
is no easy task because building that audience is where the problem is at. It can take an enormous amount of time to get that kind of subscribers to enable you to earn a good amount of money from video marketing.
It is not an impossible task, but it is a task that takes time to achieve for sure.
Hi Cathy,
I like your insights into someone like Pew Die Pie, when it comes to marketing on the internet. It’s always important to look at those who are doing well and try to replicate their success. What I really got out of this article is the importance of trying to have multiple income streams to take full advantage of your audience.
Just wondering if you have any view on which technique is more successful in this day and age – Youtube or Blogging, or are they complementary? Any advice would be greatly appreciated.
Each has its pros and cons, Dominic. One isn’t necessarily greater than the other. It depends on your skill set, what you enjoy doing and how you like to engage with your targeted audience. Blogging works for me thus far, but someone who doesn’t like writing and prefers talking may enjoy doing videos instead.
That’s just my point of view.
I browse Reddit occasionally and there’s a subreddit over there dedicated to him. I’m not sure if it’s run by him or just fans, but it seems like he has a lot of passionate followers that are actively working to increase the number of subscribers on his Youtube channel. Just didn’t realize he made that much money.
I’ve never thought about linking products in the Youtube video description. Will try that and see what happens. I used to make around $100/month between Amazon and Youtube, but I quit uploading new videos and slowly the number of views I get has been dwindling. I might have to start cranking out some new videos again.
Pew Die Pie has gone a long way in monetizing what he loves doing. The returns he gained in a year really worth his efforts. He made good use of his brain to figure out things that can earn him huge money. That’s fantastic.
A lot of people especially celebrities and other skillful people are making it big on YouTube. Apart from sharing their lifestyle updates, they also venture into affiliate marketing, become a merchant and many more.
That’s the kind of life I want to live. I find this post a good motivation for me.
OMG – this is the timeliest posts ever Cathy!
I just watched PewDiePie’s latest video on his Cooking Simulator game and he’s got 2.7 million views already in less than 24 hours! Needless to say, I was pretty curious about his earnings but never managed to figure out how much until you did the calculations.
$12k per video ?! And that’s just the video, I cannot imagine how much more he gets from affiliate marketing promos and his merchandise sale. It’s understandable why he works so hard to publish videos every day. Playing the game alone would take 4-5 hours top (I know I do) and editing can take just as long – just imagine how hard he works to create content a day. My guess, 10-12 hours per video?
Man, that hits me hard! And then there’s me working 4 hours a day on my blog and I’m already fatigued. I really need to work harder. Thanks so much for sharing this.
Time to finish my content! How many hours do you put into your content creation process a day, if you don’t mind me asking? 😀
Great to hear from you as always, Riaz.
I spent pretty much the same amount of time as you do plus additional hours on weekends. I am still stuck in a day job so it’s an everyday juggle kind of thing. When I am on the go, I do research and brainstorming. When I am back at my desktop, I focus on writing. It’s been like that for 2 years plus now and I am planning to take it to the next level like doing paid traffic or hiring a freelancer so that I get more time to do other things.
Interesting! I have never heard of Pew Die Pie. I don’t use YouTube much at all aside from the occasional videos redirect from another site. It’s always great to see what other successful people have done to get to where they are.
Based on your review, I think his strategy is a lot of work and side hustles. He sounds like a busy man! I too am implementing this strategy. I work 2 jobs plus have my own pet sitting business and have just started affiliate marketing. I plan on getting into photography too. Maybe it’s time to do some YouTubing as well.
Wow, great information Cathy! I would love to make that kind of revenue just for a YouTube video.
Seems like it would take quite a long time to build up the number of followers that he has. My son is looking into starting this. He’s doing it just for fun for now so we shall see where it goes from here. I will stick with my affiliate marketing technique. It would be great to invest in a drone and do some videos as mine is a travel site.
This post is an eye-opener on how top earners on YouTube make money. It’s something that I’ve always been curious about. I never thought of using affiliate marketing with videos, but now I see how they could work. I still need to figure out what will work better for my niche and my current content. Creating YouTube videos will definitely be a good addition to the revenue.
Pew Die Pie is a great example of building multiple streams of income. I had no idea how much someone could make just from allowing YouTube advertisements.
Following in his footsteps is something that I would like to try, but I think the biggest struggle is that I don’t like to be filmed. It gets me out of my comfort zone. Furthermore, I always question whether I’m interesting enough or if I can make the topic interesting so it doesn’t lose the viewers attention.
Like anything, making money from YouTube does seem to take a lot of work, and probably practice as well. It’s something again that I will try, and over time hopefully, get better at it.
As PewDiePie shows, you can never have enough streams of income! 🙂
I had always wondered how YouTube personalities like PewDew Pie make money with their YouTube channel and videos, and after reading through your article on the subject, I can say this sounds like something that all online marketers need to be involved with.
The YouTube platform is huge and owned by Google, so the work you do to get your channel and videos liked and viewed will help out for content that you may be adding to your website blog. That can be useful for any kind of marketing that you may be doing.
It is something to strive for, and there are many strategies you can take with the platform and your videos. I think it is a good idea to get a good understanding of the options (which you have laid out here) and then decide which one (or more) that you might want to pursue.
Up to now, I have not really leveraged the power that is found within that platform for my marketing efforts online. I have used it simply to host my related videos to whatever content that I may be promoting at the moment, but I can see that I need to relook at this.
Do you recommend a different channel for each kind of marketing that you may be doing? For instance, I am involved in 3 main areas of online marketing – Online Training, Offline Business Services, and e-Commerce (stores). It might be a bit much if I tried to stuff all of that into one channel?
Hi Dave, I am no YouTube expert here but I am guessing that placing all videos in one channel will help all the content to gain some traction. If your ultimate conversion is taking place on your blog, I think it’s a good idea to funnel all the traffic there so concentrating all the videos in one place will give that added advantage.
Hope this helps.
I am planning to start a YouTube channel and there are so many resources that use PewDiePie success story as a reference. Your key points help me to understand the mechanisms underlying the monetizing process. I am going to alter a few things in my plan based on these insights so thanks for sharing the information with us.
This is quite an inspirational article, drawing a strong example for a figure we know all too well.
What really struck me is how much PewDiePie makes per video. On average they must certainly have a long life in order to generate that much income. Although he is certainly an inspiration, for those of us who are less inclined to put our mugs out there, the suggestion regarding affiliate marketing represents a more palatable method to make an income.
I like the commission opportunities you referred to for selling as an Amazon affiliate. Some of those commissions are pretty good and with higher priced products or a high sales volume, there is real money to be made there. However, it does take time to build up this type of business as well.
On-line businesses are not built overnight and successful ones take time, but there is a light at the end of the tunnel for those who commit and never give up.