My YouTube Channel Hit $10K/Month — Every Revenue Stream Broken Down

18 months ago: $200/month AdSense on my finance YouTube channel. Today: $10,400/month. Every stream:

1. AdSense: $3,200 (RPM ~$28, finance niche pays well for US viewers)

2. Channel Memberships: $890 (210 members at $4.99 — monthly Q&A calls)

3. Sponsorships: $4,100 (2 sponsors, ~$2,050 each — reached out at 40K subs)

4. Affiliate Links: $1,100 (Robinhood, Webull, M1 Finance)

5. Digital Product: $1,110 (investing spreadsheet at $37)

Channel: 82K subscribers, 380K views/month, 4.2% CTR, 7.8min avg watch time.

What I'd do differently starting over:

Build email list from video 1 (I started at video 80 — massive mistake)

Contact sponsors yourself at 20-30K (don't wait to be found)

Price digital product higher — $37 was too cheap, now testing $67

Biggest lesson: Don't rely on AdSense. Build memberships, affiliates, products first.