Finally Getting Use Out of YouTube and Rumble
It’s been forever (two years really) since I last did anything with these channels. I ended up dropping Bitchute because it was too difficult to upload things over there. YouTube and Rumble, however, are simple enough to use.
The plan that failed
My original plan was to have my oldest son read my books and upload them for me. He read the entire book for Nobody’s Fool, and at chapter 15 in edits, something happened to the file, and he was unable to open it anymore. He does not have a Mac. I think I will die on the “Apple makes a better computer” hill because I haven’t had the issues other people have had with losing files on other computers. I know Apple is pricey, but in my humble opinion, the cost is worth it.
I was depressed when my son’s attempt at making audiobooks didn’t work out. I still wanted to get these books into audio form. The main way I have to consume books is to listen to them these days. My eyes are much better, but I want to save them for writing new books and working on blog posts, updating my website, etc. I can’t overdo it.
What I am doing about it
I have decided that I will narrate my own books, and I will upload them using my computer. I found a program called “Voices” in my Application folder, and I downloaded the iMovie app to my computer. I use BookBrush to make the graphic to go with the video. It’s a simple graphic. Here is the one I made for Tagalong Bride.
I am not going to worry about using a microphone or trying to do anything fancy. I am not making money with this, so I am not going to spend any money making these videos. I am also not going to worry about how “professional” these will be. Recently, I have been listening to audiobooks on YouTube from people just sitting down and reading the book, and I figure if I can be happy listening to books “unprofessionally” done, then there will be people out there who won’t mind my approach.
Essentially, imagine I am sitting in the room with you and reading the book. That’s how I imagine it as I record the files. I am doing a light edit to remove glaring errors, but I have decided to let a couple of stumbles as I’m reading pass through. I don’t want to spend more than 30 minutes on each chapter. When I did Meant To Be, it took me about 2-3 hours to edit each chapter. I’m not putting myself through that aggravation again. I want this to be a fun project.
I am currently uploading Tagalong Bride
My plan is to keep reading and uploading chapters of all of my books. After Tagalong Bride is done, I am going to put up Eye of the Beholder. If anyone has a request, I will happily work on that book after I’m done with Eye of the Beholder.
I am removing all spicy content in order to keep my videos on YouTube and Rumble. They have this policy where spicy content can get books (or the author’s channel) banned. Even if authors put, “Not meant for kids”, they risk video removal. So I’m going to play it safe and make these all PG. I want the books to be available for many years to come.
I will be posting the book chapter by chapter
I made a post not too long ago about how crazy I felt that authors are pushing to get a complete full-length book out every single week on YouTube. I won’t rehash that. I’m just going to say that I will be uploading one chapter at a time, and I am going to do this on a consistent schedule. Right now, I have picked Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. I need to give myself time to record the chapter, turn it into a video, and upload it to YouTube and Rumble.
Now, I am able to put each chapter into a Playlist on YouTube. That way you can go to the Playlist, and after one chapter is done, the next will automatically play if you have your settings set to “autoplay”. I am not sure I can do the same thing in Rumble. I have done a lot more on YouTube than I’ve done on Rumble. I will see if I can get the chapters together.
I will try to make a file with the entire book on it after I finish uploading all of the chapters in case people prefer that way to listen to a book
I am going to see if I can merge all of the chapters into one file (in case someone does want the entire book in one video), but I will try that after I get all these chapters uploaded separately. I am also going to keep all the separate chapters on YouTube and Rumble. That way if people prefer the chapters to be separated out, they can have that. Personally, I prefer to listen to books chapter by chapter. I don’t like having to go back into a file to find where I left off, even if there is a way to mark it. YouTube does not always give me the video I had to pause and come back to later.
It really isn’t difficult to combing audio files in iMovie. It just takes time to do it.
My goal is to have fun and enjoy this
My goal is not to make money with this. To make money, I would have to rush these out. My goal is to have fun. I do want to make money with my writing, but I don’t want to kill myself while doing it. I need to have some things that are fun to me. I love reading my books. I would hope that any author would love their own content. 
I find that when I spend time doing fun things, I am a lot more creative, and it’s easier to write new books. The business angle plays a part at times, but I think there’s something to be said for not worrying about money if you can. Fortunately, my husband is the main breadwinner, so I do have the luxury of making this choice. I realize some authors don’t.
Side note: If you’re an author reading this and want to make money by posting your books on YouTube, here is what I advise after listening to tips from authors who are making “three to four figures a month” off of YouTube. Get one new book out a week, put the entire book into one video, make sure to monetize the videos when going through the ad revenue portion while you’re uploading the video, remove any R-rated content (maybe even tame the book to a PG rating to be on the safe side), and engage with your audience. I can’t guarantee this will work for you, but it has worked for other authors who’ve done this. (If you would like to actually take the course that walks you through the steps, let me know in the comments, and I’ll link to it. I think the course was $199. I thought it was worth taking even though I decided not to do this path.) Rapid release works just as well on YouTube as it does on Amazon, which is why you see content creators posting new videos all the time.
Links to my YouTube and Rumble channels
I waited until now to make this announcement because I wanted to make sure that I was getting the videos uploaded correctly. Like I said in the beginning of the post, it’s been two years since I’ve done this. I was a bit rusty. But now that I have a few chapters up, I feel safe in pointing people to the channels in case anyone wants to listen to me read. By the way, I am not going to try to do different voices for the characters. My son has that gift, but I don’t. Plus, I have trouble remembering which voice to use for which character. It’s easier this way.
Quick note about YouTube ads
I have paid YouTube to remove ads, so I no longer get them when I am watching videos over there. Because of that, I have no way of knowing if these chapters will be having ads attached to them. (In the past, I noticed that some videos had ads, and some didn’t.) In the course I took about YouTube books, someone was saying that YouTube runs ads every three minutes on a video. This is even if the author isn’t paid. If you notice that happening on my videos, please let me know. I will sort through the settings in my videos and see if there’s a way to lengthen out the ad spacing. That is an option they discussed. I just haven’t thought to do anything about it since I’m not worried about making money. I think what I’ll do is look into my YouTube channel the next time I upload a video to see if I can find that spot and preemptively arrange for the ads not to come every three minutes. I’m not a fan of ads. Since I have so little followers and views, I am thinking that the ad thing isn’t an issue. But please let me know if you’re finding an ad coming up every three minutes, okay? You can leave the comment in any of my blog posts or contact me through my contact form.
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I apologize that this turned into such a long post. I honestly thought it would be a lot shorter. I hope all of that was clear. I didn’t have time to go through here and edit. I had to run out to the accountant to turn in some tax information and then pick up my deaf son from work. (My deaf son was unable to get his driver’s license, so I’m his ride.)
