What separates the YouTube automation channels that generate tens of thousands of dollars in profits each month from the failed channels that make next to nothing? Choosing the right niche! If you’re thinking about starting a YouTube automation channel, you’re probably wondering which niche you should choose to make the big bucks for years to come. Just like with starting a local lead generation business, choosing the right niche is the foundation for a successful YouTube automation channel. In the following article, we look at how to find a YouTube automation niche with long-term profit potential, the 11 best YouTube automation niches to generate long-term profits, and a simple tip for dramatically increasing the profits of your YouTube automation channel!
How to find a YouTube automation niche with long-term profit potential?
If you want to create a YouTube automation channel that is both profitable and offers the potential for long-term cash flow, you’ll want to choose a niche with the right variables. You can target niches with low competition and you can research your intended niche by checking the performance of channels that create similar content. For example, if you want to start a YouTube automation channel around the best attractions in the United States, you can look for similar channels by typing “best attractions USA” into the YouTube search bar. When analyzing the potential of a niche, make sure it checks these boxes:
YouTube ad revenue and CPM
The primary way YouTube automation channels make money is through Google AdSense from the YouTube Partner Program. With AdSense, advertisers spend money to display their ads on your content. The amount of money that advertisers are willing to spend, and therefore the amount of money you could potentially make, depends on the content of your videos and the audience you attract.
On YouTube, the standard metric for determining the profitability of a channel is called the CPM, or Cost Per Mille. The CPM is the cost per 1,000 ad impressions on a channel and it varies greatly between channels and countries. According to HubSpot, the average CPM for US channels is just $0.38, while in Spain it's $4.38. Although it's impossible to see the exact CPM of a channel you don't own, you can often find the CPMs of other channels posted online with a little research.
Note: Many new YouTubers wonder if views from YouTube Premium members negatively affect their revenue potential because YouTube Premium members don't see ads. The answer is that they do not. YouTube shares 55% of the YouTube Premium membership fee with creators as a replacement for the lost ad revenue, so you still make money from Premium viewers. .
If you're struggling to find some profitable YouTube niches, here are 11 of the best YouTube automation niches with long-term profit potential to increase your YouTube automation salary!
1. Health and fitness
Everybody has different needs and goals in regard to their health, so there are many routes you can go with your channel when creating content for the health and fitness niche. Two popular micro niches are "how to gain muscle" and "how to lose weight" as most people will try to do at least one of these in their lives. This niche is one of the most saturated on YouTube, so it’s best to find a unique micro niche to create content around, such as building muscle for college-aged men. Body Hub is a great example of a successful YouTube automation channel in the health and fitness niche.
2. Technology
Technology makes our lives easier and more enjoyable (usually), which is why so many people are enthralled with the latest gizmos and gadgets. If you create your YouTube channel for the technology niche, you can expect one of the highest CPMs around because technology products are expensive, so advertisers are willing to pay big for space on your YouTube video. AppFind is a faceless YouTube channel with around a half million subscriber count that puts out videos over the latest features and apps for IPhone and Android products. It’s a great example of a successful channel in the technology niche.
3. How to make money online
Everyone wants to make money online these days. According to YouTube business and automated income expert Greg Preece, the making money online YouTube niche probably has the highest CPM of any. In fact, on one video he made to review web hosting service, Hostinger, his CPM was a mindboggling $292.25! However, unlike starting a local lead generation business, creating content for the making money online YouTube niche is extremely competitive.
Even so, if you have the patience to consistently put out great content for a few years, you can establish one of those highly sought after cash cow channels that makes buckets of money, like TedGetsBread. The best performing of these kinds of channels are not faceless YouTube channels, though, like most full-fledged automation channel usually are, so you'll probably want to show your face too. However, you could hire a paid actor to deliver the content if that's an issue.
4. Travel
According to a study by GOBankingRates, despite high inflation and lingering Covid issues, most Americans are spending between $1,001 and $2,000 on a typical vacation. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that travel booking company, Expedia, is one of the biggest ad spenders on YouTube. If you love travel and want to turn your passion into a moneymaking project, you can be like MojoTravels and create a travel inspired automation channel.
5. Software tutorials
Software tutorial videos like the ones Skills Factory puts out are another YouTube channel idea for those with a knack for operating software, or at least finding the right people who are. New software is constantly coming onto the market and current software regularly receives updates, allowing for potentially limitless content. Furthermore, software isn’t cheap, and many are even packaged as a recurring subscription, making it especially lucrative for advertisers and the channels that provide valuable traffic.
6. Business and luxury
It's in most humans' nature to want nice things. A luxurious lifestyle goes hand in hand with success in business, which is why channels like Alux have become so popular. Videos in the business and luxury niche capture YouTube users' attention and rack up watch time by showing things that only the wealthy can afford and then providing lifestyle and business tips to get those things, too.
7. Personal finance
Personal finance is a YouTube niche idea with massive potential financial benefits for both the audience learning how to grow their money and for the creator of the channel. However, most of the ultra-successful channels in this niche, like Graham Stephen, do not make faceless videos. Taking personal finance advice from an actual person just resonates better with people. Therefore, if you want to fully automate a channel in this niche, you’ll most likely have to find someone to appear in the videos for you, or at least heavily incorporate the facts, statements, and experiences of successful people in your videos to establish authority.
Personal finance is an industry that deals with money and will always be relevant, so an established channel in this niche is poised for long-term profits. As proof of the profit potential, just look at this screenshot of personal finance YouTube influencer Andrei Jikh's channel with a very solid playback-based CPM of $26.30!
8. Interesting facts
Creating video content around interesting facts won’t get you the absolutely highest payout from YouTube AdSense, but it is an easy niche to automate because it doesn’t require a high level of knowledge in any specific area. Just look at Trend Max, for example. The channel creates animation videos around attention grabbing topics like “The biggest cats in the world”, or “Top 10 most dangerous dinosaurs” and gets tens of millions of views on each. As long as the content your channel puts out is high quality and someone on your team has solid YouTube SEO skills, you can create a channel with high watch time and many unique topics to cover.
9. Cars and other vehicles
Cars and other vehicles can be a very profitable niche for a YouTube content creator. Ad revenue on these types of channels can be huge because most vehicles are high-ticket items that advertisers can spend considerable amounts of money on trying to convert sales. Plus, new car models come out yearly so the channel topic is evergreen. Thansis1997 is an example of a successful channel in this niche, boasting well over 1 million subscribers.
10. Happiness
Another channel idea that’s easy enough to automate and can generate a decent cash flow through the YouTube Partner Program by sheer audience volume alone is happiness-related content. Most would agree happiness is the ultimate goal of life, and so happiness-related content can attract a large crowd. Einzelganger is a great example of a YouTube automation channel creating content around philosophy and happiness. Although this niche won’t provide the highest payout on your channel views because there isn’t tons of money involved in the niche's products, it can allow you to generate a sizeable cash flow from the large number of viewers.
11. Cryptocurrency
Given its status as a relatively new phenomenon, the cryptocurrency niche may struggle to check the box of having other channels with five years of success on YouTube. Nevertheless, cryptocurrency and Bitcoin have been steadily gaining popularity for over a decade and many believe the industry has a bright future despite recent setbacks. Besides creating content around blockchain in general and the intricacies of cryptocurrency itself, there are thousands of potential crypto projects a YouTube creator can create content around, like Ethereum and Polygon.
There are cryptocurrency booms, like when Bitcoin nearly reached $69,000 in November 2021, and there are cryptocurrency winters, like right now when the cryptocurrency prices are crashing and crypto exchanges are going bankrupt. However, publishing content now when there is minimal interest and competition in cryptocurrency content for YouTube could pay off big time when the next crypto boom happens since you’ll already have a solid backlog of content like Crypto Whiteboard is doing.
Pro tip for making even MORE money with your YouTube automation channel
Relying on YouTube ads revenue alone can be very profitable. However, you can substantially extend the profit potential of your YouTube automation channel by incorporating affiliate marketing along with AdSense into your monetization strategy. You can do this by joining an affiliate program with relevant offers in your niche, using part of your video content to mention the benefits of the offer to the viewer, and then directing them towards your YouTube video description where you paste the affiliate link for them to click on so you are awarded for the sale. Affiliate marketing is an easy way to provide a substantial boost to a YouTube automation business.
Conclusion
Although YouTube automation can take considerable resources and effort to get started, with consistency, you can create a cash cow channel in any of the above niches. If you’re ready, head over to the YouTube studio and start working on your first video idea! However, if YouTube automation doesn’t quite sound like a fit for you, there are many other opportunities in digital marketing, like a social media agency.
I personally much prefer local lead generation because you can start making passive income much faster. Whereas YouTube automation usually takes at least a few years to generate passive income, local lead generation can take as little as a few months. Whether you decide to start a YouTube automation channel in one of the 11 best niches above or go with another online business model, it’s essential to set goals and be consistent in your efforts towards reaching those goals if you want to create a successful online business.
