Maker Studios Offerred me a Contract

So, I'm a singer. Maker Studios reached out to me and offerred me a contract for my youtube videos. The correspondant that I'm talking to is trying to make it sound like they are going to help me out so much.. but I really don't see any benefit. Basically, the only thing that I would want from them is help building my channel, and gaining more subscribers. When I asked them how they would help me do that, they were soooo vague. The only positive thing I see coming from them is their help in facilitating collaborations with other people in their network... but even so, they made it clear that reaching out to bigger youtube people like Ray William Johnson would be really hard (basically impossible)

So the only thing I see out of a relationship with Maker Studios is them taking a huge chunk out of the little advertising money that I am making...?? Have i assessed this situation correctly? I shouldn't sign with them, right?

Doesn't seem logical to me... The benefit doesnt seem good enough to give them a huge portion of your advertising money.

FUCK MARKER! they Want only your milk go with Youtube Partnership!

yeah try to partner with youtube.

Dark Joker said:

yeah try to partner with youtube.

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Sounds good, thanks for your guys' help.

If you're not able to partner with YouTube directly, I'd say it is worth partnering with Maker because you'll receive the benefit of custom thumbnails, channel customization, and I do feel like youtube will rank your videos higher if you are a "partner". Maker has a deal where they only take 10%. That is not bad for those added benefits. Plus they may be able to get you a higher CPM which would more than make up for the 10%. They can do a little to help you with hooking up with similar artists but it will be with people around same number of subscribers you are at.

First, they claim to help but most networks are trash when it comes to that unless you hand them $$$ from your own pocket. They suck you in with your "dreams" and in reality laugh at how pathetic you were trying to make money with them. You do know these vultures wait for the right moment to slowly kill your caracass (your content) and move in to eat it. They kill it by making big promises and crushing them. How do I know? several friends and I have been through several partners and various things. Before I seriously got into quality content creation I got fucked hard several times. MakerStudios is a STD if you don't play your cards right. Always ask for the best CPM, ask about their CPM floor (top CPM they max out on giving you), and ask how they are going to actually help advertise you more than a day. If they don't give you a detailed plan upfront, fuck em.

The reason these networks were created is because large advertisers like Universal won't just take ads on YouTube without knowing the channel they are on has quality content and doesn't say promote mass drug use. These networks do quality checks and then YouTube can contact them to have them enter them into a certain part of their network. Say it's a beauty brand obviously they don't want ads to run on RayWJ so they will only run them on the channels that are relevant, but keep in mind this is only for top advertisers who pay a premium. The networks then of course want to increase their networks with good quality content to attract these huge advertisers that might pay a 25 CPM. This means of course that depending on the talent deal a talent could be making 50% on up on that 25 CPM, which is way more than what YouTube offers you otherwise.

Overall when signing a deal with any channel you should negotiate. The reason the network wont take you through how to grow at first is because your talking to a talent rep if you want more information you have to talk to other departments that can help you grow your channel and do cross collaborations. Talking to them just through email probably isn't the best thing, but the fact is with these network models you can make more money from premium advertisers. I'm not saying any one network is better than the other, but from my experience that's what I know and also never ever sign a contract more than 2 years.

Hey Everyone,

I'm an exec at Maker Studios.

I did an AMA on reddit (Can't link to it because I just created the account, sorry!) that answers some of your questions. Thanks to those of you who have applied to join us or have shown interest.

I would like to echo the sentiment on this thread. Whenever you are offered a contract from a network you should always make sure that they have a sufficient plan to help you. Check with the person reaching out and ask what specific things they have in mind for you. If what they offer sounds like a good fit, move forward. If the offer doesn't sound like something that can help you, tell them and see if they can change their plan or move on to someone else.

I will also mention that we have sales in place that affects every channel that joins. We get pretty sizable media buys that we spread out to every channel who fits that advertiser.

Additionally, we have dedicated people who work with you. If you are being recruited by TGS or Maker, that means you will be managed for as long as you are with Maker by a dedicated person.

I'd be happy to answer any additional questions here, through private messages, or on the reddit AMA which I check daily.

-David

Here is the AMA for those of you that want to read it!http://www.reddit.com/r/IAmA/comments/zpx04/by_request_i_know_a_thing_or_two_about_making/

I would take it.

h1myname1sdav1d said:

Hey Everyone,

I'm an exec at Maker Studios.

I did an AMA on reddit (Can't link to it because I just created the account, sorry!) that answers some of your questions. Thanks to those of you who have applied to join us or have shown interest.

I would like to echo the sentiment on this thread. Whenever you are offered a contract from a network you should always make sure that they have a sufficient plan to help you. Check with the person reaching out and ask what specific things they have in mind for you. If what they offer sounds like a good fit, move forward. If the offer doesn't sound like something that can help you, tell them and see if they can change their plan or move on to someone else.

I will also mention that we have sales in place that affects every channel that joins. We get pretty sizable media buys that we spread out to every channel who fits that advertiser.

Additionally, we have dedicated people who work with you. If you are being recruited by TGS or Maker, that means you will be managed for as long as you are with Maker by a dedicated person.

I'd be happy to answer any additional questions here, through private messages, or on the reddit AMA which I check daily.

-David

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dont' understand why your even chiming in. Thats why she posted on the board. She wants to see if its a good deal. most people think its shit and i'm with them. She should partner with youtube herself get the money that you guys were not going to share with her.

Correct me if I'm wrong but from what I understand Maker has much higher paying ads than Youtube. Youtube might give you $0.50 CPM but Maker will give you $10 CPM

So the only thing these people are good for is to show relevant ads for said videos?
I might not me the smartest guy in the bunch but doesn't google have scripts that do the same thing?

When it comes down to it, you go where the money is.

I heard Machinima let's you upload to their main page to get you get hundreds of thousands of views and a much higher CPM than uploading from your own page, so you get at least a 1,000 times more money! Maker doesn't offer anything like that as far as I know. You upload your own video that you spent a week making to your own page and get ten views.

I'm in a similar boat, but they were asking for a 30% cut! I mentioned that It didn't seem like a great deal came back with this "we can offer you a RPM floor. this takes an average of how you are currently monetizing and creates a floor so we dont take a cut until you are monetizing better then your channel usually does."
What are your thoughts on this? I think that seem's like a pretty fair deal, but then again this is all new too me and if there is one thing I know its that averages are not always accurate...

OneMillion said:

I'm in a similar boat, but they were asking for a 30% cut! I mentioned that It didn't seem like a great deal came back with this "we can offer you a RPM floor. this takes an average of how you are currently monetizing and creates a floor so we dont take a cut until you are monetizing better then your channel usually does."
What are your thoughts on this? I think that seem's like a pretty fair deal, but then again this is all new too me and if there is one thing I know its that averages are not always accurate...

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Depends on how much that is...ask them for figures...

would love to see/hear what you're doing on YouTube if you can share the channel

cheers,

chef

I'm partnered via Maker studio. Only thing I got from them is the partner facility and nothing to help my channel, that includes no new subscribers, views, promotion. End of the month they take their commission and give the rest promptly.

Still I got what I wanted.

timefactor said:

I'm partnered via Maker studio. Only thing I got from them is the partner facility and nothing to help my channel, that includes no new subscribers, views, promotion. End of the month they take their commission and give the rest promptly.

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So if you're already a FULL branded partner with youtube is there any benefit to joining Maker?