RayWJ Makes $1 Million a Year From Youtube Videos
RayWJ, the most subscribed to person on Youtube, is reportedly making more than $1 million a year from his video channel.
The Wall Street Journal reports that RayWJ, or Ray William Johnson, brings in close to 10 million people to his channel every week. More than 5 million people subscribe to RayWJ’s channel and his videos have been viewed a total of 1,572,663,024 times.
David Cohen, the global digital officer of Universal McCann, said:
“Look at some of these major YouTube stars, [who] aggregate two, three, four million views of their content. That rivals second- and third-tier cable networks. This is a microcosm of what’s going on in the overall media landscape. We’re moving from a scaled mass media to more hyper-local, niche media.”
The WSJ estimates that RayWJ is making more than $1 million per year from his Youtube videos. RayWJ makes part of his money through Youtube’s Partner Program, which gives popular users a slice of advertising money, and the rest through merchandise sales.
Johnson denies that he’s making millions, however, saying that his Youtube channel is just a hobby.
“Maybe someday, if I work hard enough, entertainment will be a career for me, but right now making videos and uploading them to the Internet is just a hobby…. I run advertisements and sell T-shirts to cover overhead costs and pay the few people who help me out behind the scenes… Anything left over is spent on production costs, animation costs, etc.”
Several Youtube stars have signed non-disclosure agreements so getting an exact salary is difficult. But people familiar with Google’s business practices say that Youtube Partners make $3,000 to $9,000 for every two million views. RayWJ’s videos have been seen more than 1.5 billion times.
So what exactly makes RayWJ so popular? Johnson basically takes popular Youtube videos and then adds his own raunchy commentary. Here’s his most popular video. (NSFW Language)
Do you think RayWJ makes more than $1 million from Youtube every year?
