The YouTube Formula

9How Businesses Extend Their Reach and Drive Revenue

Everyone you want to reach can be found on YouTube, whether you're a mom‐and‐pop shop, brick‐and‐mortar business, or Fortune 100 company. If you think you can skip or skim this chapter because you're “not a business,” think again. Every channel that brings in any money from YouTube or wants to bring in any money from YouTube has to think of itself like a business.

One of my favorite examples of extending reach and driving revenue on YouTube comes from a quilting company in Small Town, USA. Jenny and Ron Doan own the Missouri Star Quilting Company, whose YouTube channel has almost 700,000 subscribers in mid‐2020. But in the early 1990s, before quilting was on their radar, the Doans were living in California, and they were down on their luck. One of their seven children had medical issues that required very expensive treatments. The medical bills crushed them. They were nearly bankrupt when they decided it was time to move somewhere more affordable where they could pinch pennies and get out of debt. They literally took out a map of the United States, closed their eyes, and pointed. Missouri was the winner.

So in 1995, the Doans moved to the Midwest to a little town called Hamilton, Missouri. Ron got a job at a newspaper working as a mechanic, but it was a long commute with extended hours and many nights away from home. Jenny found odd jobs to help make ends meet. Unfortunately, they lost retirement savings with the stock market ...