YouTube Influencer Marketing: Approximate Costs of Partnership with YouTubers

In 2024, YouTube remains the main platform for publishing video content. TikTok is indeed catching up, but there is still a huge gap in numbers. In the coming years, YouTube is unlikely to be replaced by another project.

In our article, we will explore costs of YouTube influencer marketing. We will also discuss popular formats, current prices, and the peculiarities of choosing bloggers to partner with. If you have been wanting to test sponsorships, product placements and other methods of YouTube influencer marketing, our material will be useful to you.

Approximate Costs for YouTube Influencer Marketing

Unfortunately, YouTube channel analytics do not reveal the actual earnings per video for influencers. Therefore, the only source of information is from analytical studies.

But, according to IZEA, the average cost of sponsored content on YouTube in 2022 was $2,102. However, Twitch streamers earn twice as much.

More statistics can be found in the public domain, but often there is no information about rates of YouTube influencer marketing. Nevertheless, they are more organized in this regard, creating websites, providing links to price lists, and giving examples of posts.

According to this data, channels with an audience of 7 million subscribers or more can expect to earn $30,000 from a single video. However, there is no proof, but the numbers are quite impressive.

YouTube is a great place to earn money for people around the world. Become part of this community and learn how YouTube shorts monetization works.

PewDiePie

This blogger has been called the most famous YouTuber on the planet multiple times. As of September 2023, he has 111 million subscribers. Major global brands are among his advertisers which is top-notch thing in the aspect of YouTube sponsorships history.

PewDiePie’s statistics are impressive, but there is almost no information available about the cost of his partnerships. Some say that he earns about $150,000 per week from embedded monetization alone, and the cost of paid promotions starts from $125,000.

Thanks to his popularity, PewDiePie has made YouTube his main source of income and can reject any advertisers he doesn’t like without affecting his income.

Dude Perfect

This creative group regularly publishes videos featuring extreme stunts that receives tens of millions of views. The total number of views has exceeded 16 billion.

According to media reports, these guys earned about $25 million in 2023. Currently, they have more than 60 million subscribers on their channel, and videos are released less frequently, every 14 days.

Dude Perfect is sponsored by Nike, BMW, Walmart, Gillette, and dozens of other well-known companies. It can be assumed that a single video with a commercial costs advertisers between $100,000 and $150,000.

Markiplier

This YouTuber gained fame for his gameplay videos on YouTube. He has 36,7 million subscribers, and each video typically receives 4 million views on average.

According to media reports, Mark earns around $20 million annually through his channel. It can be assumed that, on average, a commercial costs advertisers around $100,000.

Most popular bloggers earn hundreds of thousands of dollars each month, but it is extremely difficult to build an audience of even 2-3 million subscribers, let alone 10-15 million. New influencers face challenges, so it cannot be considered an easy niche to enter.

What About Smaller Influencers?

Mega-influencers like PewDiePie indeed attract a lot of attention but the thing is that their prices are often out of reach for most affiliates and even companies. The good news is that you can achieve excellent results by partnering with a lot smaller influencers who have more targeted audiences and often higher engagement rates.

Take a look at these approximate costs of partnering with YouTubers based on subscriber size:

• Nano-influencers (10,000-50,000 subscribers): $20 – $200 per video
• Micro-influencers (50,000-100,000 subscribers): $200 – $5,000 per video
• Mid-tier influencers (100,000-500,000 subscribers): $125 – $1,200 per video

But keep in mind that these are just estimates. The actual cost will depend on various factors like the influencer’s niche, engagement rate, content type, complexity of your campaign, and even this person’s mood.

Finding Your Perfect Partner

As we have already mentioned, most bloggers achieve fantastic results by partnering with smaller, more targeted influencers. But finding the right fit can be a challenge, and you can solve it by looking through special marketing platforms. That’s why we listed the following platforms and agencies for you:

Popular influencer marketing platforms:

• Upfluence: A user-friendly platform with a large influencer database;
• CreatorIQ: An advanced analytics and reporting tools;
• HypeAuditor: Focuses on influencer authenticity and engagement;
• Takumi: A platform for finding micro and nano-influencers.

Influencer marketing agencies:

For a more hands-on approach, influencer marketing agencies can handle the entire influencer selection and campaign management process:

• The Influencer Marketing Factory: Offers comprehensive campaign management and data-driven strategies;
• Carmichael Lynch Relate: Specializes in influencer marketing for businesses and tech brands;
• Socialyte: Focuses on building long-term partnerships with influencers;
• Obviously: Known for their creative influencer marketing campaigns.

What are the benefits of using agencies?

• Expertise and efficiency: Agencies can save you time and resources by using their knowledge of the influencer marketing landscape.
• Relationship building: They can handle influencer negotiations and maintain positive relationships for future collaborations.
• Campaign optimization: Their experience allows for campaign optimization and maximizing your ROI.

How is pricing determined for YouTubers’ sponsorships?

Prices of advertising with YouTube bloggers depends on these factors:

1. Audience size: Many advertisers prioritize the size of the audience. However, this factor is not always the deciding factor. A million subscribers might seem impressive, but if they’re not relevant to your brand, the impact will be minimal.
2. Audience profile: Advertising for cryptocurrency bloggers costs much more than for those who create game reviews. Advertising is effective only if the influencer’s audience includes potential customers for the brand.
3. Content type: Vloggers can easily integrate products into their videos within a short time. However, if an author releases only one video per month and invests a lot of money in editing, the cost of advertising will be much higher.
4. Audience engagement: Look for influencers with high engagement metrics like comments, likes, and shares. A smaller audience with a more engaged following can be more valuable than a larger, less engaged one. High engagement suggests viewers actively connect with the influencer’s content, making their recommendations more trustworthy.
5. Product characteristics: Advertising for a clothing store will not cost the same as for an online casino.

But don’t just focus solely on views count. Likes, comments, shares, and other engagement metrics are key to measuring real audience interest and campaign success. These show viewers are actively connecting with the influencer, making their promotion more impactful.

In some cases, opinion leaders set prices several times higher than the market rate. Advertisers themselves decide whether the high figures are justified or if they should look for alternatives. This market is highly heterogeneous and constantly changing.

Being a blogger is not as easy as it may seem. To keep up with the competition, bloggers need to constantly think about how to attract traffic. In our article, we collected information about which tactics will lead to a visible increase in activity.

Any statistics can become outdated when considering specific segments. For example, advertising placements with one crypto blogger may cost $10,000, while with another, it may be $5,000, despite the minimal difference in audience size.

It is also worth noting that if you approach an agency for advertising, the cost of commercial will generally be higher compared to direct interaction with the opinion leader.

Potential advertisers should be prepared for difficulties. Although the YouTube influencer marketing has existed for many years, some influencers still have not learned to effectively manage the creation and placement of ads.

Costliness vs. effectiveness: How to avoid wasting your advertising budget

The strategy for YouTube influencer marketing should be tailored to each specific case. You can spend thousands of dollars and get no significant results, or conversely, achieve several times the return on a small advertising investment.

For example, an ad made by a famous blogger may not necessarily generate hundreds or thousands of leads. It all depends on effective media planning and the blogger’s performance. If the opinion leader does not understand the product’s specifics, they may promote it lazily, resulting in little impact.

Preparing a successful advertising campaign requires investing many hours and carefully considering all the nuances. Only with this approach can one expect tangible results in the future.

To avoid wasting the advertising budget, consider these rules:

1. Don’t rush to spend money: First, understand how interested the opinion leader is in collaboration.
2. Don’t chase numbers: Small companies don’t need to spend millions on a post from an account with tens of millions of subscribers.
3. Pay attention to local opinion leaders: For example, there are food bloggers with an audience of 30,000 to 50,000 subscribers and highly engaged audiences.
4. Conduct tests: Start with inexpensive pre-roll ads and assess their effectiveness.
5. Find backup options: Bloggers often ignore requests or break agreements.

Some influencers are open to collaboration based on KPI payment. Set realistic goals within specific metrics and pay only for actual results. Don’t to focus on views alone but prioritize leads, app installations, and other effective forms of CPAs.

Remember that product placements and sponsorships are one of the main sources of income for bloggers. Don’t make it easy for them; strive to ensure that every dollar spent brings a return on investment.

How to choose the right blogger

The key to effective work with bloggers is to have the right approach when searching for influencers. If mistakes occur from the very beginning, the campaign may turn out to be a failure.

For example, when promoting a travel service, it doesn’t really make sense to seek recommendations from those who gamble and post related content. It’s better to pay for a video from a travel blogger who can create a high-quality review that will garner many views.

Each advertiser has their own method of finding bloggers for advertising, but the most important thing is not to skimp on thoroughly checking their profile. The internet is full of analytical services that greatly simplify this process.

With the help of various analyzers, you can find ideas for videos, gather keywords for descriptions, and even estimate the potential profit for the creator through embedded monetization.

When selecting bloggers, give special attention to analyze the audience’s activity. If there are hardly any comments, but the number of likes and views is excessively high, suspicions of artificial inflation should arise.

The golden rule for all newcomers in the paid advertising market on YouTube is not to chase numbers. It’s better to generate a lot of leads with 10,000 views than to reach 1 million users with zero results.

It’s also worth paying attention to influencers who create videos for YouTube Shorts, as they tend to perform well in the Recommendations section. This format delivers good results.

Conclusion

YouTube remains one of the main platforms for video content publishing. While Telegram and TikTok is actively attracting audiences, it cannot fully replace the platform for watching videos.

YouTube influencer marketing is advantageous for brands in almost any niche. With careful planning of advertising campaigns, maximum profit can be extracted even with a relatively small budget.

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