YouTube Growth Tips From Erika Kullberg

Erika Kullberg became one of the largest female finance YouTubers in a relatively short time and has shared number YouTube growth tips online.

In this post we share some of Erika Kullberg’s tips for gaining subscribers and earning a six figure income on YouTube.

Who Is Erika Kullberg?

Erika Kullberg with her silver play button from YouTube for 100,000 subscribers

Erika Kullberg is an attorney who founded Plug and Law, a company that provides legal agreements and templates to small business owners. She is most well known as a personal finance guru sharing content on YouTube and Tiktok.

In 2019 she started a YouTube channel that discusses personal finance. Her channel grew quickly and earned over $100,000 in the first year. It now boasts over half a million subscribers.

She later went on to create a successful TikTok account with over 8 million followers.

erika kullberg shares YouTube growth tips for busy professionals

She’s also the creator of the Mastering YouTube For The Busy Professional Course.

The course helps busy professionals get started and grow on YouTube efficiently.

Mastering YouTube For The Busy Professional Course

Learn how to grow a profitable YouTube channel while still working full-time. This course from lawyer Erika Kullberg teaches you everything you need to know.


I earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you.

The course is the ideal option for anyone doing YouTube on the side with limited time to learn. Since I’ve been a friend and fan of Erika I also happily share her course as an affiliate.

She knows what she is talking about based on experience and helping thousands achieve the same outcome.

Now let’s look at her YouTube growth tips.

Erika Kullberg’s Tips For Gaining 1,000 YouTube Subscribers

Erika shared a list of 13 ways she grew her YouTube channel from 0 to 1,000 subscribers in a YouTube facebook group. She also shared the video on her channel as you can see below.

The video and list below in her own words are full of great advice from a YouTuber who grew from 0 to 1,000 subscribers in just 3 months.

Here are the 13 ways Erika grew from 0 to 1,000 subscribers in her own words:

  1. Consistency – most people will give up before they even hit 1,000.
  2. Consistent upload schedule. I did 1 video a week. Make sure whatever it is, stay consistent.Better to do 1 and increase to 2 than start at 2 per week and decrease to 1
  3. Provide valuable content.Ask yourself, would I like this?
  4. Use consistent and catchy thumbnails and titles. Thumbnails should be recognizable as “yours”.
  5. Write a good description.
  6. Use tags.
  7. Focus on a niche.
  8. Call to action. Ask subscribers to do what you want them to do – like, subscribe, comment.
  9. Respond and interact with every single comment. You’re building a community.
  10. Stay organized.
  11. Use your network–announce on all of your social media platforms.
  12. Comment on others channels within your niche! SINGLE biggest driver. 34% of my channel views comes from other channels.
  13. Study analytics to figure out whats working, what’s not and adjust. When a video does pick up, start creating more in that specific topic.

Those are fantastic tips!

All of the growth tips are important when gaining subscribers on a new channel. But what really made the difference?

Erika shares her best YouTube subscriber tip for new channels:

“I think it’s really been key to comment on other channels in my niche. I spend a lot of time watching videos in my niche and commenting on them. And I always try to make the comments encouraging, positive, thoughtful (and funny if I can manage). The more likes the comments get, the more it goes to the top of that video, so more viewers see it. Out of curiosity, they’ll then come over to my channel. I know this because traffic on my channel from other channel pages is around 34%.”

As someone that personally found Erika through a YouTube comment I know this method works!

Related: How To Grow A YouTube Channel

Advice from Erika Kullberg on how to grow on YouTube

Youtube Growth Tips For Making $100,000

Erika began her YouTube channel with the goal of making $200,000 per year and she was able to make over $100,000 in less than a year.

She freely shares her YouTube growth tips insights on making money within multiple Facebook groups and within her course. She also has a free YouTube guide where you can access all her best tips for growing to $100,000 per year.

Here are Erika’s growth tips for going from 0 subscribers to making over $100,000 on YouTube in less than a year:

Just Start

“Don’t spend so much time “thinking” about starting. Just start.

I LOVE researching and overanalyzing things (I’m a lawyer so it comes naturally). I personally spent about 2 months ‘preparing’ to launch my channel, but I wish I would’ve just gone for it. And I wanted everything to be perfect, but the reality is, the only way to learn on YouTube is by doing.

All of the training and courses and videos you could watch on ‘how to YouTube’ will never measure up to just starting the channel and learning through trial and error. If you’ve been on the edge, just start – today.”

Network

“Networking. The power of networking with other YouTube creators, something I didn’t realize would be so important on YouTube. It’s important for a number of reasons.

First, it’s good to surround yourself with people who love YouTube and understand what you’re going through. There are going to be times when you want to quit or need to vent or are disappointed about the slow growth of your channel or a video you poured your heart into being a complete flop, and your YouTube friends will be there to support you. (I’ve had a few times where I just got really hurtful comments on my channel and wanted to give up, and my YouTube friends got me through it).

Join a mastermind if you can – this is how I’ve made most of my YouTube friends. I also just IG DMed huge creators on YouTube and luckily a few responded back, so those have developed into friendships now too. Just always remember to give more than you take.

Second, by networking, you’ll get to compare analytics, and, perhaps more importantly, share information about companies that are looking to sponsor YouTube videos / companies with good affiliate programs, etc. It also helps negotiating (which we’ll cover below) when you understand what others in your niche are making with certain sponsors / affiliates.”

Affiliate Marketing

“Focus on affiliates before you even get monetized.

The best thing about affiliate marketing (which, funny enough, a year ago I had NO IDEA what affiliate marketing was), is that you can make money from it before you are even monetized on YouTube. Monetization on YouTube requires 4,000 hours of watch time and 1,000 subscribers. Guess what becoming an affiliate typically requires? 0 hours of watch time and 0 subscribers.

The best time to start affiliate marketing is as soon as possible. I mention an affiliate in virtually every video I make. The description of every video of mine contains affiliate links, as do the pinned comments. I just do a quick 10 second mention of the affiliate at the end.”

Press

“Press. Getting press coverage is important purely from a sponsorship / opportunity angle. I try to get into the press about once or twice a month (Business Insider, CNBC, US News, etc), but have never seen any uptick in subscribers from the posts.

The true hidden benefit: I did, however, get sponsorship opportunities (and interview opportunities) that I don’t believe would have happened had I not had the ‘added credibility’ that press coverage provides. To get press, start off with sites like Qwoted and HelpaReporterOut, then once you’ve been quoted in 1-2 publications, start reaching out directly to journalists and pitching your story (subtly mention in your signature that you’ve been featured in those 1-2 publications).

Keep pitches concise and demonstrate that you actually follow that journalists work and understand what kind of topics they cover/what resonates with their readers.”

Negotiate

“NEGOTIATE! This is my golden nugget for you today. Prior to founding Plug and Law, I was a corporate lawyer and would negotiate billion-dollar deals. So, I applied that same mentality to negotiating for YouTube.

Understand that you can negotiate everything. For affiliates, you can negotiate payout. There’s one popular affiliate that many personal finance creators promote. I negotiated to get them to pay me double their standard payout amount. By all standards, I shouldn’t have had any leverage to negotiate (I had 1,000 subscribers at the time), but I still tried and was successful.

Same thing goes for sponsorships. Out of all of the sponsorships I’ve gotten, only 1 approached me! The rest I reached out to myself. Don’t have this mentality of “I’m too small” to reach out–that’s definitely not true.

Also, don’t sit around waiting and expecting sponsors to find you. If you want to make money through sponsorships on YouTube, you must be proactive and pitch yourself.

When I pitch, I always pitch asking for 30% more than I actually want. Sometimes they just agree to the rate (which was 30% more than I wanted). If you are able to, don’t be afraid to “walk away” from a deal. Twice I couldn’t get a sponsor to agree to my rate because they said it was out of their budget, so I said “I appreciate it, but out of respect for my other sponsors I don’t have much flexibility on this rate – would you be able to speak to your team again and mention [insert some cool metrics or information about your channel that would persuade them] to see if they might still be interested?” Both times, they came back within a few days and agreed to my rate.

Also, this goes back to the point above about the value of networking. If you can, talk to your YouTube friends about what sponsors are paying them. Once, I had a company reach out to me and offer half the amount that they offered my male friend with a smaller channel. Because my male friend shared his rate with me, I knew I wouldn’t accept anything less. Sure enough, they doubled their offer for me after I refused their initial offer.

Like any negotiation, the more information you have, the better equipped to understand the leverage you have in the negotiation.”

Mistakes To Avoid

“Mistakes I made: I made 2 big missteps my first year.

First mistake – when my channel first went viral, I didn’t take full advantage of the momentum. I wish I would’ve created at least 5 videos per week on the same topic while my channel was being blessed by the YouTube algorithm powers.

Second mistake – after my channel went viral, I switched from doing evergreen content to trendy content only. I wish I would’ve continued to do a mix of both. The lifespan of the trendy content (stimulus) that I cover on my channel is about 2-3 days, meaning my ad revenue drops down to almost $0 when I’m not doing a video.

The benefit of having evergreen content is that evergreen is truly passive – you can make money on those videos for years to come. Trendy videos, as I’ve learned, are far from passive – I essentially can expect to make about $200-500 in ad revenue for each trendy video in the first 2 days, then it drops to $0. With trendy, you’re trading time for money. With evergreen, it may be slower to build up the growth and momentum, but once you build it, it’s pretty close to passive income (as close as you can get on YouTube).”

Revenue Sources

“Revenue: My YouTube income comes from 3 sources:

  1. YouTube Ad Revenue
  2. Affiliates
  3. Sponsorships

As mentioned, I’ve made over $100k in under a year from these 3 sources on YouTube. I think I should also mention that I didn’t even get monetized until April 28th, so even though I’ve had the channel for almost a year, the bulk came in the last 5 months.

Just to give you an idea – every month, YouTube ad revenue has accounted for less than half of my total YouTube income. I share that to reinforce the importance of sponsorships and affiliates.

There are also other income streams you should consider (merchandise, patreon, your own digital products, etc).”

Following Erika’s Advice

All of this advice from Erika is amazing for creators.

All of her YouTube growth advice boils down to a few things you can do:

  • create content consistently
  • network and share information with other creators
  • focus on doing what provides the most value

If you’ve been hesitant about starting on YouTube, stop thinking about it and just get started! There is room for many different creators on YouTube.

For more detailed YouTube growth tips, advice, resources, and tips you can enroll in Erika’s course Mastering YouTube For The Busy Professional Course.

Mastering YouTube For The Busy Professional Course

Learn how to grow a profitable YouTube channel while still working full-time. This course from lawyer Erika Kullberg teaches you everything you need to know.


I earn a commission if you make a purchase, at no additional cost to you.

Mary is the founder of Pennies Not Perfection where she shares her journey to build wealth through online income. She quit her day job in 2021 after she paid off her debt and doubled her 9-5 salary.

Mary's favorite free financial tool is Personal Capital. She uses their free tools to track net worth and work toward to financial freedom.

Her favorite investment platform is M1 Finance, where she built a custom portfolio for free with no fees. She shares her portfolio growth and savings progress every month on YouTube.