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Facebook and YouTube streaming earnings: Myths and reality

Rassiq Aziz Kabir | Saturday, 3 December 2022


With the advent of technology, more and more people are getting involved in live-streaming on both Facebook and YouTube to earn money. As these sites have a ubiquitous presence, earning money from them has become a viable option for many people, especially those from a young generation. 

However, there are a lot of misconceptions regarding these, which often put people in a precarious position as they get involved without much prior knowledge. 

Many people think streaming is an easy way to earn a lot of money, but in reality, it is not that easy and involves quite a few steps. Even then, one must go forward in a calculated way to achieve optimum success.

The parent company of Facebook, Meta, has a well-defined monetisation guideline, and the contents have to pass the monetisation eligibility standards, which are quite succinctly put as well. Facebook generally pays using the CPM (cost per 1000 impressions) method. 

The CPM depends on the users' location; North American users can earn as much as USD 20 to USD 50 for every 10,000 views, whereas the CPM in Bangladesh is significantly lower. 

The average CPM for Bangladesh is USD 6.65, and the privacy guidelines are also quite different when compared to North America. Hence, earning a lot of money through Facebook live-streaming in Bangladesh is an arduous task, and its success depends on many factors.

YouTube, being solely a video-sharing platform, also allows monetisation in live streaming by enabling ads and using Super Chat. The content creators of YouTube live streaming get paid on a cost-per-click or cost-per-view basis, where the creators get to keep 55 per cent of the earnings. 

One of the common fees per view is 18 cents, which is applicable only if the ad is at least played for more than half of the total time up to which it is supposed to be played.

The constraints come with the limits of the commercials and the material of the contents. And quite similar to that of Facebook, the CPM and the CPC advertisement rates of YouTube vary from country to country, with live-streaming views from North America being the most profitable. 

YouTube cuts almost 45 per cent from the creators' earnings, and for Bangladesh, for 10,000 views, about USD 20 can be earned by the streamers. Hence, growing big as a live-streamer in Bangladesh is also challenging.

The popular myths about live-streaming tend to infatuate the country's young generation, who collectively think of it as an easy way of earning quick bucks by playing some popular games. 

However, the situation is quite grim, which has a lot to do with the geographic location of Bangladesh, and one has to think carefully before pursuing this as a career option.

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