(Please also see my latest update at the end)

This article is mainly a review of BroadBandTV (Viso) and is something that YouTubers can relate to and may not make sense to you if you are not. But at the same time it may make you want to become one!

First I tell you a little about how making money on YouTube works. If you already know that, skip to my story of BroadBand TV further below.

All of you have seen those pesky advertisements that run on YouTube videos. Of course YouTube or in fact Google makes money off of those. What you may not know if you are not a YouTuber like me, is that content providers like me who make videos are also paid a portion of the money Google makes out of the advertisements. The money we YouTubers make is dependent on many things:

• First of all, we make money if somebody clicks on the ads, and there are not many. According to my experience only 3% of the advertisements played on videos (monetized views) are clicked on.
• Not all videos are monetized. Nowadays people play videos much more on mobile phones where advertisement doesn’t play on most of them, and also some people block ads.
• The amount of monetized views also depends on the content. If the target audience is old people or people in countries where people use mobile phones much less, the chances are more of the videos played are monetized.
• Also Google may block ads to play on some videos because of sensitive content, etc.
• My content usually brings me above 50% monetized views when I am with Google Adsense system.
• Every click brings me anywhere from 5 to 10 cents.

So statistically speaking as what I experienced with Google, I would receive close to $1 for every 1000 total views, which would include monetized and non-monetized views. I also have 3 videos out of 20 so far that don’t play ads on them at all.

There are some terms like RPM that you should know about. RPM basically means the amount of money you would receive per 1000 monetized view (not all the views). Before joining Broadband TV, Google reported that my RPM was $1.77.

Considering that I received close to $1 per 1000 total views, that would mean that I would at least have close to 56% monetized views.

My Story with BroadBand TV (BBTV or Viso)

Well, I can’t speak for all these YouTube Network companies, but I can definitely speak for BroadBand TV (BBTV or Viso) which is a large company at that. To make it simple they sucked and made me lose money! Let me elaborate:

Like all these other providers, Viso people approached me saying that I would make good money, better than what Google Adsense paid me. They said I would receive $3 to $15 per 1000 views. And considering I was making just close to $1 per 1000 views, I thought that was a great deal. But I pushed further for more information and asked them to confirm the numbers, and they confirmed that the RPM would be $3 to $15 depending on the time of year, etc. So that would mean $3 to $15 per 1000 of monetized views, not total views.

I wasn’t quite familiar with the meaning of RPM at the time and I thought that was the total views. My bad! But then when I realized it, it was still not a bad deal as according to Google itself my RPM was $1.77 and $3 to $15 RPM was a great deal.

Still I pushed them for a temporary trial period as I wanted to make sure this wouldn’t cause me grief, as it did. They sent me the contract and I realized that it was binding (you are stuck with it until the contract ends). So I asked them if I could break the contract if I want to, and they told me to let them know and they would release me. Me being the trusting kind, accepted their offer. My initial contract was a 70% / 30% split between me and BBTV (70% me).

First of all, I lost my daily income visibility right away. I could not know how I was performing until the end of next month. So I patiently waited for a long while and no matter how much I asked them to give me a rough estimate of what I made like Google always would, they didn’t.

After that long while I received my report and realized my RPM was $2.83 and my monetized views were only less than 25% of the total views. This means that although the RPM was increase from $1.77 to $2.83 (60% more), my monetized views were cut in half. To break even with YouTube, my RPM should have doubled , and so I lost over 20% of my income. I talked to them and complained and they explained that their usual monetized views rate is also 50% and this might have been an anomaly.

Well, although the RPM was lower than their promised range of $3 to $15, I thought maybe next month the monetized views would go back over 50% like before.

Next month: the RPM dropped to $2.75 and the monetized views only increased to 30%. And so I lost over 10%.

So I complained and asked to terminate my contract like they promised. There was a bunch of back and forth and some higher level people in the company got involved and we had a meeting.

• They said the person who made that promise to me was no longer with the company (fired?) but since he made the promise, they wanted to do their best.
• They insisted that monetized views are not controlled by them and is fully in control of Google. And that I should give them more chance to get more data to see if the trend continues.
• They said if I was really unhappy they would let me go.
• And also they offered a new 6 month contract with a 80% / 20% split so I would make more money and this lower income would be covered.
• The 6 month contract was actually a trial term, something they didn’t tell me right at the beginning when they made me sign a one year contract.

I asked them to terminate the contract and let me be with Google again for a while to see if the trend would match theirs. Although I was insisting on termination, they pushed so hard and convinced me to stay a but longer to gather a bit more data. You don’t believe how much they pushed, and considering the new split, I would at least break even, right?!


I signed the contract that would start one month after the meeting.

Next month of 70% / 30% split: RPM dropped to $2.43 and monetized views around 30%.

First month of 80% / 20% split: RPM was raised to $3.15 and 30% monetized views. Well, now that would mean close to the minimum of Google payment (56% monetized views). But in fact this would mean $0.945 per 1000 total views and like I said with Google I was at that level already, so why would I go through the trouble?

I called them again and told them that I am not happy at all and I wanted to terminate. After lots of back and forth and delay, they said I couldn’t. They said because I signed a new contract, it meant that I was happy with the terms. Didn’t they say I could terminate if I was really unhappy? All my efforts went no where and the responded the same, and so I got stuck.

And guess what, the next month RPM was $2.33 with 30% monetized views. This trend went the same and my RPM was always close to average $3 and monetizes views at 30%. I was with them for around 8 months total and lost some good portion of my income. So I pledged to write about this and expose their lies. Of course I wouldn’t do this before gathering some data being back at Google and making sure the numbers are back to normal. So:

Back with Google Adsense

I gathered information for 27 days so far and I’m happy to tell you that I have made $1.11 per 1000 total views since my return, which is above my original thought from Google.

This would mean if the monetized views were 30% like at BBTV (Viso) my RPM should have been $3.7, which I never got from them.

Or if I go with Google’s report of $1.77 RPM, I should have 62.7% monetized views, which I think is more likely. The monetized views dropped significantly at BBTV (Viso).

So in any case, BroadBand TV (Viso) with their best split of 80% / 20% during the 8 months I was there were never able to beat a single month with Google.

Of course I haven’t had an official report from Google since I returned and I will update this if I realize the data if different.

Here’s my final thought: never trust this Network people, stay with the good old Google. Maybe consider these networks if they provide a solid performance record for their previous months for similar content as yours and provide you with a non-binding contract that you can terminate any time.

I mean, if according to these people you will make more money than Google, then why is their contract binding? Why would you want to leave if you make more money? It is a sign they are lying in your face! Forget them!

[UPDATE]

In order to make a more solid comparison, I recorded my earnings from BBTV and Google in the same month of November 2013. I canceled my account with BBTV on Nov. 13 and switch to Google.  So almost half a month was with BBTV and the rest with Google. In any case, since I take a ratio of the income versus the 1000 total views, it wouldn’t matter how many views I had with each. But I had 50% more views with BBTV than Google as my video in that period with BBTV was watched more.

The results are: 0.52$ per 1000 total views with BBTV, and over $1.1 per 1000 total views with Google. So it is safe to say that you will lose money if you go with BroadBandTV. Stay away!