Are these Vloggers just a scam? SOL or Shmee etc???????
Discussion
anonymous said:
[redacted]
It's very interesting how he has targeted Tim aka (Shmee 150) and has shot down his whole "I earned these cars from YouTube" persona. As Matt indicates Shmee's numbers on YouTube do not support his car buying habits, the numbers just don’t add up. Where he gets the money from is anyone's guess, personally I don’t care but he needs to be a bit more honest to his audience that he is selling them an unrealistic YouTube lifestyleShmee said:
I'm afraid to say that unfortunately there is very little global interest in that type of car so it just isn't worth trying. Yes, it would go down really well with this forum but that's a minority of the internet overall.
ty for the reply i look forward to seeing more vids on the mini 
hope its better now!Streetrod said:
It's very interesting how he has targeted Tim aka (Shmee 150) and has shot down his whole "I earned these cars from YouTube" persona. As Matt indicates Shmee's numbers on YouTube do not support his car buying habits, the numbers just don’t add up. Where he gets the money from is anyone's guess, personally I don’t care but he needs to be a bit more honest to his audience that he is selling them an unrealistic YouTube lifestyle
I feel I've been rather honest through my many posts on this thread dating back to the start; or at least as detailed as my contracts allow me to be.Never in my life, genuinely not once have I stated that YouTube is my only earner, this is a major misconception that didn't come from me. In the early days of doing this I was working in a city investment consultancy and it was a small additional 'hobby' - that was when I had the V8 Vantage Roadster and then R8 Spyder; these cars are pretty easy to achieve if you have a decent job having progressed a few tiers and this venture probably earned an additional £10-20k annually on the side.
Along the way I left my job when I fell into a fortunate company restructuring situation, so jumped at the opportunity to try and grow this and it took a hard year or two where it wasn't working but now it's turned around and we have a 10 man social media operation, running pages with around 6-7 million followers and reaching stats of around 150 million impressions a month. Beyond the obvious 'YouTube videos', Facebook is a key earner and in fact in the 12 months to date represents an almost equal figure to the YouTube content, probably each around 25% of my whole Shmee150 umbrella. In addition to that there are many other activities, a non exhaustive list includes: social media advisory, affiliate schemes, merchandising, book licensing and sales, content licensing and writing for other platforms, being a presenter, introducing in many areas (cars, insurance etc) and so much more.
I don't think it's at all right that I should be expected to post my income details online, nor do I think it is in the slightest bit reasonable for anybody expect me to reveal all of the information about how I run my private business. Coca-Cola don't post out the recipe for their drink, so I have no intention of writing a complete how-to for running a social media business like this. I have repeatedly given small bits of information in this very thread, I don't want to be so crude as to post out numbers (and nor do I feel they should be demanded of me), but the Shmee150 venture is happily covering more than a Ford GT a year, and rising, that does unfortunately come with a rather large tax bill due in January!
Consider also that my connections in the automotive industry give me good access to low rate funding, I am young enough and with no commitments that I can reasonably spend the vast majority of my income on cars and hey presto you immediately open up to a world of the kind of garage I am entering. The biggest difference I operate is that as mentioned above, YouTube represents just around 25% of my income, so consider a smaller YouTube channel then obviously they can't work out how the Shmee platform is where it is, because we're 10x the scale when you consider everything else we do!
Being a 'YouTuber' is not about being good on camera, it's about running the business behind it, most creative people don't get that and how to actually do it. This is a re-occurring theme I come across when meeting other people in the social media world.
As I wrote on page 8:
Shmee said:
I'll address anything that doesn't descend into typical PH-style internet squabble, what would you like to know?
Ask me direct questions and I shall try to answer, please don't just finger point based on a lack of understanding of this industry and what I do.Shmee said:
Ask me direct questions and I shall try to answer, please don't just finger point based on a lack of understanding of this industry and what I do.
When you say that the Shmee150 venture can pay for a Ford GT + a bit more, does that mean after you've paid your 10 employees, covered the cost of the business, paid yourself and the mortgage etc. Or that the Shmee150 venture can pay for the Ford GT and the other stuff is paid for from other income.I am trying not be nosy, but i am just genuinely interested in what "youtubing" can pay
My wife works in the beauty industry and says that what some of the beauty/fashion vloggers are bringing in is quite astonishing.
jimmy156 said:
When you say that the Shmee150 venture can pay for a Ford GT + a bit more, does that mean after you've paid your 10 employees, covered the cost of the business, paid yourself and the mortgage etc. Or that the Shmee150 venture can pay for the Ford GT and the other stuff is paid for from other income.
I am trying not be nosy, but i am just genuinely interested in what "youtubing" can pay
My wife works in the beauty industry and says that what some of the beauty/fashion vloggers are bringing in is quite astonishing.
My guess is that whatever numbers she has heard, double it!I am trying not be nosy, but i am just genuinely interested in what "youtubing" can pay
My wife works in the beauty industry and says that what some of the beauty/fashion vloggers are bringing in is quite astonishing.
As with most YouTubers, expenses are pretty low as the best way to make money is not to spend it in the first place. Even with the amount of travel I do, if it was 1st Class and 5* hotels everywhere (which it's not), I'd still not be spending much relatively to turnover, well under £100k goes out per year.
I operate as a sole-trader on the receiving end of commercial deals from an agency working on the Shmee150 project, equally a company is set up to run the social media pages out of income secured against them and commissions paid to my end. Structuring is obviously desperately complicated and I'm not going to get into many details here because I leave this to be handled by professionals that understand more than I do.
There is no simple definition of "YouTubing" because no two channels do the same thing, and as mentioned I'd say YouTube, although the most visible part, only represents about 25% of my commercial activities.
anonymous said:
[redacted]
I guess that goes some way to explaining how some of the fitness Youtubbers that I follow who had nothing end up driving around in G-wagons or SRT10's and opening up their own gyms, clothing lines, suppliements, and also how some really annoying people who upload CoD videos end up buying R8s and not even knowing where to top up the oil.Shmee said:
My guess is that whatever numbers she has heard, double it!
As with most YouTubers, expenses are pretty low as the best way to make money is not to spend it in the first place. Even with the amount of travel I do, if it was 1st Class and 5* hotels everywhere (which it's not), I'd still not be spending much relatively to turnover, well under £100k goes out per year.
I operate as a sole-trader on the receiving end of commercial deals from an agency working on the Shmee150 project, equally a company is set up to run the social media pages out of income secured against them and commissions paid to my end. Structuring is obviously desperately complicated and I'm not going to get into many details here because I leave this to be handled by professionals that understand more than I do.
There is no simple definition of "YouTubing" because no two channels do the same thing, and as mentioned I'd say YouTube, although the most visible part, only represents about 25% of my commercial activities.
Really like these replies made here, perhaps more than the video content as most of that is not really 'my thing'.As with most YouTubers, expenses are pretty low as the best way to make money is not to spend it in the first place. Even with the amount of travel I do, if it was 1st Class and 5* hotels everywhere (which it's not), I'd still not be spending much relatively to turnover, well under £100k goes out per year.
I operate as a sole-trader on the receiving end of commercial deals from an agency working on the Shmee150 project, equally a company is set up to run the social media pages out of income secured against them and commissions paid to my end. Structuring is obviously desperately complicated and I'm not going to get into many details here because I leave this to be handled by professionals that understand more than I do.
There is no simple definition of "YouTubing" because no two channels do the same thing, and as mentioned I'd say YouTube, although the most visible part, only represents about 25% of my commercial activities.
Hats off to you.
Shmee said:
Streetrod said:
It's very interesting how he has targeted Tim aka (Shmee 150) and has shot down his whole "I earned these cars from YouTube" persona. As Matt indicates Shmee's numbers on YouTube do not support his car buying habits, the numbers just don’t add up. Where he gets the money from is anyone's guess, personally I don’t care but he needs to be a bit more honest to his audience that he is selling them an unrealistic YouTube lifestyle
I feel I've been rather honest through my many posts on this thread dating back to the start; or at least as detailed as my contracts allow me to be.Never in my life, genuinely not once have I stated that YouTube is my only earner, this is a major misconception that didn't come from me. In the early days of doing this I was working in a city investment consultancy and it was a small additional 'hobby' - that was when I had the V8 Vantage Roadster and then R8 Spyder; these cars are pretty easy to achieve if you have a decent job having progressed a few tiers and this venture probably earned an additional £10-20k annually on the side.
Along the way I left my job when I fell into a fortunate company restructuring situation, so jumped at the opportunity to try and grow this and it took a hard year or two where it wasn't working but now it's turned around and we have a 10 man social media operation, running pages with around 6-7 million followers and reaching stats of around 150 million impressions a month. Beyond the obvious 'YouTube videos', Facebook is a key earner and in fact in the 12 months to date represents an almost equal figure to the YouTube content, probably each around 25% of my whole Shmee150 umbrella. In addition to that there are many other activities, a non exhaustive list includes: social media advisory, affiliate schemes, merchandising, book licensing and sales, content licensing and writing for other platforms, being a presenter, introducing in many areas (cars, insurance etc) and so much more.
I don't think it's at all right that I should be expected to post my income details online, nor do I think it is in the slightest bit reasonable for anybody expect me to reveal all of the information about how I run my private business. Coca-Cola don't post out the recipe for their drink, so I have no intention of writing a complete how-to for running a social media business like this. I have repeatedly given small bits of information in this very thread, I don't want to be so crude as to post out numbers (and nor do I feel they should be demanded of me), but the Shmee150 venture is happily covering more than a Ford GT a year, and rising, that does unfortunately come with a rather large tax bill due in January!
Consider also that my connections in the automotive industry give me good access to low rate funding, I am young enough and with no commitments that I can reasonably spend the vast majority of my income on cars and hey presto you immediately open up to a world of the kind of garage I am entering. The biggest difference I operate is that as mentioned above, YouTube represents just around 25% of my income, so consider a smaller YouTube channel then obviously they can't work out how the Shmee platform is where it is, because we're 10x the scale when you consider everything else we do!
Being a 'YouTuber' is not about being good on camera, it's about running the business behind it, most creative people don't get that and how to actually do it. This is a re-occurring theme I come across when meeting other people in the social media world.
As I wrote on page 8:
Shmee said:
I'll address anything that doesn't descend into typical PH-style internet squabble, what would you like to know?
Ask me direct questions and I shall try to answer, please don't just finger point based on a lack of understanding of this industry and what I do.I think the issue is that the less well informed assume your lifestyle is financed by YouTube, therefore they think if they can build a channel of a similar size they too could have a garage to rival yours, this is obviously unrealistic but to many they don’t see this. Like it or not your perceived success has spawned a raft of wannabees.
The fact you don’t appear to have to support a family, a large home of any of the other major outgoings like say I do allows you have the freedom to indulge in cars you love and good luck to you on that. I for example could easily afford to run a couple mid range supercars on the money I spend on my kid’s private education, but that was my choice. I only wish my kids would appreciate that more but what are you going to do. These are the choices we make in life and I am happy with mine.
Whatever financial model you have obviously works for you and I admire your work ethic. But if you live your life on social media then I am afraid a byproduct of that is that people feel they have a right to know all your intimate details, in this case how the money works.
Matt Farrar has called you out, you might want to have a chat in his shell like and put him straight, if he is a gentleman he will make a statement to that fact
They are only less informed out of personal choice. You can lead a horse to water etc.
A line has to be drawn somewhere and Shmee has laid it all out in a popular public forum the basic details which is way more than sufficient. Beyond that point it is very much the responsibility of the guardian or carer to attend to the special needs of the people in their care, not the private enterprise.
A line has to be drawn somewhere and Shmee has laid it all out in a popular public forum the basic details which is way more than sufficient. Beyond that point it is very much the responsibility of the guardian or carer to attend to the special needs of the people in their care, not the private enterprise.
BlueFiestaST said:
Well congrats on the success so far Tim.
I used to watch you back when you had the Aston Martin and you've came a long way.
Did you ever think when you started out that you would have the cars you do now?
Honestly, no, I mean who would have thought so. Technically still to this day it wouldn't be possible on its own by 'YouTube' alone - I would expect I'd be able to find myself in a 650S perhaps but to be growing out into a fleet of cars comes from the additional business aspects and bringing it all together.I used to watch you back when you had the Aston Martin and you've came a long way.
Did you ever think when you started out that you would have the cars you do now?
anonymous said:
[redacted]
Now that's fascinating, and he's a channel with 200k subs. All I will say is that the larger your channel gets, the more the earnings rate goes up; but simple maths: 2.17m views equated to $5,670; also known as $2.62 RPM. My channel receives 5-10m views a month and the rate is obviously higher.However, it is in breach of your contract with YouTube to reveal this information, so it wouldn't surprise me if his channel gets shut down as a result.
Streetrod said:
Hi Tim, thanks for filling in some of the gaps.
I think the issue is that the less well informed assume your lifestyle is financed by YouTube, therefore they think if they can build a channel of a similar size they too could have a garage to rival yours, this is obviously unrealistic but to many they don’t see this. Like it or not your perceived success has spawned a raft of wannabees.
The fact you don’t appear to have to support a family, a large home of any of the other major outgoings like say I do allows you have the freedom to indulge in cars you love and good luck to you on that. I for example could easily afford to run a couple mid range supercars on the money I spend on my kid’s private education, but that was my choice. I only wish my kids would appreciate that more but what are you going to do. These are the choices we make in life and I am happy with mine.
Whatever financial model you have obviously works for you and I admire your work ethic. But if you live your life on social media then I am afraid a byproduct of that is that people feel they have a right to know all your intimate details, in this case how the money works.
Matt Farrar has called you out, you might want to have a chat in his shell like and put him straight, if he is a gentleman he will make a statement to that fact
Informing is hard, I have regularly written these kind of responses here and in comments, even at times spoken in videos but there's a mentality online to not go looking for the information. Maybe one day I'll come up with a way to explain via video how it all works in a way that won't be revealing my full business model to the entire world - ultimately that's a valuable asset I don't really want to give away to be duplicated so easily.I think the issue is that the less well informed assume your lifestyle is financed by YouTube, therefore they think if they can build a channel of a similar size they too could have a garage to rival yours, this is obviously unrealistic but to many they don’t see this. Like it or not your perceived success has spawned a raft of wannabees.
The fact you don’t appear to have to support a family, a large home of any of the other major outgoings like say I do allows you have the freedom to indulge in cars you love and good luck to you on that. I for example could easily afford to run a couple mid range supercars on the money I spend on my kid’s private education, but that was my choice. I only wish my kids would appreciate that more but what are you going to do. These are the choices we make in life and I am happy with mine.
Whatever financial model you have obviously works for you and I admire your work ethic. But if you live your life on social media then I am afraid a byproduct of that is that people feel they have a right to know all your intimate details, in this case how the money works.
Matt Farrar has called you out, you might want to have a chat in his shell like and put him straight, if he is a gentleman he will make a statement to that fact
And yes, you are absolutely correct, these days people don't batter an eyelid at purchasing a £1m flat in London, but a collection of cars less than that is massively intriguing. Children are substantially more expensive than cars, and that's a point I've made on video at least once before! 'Fortunately' I'm not at that stage yet, mostly because I refuse to enter the world of a family while I live the busy travel schedule I do at the moment, but it will come and sacrifices will be made if required when it does.
I dropped Matt a Tweet last night but he hasn't got back to me. We've actually met before and got on fine so I was surprised he would do so on a Podcast without talking to me first.
It certainly is a fascinating business structure from the car manufacturers perspective, they must save an absolute fortune on advertising. If you think about what the traditional means of reaching a quarter of a million people every day would've been before reality tv/vlogging etc became their norm. I'm very chuffed for you that you've turned a hobby into a career, I'm not sure I would rely on it forever, especially seeing as how fast things change nowadays. But hey, the sun still shines so make hay.
Streetrod said:
I think the issue is that the less well informed assume your lifestyle is financed by YouTube, therefore they think if they can build a channel of a similar size they too could have a garage to rival yours, this is obviously unrealistic but to many they don’t see this. Like it or not your perceived success has spawned a raft of wannabees.
It's an inherent issue with a fair amount of the famous YouTubers, their audiences watch their lifestyles grow over the years solely via the videos and social media. I think particular younger audiences have some trouble delineating that these things are not 'real', and whilst it is not explicitly said that "my complete lifestyle is funded by YouTube" it perhaps more importantly is not explicitly labelled the other way around. The gray area between these two lines is left for the watcher to fill with their own perceptions. Anyone with younger teenagers will no doubt have seen the devout following some of these channels can inspire, whether it be make-up, gaming or something else. Social media and YouTube are much 'closer' technologies, in theory anyone who has a smartphone can become a global star almost overnight. Watching people become famous via TV for example always was one or two steps removed, there was always some gate/gatekeepers in the way...with YouTube, that dream is technically much more accessible to a young and malleable mind. For a company/brand who wants to target a prime audience, it's an absolute wet dream.
Whilst the discussion on here trends towards Tim as an example, and not unfairly IMO, it applies to many, many more channels over the platform. Starting each video with a detailed breakdown of each 'stars' finances and behind the scenes business breakdown is never going to retain eyeballs.
It is that grey area where people who were not known to be rich/successful in something else beforehand suddenly seem to 'become' rich/successful via YouTube that causes the scepticism. The power of influence YouTubers hold over younger mind should not be underestimated, which is why introducing sponsorship from trading platforms or similar caused an issue to some people as it could steer some towards gambling/trading once they are legally allowed to do so.
Although Tim gets a fair dose of stick on here, he (perhaps unintentionally) fits the bill as that perfect target of the byproduct of the above scepticism. He is the car community example of the wider trend at work. Most people would not think it worthy of their time to engage at any level 'below the line', so your detailed responses should be appreciated.
No disrespect to Tim but the way he talks, always wears a shirt with a collar, very expensive post code - its obvious - to me anyway what his background is and that's that really. I cant walk into McLaren dealers cold - they would laugh me out of the place the second they look at me - if I open my mouth they will probably hand over the keys and say "don't hurt me I am too young to die!!". Or some such. That's just life. JWW is the same, well spoken, well educated, clearly has a few quid regardless of some poxy website doing videos.
SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
red_slr said:
No disrespect to Tim but the way he talks, always wears a shirt with a collar, very expensive post code - its obvious - to me anyway what his background is and that's that really. I cant walk into McLaren dealers cold - they would laugh me out of the place the second they look at me - if I open my mouth they will probably hand over the keys and say "don't hurt me I am too young to die!!". Or some such. That's just life. JWW is the same, well spoken, well educated, clearly has a few quid regardless of some poxy website doing videos.
SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
"No disrespect to Tim" before going off on a number of disrespectful points! Simply put, if I didn't run Shmee150 then I wouldn't be driving the cars I'm driving - this has all come from growing a business off the back of a YouTube channel. I know it's a hard concept to grasp but it is actually possible!SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
Both JWW and Ale have run and continue to run companies independently of their YouTubing; neither makes videos for their full time living at this stage although Ale is pushing that way. Both SOL and STG have built it like me as a hobby turning into their jobs and are making strong progress and success.
Shmee said:
red_slr said:
No disrespect to Tim but the way he talks, always wears a shirt with a collar, very expensive post code - its obvious - to me anyway what his background is and that's that really. I cant walk into McLaren dealers cold - they would laugh me out of the place the second they look at me - if I open my mouth they will probably hand over the keys and say "don't hurt me I am too young to die!!". Or some such. That's just life. JWW is the same, well spoken, well educated, clearly has a few quid regardless of some poxy website doing videos.
SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
"No disrespect to Tim" before going off on a number of disrespectful points! Simply put, if I didn't run Shmee150 then I wouldn't be driving the cars I'm driving - this has all come from growing a business off the back of a YouTube channel. I know it's a hard concept to grasp but it is actually possible!SOL - he is a normal guy making a go of it. STG similar. If youtube stops tomorrow JWW and S150 will still drive round in nice cars, they just wont make videos any more.
They don't want to say it - because they don't want to come across as arrogant or "do a Ratner" but they are rich. Proper rich. They can afford the cars, so stop asking how / why etc! They just can. Alejandro Salomon is only but one more example.
Both JWW and Ale have run and continue to run companies independently of their YouTubing; neither makes videos for their full time living at this stage although Ale is pushing that way. Both SOL and STG have built it like me as a hobby turning into their jobs and are making strong progress and success.
monamimate said:
I have to compliment you on your ability to stay so calm. Seems rather naive to suggest that one's clothes or accent define one's wealth!
It's not the best evidence is it. You could find better things to go on...Shmee said:
that was when I had the V8 Vantage Roadster and then R8 Spyder; these cars are pretty easy to achieve if you have a decent job having progressed a few tiers and this venture probably earned an additional £10-20k annually on the side
Different folks have different ideas on what a 'decent' living is.red_slr said:
I cant walk into McLaren dealers cold - they would laugh me out of the place the second they look at me - if I open my mouth they will probably hand over the keys and say "don't hurt me I am too young to die!!".
Obviously, that's a load of silly drivel but it's incredibly sad to find that someone would have such an utterly low opinion of themselves or such a chip on their shoulder about others that they could possibly think or believe such tosh. Seriously, just walk into the dealer's. They are a shop. The staff's sole purpose for existing is to cater for you as the potential customer. In reality, it's you who is looking down on yourself and you who is laughing you out of a shop that sells things.
It reminds me of the PHers who always claim people are looking down on them. No one can look down on you unless you chose to be their worn in your own mind.
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