Research proposal on YouTubing as a full-time job in Bangladesh

Course Code: MSJ11102

Introduction

Uploading videos of someone or something to the video-sharing website YouTube and earning money on that platform is called YouTubing. Hundreds of YouTubers earn millions of dollars, from making quirky video game walkthroughs to instructional videos to personal vlogs. YouTube has partnered with the “Google AdSense Program” to split the profits. The site keeps 45% of a video’s revenue, says Business Insider (Ellena Kilgallon,2017).

However, when it comes to YouTubing in Bangladesh, this is a relatively new concept. Nowadays, we can see many rising YouTube stars in Bangladesh. Among them, a few notable ones are – Salman Muqtadir, Lamia Linda, Basma Liakat khan, Raba Khan, Ridy Sheikh, and a few more. However, the question is if it is possible to make YouTubing a full-time job for the mass people in Bangladesh.

Significance

In Bangladesh, the latest survey by the government has found 26 lakh unemployed people in the country (The Daily Star, 2017). If it is possible to earn through YouTube, people in Bangladesh can earn money by uploading videos like instructional, DIY, tutorials, Vlogs, etc., just from their homes. In this way, the problem of unemployment can be removed significantly.

Besides, if Bangladesh can build a strong YouTuber community, there will also be scope for earning vast amounts of foreign currencies. International brands are always looking for influencers on YouTube across the globe, but usually, they target countries where there is a pretty strong YouTube community & huge audience. Once they find their targeted country, they invest a considerable amount of foreign currency in promoting their products and services through YouTube Influencers. Moreover, if this can be done in Bangladesh, it can be a huge source of earning foreign currencies.

On YouTube, a person is free to upload any video of his/her interest, and a person has the independence to show their creativity and conduct their business in their way. For example, beauty influencer Lamia Moktar Linda was fascinated by makeup and was a complete makeup hoarder. Even though she loves doing makeup, her hobby has been collecting it, and the apparent by-product was the immense knowledge she has acquired about makeup products, range, and quality. Encouraged by her family, she stepped into the world of beauty blogging. Soon she realized that her followers would benefit more if they saw the beauty product in action. This led her to upload “YouTube” tutorials where she shares new makeup looks and reviews products (The Daily Star,2018). Here we can see how Linda turned her “hobby” into a “career” and how she can continuously show her creativity in her platform and earn money through it.

Literature review

This part will review and analyze the existing pieces of literature related to the subject matter. This literature review will discuss YouTubing in general, how international YouTubers take this as a full-time job, and the revenue they get paid for it. As stated before, there needs to be more research that is being conducted on YouTubing in Bangladesh, which is why an analysis of news articles and interviews of YouTubers will be done in comparison with the international scenario.

YouTubing as a full-time job: If you click on a video to watch and an ad plays before it, the video’s creator is making money. After YouTubers submit videos for monetization, the ad’s company pays YouTube for the placement, and YouTube pays the creator. The more people who watch the video with the ad, the more a creator makes. Because YouTube has partnered with Google’s AdSense program to split the profits, the site keeps 45 percent of a video’s ad revenue, says Business Insider.

Nevertheless, video monetization is one of many ways creators can make money. Companies and corporations can also pay creators to advertise their products. Creators are required by law to say that a video is an ad for a product in the description. Although they are commercials, unboxing, product placement, and “trying a new product” videos are very popular. If a creator is big enough for companies to reach out to them, accepting their products is another way YouTubers can make money off their videos (Ellena Kilgallon,2017).

There are plenty of reasons YouTube has become the platform of choice for many would-be Internet entrepreneurs—not only is it free and has a lovably DIY heritage of people sharing everything from their hobbies and daily experiences to videos of their beloved cats (Baghdig Balyan,2014).

Journey of some successful YouTubers across the globe: In recent times, there have been hundreds of thousands of Channels on YouTube. However, let us look at the journey of a few most successful ones on YouTube who actually took YouTubing to another level.

"Within a month, I gained 3,000 subscribers, and I thought, 'Wow, this is incredible,'" said Jeffrey Chang, a video creator from Montreal's South Shore. "And then AdSense [a targeted advertising program developed by Google] came along [and] I got my first paycheck on YouTube."

Jake Roper is well known for his video game-related content on the YouTube channel Vsauce3 and has over 2 million subscribers. He turned his YouTube channel into a full-time career after it launched in September 2012. "Making money on ad revenue is not the most lucrative thing in the world," Roper said. "So you do need many views or large audiences to be able to sustain that." Roper added that while it is possible to "make a living" off YouTube, a substantial amount of work is necessary.

"Many people have told me that I inspire them to go natural and go to college — both things that they thought they would never be able to do," Wellman said. "Do not get so stuck on the YouTube numbers. ... Realize that being on a social media platform can be much larger than that." Wellman agreed, adding: "Be consistent, and the money will roll in." (Lexie Carmon,2017).

After analyzing the stories behind the success of most YouTubers, the key to being a successful YouTuber is to be consistent. Besides, google AdSense is not the only source of income. Paid partnerships and sponsorships are a few significant sources of income when it comes to YouTubing.

YouTubing in Bangladesh: For online earning, creating a YouTube channel is a trendy way to earn money. Many online workers in Bangladesh are working on YouTube to promote their online business through their YouTube channels. Some of the categories of YouTube channels like entertainment, education, channel, comedy, tutorial, etc.

Here is a list of 10 Bangladeshi YouTuber channels:

Ø SalmoN TheBrownFish: SalmoN TheBrownFish is one of the most popular channels. He uploads videos of our culture creatively. When you watch his videos, you will certainly laugh. As per some of the considerations, we call him Bangladeshi first YouTuber. With all consideration, we have ranked this channel as the number 1 Top Ten YouTube channel.

Ø TheCrazyBangladeshi: TheCrazyBangladeshiAli, Jawad Akash, is one of Bangladesh's famous funny video posters. From his video, you can realize that Bengalis do much crazy stuff, indeed. This YouTube channel is very popular and has gained an incredible amount of 37,181 subscribers and 1,870,402 views; joined on May 28, 2014.

Ø ALightSwitch: ALightSwitch, Ahnaf Arefin, is another name of a popular YouTube guy. He is a comical character in the YouTube channel as well it is a travel blog. Now, this channel has 6,672 subscribers and 536,766 views; joined on April 21, 2012. Day by day, they are increasing their number of subscribers.

Ø Naziba Naushin: This channel is run by her tutorial about makeup and fashion. Her channel has 1,730 subscribers and 82,564 views; joined on June 12, 2013. Every day this channel is increasing their subscriber and views.

Ø Gaan Friendz: This channel is mainly about music. Tamim Mridha & Shouvik Ahmed decided to create a YouTube channel that is fun and music-related. It already has 248,826 subscribers and 15,906,387 views. These musically related channels promote their subscribers daily with their friends and fan.

Ø Mango Squad: This is another fast-growing YouTube channel in Bangladesh. More than 1,60,000 subscribers and 7,066,792 views. Every day this channel is growing its subscriber views and watch time.

Ø BhaiBrothers LTD: BhaiBrothers LTD, this channel is now popular in Bangladesh for its entertaining videos. It has uploaded 100 videos, subscribers 290,918, and video views 32,402,625. It started its journey on March 3rd, 2014.

Ø Prank King Entertainment: It is a Social Awareness Prank & Funny Video channel and a Production house by some young Bangladeshi talents. The channel has 282,883 subscribers and 38,309,799 views; joined on August 27th, 2013.

Ø BongoBD: BongoBD is another fast-growing film-related YouTube channel in Bangladesh. They Uploaded more than 708 videos with 273,264 subscribers and 137,360,778 channel views; joined on August 25th, 2014.

Journey of some successful YouTubers in Bangladesh: Nowadays, in Bangladesh, there are many teenage influencers who started their journey through YouTube. Among them, one of the most renowned and youngest ones is Raba Khan. Still a teenager, currently studying O levels, Raba Khan burst into the comedic internet scene of Bangladesh with a YouTube channel named "The Jhakanaka Project" back in 2014, where she and her brother Fahad Reaz Khan posted videos portraying mainstream situations/conversations of typical Bangladeshis in a more comedic and satirical manner. Since then, their channel has had over 1.3 million views. At such a young age, she is already the host of two regular shows on Radio Foorti (The Daily Star,2018).

Another notable young star is Lamia Moktar Linda from "Makeup Maniac by Linda." She says one of her main reasons for starting beauty blogging was that "I realized that there was a lack of knowledge regarding what kind of makeup suits our Bangladeshi skin tone, so my initial aim was to spread that knowledge regarding these issues." Linda is affiliated with brands like Ofra and Sigma and does many beauty product endorsements, product reviews, and makeup tutorials. One of her most significant achievements, and a mark of her popularity, is that she crossed 1,00,000 subscribers on YouTube, a first for a Bangladeshi female beauty vlogger residing in the country. She will receive YouTube's silver play button and have her channel verified (The Daily Star,2018).

Beauty influencer Mim Sabrin, also a self-taught makeup artist, mastered her skills from makeover tutorials on YouTube and from experimenting with different styles on herself. Being a makeup enthusiast, she was a member of many Facebook groups focusing on makeup. Whenever she experimented with a new look, she posted pictures of herself on various pages. The positive feedback she got encouraged her to start her own Facebook page as a beauty vlogger. By popular demand, she expanded onto YouTube and Instagram (The Daily Star, 2018).

Singer, Xefer started as a YouTube cover artist with no plans of entering the industry. However, people loved and appreciated her videos so much that they became viral, and almost everybody shared them on Facebook, helping her catch the attention of many musicians and composers of the country (The Daily Star, 2017).

Salman Muqtadir is a popular name amongst Bangladeshi youth living all over the world, mainly because of the witty and trendy stories that he showcases online. Tagged as a YouTuber, a public speaker, an actor, and a youth icon (The Daily Star,2016).

Talent Hunt "Next Tuber": In order to build a strong YouTube community in Bangladesh, back in 2017, Banglalink Telecommunications company arranged a competition called "Next Tuber" in partnership with google and YouTube to inspire new content creators in Bangladesh and give them a new platform to work on. According to a press release, the competition is a 'digital reality show' hunting for talent in video content - a first of its kind in Bangladesh.

From the selection process, grooming and competition, a winner will emerge with the opportunity to become Banglalink's Digital Media Ambassador, train at the Google Singapore HQ, and receive prize money. The first and second runners-up will also receive a cash prize, and the top three will also get the opportunity to produce exclusive content for Banglalink's digital services. The main judges of the competition are famous local YouTube content creators Salman Muqtadir, Raba Khan, Shouvik Ahmed, Asif Bin Azad, and Tamim Mridha. Singer Elita Karim and director Adnan Al Rajeev will also be guest judges and groomers. The competition will go on for two months.

Nasif and Rafid were selected as winners based on the judges' decisions and audience likes. Rasel Topu, an entertainment video content maker, and Sadman Sadiq, an educative video content maker, took the second and third positions, respectively. Winners received 1.5 lakhs BDT in cash along with a scope for training at Google's Asia-Pacific HQ and the opportunity to be the digital ambassador of Banglalink. Salman Muktadir, Shouvik Ahmed, Tamim Mridha, and Asif Bin Azad -- four popular YouTubers in the country -- were the show's judges (The Daily Star,2017).

Research Questions

• Why should one take YouTubing as a job?

• What are the prospects of YouTubing as a job in Bangladesh?

• What are the challenges that a Bangladeshi YouTuber might have to face?

Research Methodology

Keeping in mind the few main research objectives, a combination of qualitative research and content analysis has been applied to this research. As YouTubing is a relatively new concept in Bangladesh, only a little research has been done before, which shows the actual amount of paid revenue to the YouTubers of Bangladesh. That is why firstly, the content analysis shall be done by going through a few international articles, news, and statistics. Afterward, the qualitative research should be applied according to the context of Bangladesh. In-depth interviews should be done with the top Bangladeshi YouTubers. YouTubers in Bangladesh whose subscribers are 10,000 and above from different categories will be selected. For example, Comedian YouTubers- Salman Muqtadir and Raba Khan; Beauty Influencers- Lamia Moktar Linda, Nabela Noor, and Shahnaj Shimul; Singers- Xefer Rahman, and Tasnuva Ashraf Umama, Motivation Speaker- Ayman Sadiq.

The timeline of the research activities is given below:

As the research is conducted by the researcher for academic purposes, it should be done within a certain period. Furthermore, the researcher will get around six months to conduct the fundamental research starting from January 2019 to June 2019. The following chart shows the division of activities throughout this expansion of time.

Budget

For conducting this research, the central part is interviewing at least five top YouTubers in Bangladesh. Moreover, for the interview, a minimum amount of honorarium should be given to the guest, usually 3000tk. This means 3000*5= 15,000 BDT in total for the responders.

The researcher will also require the travel conveyance expense to take the interviews with the entire team, which will take 10,000 BDT in total for five interviews.

Moreover, lastly, 5000 BDT while analyzing and gathering the researchers' data and information to complete the entire research.

TOTAL: 15000+10000+5000=30,000 BDT

Conclusion and Recommendations

YouTube is one of the fastest-growing social media platforms at the current age, with a wide variety of audiences. Furthermore, hundreds of thousands of YouTubers currently create and upload content on YouTube and pursue YouTubing as their full-time job. Previous researches reveal that although this is a new concept in Bangladesh, there are many teenagers and youngsters who took this new concept as their way of pursuing their dreams. The current research will help reveal how it is possible to make YouTubing a full-time job for the mass people in Bangladesh.