Jimmy Donaldson is the man known to the online world as 'Mr. Best' and is considered to be the most famous YouTuber in the world. With the help of YouTube, he has earned immense wealth along with popularity.
The 25-year-old has launched his fast food chain 'Mr. Best Burger' after gaining immense popularity on YouTube. In November 2022, Forbes magazine estimated that he earned US$54 million from YouTube in one year from videos, sponsorship deals, and advertising. His main YouTube channel has a total of 172 million subscribers.
He also has several other YouTube channels with tens of millions of subscribers. One of these channels is for philanthropic support and one is for video games.
It is not clear how much they earn from YouTube in total with all these channels. Jimmy Donaldson is said to spend all his earnings on his most expensive videos. Some of these videos cost millions of dollars to make. He told a podcast in June that every penny he earns on YouTube he puts back into making videos.
It is his approach to the content he presents on YouTube that attracts so many audiences to him and makes them willing to risk everything. His most popular video to date has received 472 million views, and Netflix created a real-life squid game with a prize of US$456,000.
Compare that to videos from 2017, one of the biggest of which was him saying 'Logan Paul' 100,000 times over 17 hours and a video in which he tipped pizza delivery drivers hundreds of dollars. Each video received between 20 and 40 million views.
In addition to his videos, Donaldson is also known for his philanthropic work and many business ventures. His charity operates as a food bank providing food to poor people across the United States. And they've helped raise tens of millions of dollars for environmental improvements.
Apart from Mr. Best Burger, he also deals in different types of snacks which is named Festable. However, they are now trying to pull back from Best Burger, but they say their festival snacks are still selling well in the UK.
In general, YouTubers rely heavily on YouTube advertising for their income, but Mr. Best says that sometimes it doesn't cover their expenses.
Donaldson, for example, revealed to his Twitter followers in July that his latest video cost nearly three million US dollars to produce. However, within a few days of its release, it received only US$167,000 in advertising.
It is only in such situations that sponsorship deals come in handy. For some content creators, it earns more than advertising.
YouTuber Lucy Edwards has over seven million followers and came to be BBC Radio 1's first blind presenter in 2019. He told the BBC that most of his income comes from these brand partnerships.
She said 'I am currently promoting Pantene, a shampoo and hair care brand globally.'
"I have multiple campaigns, probably four to five activations a month and we make very little money from (advertisements) on Tik Tok and YouTube," he added.
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She relies on shorter and shorter material than Donaldson. His most popular video is only two and a half minutes long which has received over 2 million views.
He said YouTubers like Mr. Best could potentially earn more thanks to the length of their videos, which are usually between 10 and 20 minutes.
He said: 'If you're a long-form content creator, they have post-roll, pre-roll, mid-roll ads, and if your content is longer than eight minutes, you'll get more ad revenue.
'But all brands want short-lived content, so you always have to balance the two.'
'People click when they upload videos'
Donaldson's videos can be difficult to categorize.
These usually include a challenge such as a survival in Antarctica video, or games with large cash prizes, for example, one million US dollars.
Steven Bridges is a YouTuber himself and has 470,000 subscribers. He told the BBC that it was Donaldson's creativity that drove him: 'I think the interesting thing about Mr. Best is that he has it in him to make what he thinks is a great video. There is total dedication.'
People click when they upload videos. They know that when they click on Mr. Best's video, it will take a lot of effort to make it interesting."
In recent years, Mr. Bridges has remade himself on YouTube. From magic content to card counting. His most popular video, showing a popular scheme used to defraud tourists in London, has been viewed 4.6 million times.
"It's hard to sustain a career on YouTube for 10 years," he said.
'But Mr. Best is concentrating on the only thing that matters. That means putting the audience first and then thinking: What can I give them that they will like?'
A big reason for Donaldson's success on YouTube may be his likable personality. Even when he beat PewDiePie to the number one position on the platform, his rival congratulated him and said he deserved it.
But even though Donaldson is the most-subscribed individual user on YouTube, he's still a long way from being the person with the largest single YouTube channel. T-Series, an Indian music video publishing company, is the leader in this category with over 246 million subscribers.
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