YouTube is lowering the barrier to entry for its monetization program. The company is expanding its shopping affiliate program to U. S. -based creators who are part of the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) and have more than 20,000 subscribers. The Google-owned company said that the new eligibility criteria for the partner program will enable more creators to benefit from the platform.
To be eligible for monetization on YouTube, you must have 500 subscribers, 3 public uploads in the last 90 days, and either 3,000 watch hours in the past year or 3 million Shorts views in the last 90 days.
Creators who meet the new eligibility threshold can apply to join the YouTube Partner Program (YPP) and gain access to tipping tools like Super Thanks, Super Chat, and Super Stickers, subscription tools like channel memberships, and the ability to promote their own merchandise with YouTube Shopping.
The new requirement of uploading three videos per 90 days is intriguing, as some long-form content creators may not have enough material to produce multiple videos within that time frame, even if they have millions of views. YouTube is currently rolling out this new eligibility criterion in the U.S., the U.K., Canada, Taiwan, and South Korea, and plans to expand it to other countries where YPP is available.
The video-streaming company is also expanding its Shopping affiliate pilot to more creators in the U. S. Creators that are already in YPP and have more than 20,000 subscribers will be eligible to tag products in videos and Shorts and earn a commission.
YouTube introduced shopping-related features for Shorts to some U. S. -based creators last November. YouTube is set to discuss and give more details about its new programs at the VidCon conference next week. In March, YouTube had to change its rules against using profanities at the start of the video. The company introduced a policy in November to disqualify any video using profanity in the first 15 seconds — even if the video was an old upload. The company made the time limit to seven seconds under the new policy and allowed profanity in music.
The Google-owned company, YouTube, has been focused on introducing new monetization tools for Shorts creators. In February 2022, YouTube began sharing ad revenue on Shorts with creators. During its Q4 2022 earnings call, the company reported that Shorts had crossed 50 billion daily views. Last October, Meta reported that Reels had 140 billion daily views across Instagram and Facebook.
In March 2022, YouTube announced Creator Music, a tool that allows artists to earn money when their music is used in videos. The company also rolled out a new metric to track an artist’s reach across different formats, including Shorts.
