Question: What do you think of Youtube as a distribution model for an animated series? One can spend years pitching their project before finding success. Are there any success stories of persons or studios that went the Youtube route and became successful with their series?
Success would look like either gaining so many followers and views that the Youtube revenue and merchandising revenue, sustains the series or a network picks up their animation for development and distribution.
I think Bee and Puppy Cat and RWBY come to mind, but are those just lucky instances and what about kids animation. How well do those work on Youtube to be able to earn enough revenue to sustain the production?
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I think YouTube is a great distribution model for an animated series, Kevin Jackson. There are animated series on YouTube that get a lot of views. Some series get A TONNNN of views (the more well-known series). I watch animated series on YouTube more than I watch animated series on streamers.
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Hazbin Hotel, Lackadaisy, Digital Circus, even Hullabaloo...many independent/freelancers are seeing YouTube for long-series animation over the streaming services in its growing crisis. All it needs, as Mike Disa strongly lectured at his last webinar, is a proper business structural strategy. Perhaps these articles from Cartoon Brew will help:
https://www.cartoonbrew.com/streaming/7-tips-for-building-a-successful-a...
https://www.cartoonbrew.com/interviews/the-amazing-digital-circus-creato...
https://www.cartoonbrew.com/internet-video/theodd1sout-let-me-explain-st...
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Making money on YouTube is a long shot, but you can use it to build your audience. Once you have a community, then you work to convert followers to paid subscribers on Patreon or Substack.
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agree with Mike Boas youtube is a bully now, not only you have to upload your content there but pay them to to be seen , So it can be part of your strategy , get tons n tons of views and migrate those users into your own ecosystem. so that you don't loose them when YT decides to update their algorithm.
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How does one “pay YouTube to be seen”?
I know that’s the Facebook model, but haven’t seen it at YouTube.
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That's what I'm trying to do with my channel: https://www.youtube.com/@thehighmeows But it's very hard, and nearly 3 years into it I'm not making anywhere near what it costs me, I'm just hoping it will change as I'm so invested at this point that there's no turning back. Be ready for the long game if you go into it.
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Mike Boas in google ads you see an option to promote you videos, it also give option to name you competitor so that you tube can put your video on top of their competitions
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It may take some time before Youtube covers productions cost, but as has been previously mentioned it is a great way to see if what you've got can attract an audience. Sometimes a great idea is before it's time, or only a great idea to the creator. Getting out in front of people will help to determine if you have a project with legs or you need to move on to the next. I would give Youtube a run, but continue to pitch. As your audience grows you'll have better positioning should someone check you out.
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Ok Kamar, I see what you mean. That sounds like advertising, not affecting number of times the algorithm promotes your video in searches. A slight distinction in my mind.
I’ll also say that putting animation on YouTube is not enough to build an audience. Grassroots community building would involve social media, email newsletters, patreon, discord, etc.
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Mike Boas Yes Youtube is a good way to promote your content to get some early traction to show engagement with your content to your investors, the 2d Anime teaser i posted recently , that IP is on tiktok only , and they are killing it, they are producing a show cuz they are super hit on Tiktok.
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Youtube is viable for getting your work out there, and if you can build an audience to attract sponsors, then you have a better shot of making money. Whether it is YouTube, Roku etc. the future of entertainment will be indies finding a way to get their work somewhere as the industry continues to implode. If you can afford to produce it and get it out there, that's better than pitching for years and having it sit still on your hard drive. But you have to promote it, advertise it, and just hope that it will get discovered if you want any chance of financial success.
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Has anyone tried to, or successfully used Crunchyroll?