Why Take My Advice?
My name is Keith and I’m a certified teacher with a degree in education. I’ve been living and teaching in Vietnam since 2009. I started a YouTube channel 2 years ago, and started experimenting with it recently to see if I could make some passive income. I was successful, so I have decided to share my tips with you here. I hope you find this helpful during a time when 100% of teachers in Vietnam are without work. Maybe this will help you and others make some extra income during this difficult time.
Find Your Niche
First off, you need to figure out what your niche is. What is it you have been doing the most of since you became a teacher? Are you really good at working with students in the 3–5 age range? Do you have great game ideas? Maybe you are really good at teaching older students proper English pronunciation and the International Phonetic Alphabet. To help determine your niche, you should also determine your target audience. Do you want students to learn from you on YouTube, or do you want to share your tricks and tips with teachers all over the world? Whatever topic you choose, make sure it is something you are passionate about and are willing to keep making videos about even when your subscriber numbers are stagnant.
Here are my top 10 ideas for ESL Teacher YouTube videos in no specific order:
– IELTS/TOEFL Test Prep for students
– International Phonetic Alphabet
— Pronunciation Practice
– Classroom Management Tips for Teachers
– Lesson Planning Tips for Teachers
– ESL Vocabulary Songs for Kids
– ESL Games for Kids that can be played directly from YouTube
– ESL Games for Kids that they can watch & play on YouTube at home
– Basic Vocabulary for Kids
– Phonics
Get a Good Microphone
This one should be a no-brainer. If you are making content that requires viewers to hear everything clearly in order to learn, then you absolutely need a good microphone. People will stop watching your videos right away if your audio is not good enough quality. Personally, I recommend any mic from Blue Designs. My mic of choice is the “Blue Yeti” which you can find here on Amazon, or if you are in Vietnam you can find it on Lazada.
Choose a Proper Video Editing Program
Video editing is essential when putting your creations up on YouTube. You don’t need to have Hollywood quality special effects, but simple editing like inserting music, making title screens, and controlling the volume in your videos are all essential edits that make your videos easier and more enjoyable to watch. There are two programs that I highly recommend. My personal software of choice is Camtasia, and they even offer an education discount. Previously, I used Screenflow. I love both programs, but I find Camtasia to be easier to use, and it has more features that I use regularly.
Build it and They Will Come
One important lesson I learned early on is not to nitpick over my content. As long as you have chosen the right niche, you will be fine. Don’t try to copy everyone else. Don’t spend days wasting away trying to make the perfect outline for your video. The key is consistency. As long as you are plugging away at your videos with some regularity, and you are focused and motivated, the quality will improve over time. Build your channel, establish your niche, keep the videos coming at regular intervals, and everything else will fall into place eventually.
Use Royalty-Free Music
One of my favorite aspects of video editing and watching content on YouTube is the music. As a viewer, the music choice often makes or breaks it for me. As a creator, this is even more important. The right music can keep people watching your video long past the average time. The wrong music will keep people from coming back. Most importantly, if you just post popular music, your content will be flagged and you won’t be allowed to monetize it.
To solve this problem, I chose to subscribe to Artlist.io. While the price seems steep, once you are creating videos regularly, you will reply appreciate the diversity of genres and moods you can find there. My favorite part is you can even find tons of music without the lyrics, which is perfect for my ESL videos. If you want try out try it before you buy it, send me an email and I will hook you up a la carte style so you don’t have to make a big investment up front until you are sure you love it. An honorable mention in this category goes to Epidemic Sound which also includes sound effects for your videos.
Create Your Videos for Maximum Replay Value
Like any good list, I’ve saved the best recommendation for last. When you make YouTube videos, the name of the game is subs & views. What better way to get more views than to make content that people want to watch over and over again? I specialize in phonics videos, and I even have my students watch them for homework. I originally posted my content on YouTube simply because it offered free storage and a simple way to share it with my students. However, once I discovered how popular Jolly Phonics is around the world, it only made sense to make quality phonics content that teachers and students everywhere would find great value in and use again and again. As of this post, my top 5 videos have 283,000 views (an average of 56k views a piece), with my top video coming in at 117k views.
Okay, but How Do I Make Money?
Once you have 1,000 subscribers and 4,000 hours viewed in the last 12 months you can become a member of the YouTube Paid Partner Program. I have no idea how the algorithm works, but I can say with certainty that it does. I have been making videos for the last 2 years, but have only really looked into making money on YouTube for the last 6-months or so. I did not know anyone personally who made money from YouTube unless they had invested thousands of dollars into equipment and production. So I set out to see if it was possible to make any money as a regular guy. I spent $120 on my mic, $120 on my editing software, and then got to work. For the first 2 months I put a lot of time into making videos that had maximum replay value. Then life got in the way and I couldn’t make content regularly. Even with these issues, I still bring in $40–50 per month right now without even making any new content over the last 2 months. While I would like to be more consistent, I’m sharing this with you just to show you that it really is possible.
Seeing is Believing
If you would like to have a look at what I have done to make nearly $50 per month on YouTube with very little investment overall, please head on over to my channel at Wordplay English Language Center
If you have any questions about the process, or you would like to discuss it further, please leave a comment below and I will do my best to point you in the right direction.
Thank you for reading, and following along!
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Teacher Keith
